Saturday, October 22, 2011

$2.01 USD

The title of this post is exactly how much I've made so far in royalties from my story "Snooping," which was recently published in an e-book anthology from Nevermet Press. That's the amount that went to me after the editor/publisher took his percentage and all the other authors divvied up the rest.

So obviously, unless you're Stephen King or J. K. Rowling, you do this thing for love, not money. In fact, they probably do it for love too. The money just kind of happened.

But you plug on. I just got word that my story "What the Dog Saw" has been (kind of) accepted for publication. The editor wants some revisions, and unlike previous instances in which I've been asked to revise a work before publication, this guy sounds as if he's not ready to publish the story unless I meet his expectations. So we'll see what happens there.

I've been publishing fiction now for about three years, and I've got a good twenty stories and just about as many dollars to my credit. To some, this might make the act of seeking publication for one's work seem pointless.

But me, I'm not complaining. I'm living large. And I've got $2.01 USD to prove it.

Saturday, October 8, 2011

Survival Colony Nine, Doing Just Fine

Just an update on my young adult fantasy novel-in-progress: it's coming along quite nicely. I've hit a very fertile stretch of the writing, and I'm now pleased to report that if I stick with my 2-page-a-day average, I'll be done with a complete draft by the end of November (not December as originally projected). And, the best part of all, my 12-year-old daughter, who's serving as my test audience, really likes it!

I know, that doesn't sound like much; what's she going to say to her dad? "This really sucks, old man"? "Don't quit your day job"? It's no doubt hard for her to disentangle her affection for me from her estimation of the book.

But what the hey. I think it's pretty good, she thinks it's pretty good, and I've logged just over 200 pages, or roughly two-thirds of the projected total. So there's no stopping me now!

Look for it in bookstores. . . . Well, whenever!