FOUR SCIENCE FICTION Kickstarter Campaign
Four Kristine Kathryn Rusch Science Fiction Novellas…
Campaign starts Tuesday at noon. Four Science Fiction.
Wow, is there some good sf reading in this campaign. Not only do you get the four novellas with every award, but you can get six of Kris’s other sf novellas. You can also get all (or choice of three) of 18 Diving Series books, and some great Kris short stories as stretch rewards.
Also brand new focused Pop-Up classes as stretch goals. That’s right, brand new.
And two of the best Special Workshops on science fiction we have ever done. Maybe the best ones. Here are descriptions of the two special workshops.
— Workshop #1…Kirk’s Chair and Apples in Space
This is a special three-week workshop on details in space, how to write them, how to make sure a reader understands them. And why there are no seatbelts in science fiction. (There is a very good reason.)
You want to write science fiction, this is the craft and information flow workshop for you.
And there is a short story to write for the third week’s assignments.
— Workshop #2…How to Create Your Own Short Story Market.
With the collapse of the four major digests as viable markets (Asimov’s, Analog, Queen, and Hitchcock’s), there is a real need for this class. This is a special three-week workshop on how to create your own short story markets. (Not talking about starting a magazine, talking about how to create ways to get your stories out to readers and make money from your own short fiction.)
Since Kris can no longer sign a contract with the four major digests because of their non-negotiable contract terms, she has been working on ways to build up her own short story markets and feels she has enough ideas and information to share it here.
And there is a short story to write for the third week’s assignments.
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These special workshops will only be offered through this Kickstarter. Plus you get the four Kristine Kathryn Rusch science fiction novellas in electronic form.
Both three-week classes will be offered starting August 12th and August 26th. Your choice. They will not interfere if you are taking other workshops at the same time.
Great science fiction reading by the top writer working in science fiction, great workshops for writers. Hope you can join us.
15 Comments
Mark Kuhn
Wait, WHAT?? The Big Four have collapsed? I knew they had a new owner.
Mark Kuhn
Okay, I fired from the hip (I’m good at that) and then read further down. I tried to do some digging online, but there’s not much out there, but am I correct (or close?) in assuming that contracts will only be negotiable if you have an agent?
dwsmith
LOL, Mark. Agents never deal with short fiction. It is below them and not enough money there to scam.
No, this is simply they are demanding you wave Moral Rights, which means they can then do anything they want with your story and. you have no recourse. Too ugly for words. Kris was the top writer at Asimov’s and close to the top at Queen, they would not budge and the new owners are jerks and are trying to scam writers. Extreme caution. Very sad.
Mark Kuhn
Wow, those magazines were the only safe markets in the new traditional world of scams. And you know how I feel right now? I feel exactly how William Wallace felt when he pulled off his opponent’s helmet and found Robert the Bruce looking up at him.
Mary H
Sounds like another great one!!
Mangala McNamara
OMG!
What happened with the big 4? What about F&SF?
I’ve been head down in publishing novels… short stories for next year.
dwsmith
F&SF is now owned by the same people. There contract is so ugly, you would never want to sign it.
Emilia
Wow, this and Kris’ Patreon are how I learned.
I really don’t understand when people buy a value producing company and take a baseball bat to the process which creates that value. I’ve seen it in different fields and I can’t see how it’s good for the business, or customers, or anyone involved
dwsmith
They think they know more than anyone else in the room, and one is a former agent who has no respect for any kind of writer, let alone short fiction writers. They just want to grab rights. You know that instantly when they demand you wave Moral Rights and will not budge. Almost worse than buying all rights. Maybe sometimes it is.
Grace Wen
As someone who has (stupidly) signed all rights contracts in the distant past for short fiction markets, I think the moral rights waiver clause is worse because it muddies what a writer is actually signing away and can sound like no big deal. At least with an all rights clause, they’re grabbing everything right out in the open.
A warning to any writer who thinks waiving their rights to attribution and integrity are no big deal: back when I wrote for confession magazines, they wanted all rights (which includes essentially waiving moral rights). What does that look like in practice? They could change whatever they wanted in my stories, and not just names. Once they added an incredibly lame sentence that ruined the ending. And NONE of those stories are attributed to me–they were supposed to be “true,” not written by hired gun writers.
The magazines changed hands and eventually went defunct. The current copyright owner is an IT person at a non-profit who treats this as a hobby and sometimes puts out a collection of stores from the pile of IP she has (thousands of stories over decades). And when she does, it doesn’t help me a bit because my name isn’t on any of them.
The fact the new owners added the moral rights waiver in the first place and are fighting so hard to keep it in should be a huge red flag, especially since the new owners also do film and TV (easier to exploit the IP rights without pesky authors getting in the way), but I guess some writers will have to learn the hard way.
dwsmith
Yeah, afraid so. But now we indie writers can develop our own ways of getting short fiction into reader’s hands. I have been working on testing different things for a time now, Kris has now joined the push.
Mangala McNamara
Looking forward to hearing more on this from you both!
Emilia
I’m really happy to live and write in the time of the indie revolution. Also grateful for people like you and Kris for sharing information.
dwsmith
Thanks, Emilia. If not for the indie movement taking over, I would have been long gone from publishing. So I too am grateful.
Mangala McNamara
Yes, this. I can’t imagine wading into the morass of trad publishing a la late 90s/early 2000s.
I realize I’m very lucky to have a spouse supporting us while I work on learning publishing a an indie…
… but all the parts on FB about how Amazon is a bad deal, etc etc…
There may be better options, but Amazon largely built the field for us to play in.
And WORLDS better than trad publishers or, sadly now, even the ‘zines.
🙁
So grateful for this blog, too!