Eagles Over the Kennebec

This just in from Neilson Bookscan, for the week of June 10, 2015:

Dragon in Exile by Sharon Lee and Steve Miller hit the #9 slot for overall sales of science fiction books during the week of May 31, and! it was the #3 bestselling science fiction hardcover for the period, as well.

Baen's intrepid publicist lets us know that Dragon sold 100 more copies than Trade Secret during its first week released in the wild.

Thank you all!

Steve Miller and Sharon Lee talk with Baen Editor and Podcaster Tony Daniels about Dragon in Exile during the Baen Free Radio Hour today.  The podcast usually posts at noon.  Here's your link.

Enjoy!

We're having Quite the Wind Storm here in East Winslow.  How windy is it? Windy enough that the little traveling bytes are being battered against the sides of the intertubes and it took the colored Friday page for Girl Genius a full two minutes to load.

So, going against the wind, as we are, I  will quickly mention that Uncle Hugo's SF Bookstore in Minneapolis is now accepting pre-orders for personalized and signed copies of A Liaden Universe® Constellation, Volume 3*, to be published by Baen in August.  Here's your link to Uncle Hugo's ordering page, with instructions. Please note that there is an ordering deadline involved for those who want their book personalized, and that deadline is Wednesday, July 1, 2015.

Speaking of the Uncle, Mr. Blyly has mailed out all of the pre-ordered signed/personalized copies of Dragon in Exile, save a handful of "problem orders" which should be cleared and go out this week coming.  We've heard that some folks have received their books, so the system is working!

Speaking of Dragon in Exile, this morning's sales number for the Kindle edition stood at 1,799 (#25 in Kindle Store Space Opera; #26 in BOOKS Space Opera; #43 in Kindle Store Science Fiction), which is pretty cool.  We hear through the grapevine that Amazon is shipping the Dragon early, as well, so if, yanno, watch the skies!

Steve and I would like to thank all of you once again for your support and assistance.  Whether you are one of the kind people who has written a reader review on Amazon to give the new book that little extra push, contribute to our Patreon account, support Splinter Universe, read and recommend our books to your friends -- thank you.  There is no "just" in this effort, and no contribution is "too little;"  everything helps, and we're grateful for your time and your care.

I hope everybody has a great weekend.

___________

*Here's the Table of Contents for ALUC #3:

Foreword
Code of Honor
Guaranteed Delivery
Intelligent Design
Out of True
Roving Gambler
King of the Cats
Kin Ties
Eleutherios
The Rifle’s First Wife
The Space at Tinsori Light
Landed Alien
Moon’s Honor
Quick Working Glossary

Visited the vampires early this morning; afterwards moved on to Starbucks for mocha and bagel.  They were out of multigrain bagels so I had to be content with an Everything Bagel.  O! woe is me.

Home to find bills in the mail, and that the UPS account number, possession of which will magically get one cool dozen boxes of books out of my living room and on the bus to Minneapolis, is apparently none so easy to acquire.  Two fiddles at the UPS online form, one email to those who had provided the pre-paid labels, which do NOT include the account number, a third fiddle at the online form, one phone call to UPS, one phone call to the label providers, one more go at the online form, and we have ignition!  Boxes to be picked up no later than 3:00 today.

Yay.

I now await a call from yet another doctor's office, to let me know if the appointment set up for Wednesday is actually needed.  I'm not very much in charity with the doctor or her office at this particular moment, and if they fear being in my Black Book (as who would not?), they'll get cracking and give me a call-back.

Also, I am exhausted, which I blame on the vampires, and which is not useful at the moment, since I have work to do.  So!  I'll be arising from the comfy chair in just a moment to make a pot of coffee.

In other news, it's cloudy and cold in East Winslow, and, honestly, if it's going to be as cloudy and damp as all that, it might as well rain and have done.

And that?  Is all I got.

Everybody stay safe.

Procrastinators Take Note: You are at deadline.  This is not a test; this is an actual, real-world deadline.  Tomorrow, Friday, May 1, 2015.

Those of you who have been meaning to pre-order a signed and personalized copy of Dragon in Exile, the eighteenth novel in the Liaden Universe® by Sharon Lee and Steve Miller, the hour is upon you. Now is the time to go to Uncle Hugo's ordering page and order your book.  Use the blank box on your order form to type the personalized message you would like us to write in your book.  Be careful!  Proofread!  Because we will write exactly what you put in that box, unless:  (1) It is, in the sole judgment of the authors, too long, or (2) It offendeth us.

For those who do not desire a personalized book, but would like to have a signed edition -- carry on.  Uncle Hugo's will continue to take orders for signed copies until the signed copies are gone.  I believe that Mr. Blyly ordered in 200 copies, total.  They may go fast, or they may go slow, but when they're gone, there aren't any more.

For those who doubt that this fabled volume exists, here is proof:

All righty, then.

In other news, Argent the Wondercar, Steve's 2002 silver Subaru Forester was retired yesterday.  We'll be a one-car family for a bit, which has certainly been done before, while Other Things sort themselves out.  And the repercussions of Uncle Sam taking more than half of our last check of last year just keep on repercussing.  Gah.

