Source: World Builders — G. Derek Adams
I’m a guest today on John Robin’s blog — I’m kind of picking a fight with plotters and people who really worship world building — but in a nice, respectful way I hope? YOU BE THE JUDGE.
Category: Uncategorized
The Unquiet Streets and the Fear We Cannot Name
Edward Felspar
Crime Desk
Vyle Tymes – 15th of Psydros, 2015
We live in two cities. Though they share the same streets and the same names and the same buildings proud and tall. Cerulean street lights, crimson flags, the moonsilver steel of the Rail – all the same. The city of Vyle: serene and shining, as clean as fresh clockwork. Every citizen, no matter how mean, holds their head a little higher to count themselves a trueborn son or daughter of Vyle. We know our city, we love our city. But, of late, we all have begun to see a second city, a darker one, one that we do not recognize, one that we are not so proud to bear in our blood. One that we walk a little faster from to put lock and key between us and this second city, the hungry city that appears when the sun goes down.
The Constant Reader is familiar with the litany of crimes that have become common in the midnight streets of Vyle. The kidnapping of Haley Westermont this summer. The brutal pillaging of the Veritas Freight shipment. The invasion of homes for petty theft and larceny, the accosting of ladies after dark for nefarious purpose, the bodies found washed up in the harbor come dawn. Over these past many months the rate of crime has accelerated. The hungry city has streets made of teeth and there are few among us who have not felt the bite in our own families.
The question must be posed: why in the largest city on the continent, the home of
the most potent military force ever devised by the will of mortal men, has this quiet harvest of its citizens gone unchecked? This question has been posed, again and again, by this reporter and by many other frightened and concerned Vylians. Poliarchos Winston Gage of Tagma Brass has responded only with the most terse and unfulfilling of statements. “Patrols will be doubled during nighttime hours.” “Tagma Brass investigates every criminal report and does not rest until the guilty party is brought to justice.” “We have some reports of isolated incidents near Flux St. and the more unsavory corners of the city, but the vast majority of Vyle is completely safe at all hours.”
Safe where he lives, perhaps this is what Poliarchos Gage means.
Though there are no sources willing to go on record to the following information, the lapse in journalistic diligence can perhaps be forgiven. Most sources who have reliable information are terrified for their lives and livelihood, and what is proper to print here can safely, and sadly, be considered common knowledge to most citizens of Vyle below the rank of demiarchos. This increase in criminal activity and the furor and intensity that has been visited upon the citizens of Vyle can be tracked to one organization: the Black Cross Gang. Their base of operations is unknown, their full number is unknown, even the origin of their crude symbol and moniker remains under a deep cloud. What is known is their cruelty, their fierce despite for the law, and their unending avarice. Recognize them by the black bandannas they wear, and the all too often sign of a black cross or ‘X’ daubed on their clothes with coal or tar.
If you encounter them in the daylight city of Vyle, avoid if at all possible. If you encounter them in the midnight streets, only your own skill and the gods’ love walk with you as Tagma Brass will not stir to defend its citizens.
Whispers have also reached this reporter’s ears of the purported head of this vicious cadre of thieves and murderers, a person known only as ‘White Crown’. No verifiable reports have been made of anyone seeing this person, it is not uncommon for criminal groups like this to create a fictional figurehead — a ‘boss’ figure that both lends to their mystique, and also allows for a ‘monster in the shadows’ to lean on as a negotiation or intimidation tactic.
This newspaper will continue to report as accurately and as fully as we can about these true events and fierce dangers that grow ever more present in our city. We live in two cities now, haunted by a Beast that we cannot see and we are not even given the privilege of calling by name. The fear that grips this reporter is: will there always be two cities? Or will we wake one morning to find the jaws of the midnight city has closed over our peaceful home forever, beyond all reclaiming?
E. Felspar is a staff writer for the Vyle Tymes. Communication may be sent to his box at the Vyle Tymes Offices with further reports and news of criminal activity.
