Announcing ANNIHILATION ARIA

I’ve been alluding to a [REDACTED NOVEL] for some time now, and I can finally drop the brackets and tell everyone what’s up!

My next novel is a space opera called ANNIHILATION ARIA, and it’s coming May 5th, 2020 from Parvus Press!

On Monday, Parvus tweeted this:

 

and this:

 

 

Which may or include zoomed-in sections of a soon-to-be-revealed cover. Who could say? 😉

Here’s the official announcement.

There will be more news about ANNIHILATION ARIA soon, from art to endorsements to some travel plans and more! This novel has been a long time coming, serving as a back-burner project for several years as I was wrapping up Season One of Genrenauts and as I was developing and writing Born to the Blade with the team and Serial Box.

 

Bridges to Hope – RAICES fundraiser

Bridges to Hope by Julie Dillon - An angelic figure holding up a flaming sword. The text reads "Bridges to Hope" and "RAICES FUNDRAISER"

 

I’m participating in a charity fundraiser for RAICES. Their mission is to help separated families, detained families, unaccompanied minors, and others who are seeking asylum in the United States. RAICES been a major force in responding to the appalling treatment of immigrants and asylum seekers, and this effort is one of many fundraisers to support them and other groups trying to help.

Donors will get a copy of Genrenauts: The Data Disruption as well as art, comics, discounts on prints, more short stories, etc. from more than 20 creators! This campaign runs through the end of the month, and be sure to claim your rewards if you do donate (we can’t host the files there forever, etc.)

100% of funds go to RAICES – there’s no overhead, no private profit, etc.

https://www.classy.org/fundraiser/2173437

I’d be very grateful for anything folks can donate, and of course please share this far and wide!

Labor in the Publishing Industry

Things like close-open shifts at bookstores, where booksellers got less than 10 hours off the clock between closing one night and opening the next day. Co-workers at the B&N I worked at faced it more than once or twice.

It’s commonly known in the industry that most editors have to do most of their reading and/or editing at home, *after* putting in full-time hours in the office doing project management/meetings/etc. On salary, so no OT. That’s a culture of habitual crunch.

Publicists given 12 or more titles per month to cover, requiring either shoddy support for some titles and/or substantial, *habitual* overtime. Again, likely uncompensated.

Sales reps asked to read up on the titles they’re selling, which almost always happens outside of office hours. Again, uncompensated. I’m told this happens with some indie booksellers, too.

Unpaid overtime is, from what I can see and what I’ve heard, the *norm*, not the exception. Especially in the entertainment industry, where “passion” is supposed to sustain you. Where there are a hundred people eager to replace you if you leave your under-paying position.

New York State has done a version of this just on the NY level, which is a step in the right direction. Assuming it is enforced and workers aren’t intimidated into working unpaid overtime and not reporting it. I don’t know how it’s working in practice.

Also, let’s talk about how many agents are paid *only* on a commission basis – where it frequently takes several years to build up a client base with sales at a level necessary to make up a living wage.

Oh, yeah, what about the people that write the dang books?

So that’s a lot. And that’s not even including authors. If there’s one type of actor in the publishing industry without whom it could not even begin to function, it’s authors.

How many hundreds of hours of labor goes into each book? What % of book deals actually cover that spread at a level that comes out to even minimum wage? The fastest I ever wrote a novel was 31 days. 71k words for the first draft. About 3 hours a day.

I took Sundays off. So that’s 26 days times three hours a day. I put in *at least* 50 hours of editing & extra writing, and that’s lowballing. But we also have to count outlining, brainstorming, copy editing, page proofs, and promotion. Say another 100 hours for all of that.

(26 x 3) + 50 + 100 = 228 hours. I’d wager that is far onto the low end for a full-length adult novel. Even written very quickly, my $4k advance divides to become $17.5 an hour. Also, it’s not W2 money, that’s 1099 money, so I paid more taxes on it. Plus 15% of the gross went to my agent (which I do not begrudge at all). So I maybe, maybe, hit $15 an hour on that one, pre-tax. So $10 an hour post-taxes.

And that was the *only* novel I’ve been able to write anywhere near that fast. Most I’d say took twice to three times as long. The fast novel was the fourth in a series, so I really knew the characters and had a big arc ending to push for. I was also in good health at the time.

