Looking backwards for a moment, a year ago today I was worried that I’d need to find a job to keep the bills paid. This year, I’ve got a job–thanks to the thousands of people like you who’ve found my work. I need to get better and I need to get faster. My production in 2011 was limited to one podcast, two short stories, and a novella. We got Full Share released in May. I’m planning on six novel length works in 2012 along with a few shorter pieces. My new desk set up, a project schedule, and some grit should help. I also need to get better and more aware of the craft of story-telling. I’ll be taking a course in March and I’ve looked into getting some more formal training. I think the ‘school’ part of that will fall away but I’m looking forward to spending a week in Oregon with Kristine Kathryn Rusch and Dean Wesley Smith. That’s gonna be a blast.

Unfortunately, I don’t have the good news that you’re all waiting for. Double Share will not be out before Christmas as promised. Ridan has not yet returned the edits to me and I can’t imagine that–even if I got them back this morning–there’s time left for me to review almost 125k words, return them to Ridan, and leave time for them to review and publish. The only way we can make the deadline now is if Robin publishes the book without my seeing her edits. That’s something I suspect she will not do.

Yes, I know you’re disappointed. So am I. From a marketing perspective, all the momentum that the promotion of Quarter Share generated in November has almost disappeared. It’s not quite back to October levels, but it’s lost a lot of oomph. That means we’ll have to rebuild the franchise anew in 2012. At least there’s a solid base, even if a lot of people have given up on me. With any luck, the eventual release will spark enough interest to rebuild things.

Before you break out the torches and pitchforks–and to preempt the outcry–Ridan will finish out the Share books. As disappointing as this year has been in terms of their ability to meet production goals, I still like what they’ve managed to do with the books when we’ve gotten them released. In the short run, looking at things through the “I’m still waiting” lens, it’s hard to keep a big picture perspective. Looking at this strategically, the books will be in print for a long, long time. Getting them right is much more important than getting them now. The plan is to get the last three Share books released in the first quarter of 2012. Will we make it? I doubt it, but that’s the plan.

Also in my plans are another trilogy featuring Ishmael Wang, two more books in the Tanyth Fairport series, a Philip Carstairs novel, and at least two novella length works–one in Scott Sigler’s Galactic Football League universe and another story about Odin’s Outpost.

Speaking of Tanyth Fairport, I hired Kip Ayers to create a set of covers for the trilogy. I got the rough first draft of Zypheria’s Call–Tanyth’s book two–done in November and I’ve been pondering it ever since. I think I’ve found most of the flaws and I’ll be working to get those corrected and the book produced by the end of January. You can see the cover and keep track of other happenings in Tanyth’s world over on Lammas Wood.

Merry Christmas, joyous Yule, and a safe and prosperous New Year to one and all. Thank you, again, for adding so much to my life and I hope I can continue to add to yours in the months to come.

Come and get ‘em.

Yes! Hardcovers are in the works. We’re still looking for the right printer. Patience.

Personally, I’m not convinced that advertising works all that well. I may have to revise my opinion if this actually results in sales today, but just seeing it is cool — and having Ridan Publishing books appear together here? Sweet.

I’m working on getting the cover art but you can find the book on Amazon now.

Last year, Quarter Share was eligible, and nominated, but didn’t make it to the finals.

This year, the other three novels were eligible and nominated. Full Share and South Coast made it into the finals, but Mur Lafferty’s Playing for Keeps won. I can’t find any fault with that decision. Losing to Mur no shame. She’s awesome and Playing for Keeps is an excellent novel. So, we got a little closer.

Next year? Double Share will be eligible. And we’ll see what else may come between now and the end of April.

Thanks to all of you for your warm wishes and words of support and encouragement. I’m humbled and grateful.

[UPDATE: Farpoint Media has a good rundown of the categories, nominees, and winners.]

The Parsec Awards have listed the short list finalists and BOTH Full Share and South Coast have been selected as finalists. Only one can win, of course, but hey, just getting the finalist nomination is an honor.

Long and short is that the music I’ve used in the four novels has been licensed in various ways. For the present use, that is, as a free podcast novel, the licensing which includes Non-Commercial is fine since the Podiobooks are released under attribution, non-commercial, no derivatives licenses. The Podiobooks authors working to support the OLPC project by having our work included as source content for educational purposes. The problem, of course, is that we have to change the license to Attribution-ShareALike and my music isn’t licensed for that.

So, I’m posting the music credits here in text in hopes that the people responsible have vanity-searches and will contact me.

Quarter Share: Lucky Black Cat – James Curran
Half Share: Banks of Newfoundland – Peter James Conlan
Full Share: Foxhunters – James Curran
South Coast: Wish – Raphael Garcia Perdigon

All from the Open Audio archives at http://www.archive.org.

And any musicians out there who’d like to have me consider music for future novels, drop me an email via the Contact link on the side bar! I’m planning on six books this year and I may wind up remixing if I can’t get these licenses untangled.

It’s just a short thank you to all of you who’ve been so supportive of the Trader’s Diary over the last few months. I think I’ve answered all the questions. We can do this again after South Coast Shaman, maybe

The Lois McKendrick runs headlong into trouble when a routine in-system transit goes bad. Ishmael and the rest of the crew must scramble to figure out what went wrong and how to fix it in order to keep the ship alive. Learn more about the officers and crew as they struggle to keep their ship and discover how Ishmael finds out how wrong he’s been about what it means to be a spacer in this latest Trader’s Tale.

AVAILABLE NOW AT Podiobooks.com