Asteroid Made of Dragons
My first traditionally published novel! Exciting, strange, a little bit crunchy with a hint of hazelnut. I’ll put more specific information here later, but for now you can read sample chapters, read a synopsis, and pre-order HERE from my publisher Inkshares, or directly through Amazon HERE.
Three-Syllable Gospel – Notes
As therefore it was not impossible to God to create such natures as He pleased, so it is not impossible to Him to change these natures of His own creation into whatever He pleases, and thus spread abroad a multitude of those marvels which are called monsters, portents, prodigies, phenomena, and which if I were minded to cite and record, what end would there be to this work? They say that they are called
monsters,because they demonstrate or signify something;portents,because they portend something; and so forth. But let their diviners see how they are either deceived, or even when they do predict true things, it is because they are inspired by spirits, who are intent upon entangling the minds of men (worthy, indeed, of such a fate) in the meshes of a hurtful curiosity, or how they light now and then upon some truth, because they make so many predictions.Saint Augustine, City of God, Book XXI, Chapter 8
Just a little something from researching next project. PAY NO ATTENTION.
Inkshares Contest Survival Guide
With the announcement that my publisher is running another contest sponsored by The Nerdist, I raise my creaking bones from the sharp-edged divan of Anxiety and 
Editing to applaud and salute all the new campaigns! More writers, more books, more readers – these are always good things. It’s easy to think of writing as a purely competitive enterprise – especially in a contest framework, but you know what’s great about readers? They don’t want to read just one book – they want to read many books! And bringing more attention to my publisher helps me too – *rubs together hands maniacally* – now more people have a chance to see MY STUPID DORK BOOK FOR DORKS.
But let’s talk about your stupid dork book for dorks. And more importantly about how you can survive the next few weeks of the contest with crying in the bathtub only every other night.
- Use your campaign dashboard. Inkshares gives you plenty of easy tools to link up all of your Facebook, Google, etc. contacts and puts them in a handy list called the Reader Pipeline. This is a perfect way to start keeping track of who you have contacted, who’s pre-ordered the book, who you need to beg harder. There are also built-in tools to contact prospective readers and also to THANK people who bought your book.
- Get comfortable with asking people for money. Yes, I know. It’s terrible. But you have to do it. All of the easy/passive ways you can ask aren’t going to get you there – i.e. posting on Facebook, or your blog, or Twitter. You are the best salesman of your work – you need to go directly to your friends, family, acquaintances, vague strangers, lemurs and ASK for the pre-order.
- Take a long look at your writing schedule. Assume it’s going to get thrown away for most of the contest. It’s a stressful time! You are going to start refreshing the contest page a few times an hour in the last few days of the contest – go ahead and accept that your writer-brain has checked out, and you are pure rodent-lust. It can be extremely demoralizing for writers – as surprise! – writing is what keeps us happy and reasonably emotionally balanced. You need to account for that, and build in some slack in your support network. (see: crying in the tub.)
- Get to know the other competitors. Not just follow their campaigns from the shadows — talk to them! 5 winners are going to make it, but there’s nothing saying that even more can hit the overall Inkshares funding goal. The more you share resources, readers, knowledge, and support the easier things will be for all of you. I made several friends during the last contest and I’m very glad that they are still talking to me. One of the winners of the last contest is putting another book up – JF Dubeau – he would be a great resource to you for help and ideas.
- Noblesse oblige. No doubt, tensions are going to run high as the contest heats up – it pays to remember that you all have the same goal, the same dream. Go out of your way to play fair, to help out the other campaigns. We’re all a bunch of small-timers trying to take the leap into a bigger arena. Even if you win, you can still stumble. Nerds must be held to a higher moral code – we are all taught by the finest stories and the greatest heroes.
- Updates. When you send out updates to your backers – remember that they are your allies, your friends and boon companions that want to help you make your dream come true. They are not your servants or conscripts. Ask them to help you, give them clear instructions of things they can do to aid the campaign – but don’t forget to entertain them! Show them exclusive parts of the book, concept art, videos, terrible pictures of yourself. Don’t just send out endless ‘GET MO PREORDERS’ updates – if you cause your core audience to tune you out, that’s hard to come back from!
