It’s not the easiest answer. The advantages for doing BANSHEE BEACH: it’s a novel. I got more backers for my novel Kickstarters than for the others. There may be more of a market, downstream. Disadvantages: the novel is not finished*, and I need a much larger goal than usual.
Advantages for TALES FROM THE FERMI RESOLUTION 2: the stories are written. I can advertise BANSHEE BEACH with it by taking the self-contained story in that book and putting it in the collection. I don’t need cover art (I already have it, for another project) or a map. It’s cheaper to finance. The goal is smaller. Disadvantages: doing that pushes BANSHEE BEACH to 2025, probably.
It’s a balancing act, really. Thoughts?
Moe Lane
*The goal is to get the manuscript much closer to ready by the end of the year, and possibly in draft form by the end of January.
As a consumer, I prefer the full novels for my money. Shorts are fun, but really only as diverting fillers once the wider universe has been firmly established for a while.
As a Patreon supporter, I would vote for more Tom Vargas novels.
I say this primarily because my impression is that I’ve seen chapbook material on Patreon already, and I can’t currently justify paying for it a second time.
That, and I’m a sucker for the noir/gumshoe/pulp genre, particularly when used in novel (ha-ha!) ways, such as for a post-apocalyptic fantasy story.
OTOH, some of your short stories resonated with me. “Liches get Stitches”, “The Stars are Wrong”, and “Deep in the Heart of Sex Fish” are easily my favorites. I’ve never deleted their notification emails from my inbox, so they’re readily available for re-reading. I’m not sure how well they fit in the Tales from the Fermi Resolution universe, though.
Does the calculus change if it’s the difference between me publishing something in 2024, and something in 2025?
Embrace the power of shaddup and take my money?
Mew