If it takes 500-1000 hours to write a novel and you’re getting $5k to $10 in advances, many of which don’t earn out, you’re looking at maybe $10 an hour, minus agent commission and taxes. For the person *who wrote the damn book everyone else gets paid to help publish*.

Staff and booksellers and other publishing professionals work on a lot of books at once, so the jobs are not a direct comparison. And they for sure add value and deserve to be compensated. Ultimately, my point is that just about everyone is getting screwed until you get into (probably) upper management or the C-suite.

Authors, editors, publicists, sales staff, booksellers, all grist for the mill. And who profits? Who is doing *really well* in this equation? Executives, stockholders, and a *very* tiny percentage of authors. Most of the costs and risks are born by the folks at the bottom. The authors that get dropped when a series doesn’t take off. The publicist let go because they struck out despite working their ass off. The booksellers let go when a chain liquidates to pay out stockholders.

As I think about this, I try to remember that I’m not the only person in the hot seat. I’m in the grind with my agent and (probably) my editors, publicists, sales team, etc. But Passion. But Love of Books. But Literature.

The people at the top are counting on passion. They’re counting on the fact that there is no end to the # of people that want your job or your spot on the list. But we have to do better. We have to demand better.

We can create a world where work is fairly compensated. Where people aren’t pushed to their breaking points to stay on top of the schedule. Where the expectation of unpaid internships doesn’t keep excluding marginalized writers & staffers.

So, what’s the takeaway?

What can I do? What can any of us do?

1) If you’re in a position to set work culture in your office, be a leader in taking care of your staff. In pushing upper management for overtime pay and/or more sensible hours.

2) Remember that you are not alone, not if you’re an author, agent, junior publicist or bookseller. That passion that gets used against us also links us with other people in the field. We can fight for one another.

3) Vote for candidates that support living wages and stronger protections for workers.

4) Investigate unionization and labor advocacy in your workplace.

5) Take care of yourself. Especially if no one else is. And then, if you can, try to help someone else.

The New Landscape, Part Three – Bifurcation, Specialization, and Hybridization

Today I started a twitter thread inspired by Chuck Wendig’s post about writing series. I’m re-posting it here because it’s really a continuation of my The New Landscape series that has been fallow for a while because my life 2016-2018 has been pretty overwhelming, even post-Angry Robot.

If you missed Part One and Part Two, here they are. This post re-treads some of this ground, but it might be handy to have read the previous bits if you don’t mind me repeating myself a bit here.

It’s pretty remarkable to me that trad and indie SFF are diverging so sharply on series. Trad moving away from longer series for new writer/work because of retail death spiral while indie SFF writers are finding the best success with series where they can create a product funnel.

I understand the reasons – shrinking shelf space in the retail marketplace, difficulty in breaking out new authors, etc. vs. a MOAR CONTENT! high rate of consumption, KU-dominated indie model where rapid publication is logistically easier and maximizes reader retention.

I have, for a while, talked about a bifurcating market, where indie and trad are two models uneasily sharing an industry, each in the shadow of and reacting to the other. Trad-focused sites and figures talk about print resurgent and ebook fading while indie-focused reporting talks about a massive increase in the readership of SFF. It’s a heightened version of positionality and confirmation bias mixed in with results extrapolated from poor data.

It’s hard for trad publishers to do well with digital-only books (I know from experience) because they’re not as comfortable in the digital space and don’t work on indie timetables. They also don’t want to undermine print, where they have a massive structural advantage.

Indie authors are increasingly beholden to AMZ as KU and Audible continue to dominate the ebook and audio marketplaces. Print distribution, meanwhile, remains largely inaccessible.

Trad can put a huge amount of push behind individual releases, but can’t magically make more shelf space for sequels, watches Mass Market die a slow and struggles to adjust b/c they’ve largely sacrificed digital to protect print.

Indie authors have developed tons of tools to drive discovery and to keep readers coming back for more in a series, but they’re caught in an ever-faster loop of rapid publication, a flooded market of competition, scammers, stuffers, and hustling constantly to stay afloat in the insatiable seas of the algorithm until they hit their 1k+ true fans, etc.

Many writers have already unpacked and explained the utility of a hybrid career, but as the two models diverge, each demanding more and more of writers, it gets exhausting even when you’ve got the energy and time to do both. And all the while, the writer always gets paid last.