- Cry in the shower. There are going to come moments when you will wonder why you jumped into this thing. We make stuff, we write stuff – it’s a learned skill to put your work out there in the world where anyone can bang on it, or worse ignore it. This contest is 6 weeks of permanent vulnerability – it will be hard. And it’s okay to feel bad. Here’s another post I wrote all about the emotional damage of self-promotion.
- It is okay to ask people for money. I’m saying this twice, because it goes against the grain for so many people. My day job is sales, so I have a much thicker skin about it – but even I get squirmy when it’s for my nerd poems. People want to help you – don’t feel like you have to make them read your excerpt, or explain the whole book to them. Don’t sell the book – sell YOU. Look in their eyes and ask for ten dollars. This contest is purely based on unique readers – not preorder count, so you don’t have to stress about getting multiple books out of people. Just ask – I promise that it is okay.
- Take breaks. Seriously – as much as you can, especially those last two weeks. You are going to become an internet-octopus, dripping your tentacles across all platforms looking for information and preorders and mentions and ideas and any glimmer of aid that can come to your campaign. Go on walks. Play video games. Write if you can. There will come moments where you will stare at the contest page and try to WILL the numbers to go up – these are normal, but get your support network to pull you away from it as much as they can.
- Contact Inkshares with questions or concerns. Some weird stuff happened last contest. A glitch with some referral credit, things not appearing properly on campaign pages, etc. Everyone at Inkshares was always quick to respond, eager to fix the problem, and as transparent as they could be about the source of the problem and the solution. They want to get it right and they work hard to do so – it’s why I’m quite glad to have them as my publisher. (HEARTS 4 INKS)
- Cry in the shower.
- Your book is not on trial. There are a lot of moving parts to this contest. People are going to pre-order your book because it sounds awesome. Or because you asked them. Or because they liked the cover. Or, or or…if you find yourself slipping down the ranks, it DOES NOT MEAN your book is bad. Maybe the other books are doing a better job of pestering people, or they have a bigger family, or, or or. Do not start beating up your book and blaming it for not being shiny enough. Unless your book is into that and has given clear, vigorous consent.
- You can do it. By that I mean – you can get your book out into the world. This contest, the next contest, regular funding through Inkshares, Kickstarter, self-publishing, finding an agent, printing it out on copy paper and hiding it in Waffle House bathrooms — you can do it.
Enough blathering from me! Good fortune and good campaigning. If you have questions about anything, drop a comment below or look me up on Twitter – @gderekadams.
Straydog Stammer
Coming back sometimes, flipping times like a rolodex
to my younger self, hammering away sans respect
to the idle box i’d be spamming and scratching
looking for fire with a match that wasn’t catching
stomp and stammer, praying for the manner
of device and craft, of thor’s fucking hammer
to break the wall of the world with my science
mjolnir’s breaking, now i got to try this
hustle and grease and the black knight’s deceased
trying to get more when the most is the least.
if i can just keep moving, keep rattling the wires
the solution will fall out, and my brain on the spires
now
i’m older and colder and Mulder and Scully
stomping on the ice, glass that i sully
with my whisper-gleams that i steal from the fabric
Hoppin and bopping and boosting the magic
easy to forget the eggs, the chicken and the box
which came first, doesn’t matter when the locks
you break are the locks you make
and the chains you snap are at the bottom of the lake
with the lady and the blade and the fool and his masquerade
while i’m sitting at tea with Death saying ‘pass the marmalade’
then
now
two mirrors looking back, and neither the wiser
my heart is a storm and my third eye’s a miser
but all that i have is two holes in my soul
punctured and engraved and bound in white gold
and sometimes they line, like a telescope made of pain
and all i can do is yammer and dance in the City of Rain
reaching back now, holding hands with a shadow
of me and me and my brain in the green window
hold on to me then, and i’ll hold on to you now
we can’t forget what and we never bow
thirteen devils singing on the mantel
five demons bound silver and vandal
flipping and flapping and laying down the lines
hoping and hopping that i don’t forget the rhymes
please forgive the memory still burns
sunlight and salt and what are the words?
i end this here, but howl all the same
straydog stammer remembers his name.
