The old adage “don’t judge a book by its cover” is good advice that nobody follows.
I mean, even I judge many of the books I read specifically by the cover art! A lot of the time it’s to try and figure out if I want cover art similar to it on my own works… Scalzi’s last sci-fi trilogy all featured starships and lots of green, for example.
Which is a tiny bit unusual, in that for whatever reason red seems to be the colour for most sci-fi books. My own most successful book is “Caitlyn Morcos” and it has both a starship and a red cover.
But the new book, “A Desperate Path Through the Stars” doesn’t have a starship on the cover… it has stars, and it has the protag pretty prominently, and I think it’s a good cover, but it’s not typical for the kind of covers I usually pick.
Oh, I’m so ready to get this novel out of my head and into all of your hands… soon!
Hope everyone is staying safe and healthy!
Almost Done the Edits!
I’m on the last few (critical) chapters of the novel and then I’m done with this wave of edits.
Then it’s off to the editor (again), and then uploaded to Amazon and off to all of you fine, incredibly patient people!
The last few months have been pretty consistently good (by my standards) for book sales, and I’m hoping that a new novel will give my overall work a boost. It doesn’t have to be big, just consistent… that’s really the goal. To do this long-term, I have to keep aiming for small, sustainable steps that I can make.
Still, it’s a process, and I’ll be happy to see the edits done and the book one big step closer to being done!
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Picking up the Pace
I’m not a fan of hustle-culture.
I don’t like the idea that people think you have to work yourself to death to be an artist. That the only way to create art is to push and push and push every waking moment, and some sleeping moments, to spread yourself too thin and work too hard and all that.
But at the same time, I have deadlines. Soft deadlines, for now (if the novel I’m working on releases in June instead of May, the only person directly impacted by this is me), but deadlines nonetheless. And since I’m elbow-deep in edits right now, the temptation to keep pushing and working and pushing until I actually finish is pretty overwhelming.
But that won’t help! I don’t gain anything by burning out. I lose a lot, in fact. So I have to be measured and careful and steady… but I still have a billion things I want to do and no time to do any of it.
Gah.
Oh well. Edits are happening! The first few chapters are done, and they’re the toughest because they’re also the most important. With any luck, I’ll be done the edits by the end of the week… I think I can do that.
Unrelated sidenote: I’m finally watching the last season of The Expanse. Gosh it’s good. Two episodes remaining!
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Something-Something Lions
Edits continue! May has appeared! What is time, anyway!
In the words of the wise Douglas Adams, “Time is an illusion. Lunch time doubly so.”
I am working my butt off trying to get everything done and ready and polished and edited, and there’s just not enough time to do everything.
But that’s okay! Really! I do this work because I love it, and being busy isn’t a bad thing (it would be really nice if I could make a living wage while doing it, but one step at a time!).
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Starting the Edits!
Okay, I’ve taken as long away from my novel as I can stand… time to dive into those fifth draft edits!
Still on course to be finished by mid-May… let’s see how the editing process goes!
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
It's Been One Week Since You Looked At Me...
“Threw your arms in the air and said I’m crazy…”
Ah, Barenaked Ladies. Truly a Canadian cornerstone of rock. Anyway, it has been a full week since I’ve posted, but there hasn’t been a tonne of new and exciting to post about.
Got my novel back. Talked to Christine about it, received some very useful feedback (and it was nice to finally meet her! We’ve been working together for 8 years now… not quite since the very beginning, but very close). Plus she had a chance to show off her beautiful home in PEI. Really, win-win.
But since then I’ve been stuck on other artistic pursuits, rather than my writing, in an effort to pay for my writing! The story of my life, really. But I’ll get back to the novel… probably this weekend, actually. And then I’ll finish up that fourth draft, and then that goes back to Christine for a once-over, and then into all y’all hands! Woo!
So just because I’m not posting, doesn’t mean things aren’t happening!
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Another Successful Circumnavigation of the Sun
Just going to spend all day playing video games and trying not to think too hard about my life and what I’ve “accomplished” so far.
That’s the plan, at least.
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Talkin' With Christine
Tomorrow morning I have a nice, long talk scheduled with my editor. This will be the first time I’ll actually talk with her, so I’m looking forward to it!
Basically, there are a handful of issues in the novel that I’d like to get more insight into. While her notes are extensive and very useful, there’s always more to be learned.