Let's see, what else is doing?

Oh!

As illustrated above, our authors' copies of Dragon in Exile arrived yesterday, and a handsome book it is.

Several people have asked, and -- yes.  I will be doing an accountability post about Patreon just as soon as the first check comes down, for the illumination of donors, and also to assist anyone who may be thinking of setting up a Patreon account, but would like to see how things play out in Real Numbers.

Speaking of Patreon -- it's not very easy to find other Patreon accounts, unless I'm doing something really wrong.  I'd've thought there'd be a cross-referencing system of some kind, so that people who like to support bands, or writers, or artists could find more of the Sort of Stuff They Like, but it does not seem to be so.

I seem to have lost my pedometer, which. . .sort of sucks.  I hope Princess Sprite didn't knock it under the stove.  OTOH, I have a whole bunch of stuff to do while sitting down, so I guess it's not that much of a loss at the moment.

And!  The Question of the Hour:  Steve and I are starting to think about how we ought to structure our "book signings," which are actually events where we do a little performance, and then sign books.  Last time, we gave a history of the universe's publishing history, took questions and signed books.  I don't think we even read from the book -- which would have been Trade Secret.

So, the Question:  What should we talk about this time?  Or -- if you were coming to one of the stops on our book tour, what would you want or expect to hear?  Do you like author readings?  Is there something regarding the Liaden Universe® or the writing life that you'd particularly like to hear about?  Now is the time to put your question(s) forward.  We want your input.

. . .and now?  Time to turn off the internets and go to work.

Here -- have some cat pictures:

Dragon is Exile has now entered the Review Arena, by which I mean that reviews are beginning to appear in various venues, in anticipation of the June 2 manifestation of the Hardcover Itself.

We have, first, a review from Publishers Weekly, which is a very good venue in which to see your book reviewed.  Publishers Weekly -- aka PW -- is the weekly industry news magazine for the publishing industry.  It also reviews books (though not, by any means, All The Books).  Booksellers use PW reviews to choose stock; some libraries also choose new books from the PW review lists (though I hear nowadays more librarians are depending on Library Journal and not referencing PW -- is there an acquiring librarian in the house?  Can you tell me if this is correct?).

So, anyway, a PW review is a good thing, and a good PW review is doubleplusgood.

The whole review will appear in tomorrow's (April 13) edition of PW; I'm just going to excerpt some shiny bits here.

In Lee and Miller’s sprawling and satisfying 18th Liaden Universe novel (after Trade Secret), the spacefaring Clan Korval settles into its new home on the crime-ridden planet of Surebleak after being exiled from Liad.

Space opera mixes with social engineering, influenced by Regency-era manners and delicate notions of honor. For established fans, it’s like spending time with old friends; however, many ongoing story lines are still unresolved by the end of the book. Newcomers are advised to choose an earlier entry point to the series.

*stands back and considers the above*

Not bad.  Not bad, at all.

Oh, and about that "Newcomers are advised to choose an earlier entry point"?  We hear that a lot.  Mostly established fans, who have been reading along with us, are of the opinion that newbies cannot possibly comprehend the action in any new book you'd like to name (including those volumes that Steve and I wrote deliberately to be portal books) unless they start with Agent of Change and go forth, systematically, until they arrive at the new book.

They are, let me hasten to say, perfectly reasonable and within their rights to hold and express this opinion.

However.  Because this is How They've Done It, they don't have the perspective of a Brand New Reader coming to the universe for the first time with New Title Of Your Choice.  (I also lack this perspective -- but my perspective isn't that of a reader, either.)  Among other things, this insistence on starting from the beginning reveals a touching tenderness for the sensibilities and story-sense of new readers.

Steve and I, however, like to think that most people who seek out SFF as their reading drug of choice are tough, savvy readers, with an excellent sense of story and character, who can therefore come up to speed with frightening quickness, no matter how strange the terrain.

Occasionally, we're vindicated in our belief, as in the following review, from Otherwhere Gazette:

The 18^th book in the Liaden Universe®, Dragon in Exile, is as gripping as the rest most likely are.  Readers of the series will buy the book as a matter of course.  However, there are people (such as this reviewer) who have never read anything in this series.  The good news is that this book can stand alone quite well.  The bad news is that people (such as this reviewer) who pick this book up will now be on the hook for seventeen more books.

The new reader will be introduced to a complex cast of characters who will interact based in part on seventeen books worth of prior history.  However, the authors do paint their characters quite well.  It is quite easy to believe in and root for the characters without knowing the back story.

For folks who like their plots spare and their characters few, perhaps this is not the book.  But for those who like high adventure and fascinating cultures and plots and characters so intertwined that the book should be written on a mobius strip; here’s your book, the first of eighteen that you will buy.

You can read the whole review here

*smiles fondly at the above shiny bits*

I particularly like the moebius strip comment, because that's exactly what writing these five (well, OK, two, so far) books feels like, from here.