I don’t have any easy answers. The answers I do have for writers involve lots of hard work and effort put into being an entrepreneur. And for publishers, they involve drastically re-working how to approach print/ebook/audio as well as thinking about who their customer is.


This is the part where I remind readers that they can hire me to help them with sales & marketing strategy. 😉

Floating islands against a blue sky. Text reads 'Strategic Vision'

Farewell, Robot Pals!

Hi all,

Here’s some big professional news: I will be departing Angry Robot at the end of March. AR’s parent company Watkins Media has decided to consolidate the sales group and my position is going away.

Robot Retrospective

I’ve been the North American Sales & Marketing Manager for Angry Robot for about five and a half years. I interviewed for the job the weekend before my debut novel hit the digital shelves in July of 2012. The job saw my then-girlfriend and me moving to Queens so I could work in the main office. We shortly moved down to Maryland for her job, but thankfully, I was able to keep working for Angry Robot – it’s just as easy to hop on Skype from Maryland as NYC, and getting up to the Big Apple isn’t too hard from Baltimore. Since then, I’ve taken on more and more at AR and learned a lot about art direction, editorial, strategy, and more. I’m very grateful to Marc, Penny, Nick, Phil, and everyone I’ve worked with at Watkins/Osprey/Angry Robot.

But for a couple of years now, I’ve been running myself a bit ragged – trying to do right by Angry Robot and the company’s authors AND pursue my own writing career with writing, self-publishing, and promotion AND participate in two podcasts AND maintain a healthy home life AND pursue hobbies/interests outside of writing. It’s been hard to do everything, just like it’s hard for so many people to do everything they want.

 

Since before I sold Geekomancy (really, before I sold my first short story), my professional identity in publishing has been this Author/Professional two-in-one. I’ve gotten used to switching hats, to speaking from multiple positionalities. My view on the industry was always about using one perspective to inform the other.

And now my day job is going to be Author. I’ll be working primarily for myself. I’ve been looking at a variety of options moving forward – including some consulting work that might let me continue to apply my skills beyond working an author. But mostly, I want to write more.

What’s Next?

My wife makes pretty good money in her job and is very supportive of my writing career, so this isn’t at all a Panic Stations kind of situation. I’m focusing on the opportunities this presents – now I’ll be able to spend time working on new projects – comics, non-fiction writing, etc. I’ve been meaning to break ground on Genrenauts Season Two for some time, but I have been prioritizing the space opera novel since my agent and I want to find it a home with a good SF/F trade publisher.

Obligatory Plugs

We’re also less than a month (!) from the launch of Born to the Blade. Serial Box has been a great publishing partner and writing with Marie, Cassandra, and Malka is a dream come true. Be sure to subscribe to the first season or pre-order the pilot for free.

I just turned 35 last month, making this an even clearer delineation of “okay, new life chapter coming up.”

So come April, you should expect to see more and different things from me. I won’t be traveling nearly as much in the short term, but I am looking to find other ways of putting coolness out into the world while also getting more writing done. I’ll probably be more chatty on my blog and on social media, and maybe trying out some cool stuff like restarting my Twitch stream, launching a Patreon/Drip, that kind of cool stuff. I’m eager to see what life looks like when I can direct my full attention toward my own work with Born to the Blade, Genrenauts, and more.

Onward, to new awesomeness!

Digital Strategy and the Future

It’s time for another Storify Post! This one is on comics & books industries, with a compare & contrast on digital strategy, overall vision, etc.

 

Norwescon Schedule

Next week, for the first time, I will be attending Norwescon in Washington. Even cooler, I’ll be attending alongside my boss, Marc Gascoigne, representing Angry Robot Books as the Spotlight Publisher for the con. It’s kind of like being a Guest of Honor, but in a publisher-specific fashion. A number of our authors will be in attendance, as well. It should be a grand old time.

Here’s my schedule! I’ve left off the specific info on things that I’m not certain are open to the full attendance of the convention. It may be that some of those are in fact open, and regardless, I hope to see people during the con!