After that, no working on the novel for a couple weeks… just to get some distance and objectivity on my work, and to optimize the final draft (well, probably the final two drafts, but that’s an aside).
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Editor Done
I’ve received Novel 8 back from my editor, and she had some really insightful things to say about it.
They won’t be quick and easy changes, but I do think they’ll make the novel a lot better… specifically a few plot threads that I wasn’t 100% on what to do with them.
Basically, I’m planting a few seeds in this book that I plan to pay off in future books, but I’m not sure how “central” those elements should be. I want them to be subtle, to suggest at a bigger tapestry of issues going on in the story, but I don’t want to risk anyone thinking that I abandoned or left some of the threads accidentally incomplete.
So we’re going to have a chat on Monday about the story issues, and then I’m going to dive into the last round of polish on the book. Current plan is a mid-May release! Exciting!
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Have a Good Friday!
Looking forward to finishing up one of my major projects (a painting commission I’ve been working on for about 6 weeks) today. After that, I’m clear until my novel is returned by my editor (theoretically next week, but I’m not in a rush). Then I have a 6-week English course on Cyberpunk that I’m enrolled in as of May, I think, and then… well, and then other stuff, if history is anything to go by!
And that’s good! I enjoy being busy. I like doing this work!
I just wish I could make a living, however humble, from doing it.
Ah well. One day at a time, and all that.
Exciting stuff coming soon! Enjoy your Friday off, if you get one!
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
On Brand
The trouble with social media is the nonstop-edness of it.
Don’t get me wrong, I like Instagram. I used to like Twitter before the name change and ownership insanity. But posting consistently has always been a challenge for me, and that’s kinda what social media rewards. It doesn’t want you to put down the phone and look away. You have to keep doing it. You have to keep posting, constantly, and hoping that something catches.
That’s not really my style? Although, admittedly, I don’t really know what my style is… or what my brand is. I write fun sci-fi. I paint models and shoot movies. But that’s not really “brand” so much as a sequence of facts about me.
Another fact about me is that I’m rather cold right now, so I’m going to go have a nice think while sitting in front of a heater. Maybe something will come to me about how to be more consistent with all this!
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Art for Art's Sake
I love making the art I make. I love writing the most, but I also love my painting and films (and music, if we’re going deeper into the art I do purely for self-joy).
But not a lot of people read the novels I’ve written (yet). And the movie I’ve made has only been seen a few dozen times (and I’m going to have to give a serious think about leaving it up once I start doing more of them, since it has swearing and some… questionable… choices about shot composition and lighting). Do I do this art for myself, or for others?
Obviously the answer is “yes,” since I do it for both, but at this stage it’s probably true that it’s more personal than anything else. I would like for it to be more widely spread (specifically to the tune of about 10,000 copies per novel per year… piece of cake, right? That’s basically the equivalent of being a Canadian Best Seller for 5 weeks in a row, for each book).
For now, I have to enjoy the process, because there isn’t really a lot else going for me. But hopefully soon.
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Filming Schedule
I’ve got to start thinking about a formal filming schedule for the stop motion animation I’m going to be doing.
I’ve already finished the storyboarding (gosh, I did that months ago), but next up is building the sets. I think I’m going to try and keep each set assembled between takes this time… hopefully I won’t need to reshoot anything, but it will make life easier if I do have to.
I’ve cleared off the space, I’ve got the script done… I really just have to get started, but there’s my commission (painting) work that I have to finish before I can fully dive in.
Which is too bad. I’d love to start sooner, but the editor I hired is going to cost a mint (she’s worth every penny), and that money needs to come from somewhere.
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Off to the Editor
Well, Novel 8, which I’m still waffling on the title of, is in the hands of my editor.
She says she’ll have it back to me by early April, which gives me plenty of time to get it out by the end of April, which is the current goal.
Woo! Feels good to have that done!
But no rest for the weary. Big plans already in motion, folks! Big plans!
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Second Draft Finished!
Wrote my two favourite words in the English language (“The End”) on that edit last night before bed. Felt good!
Next I send it off to my editor (who is primed and ready for it!), and then I get her edits back in early April. On the one hand, that’s a fair chunk of time (and money, gosh it’s a lot of money) between now and then.
