Some interesting insights from yesterday’s convention activity. There’s more fun in store today.
Yesterday’s Word Count: 0
Today’s Starting Count: 19,321
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- ROBERT EVANS on Day 2754: Day Not Found
- ROBERT EVANS on Day 2753: Untitled For Some Reason
- Nate on Day 2752: Was A Sunny Day
- Robert Willey on Day 2752: Was A Sunny Day
- Robert Evans on Day 2745: Busy Day
I know what you mean about mainstream authors not only not “getting it,” but not even seeing it. They really do seem to be in their own little cocoon and I don’t think that will change anytime soon. Their numbers will probably stay about the same even when their sales move more and more into ebooks from physical copies because their publishers set the prices are the same (or extremely similar). In fact, I have to wonder if their sales will actually drop. Almost no one I know that reads ebooks will pay over a certain price for one. Now that price varies depending on the person, but not one of them will pay this $12.99 crap I keep seeing on amazon.
I nearly forgot! I don’t think you should beat yourself up over the early Share novels. They writing might not be as mature/developed as the later books, but they served a great purpose–to develop Ishmael as a character. When I think about it, that really is what they really did. I would have felt a lot less invested in the story without those early novels.
Besides, a pretty large audience enjoyed them–they can’t be too bad.
Hear hear!
I’m damned glad you can’t go back and change history such that you never released the first 3 share books!
I love those books.
My wife (who doesn’t care for most of the podiobooks I listen to) loves those books.
A bunch of people I’ve introduced to them love those books.
… and, as Tony says, they develop the character of Ishmael. Indeed, I’d say that the last 3 books would not make anywhere near as much sense without the first 3 to build the universe and the character.
1) Vernor Vinge? *SQUEEEEEEE* Ok, I actually prefer his ex-wife’s Winter Queen/Summer Queen series of books, but his take on what the Singularity might mean, as well as his libertarian views, makes him one of my go-to authors.
2) David Dvorkin? *SQUEEEE* Not quite as big a squee, but I remember The Trellisane Confrontation when it came out. However, I’m glad he’s getting back into the writing game. I’m kind of surprised your server hasn’t melted down with people looking you up, though, from that panel.
3) Re the woman who’s royalty statements say her e-book sales are 25% of her paper sales – Perhaps she could have used a nudge towards KKR’s blog posts on royalty statements, e-books, and the Big Publishers?
4) I kind of suspect your name is going to be circulating in the background, and you won’t get passed over next year for panels & such. I doubt you’ll actually have to pay your way in, even. That, or you’ll be met at the door by two big guys in suits saying “We don’t want YOUR kind in here.”
*Giggle*.
Oh, I knew there was a 5) there somewhere…
5) Personally, I felt 1-3 were *stronger* than 4-6, in the Share series. Double Share was still pretty good – yes, there’s going to be conflict in Ish’s life, but Captain’s Share felt like the Ish we knew from the first three books was gone – he’d lost something, along the way. Owner’s Share completed that downwards slide, and … a lot of aspects of it felt very trite and over-done, much the way a formula romance from Harlequin or Silhouette makes you feel like someone has a program they use where they input hero name, heroine name, bad guy name, setting, and punch “Create Story”. Now, I know from what Mercedes Lackey has written on the subject that it’s not quite *THAT* easy in the formula romances, but still… If you read one, it’s not because you’re trying to figure out the ending, it’s because you want something that doesn’t really take any thinking to figure out.
I couldn’t disagree more about Owner’s Share.
I think it’s an excellent book. Do I like it more than the first 3? No. Is it as fun? No. It’s a harder book to listen to/read. Is it better? I don’t know. Is it good? Heck yes!
It is possible you have to look harder to see the essence of Ishmael.
It is possible that more is between the lines (though, really, that’s always the way in Nathan’s books).
It’s possible you may not find the ending satisfactory or in character — though I think it was precisely in character for Ishmael. At the risk of verging a little close to spoiler territory, I think his reaction was every bit as subtle, as textured, and as moving as Zoe’s at the conclusion of a certain Joss Whedon movie.
I think if you thought it was cookie cutter you weren’t really listening. That and I fail to understand how it can be both nothing like the others and following the formula simultaneously.
Ishmael in character, perhaps. However, the formula it was following was not the previous books, but other books of the “more commercial” mindset. For what it was, the ending was done well – though I felt a bit too much was left unsaid about the final depositions of things (at some point, it was commented that I should have gotten an idea what happened about the ship due to the way Miss Malone was dressed – but she was in a business suit – and *ANY* direction the story had taken would have required a meeting with the DTS board – and the required uniform for such a meeting is a business suit. She could have been telling the Board she was taking over, she could have been telling them she was selling out and going to cook for Ish for the rest of her life – or any number of things – and they would *ALL* have likely meant she returned to the ship in a business suit.)
And a more commercial mindset is not bad, really – it just loses something.
Perhaps the first books were formulaic as well – the formula of Horatio Hornblower and Nicholas Seafort – but it is a much rarer formula to be implemented these days. I’m still left wondering what Capt. Gigonne’s hurry was to get him off the ship and sent to Port Newmarr.