Thurs

Opening Ceremonies
7:00pm – 8:00pm @ Grand 3 and Grand 2
Nancy Kress (M), Catska Ench, Cory Ench, Ethan Siegel, Ian McDonald, Marc Gascoigne, Mike Underwood

Friday
The Geek Life
11:00am – 12:00pm @ Cascade 9
Shannon (M), Shubzilla, Mike Underwood, Jason Bourget

Interview and Q&A with Angry Robot
1:00pm – 2:00pm @ Grand 2
Adam Rakunas (M), Marc Gascoigne, Mike Underwood

Saturday
Autograph Session 1
2:00pm – 3:00pm @ Grand 2

Autograph Session 2
3:00pm – 4:00pm @ Grand 2

What’s New at Angry Robot
5:00pm – 6:00pm @ Evergreen 1&2
Marc Gascoigne, Mike Underwood

The Evolution of Star Wars
7:00pm – 8:00pm @ Cascade 9
Spencer Ellsworth (M), Dylan Templar, David Fooden, Mike Underwood, Rob Stewart
Sunday
Closing Ceremonies
4:00pm – 5:00pm @ Evergreen 3&4
Rob Stewart (M), Catska Ench, Cory Ench, Ethan Siegel, Ian McDonald, Marc Gascoigne, Mike Underwood, Nancy Kress

The Substitute Sleuth launch!

She’s a Wacky Comedian. He’s a Gruff Detective. They Fight Crime!

The Substitute Sleuth - Genrenauts Episode 4 cover

Today, Genrenauts continues with Episode 4 – The Substitute Sleuth.

This episode draws on contemporary police procedurals like Castle, Psych, Lie to Me, White Collar, and others. It puts Leah Tang on the spot in a big way, and dives into Angstrom King’s backstory. It also kicks the season into high gear as we barrel forward into the season finale.

You can buy your copy direct via Gumroad.

Or on: Kindle  Nook  Kobo  iTunes

The first season of Genrenauts will conclude with The Failed Fellowship, the two-part finale, coming in October!

To whet your appetite, here’s the first chapter of The Substitute Sleuth:

 

Continue reading

10 Things I Learned From Running My First Kickstarter

It’s been a bit over a month since the conclusion of the Genrenauts Kickstarter, and looking back, here are some things I learned/verified during the campaign.

It’s Best to Bring Your Own Crowd…

When people talk about crowd-funding, we can’t forget the crowd part. One of the best ways to ensure success is to have an existing base of readers/supporters/fans ready and excited to back your campaign as soon as it launches. Thanks to newsletter mailings and some social media activity, people knew about my Kickstarter and backed very quickly. Here’s a chart of the first few days:

Kickstarter funding first few days - high # of backers and pledges

In the first day, the campaign got 56 backers for $1,497, which was 29% of the original funding goal.

The second day got us to 82 backers, $2,398, 47% funded.

And day three brought the total to 100 backers, $2,758, and 55% funded.

In those first days, friends, readers, and family mobilized to get the ball rolling in a huge way. Existing fans of the Genrenauts series jumped at the chance to be a part of the next step, and friends from all over pitched in to help me reach my goal.

Based on my experience following Kickstarter, if I had been a brand-new creator — launching a brand-new series with no track record — there’s basically no way I would have seen 100 backers in the first 72 hours.

…but Kickstarter will help, too.

A full 28% of the pledges (for $2,287) for the campaign came from Kickstarter links. This means that it’s very likely that those backers did not know me or Genrenauts before funding. Instead they found the campaign through Kickstarter’s own systems, from editorial spotlights to their search engine. That was notably higher than the 15-20% I was expecting, since Fiction projects aren’t at all the hottest geek-related category on Kickstarter (games are far hotter).

The Middle-of-campaign Doldrums are Real

Looking at the full funding chart, we can see that things really slowed down in the middle of the campaign:

Full chart of Kickstarter backers and funding by dayAround the 16th of May, things slowed down some. An then after the 26th of May, the campaign really slows down, getting less than 5 new backers a day for over a week. I was still putting out updates, hitting blogs and podcasts, but not at the same rate, and even so, we were still very far from our first stretch goal (more on that later).

This was the chunk of the campaign where I was getting kind of frustrated. I was having problems getting promotional hits confirmed, and I ended up having more sparse programming at BaltiCon, my local SFF con, than I had expected. And the items I did have didn’t seem to end up moving a lot of pledges. I did have a great time there, and recorded two interviews, which will me grow my reach over time.