Charleston
ah, those people
kneeling in a circle of light
and the feather-crown beast
came and sat
and waited and
thought a bit
then broke the circle
and spilled the people
then fled
another temple desecrated.
part of me wants
to have known
to have been there
to have cried out
a warning this time.
but i was not
but i was
but i am
but please hear me say
it is coming
it is gone
my heart rings like a stone bell
and you all, in the circle of light
i’m crying and you don’t hear me
and that is as it is
but i am here
and the clack-clack bird is flown
and we remain
and you remain
and the circle of light still shines
and i am crying for you out here in the dark
I Explain My New Publishing Deal to Aragorn, the Cat Who Lives With Me.
“Aragorn!” I screamed as I ran up the steps of our porch, feet pounding up to our front door. “Aragorn!!!! It happened! It. HAS. HAPPENED.”
I slammed the door behind me, remembering to throw the bolt – it doesn’t shut properly if you don’t throw the bolt, and when Train rumbles by the door can pop open — allowing the Dogs to wreak a very limited havoc on the neighborhood. My words echoed in the house and then fell quiet. My Beloved and the dogs were out on a walk and the black and white cat was in the backyard absorbing solar radiation. It should just be me and Aragorn in the house. Is he asleep? I think I yelled pretty loud. I prepared to venture further, to face the lion in his lair, when at last his magnificent orange frame sauntered into view.
“What.”
“Oh, hey. Hey, Aragorn. Were…were you asleep? I mean, I can tell you about this later, if you were, you know, asleep.”
The orange tail lashed and he said nothing.
“Okay, I was just very excited because I’ve got my first publishing deal and I wanted to tell you about it.”
Aragorn blinked, then slowly uncoiled himself, heading back for his favorite nap spot.
“No! It’s a really cool thing! I won a contest and now I’m getting published by Inkshares and I’m going to be on Sword & Laser and –”
The orange cat stopped and looked back over his shoulder with disgust. “There’s no way you’re going to let me go back to sleep until you tell me about this, is there?”
I bounced on one foot, vibrating with pent up excitement. Aragorn sighed and curled back up in a nearby sunbeam. He flicked his whispers in a way that signified if not submission then at least grudging consent. I sat down next to him with my legs crossed. We sat together, him in the sun, me respectfully folding my hands and preparing my tale.
Aragorn opened one eye. “Did you fall asleep?”
“Snrrr..no! It’s just been a relentless couple of months okay, I was just taking a brain-pause.”
The orange cat closed his eye.
“Inkshares is a publisher, an honest to god book publisher – but they’re trying to do something different. They crowdfund books – a little like Kickstarter, but with a guaranteed product. If you can convince 1000 people that you have a cool idea for a book, they will publish that book. Professional editor, professional marketing, professional cover design, the works – and it’ll be in bookstores. For real. Like I don’t have to personally deliver them myself and sweet-talk the staff. I heard about them a few months ago when Sword & Laser interviewed Gary Whitta.” I jabbered. “I had already been poking around the site – kicking the tires as it were – trying to decide if it would be a good fit for me and my next book. But then, out of nowhere they announce this contest.”
“Contest?” the cat didn’t quite sneer.
“A contest sponsored by Sword & Laser! It started in April and ran through the end of May. The top five fantasy and science fiction campaigns on the site with the highest pre-order counts would all be published – even if they didn’t hit the 1000 book goal. I thought about it for ten whole minutes before I jumped in. It was just too good of an opportunity to pass up. It was too many coincidences! I had never even heard of Inkshares until the podcast, and now the podcast was running a fricking contest for fantasy novels and I WRITE FANTASY NOVELS. I had already setup a ‘dummy’ campaign with very basic information – in a frantic hour or two I field-dressed it and set it to launch.”
“What’s the book called?”
