Balticon was a blast and the photos are beginning to surface. I have a new set coming from JR Blackwell and I’m really looking forward to them. What really surprised me was how many people said they like the Talking On My Morning Walk podcast and how many more were looking forward to the Ravenwood sequel.
I had several meetings with Ridan and we talked about the future. There’s a lot happening and not all of it is mine to share but …
Hardcovers. They are coming. The problem we’ve had is quality and Robin is looking at actually doing a real print run of 250 if she can find an offset printer who will do them with the quality we need. Since we now have two titles that need them, we’ll probably run them both at once. A lot of them will zip out so the warehousing of the remaining few cases won’t be too much of a burden on my basement.
Schedule. I’m moving to a four month release schedule instead of the six month. That means we’re looking to finish the last three share books by this time next year. I know that’s slow if you’re waiting for the books but fast considering all we need to do to make them really work in print. Sad but true.
New works. I’m still thinking about the novellas. Odin’s Outpost is a key element in the universe that we haven’t explored much yet and I want to get into that part of the Golden Age a bit before we turn Ishmael loose again. Then there’s the Ravenwood sequel and Cape Grace — both of which I’ve been promising for far too long.
While you’re waiting, there’s a lot of good stuff out there and coming out in the near future.
Scott Sigler’s Galactic Football League series will release the third book – All-Pro – in a few weeks and his second book, The Starter, is on podiobooks and in print already. If you’ve never run into this series, this is a good time to pick up the first book, The Rookie, on Kindle and get a taste for it. Even if you’re not a football fan, I really do think this might be some of Sigler’s strongest work.
Debora Geary has her sequel to A Modern Witch coming out to beta readers soon (yes, I’m one – yay!) and if A Hidden Witch is half as much fun as A Modern Witch was, you’ll wanna keep an eye open for that.
Also Brand Gamblin’s The Hidden Institute is still looking for an audience. Steampunky with a lot of social commentary, I still can’t recommend it highly enough.
Last but not least, don’t forget D.A. Boulter’s The Courtesan. It’s been doing very well in Kindle sales lately and his fantasy book The Steadfasting was a joy – very much in the flavor of Ravenwood in terms of common people caught up in magic and the fantasy quest.
I need to get back to work now, but I wanted to let you know what’s happening here.
Safe voyage.
Thanks for the update. Anxiously waiting….
I listened to the Hidden Institute… great story. Would love to see a sequel!
Thank you for the update, Nate – and for speeding up the planned release schedule. You’re right that hard cover copies will zip out the door and you might want to consider a reservation system of some sort, even if not a pre-pay scheme. At the least, it would let you and Robin gauge the immediate demand to a certain extent and target the press run appropriately. Having the whole set inside a year will be sweet! Now if we can just get Mr. Sullivan to finish Percepliquis I’ll be able to quit haunting solarclipper.com and ridanpublishing.com every day…
Thanks for the update Nate. Its great to see things are going well and moving along. I agree with Sean about a pre-order system. It would definitely gauge how many people want to get the hardcover and it would allow people to garuntee they get a copy. I would love to garuntee a copy for myself of both half and full share.
Hey Nathan Lowell, oh marvelous author of shares of all sorts.
Please don’t forget us NOOK readers out here in B&N land.
Best regards, Bob Mac
Nook is in the production pipeline. I’m not sure why the files are taking so long to clear.
If you’re in a hurry, you can order them directly from Ridan and get any format file you want sent to you.
Stumbled across the Trader Series while looking for a new read in the Kindle Store @ Amazon; immensely enjoying it. Have been wanting to read a “slice of life” type story like this for a while. Not every s/f book needs to have some giant battle sequence to be engaging. I’m finding myself really giving a damn about these characters and wondering where you’ll take them next.
“Full Share” thankfully turned up just as I was finishing “Half Share” back when. I’m trying to pace myself reading them, as I figure the rest of the series is slowly eeking out — is there a schedule of release for the rest of the Trader series in Kindle/eReader format?
Follow-up to my post above: sorry, just read your comment on another thread here at your site:
“The rest are in the pipeline for production over the next couple of years – one every six months. It seems slow when you’re waiting for the books, I know, but it’s fast when you’re trying to produce them.”
Ah, the joy of the deadline. (I work (some writing, some page layout) for engineering firms — civil/public works type submittals; got to say this is one of the reasons I find the environmental section of the ship so engaging; I work with guys who do this stuff all the time.)
Thanks, Ralph.
We’ve moved up to a four month schedule. Ridan is hiring some more help and they’re focusing on getting more books out faster.
Fingers crossed that you’ll have all three remaining Trader’s Tales by this time next year.
You’d probably find a hard core group of fans willing to proof read galleys Nate!
Just wanted you to know that I have purchased all the books you recommended above, all but the Starter (which I already had) was solely from your recommendations. Your recommendations do matter!