Get Excited in Your Video (but don’t go on too long).

I spent a fair amount of time on my video. I wrote a script, rehearsed it until I could perform it mostly without visual reference, and did some work on setting the scene for better composition, as well as the time editing.

But the video was still too long. My video got 1,238 plays (so if no one re-watched the video, that means about 1/4 of the people who played the video backed the project. I think it’s far more likely that the video got re-played several times, so it’s harder to know the conversion %). But only 17.21% of the plays completed. Some might have cut off half-way through and just backed, and some might have watched 99% of the video and cut it off as the credits were rolling. But if I were to go back, I’d probably make the video about 1/3 shorter.

Lock Down Your Promo Schedule Early

Thanks to having a lot of connections in SF/F, I was able to get a lot of help spreading the word about the campaign – guest posts, interviews, podcasts, etc. But despite starting that process around 6 weeks before the campaign launched, I did not do a great job of locking down all of the go-live dates for those promotional hits. This means that I was sending follow-up emails, chasing schedules, and writing promo content during the campaign.

Stretch Goals Should be in Small Increments and be Broad-Reaching 

I was pretty confident that the campaign would be able to hit $5,000, the original goal. And due to the cost of producing audiobooks, my three main stretch goals were to create audio editions of episodes 3, 4, and 5&6. The trick there is that despite being a growing segment of the book industry, and despite Mary Robinette Kowal being an amazing audio performer with her own audience, it seemed like the promise of audio alone was not quite enough to carry momentum forward for another $4,000 very quickly. The campaign finished at $8,247, and thanks to Mary Robinette’s generosity, we will be able to have audio for Episode 3.

But I think I made an error in spacing out the stretch goals the way that I did. In addition to the stretch goals, I also had backer # goals, including a goal at 150 backers, one at 300, and the whimsy goals. If I’d set the first backer goal at 200 or 250 backers, that would have positioned the carrot of the bonus content more effectively to keep excitement up after hitting the initial funding goal but before reaching the audiobook goal.

The difficulty with the audio stgoals is that due to the cost, it wasn’t feasible for me to have intermediary stretch goals which required a capital cost. I needed all of the $ to pay for the audio production. Which means all I could do was offer goals with a labor cost – my labor. And because I was busy during the campaign on both keeping up the energy and in making promotional hits happen, I wasn’t in a good place to create additional labor-only stretch goals that would be feasible.

If I could go back, I’d definitely have smaller goals at $6,500 or $7,000, then at $10,500, etc. This would mean that there was always a stretch goal within $1,500 to $2,000 at any point once the original goal was hit. Having watched a lot of campaigns, the framing of “Only $5,16 dollars left until we hit <Small Goal #2!>” is really strong at converting. And for me, after hitting the original goal, it was $4,000 more until the first stretch goal. No one’s fault but my own, but I think with better-spaced goals, the campaign could have hit $12,000 or even $14,000.

Graphics are Key

This is something I got feedback on from Kickstarter-veteran friends, including Jay Swanson, Bradley P. Bealieu, and Gregory A. Wilson.

Originally, I had the covers of episodes 1 & 2 as my title card graphic for the campaign. My friends urged me to use a section of the amazing “There Will Always Be a Max” art, and they were of course right. I mean, look at it:

KS Crop

it’s got storytelling, it has bold colors, it’s just stunning. Goni Montes is amazing, and I have been plotting to get more art done by him for my work since I saw this image the first time.

Additionally, I used apps like Canva and WordSwag to make social media cards for the campaign to help mobilize whatever engagement I could get:

Genrenauts Kickstarter cardGenrenauts Twitter Card #3

and Jay Swanson very helpfully turned some of the blurbs for early episodes into image cards:

Marie Brennan blurbMatt Wallace blurb

all of these, plus adding the cover images from the episodes and short to the campaign description, gave the campaign a very strong visual appeal. Even the small preview card for the campaign was compelling, with solid copy and catchy art:
Campaign preview card

Don’t Expect To Get Anything Else Done

It was about all I could do to run the Kickstarter and stay on top of my day job. Thankfully, my wife Meg was 100% supportive of the campaign, and took on more of the household day-to-day during the Kickstarter in order to leave me with the time and energy to be the 24/7 cheerleader that a campaign requires.