“Uh. I mean. I think we’ve agreed to disagree before about my style, so –”
“What. Is the stupid. Book. Called. Human.”
Aragorn arched his back and hissed at me. I held up both hands, hoping to placate him. “Yes, yes – I know. But you see, I won. I won Aragorn. It took a lot of amazing people helping me out and Inkshares amending the contest rules right at the end to factor in unique readers as well as pre-order totals. But I’m getting a book published. It is happening. It’s happening, Aragorn!”
The cat lowered his spine and plopped back on the floor – or at least the most graceful version of a ‘plop’ that can exist. I kept going, hoping he wouldn’t mind the excited spittle flying across the room.
“And on top of that I get to be in the Sword & Laser Collection. I get to be interviewed on the podcast. It’s come full circle or something. I also have to write a whole hell of a lot in the couple of months to get the manuscript done and I think I may have some sort of anxiety-related tic forming in my left eye – but I get to see my work in hardback. I…I…I…”
Aragorn stretched with boredom. “You realize this is only interesting to you? It’s nice that you tricked a bunch of friend and strangers into helping you, but I fail to see what this could possibly mean for me?”
Cats ruin everything. “I mean, we’ve just talked so much about the other books, i thought you’d be excited.”
“Yay.”
“Okay – okay, I get it,” I got up from the floor and skulked away.
The Best Thing
In the middle of all this madness, I get a new review for my first book.
And, as I’ve learned, my core demographic is 11 years old.
What I liked about Spell/Sword is that when Rime and Jonas get of jail and fight the crystal frog and I also liked when they fought the grey witch and the assassin also that there’s a sword that is magic and can take away Rime’s magic also when she uses magic it damages her health and her power is unstoppable and Jonas on the run for murder.
Austin Sigman – Age 11
Yup. That’s what I like about Spell/Sword too. I can’t wait for him to read The Riddle Box and AMOD.
I’m being very terse because this took a kind of crappy stressful day and made it awesome. I don’t wear happy well.
Thank you so much for reading, Austin!
Addressing the Troops
[I wrote this as a backer update for my Inkshares campaign of Asteroid Made of Dragons — and I kind of liked it. I’m always trying to express my goals in some fashion or another, and I liked the word-shapes I came up with this time, so here you go.]
Good afternoon you feckless rabble, you hard-hearted convoy of bright-eyed adventurers.
We’ve picked up quite a few new followers – shamans, bladewalkers, puppeteers, guys named Chuck. My army grows with potency and I sip from a goblet of purest obsidian in vile pleasure.
Because this is the secret – this is the thing that books do, the invisible machinery of Purpose. It brings human minds together – across space and time and race and rhyme. It brings them together like little fireflies – little droplets of human energy floating in the dark. The more we gather the brighter that light becomes – doubling and redoubling like a dynamo, like thunder rumbling its way across the heavens.
The big Books? The ones out there with thousands or millions of readers – they burn like tiny suns, whole skies full of fire. Flame that sings across memory and dreams, powering the machines, turning the drill.
The drill? What drill? The drill that turns, breaking down the wall between our old gray world and the brighter worlds on the Other Side.
That’s my job, every author’s job, really. To walk along the edge of this world, tapping at the wall. And when you find a crack – when you smell something sweet or dark or evil or bright – some color on the other side you put your hand on it. You put your hand on it and you start to holler. Because you don’t want to lose it! Anything but lose the scent, the tiny little weak place in the dimensional barrier. And then you write – you write what’s on the other side, and if you’re very very lucky – readers come. With the real power, the real human energy — and if you get enough of them, you can break through.
We can break through. One day… one day. The Other worlds are out there and I can see mine — one day we’ll break on through and slip away.
Maybe this is a weird goal to post here? Chuck looks like he’s having second thoughts.
So thank you – is what I’m kind of saying – thank you for this small bonfire that we’ve built. May it guide others to our banner.
Have a great El Seis de Mayo! If you were unaware, it is officially the Greatest Day of the Year.
Sic Semper Tyrannosaur,
Derek
spell-sword.com 