The manuscript for Rags and Muffin is done, with just a few finishing touches needed. I had commissioned Eduardo Moura Barbosa for a chapter-heading image, but I was so pleased with the results I asked for some more so I can switch them up from one chapter to the next. The header image for this post is an example: Each chapter header contains objects associated with one of the main characters.
I also crossed my fingers, took a deep breath, and commissioned a cover. I decided a cartoon cover was inappropriate for Rags and Muffin, so I commissioned a cover from a reasonably priced company that appears to do good work. I haven’t seen anything for my project yet, but they claim their turn-around time is good, their portfolio looks solid, and they’ve asked me a lot of probing questions to ensure that they’re actually producing what I want. I’ll name the company after I have the final product and can discuss the overall experience. But if they’re as fast as they claim, I might just make my hoped-for October 1st release date.
The downside is that the cover will cost a pretty penny—at least by my standards. I’m not a guy who can drop $1200 on a book cover, at least not yet. This isn’t costing me that much, but it’s definitely a bite out of the wallet.
Anyway, remember that, if you pick up Dead 2 Rites, kindly leave a review.
I’m currently hunting, bewilderdly, for a cover designer for Rags and Muffin. Everything else is ready to go on that book (I have a guy making a few extra interior illustrations, but it’s otherwise complete). Although I certainly considered using the same guys who did Jake and the Dynamo, and whom I’m more than happy with, I think this particular novel needs a different design style.
But this is all new to me still, so I’m hunting around, stumbling and wandering. I’m also limited by price range: I am not a bestselling author and don’t expect to be in the foreseeable future, even if I’m turning them out at a reasonably good rate (for the moment). Some guys do some really, really cool stuff … for $1500. Quite reasonable if you can reasonably expect to move a lot of copies.
Realistically, this will probably delay the release.
Also, it doesn’t help that we are in a cover-design dark age right now. For “literary” fiction, minimalism is all the rage. And in fantasy, almost every cover is a slight variation on the “attractive woman stares at reader with glowy lighting effects” motif. This is one time I can’t even favorably compare Japanese publications to American ones since manga and light-novel covers nowadays are all slight variations on the “cute girl stares at reader with legs up in the air” motif.
I know I’ve been radio silent again for a while, but that’s because I was again in one of those stages where I have a project I want to complete but it seems to be taking too long. But, today, I have it done—the final edits and formatting for Rags and Muffin, the novel I am planning to release after Dead 2 Rites, which will release after Jake and the Dynamo.
This took longer than expected for several reasons, both related and unrelated to the project itself. One thing that took a while was inserting all the internal links: This novel has a glossary in the back, mostly because, when I was a kid, I thought novels with glossaries, such as Dune or Watership Down, were extra special. But in the world of eBooks, a functional glossary requires hyperlinks in the text. Vellum, my formatting software, has a limited ability to add internal links (though it has fewer options than I would like), and today, I got the links done.
The cover art for this project hasn’t been made yet. However, I uploaded the PDF of the paperback and mocked up a fake cover on Amazon KDP so I could use the previewer to make sure the internal margins are correct.
The chapter headers and section breaks are from Barbusco comics. At the moment, I only have the one chapter-header image, the gun next to a teacup. I’m thinking about commissioning a few more so there isn’t just one image at the head of every chapter, but if I do that, I can get them in the same dimensions so they won’t affect the page count. The complete PDF of the paperback clocks in at 490 pages, including the front matter.
Real Life
The only remaining delay has to do with real-life stuff: The magical girls and I are buying a house. We had been shopping for a while, but a house that met our wants came available suddenly and unexpectedly. We’re supposed to be moving in at the end of next week if all the paperwork is complete on time, and for that reason, after this post, I’m going to go radio silent again for a bit because I’ll be focused on packing, closing, and moving.
Release Dates
Because we suddenly had to drop money on the house to avoid losing it, there isn’t a lot in the kitty for my publication and advertising costs. After we’ve made the down payment, I’ll be better situated to assess our budget and figure out what I can do, but I think we should have enough for some modest promotion.
For that reason, tentative release dates for the books are:
Jake and the Dynamo:
Dead 2 Rites:
Rags and Muffin:
I am also (cross fingers) hoping to have the fourth volume of Jake and the Dynamo out by the end of the year.
Those are tenative, and I might tweak them by a day or three as I learn the business and, for example, figure out which days of the week are best for a release. Some unforeseen disaster or delay may also happen, but since two of the books are ready to go except for minor tweaks, I don’t think there should be any serious problem.
This has, of course, taken longer than I originally, optimistically anticipated. I can’t say I’m surprised because I haven’t self-published before; I’m just glad I didn’t have a Kickstarter because delaying release on a pre-funded project is bad form. I may, however, consider Kickstarters in the future when I’ve got the hang of this.
I had an issue with a particular logo I needed to make these upcoming book releases look as official as possible, but I think I have that worked out. It appears I have also found someone to do the title graphics for the covers; I have to wait for my publishing logo first, but then we’ll go ahead with finishing up the cover designs.
I’m hesitant to give a definite date still. I’m new at self-publishing, and my last projection (last month) is obviously something I didn’t make. However, barring unexpected contingencies or work simply taking longer than I anticipate, I don’t know any reason why Jake and the Dynamo can’t see its re-release this month. If we make that happen, I intend to open Dead 2 Rites for pre-order at the same time. Its actual release will be a month later.
Things are also progressing well on Rags and Muffin. Again, I best not give a date, but I see no reason it can’t release soon after the two Jake and the Dynamo novels.
As for my optimistic goal of getting five books out this year, I think four is more likely, but aside from despondency and laziness and family issues, there is no reason I can’t get out four.
Also, I haven’t decided yet on cover art for Rags and Muffin, but I’m so pleased with the artwork of Eduardo Barbosa that I might employ him again.
Obviously, I’m behind the timeline I was hoping for, but I’m new to self-publishing, so that’s not particularly surprising. I’m waiting on a few things and also spending this evening putting together a package for the next guy I’m commissioning.
I can also tell you I’m approaching finished on the final product of Rags and Muffin. Haven’t quite decided what to do with its cover art, but I really should have three books ready to go in the near future here.
As for both Jake and the Dynamo, logos and title designs are all that still need to happen. I wanted the cover art and formatting squared away for both of those before commissioning the title designs so the artist could do both at once.
I am currently putting the final touches on Rags and Muffin, the book project, a long time in coming, formerly known as Rag & Muffin. I still like the original title better, but I changed it because the ampersand is a special character in HTML, so it would likely cause me grief when posting it on other sites.
Also, the book’s antiheroine main character is named Rags, and I’m tired of people asking me why it’s “Rag,” singular, in the title. The reason is because of the pun, but I don’t want to explain anymore.
I have said previously on this blog that Rags and Muffin was through the editing phase. This is my first novel (first written, not published), and like many first novels, it needed years’ worth of work to make it worthy of print. It really had been edited to death before now, but I’ve recently learned a lot about improving sentence structure and deleting unnecessary words, so I am giving it one last round of improvement—and then I will finally let my baby out into the world.
This will be the third book I release this year; it will appear after the re-published Jake and the Dynamo and its sequel Dead 2 Rites.
Once I’m done with this, I am back to working on the third book in the Jake and the Dynamo sequence, which runs under the working title of The Shadow of His Shadow. I hope to finish and release that book this year also.
