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Gothic Study Along Workshop
First Story Assignment Up… The Gothic Workshop taught by Kris in person here in Las Vegas from May 5th to 8th is going to be great fun. Way too late to sign up for the in-person part, but on Teachable we have a “study along” class that goes on at the same time. (Actually delayed a few hours behind the one here because I am doing it using Kris’s notes.) Same story assignments and I read them instead of Kris. (She is way too busy with the writers attending in person.) Those who are signed up on the Study Along, the first story assignment is up now. So not too…
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Wearing Brands
Fun Wearing My Own Brands… I have got three hoodies for the Licensing Expo next month that have three of my brands on them. Poker Boy, Bryant Street, and Pulphouse. Amazing how much fun it is to wear your own brands and how much it can motivate you to write more. I had no realized it would feel that way for me. And I hope at the Licensing Expo to get some interest in the brands. Going to wear one per day. Some of you taking classes right now might see me recording in the Poker Boy hoodie. And speaking of a brand, we just put up THE KRIS AND…
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Calling It A Night…
Plans on a Blog On Cash Streams… But honestly too tired to get it written tonight. Stunning how many cash streams a writer can have these days. So stay tuned for that. Might give you a few ideas. Also I will have a blog talking about successful Kickstarters. Do you measure a Kickstarter by how much profit it brings in after costs, or by the gross number (how Kickstarter does it), or by numbers of backers??? So many writers get lost in the cool stuff they can offer. And also how does Kickstarter growth really work and how to measure it. Fun topics, all beyond my poor brain tonight. Attempting…
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Let Me Show You A Brand…
POKER BOY BRAND… I have been writing Poker Boy stories since 1987. And over the years I tried to settle on a brand look as it became clear that Poker Boy was a main part of my writing. Marble Grant, Ghost of a Chance books and stories, Sky Tate, Pahket Jones, and others like Detective Crunch are all in the Poker Boy Universe. Finally, with all the learning I have been doing on brands and trademarks, the brand for Poker Boy finally came together with the brilliant help of Stephanie at WMG. And the look of the covers is finally settled as well. So firing up a Poker Boy Kickstarter…
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Fun and Excitement…
Building a Brand… Right now Steph and I (mostly Steph) are building the Poker Boy brand. In all the years I have been writing Poker Boy stories (since 1987), I have never been able to come up with a look, a brand look, for Poker Boy. At times, his stories had covers that sort of illustrated an event in the story. At one point we went to these really nifty cartoon covers designed by comic writer Lee Allred. Then we gave up on those and I started putting really wonderful fantasy women on the covers. So with a bunch of brainstorming and just standing back and asking basic questions, we…
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Second Day of Challenge…
The Fiction Writer of 2025… Back in traditional days, when I came in, fiction writers had employees called “agents”who jumped to the writer’s beck and call and fetched drinks and chased money. They lived off of 10% and then 15% of what the author made and never said a word about a writer’s work. That was not their job. Writers were the artists, agents did the scut work. Writers built careers over dozens and dozens of novels, sometimes moving houses regularly. They did none of their own promotion because publishers had sales forces and there was only one way to sell books and that was through what was called the…
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Discussion About Publishing…
So Much To Learn and Do… Indie publishing just eems overwhelming, I know that for a fact. I am going to be doing a lot of my own layouts and publishing on my challenge in this coming year (I will announce what I am doing with the challenge after Christmas as I ramp up.) And I am trying not to panic. Failing at times. So I have really been giving a hard look at all the details now involved with publishing and sales. And slowly realizing I need to figure out a way to organize all that I am learning and have learned to keep the panic down to a…
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FOCUSING FORWARD…
Watching the Old Magnum Television Series… It was filmed in the eighties. We are watching it not to study anything, but to shut down and enjoy the entertainment, even though sometimes dated. Still fun. The one we watched tonight was about the internment camps of Japanese Americans on the islands. It happened 40 years before the show was aired and they kept talking about those 40 years. The show aired 40 years ago now. So interesting to think about the 80 years. 40 years ago Kris and I had not met yet (a couple of years from meeting, actually). We were both writing like crazy, but both of us were…
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Length of a Brand/Trademark
I Was Surprised… I was working on an issue of Pulphouse Fiction Magazine tonight and mentioned in the introduction that Kris and I started Pulphouse in 1987 and it has been going along one way or another, making money as a brand and a business name for 37 years this coming year. And we have plans to expand the brand even more very shortly. I find it interesting that the older I get, the bigger the numbers get with different things I have been doing. My best friend and I have been close for sixty years this year. I sold my first short stories 50 years ago. And the Pulphouse…
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The Fun of Building a Brand…
And A Trademark In the Process… So many writers think of doing a Kickstarter campaign for a new book or a series of old books as a way to make some small money. It is that if done right, and if you have a few followers of your work. Doing a Kickstarter campaign is also great promotion for your new book. Here are the steps for that… Have your book finished. Build Campaign and launch it. (Study lots of other campaigns first.) Put book on pre-order at the same time as you launch the campaign. Get book out to backers when campaign is over and while doing that put it…