It’s official: I’m doing the Arbutus Arts Festival.

Looks like it’ll be fun. Fun, close, and Sunday, May 18th, 2025. It’s the first time I’m doing the Arbutus Arts Festival, so I don’t know what to expect. I do know that there’s beer, so if you’re in Baltimore County that day come by to grab a book and a brew. Or a bunch of books and a brew. I’ll happily sell you my entire back catalog.

I need to sit down and replan, well, everything.

In retrospect it was not a great idea to schedule my first real cold in four years smack dab in the middle of November. I’m way behind on the book, haven’t been able to schedule any Christmas vending opportunities, and I’m just generally feeling like everything’s out of momentum. Kind of a vicious cycle, too, which isn’t helping matters much.

I’m not mentioning any of this for sympathy. I just want to be on the record as knowing that it’s been a slacker month, too, and that I have to get off my butt at some point and get going again. Nobody else’s gonna do that for me, after all.

I have an opinion on an alternate history series…

…only thing is, I don’t sell enough books to be able to effectively offer it. I mean, yeah, it’s a free country. I’m allowed to sneer. But it’ll still just come across as sour grapes; and, if we’re being brutally honest about it, that impression might not be completely wrong.

So. Buy my books! Allow me the luxury of a good writer’s feud!

Continue reading I have an opinion on an alternate history series…

So, new plan for NotAWriMo 2024.

This week has been one for the books, in terms of dealing with the fallout of the rest of the family being sick at various points during it. Writing has taken the hit. Such is life.

So, here’s the new plan. I lean into it, and spend the weekend watching surfing and beach movies. First up is GIDGET, which is… yeah. I understand that things were a bit different, sixty-five years ago, but… okay. At least the actresses aren’t fifteen and sixteen.

#commissionearned

Adventures in non-Amazon publishing!

Which is what I’ve been doing this morning. Conclusions: Draft To Digital is fairly comprehensive in getting a book together, including adding things like a table of contents or dedications for you, but their Extended Distribution royalty rates are horrible and I don’t think I can exclude Amazon from them. Barnes and Noble has a better royalty rate than I expected, but its book assembly process is far less useful than KDPs. I may still use it, but I’m first going to need to adjust the manuscript a good deal and possibly skip having a table of contents.

So that was what I did today so far. Illuminating, even if it made my brain a little sore.

Moe Lane

PS: Buy my books!

#commissionearned

I think I may need to reschedule my stuff next week.

I was originally going to do another 3K story (I’m halfway done with this week’s), as well as finish a couple of stories for the TALES FROM THE FERMI RESOLUTION 2 short story sampler (from the Kickstarter). But the way the schedule’s been working this week, that’s not viable. What I really need to do is just work on the sampler, and get it done*.

So I guess I’m doing that next week, instead.

Moe Lane

*Which, at the rate things are going, is only two stories away from being one of those novels that are really a bunch of short stories with the same characters and a narrative arc.

“Canon is a tool and not a crutch.”

This started out as a Facebook comment, but danged if it didn’t turn out half bad. I’m refraining from fiddling with it further. Oh, and obviously it’s to the tune of If You’re Happy And You Know It.