Every day, I was writing thank you messages to backers, coordinating promotion, keeping in touch with my publishing team (since I was also getting Episode 3 ready to publish during the campaign), boosting on social media, revising projections, working on updates, and generally running around with lots of nervousness trying to keep my energy channeling into useful places instead of just fretting. Friends who had run Kickstarters told me about the exhaustion, and I believed them, but being in the middle of it running a campaign is a whole different thing.

Celebrate Success and Be Generous With Gratitude

The campaign had a lot of help, from friends giving me advice and support ahead of launch, Kickstarter staff (especially the amazing Margot Atwell) advising me on how to strengthen my campaign page/video/etc., and the colleagues who gave of their blogs, podcasts, and social media platforms to support me.

And most of all, no campaign can happen without backers. They are your Super-Fans, your colleagues, your family, and the wonderful people who have come to you through the joyful happenstance of algorithmic searching and are taking a chance on you. A Kickstarter is a way to re-connect with old friends, to strengthen your relationship with long-time readers, and more. A Kickstarter is the 21st century version of a Barn-Raising. At the end of the day, one person gets the barn, but everyone who helped make it happen has a sense of ownership, a sense of pride and accomplishment. That amount of support is a huge gift, and like any gift, it is not to be squandered.

Here’s what I’ve already with some of the Kickstarter funds: Paid for cover design, editorial development, and more. Most of the costs are still ahead, and will involve producing and shipping the physical editions for the campaign. But a Kickstarter doesn’t end when the campaign closes, nor does it end when the result is delivered. A Kickstarter forges a bond between creator and backers that continues for years to come, as I’ve learned by being a backer. One month after the campaign, I’m still deep in the production process, and even after fulfillment, I know that I’ll want to communicate with and draw upon the incredible support of my 321 backers as I continue the Genrenauts series and keep them appraised of my other projects. A successful Kickstarter is a gift that does, in fact, keep on giving.

And now the bonus lesson:

Folks out there that have run Kickstarters – what did you learn during your campaign that surprised you? Or if you’ve backed Kickstarters but not run one, what surprised you as a backer?

The Cupid Reconciliation launch!

Genrenauts 3 - The Cupid Reconciliation - small for KS

Today is the day! Genrenauts continues with the third episode:

Wounded Genrenaut Mallery York returns to active duty just in time for the team to deploy to the Romantic Comedy story region. But before they can fix the broken story, they have to find it. The team scours dating sites, cocktail bars, and jogging paths looking for the right pair of lovers to re-unite.

Mallery takes the lead, bringing her expertise to bear as the team plots a grand reunion between two estranged lovers, hacking social networks, running confidence games, and doing whatever it takes to make sure the story ends in Happily Ever After.

I think it’s the best Genrenauts story yet, and I’m very excited to share it with the world. You can buy the ebook at:

Amazon
Barnes & Noble
Kobo
iTunes

…and you can buy direct from me via Gumroad.

That’s right – direct. With the release of The Cupid Reconciliation, I have joined the proud ranks of hybrid authors, those publishing both with traditional houses and through self-publishing. Getting into self-publishing has been a long process of study and research, as well as consulting with friends and colleagues that have been blazing the hybrid paths for several years.

The next Genrenauts story, The Substitute Sleuth, is scheduled to publish on July 26th, 2016. Pre-order links are available here.

Here are some reviews of Episode 3:

“With the Genrenauts series, Underwood has crafted a wonderfully delightful series of novellas using the episodic structure of a TV show to tell his tale. This makes for a perfect bit of binge-reading, one that reminds of me shows I loved as a kid like Quantum Leap and the early seasons of Sliders. Think of it as Netflix for the mind.”
Michael Patrick Hicks

“Underwood has a good thing going here, and it’s just getting better. Fun, yet thoughtful; action-packed, but pretty restrained in use of force. A great balancing act that should inspire more to do this.”
Irresponsible Reader

“Mike has a breezy conversational way of writing that lends itself well to quips, wordgames, and great characterization. He’s able to pack in a lot of quirks and personalities into each of his characters, to really make them separate entities.”
Blackfish Reviews


 

A reminder – the Genrenauts Kickstarter has a week left, plenty of time to push for the audiobook stretch goals and to hit the whimsy goals, which will force me to to do marvelous and ridiculous feats for your entertainment!