On the other hand, I can work on other projects! Woo! And then my next novel will be available to purchase in mid-to-late April, and who knows, maybe I’ll have the next short movie shot by then too!
What a time to be alive and creating art. I just wish I had more time!
Hope everyone is staying safe and healthy!
New Social Media (for me!)
So Instagram is by no means “new” in the social media scene. Well established, and not a usual choice for many authors, but I finally made myself an account.
The main reason is for the stop motion work I’m going to be doing. It’s very visual stuff, and I think showing some of my process there will be interesting to some people! As usual, I don’t need a big audience, just enough to make a little money at this (and by “little,” my expectations are humble).
Anyway, you can follow me @mhquestus, and I’ll put a link in the website page at some point. So far I haven’t posted anything except for a “family photo” of the protagonists for the next stop motion film.
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
A Good Week of Sales
Last week was a surprisingly good week for book sales for me. Which isn’t saying a lot… it was only 7 books plus a bunch of Kindle Unlimited… but it was out of “nowhere,” of a sort? I did a bunch of free book giveaways in the two weeks before that, and I’m hoping there’s some crossover there (I gave away over 60 books, which again, not a huge number but still!).
It just… feels kinda hopeful? That maybe my efforts will, indeed, at some point pay off? At least a little?
Still spent way more on ads than I made in sales, of course. Wouldn’t want anyone to think things here had gone completely topsy-turvy. That would be crazy. But still, a significant step in the right direction.
Speaking of which, I got up at 6:30am today specifically so I could do more editing on the novel! So that’s what I’m gunna do!
Hope everyone is staying safe and healthy!
In Like a Lion
I’m pretty sure that the first post I write every March for the last… 8 years?… has been some variation of “In Like a Lion.”
I don’t even know what that phrase is from. “In like a lion, out like a lamb”? Or something like that?
Anyway. New month, new novel time!… theoretically! I’m still 30K words to go in the second draft, but it’s coming along really well. I love the feeling of flow. I sit down at my computer, and four or five hours later I realize that time has passed. It’s a really amazing feeling, and that’s what the edits have felt like.
Sadly, I haven’t had a chance to start the movie filming. I had hoped to, but the painting commission I’m working on has chewed up basically all the time I haven’t been writing. I’m happy with it, I think the client will be very happy, but yeah, super time consuming. But when I wrap up the edits (maybe by the end of the weekend, if I really manage to put nose-to-grindstone), then I’ll send it off to my editor and I’ll have all that time available to me.
And I’m excited! I love my art, I love making my art, and I’m hopeful that someday soon I can focus all my energy towards that instead of dividing it between the work I love and my muggle job!
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
The Constant Worry/Worries
I worry about a lot of things.
I worry basically constantly, actually. There are many things I worry about, and all of them wax and wane in importance from day to day, from hour to hour, and from year to year.
But mostly I worry that I’m doing something wrong.
There are a lot of things I might be doing wrong. But first and foremost, I worry that I’m approaching my writing career wrong. This is what I want to do for the rest of my life. I love it, and honestly I think I’m pretty dang good at it. I doubt I will ever win a Hugo or anything like that, but there are over a thousand copies of my books circulating in the world, and I think the people who read them probably enjoyed them.
And yet I still haven’t gotten any traction. I still have only one sold short story. I spend more editing my books than the combined sales of all my books, and then when you add advertising costs on top of that… it’s not only not sustainable, it’s downright expensive.
But what else can I do? I try to stay on top of my advertising, I spend on good covers and editing…
So all I can do is keep on keeping on. Hoping that all the stuff I’m doing wrong, and all the stuff I worry about, won’t get in my way as I take steps towards being fully employed as a writer.
I’ll get there. But gosh it’s a slow process.
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!
Some "Time Off"
For the next seven days, I don’t have a muggle job to worry about… and gosh do I plan to get a lot of art stuff done!
I have the novel to finish editing (so close!). I have the movie I want to shoot (I have the script, characters, and some of the settings already built!). I have short stories I want to submit to publishers (gotta write them first, but that’s minor!). And I have some commission painting I need to get finished (I’ve started, it has a very strong start).
So much art! Gosh I wish I could make a living this way…
sigh
Ah well! I’m getting there. Slowly, steadily, these are all steps on the path.
Hope everyone out there is staying safe and healthy!