Cross-posted from NaNoForums:
Ooh, but goals. Today? Lunch. What shall I go eat for lunch? This week is “Teel doesn’t bring a lunch from home” week, I think.
Bigger goals? Loosely related to years, but mostly because they’re big goals. So, like, I have these multi-tiered, interworking and inter-dependent goals … like … let me see if I can write one down:
In 2005 I shall get a literary agent to represent my work to “real” publishers.
UNLESS I can get a substantial volume of book sales through the internet and face-to-face sales through other means such that it represents enough money to “get by”.
With the following other conditional layers:
I will do my best to get an agent to represent me, preferably within the next six months.
I will not submit my books to publishers myself – most do not take unagented work, and those that do often will not work with an agented author whose work they have already seen.
If I get to 10 finished books before I have a signed publishing contract with an established publisher, I shall simply form a new publishing company/imprint – this is complicated but not actually difficult. ((So, establish an appropriate company/LLC/whatever (I’ll research what is most appropriate), buy ISBNs, contract work with a printer/bindary, and negotiate with one or both of the two major distributors, then it’s just a matter of getting book stores everywhere to carry the books, right? Hah! At that point, that will seem easy. I’ll surely have already spoken to the owners of other small press publishers by then about how they do it, and yadda yadda yadda, I hope it doesn’t come to that. I don’t want to run a business – I want to write books.))
Actual writing and book-creating-related goals to follow:
Untrue Tales From Beyond Fiction (UTFBF) minimums:
UTFBF Book Two, Pre-Release Edition (PRE), in print by Feb 28th.
UTFBF Book Three, PRE, in print before June.
UTFBF Book Four, PRE, in print before September.
“First Edition” UTFBF Books 1-3, before NaNo2005.
Also before NaNo2005:
Write a universal “About the Author” for all Modern Evil Press (MEP) books, do another pass at copyediting all MEP books, try to get an afterword for tVC, update all source files for books online.
Make all MEP books available in easy to get to, easy to read “e-books” with the same contents as the print books.
Select appropriate excerpts from each MEP book, make excerpts and descriptions just as easily accessible online as the books and e-books.
Design uniform cover elements for use across all MEP titles, perhaps including a standard font for my name, a mini-bio with photo, and the ME logo on the back and the spine both, plus an appropriate space for future ISBN/barcode.
Look into what whole Library of Congress thing, see what that’s about.
Also, something I’m thinking about doing once I have a more satisfactory public face (ie: easily accessible author bio, novel excerpts, e-books, et cetera on the website) is order a BIG order of my books and send them all over with a “Press Kit” that explains the new publishing paradigm my books are available through, see if I can generate interest online that way. Even a bad review is good if it gets people to look at the website, maybe tell a friend. Is it possible to turn myself into a meme?
And now i’m babbling, because my blood sugar is low. Lunch in 30.