So! Today around the Cat Farm is Terrorizing the Cats (also known as vacuuming), washing dishes (gave that a miss, yesterday, in order to work with Padi), and packing what I hope will be the last box of papers to go to the archives.  Also, writing.

It's a clear and sunny day here at the Confusion Factory.  If it's not too windy, I may even go for a walk.

I hope everyone's enjoying a pleasant Sunday.

So, Steve and I have taken to stating what we'd like -- or not like -- to have in our new house, if-and-when.

For instance:  In our next house, the telephone will not be in Sharon's office.

Until that happens, however, the telephone is in my office, and yesterday the damned thing just would not stop.  I'm not a big fan of phones as things to talk to other people with on the best of days, but yesterday, I needed to work.  Letting the call go to "voicemail" (aka, the answering machine) doesn't help much, because --?

Yep, the answering machine is in my office, too.

Sigh.

Despite the annoyances of various calls, I did get about 1,500 words written well before 5:00, my "traditional" starting time, which left plenty of time to clean the bathroom, and then read the first 50 pages of the page proofs for Dragon in Exile, which landed in my inbox yesterday morning -- and produced a distraction of its own, as the black ink ran out about 70 pages short of the finish line, and --?

I was out of black ink.

I'm NEVER out of black ink, being kind of obsessive about making sure I always have one spare of each ink cartridge.  I suspect Sprite took the last cartridge to print out the most recent draft of her memoirs, A Most Fair and Puissant Princess, and failed to write "ink" on the list.

To be fair, princesses don't write "ink" -- or anything else -- on lists, and it's really too bad of me to expect her to undertake such menial tasks.  This is what she has minions for, after all.

Luckily, Steve's computer had ink in it, and so the last pages were printed.  I then checked to see if Sprite had left us any red pens and sticky notes, but those supplies are up to war levels.

Here's what's up today, then, at the Confusion Factory:

More coffee!

Write!

More coffee!

Proof!

. . .that oughta keep me out of trouble.

After reading yesterday's post, reproduced below, lots of people rushed off to pre-order their signed and/or personalized copy of Dragon in Exile from Uncle Hugo's.

This is very gratifying.  Thank you.

But!

It came to the attention of Mr. Blyly, who may, in this instance, be understood to stand in for Uncle himself, that, in the happy rush of ordering, some folks who usually ask for personalizations (yes, Mr. Blyly notices this, because he's that good) -- didn't.

So!  What I'm going to do is ask you to read the instructions carefully and don't let excitement carry you away.

We're going to do a practice run, now.  Please read the information below, and act according to your needs and estate.

1.  If you want your book signed and personalized, you must write your requested personalization in the box provided on the order form.  You must write the requested message EXACTLY as you want the authors to write it, so be sure to check for spelling errors.  Also, the authors reserve the right to not personalize a book, if the personalization requested is, in the authors' sole judgment, too long, or offensive.

1a.  If you want your book personalized, but you don't put the personalization in the box on the order form?  You're gonna get a book that the authors have written their names in.  Period.

2.  If you have already pre-ordered a book, and you wanted it personalized, but you forgot to fill in the box?  You may direct an email to Mr. Blyly at unclehugoATaolDOTcom with Dragon Personalization in the subject line, and your requested personalization in the body of the email.

I want to thank everybody for your interest in, and support of, our work.  We're very pleased to be able to provide signed books to those who want them; it adds an air of festival and sharing to the process of seeing our book published.

* * *

Original blog post follows, with link

As promised, Uncle Hugo's Science Fiction Bookstore in Minneapolis, will be -- is! -- taking pre-orders for signed and personalized copies of Dragon in Exile, the 18th novel entry in the Liaden Universe®, the history of same having been faithfully recounted by Sharon Lee and Steve Miller, Chroniclers of Korval since Nineteen-Aught-Eighty-Eight.

Be aware that there is a deadline in play!  Personalized copies (in which "personalized" means that you ask the authors to write something in addition to their names in your book) must be pre-ordered by May 1.

Pre-orders for signed copies (in which "signed" means that the authors wrote their names in your book, period), will be taken until all the books are gone.

Here's your link to pre-order personalized and/or signed copies of Dragon in Exile.

So, in reference to the latest PSA, someone asked this, seemingly simple, question:

Uh, you DO have one more "Theo book" coming along some day, don't you?

The answer to this question is. . . not simple.  Not only is it not simple, I'm not certain I can adequately explain what we're attempting with this sequence of five books, of which Dragon in Exile is the first.  Possibly, I could explain it. . .less disjointedly. . .to another writer (who isn't Steve), but readers and writers are separated by the fundamentals that bring us together:  writers write; readers read.

So, I'm going to try to explain what we're doing; apologies in advance if it makes no sense as you read it here.  We trust that the execution will be more illuminating.

. . .

Steve and I are now embarked on the writing of, as stated above, a sequence of five novels.  These five novels, in their entirety, are the. . .sequel, if you will, to I Dare and to Dragon Ship, in particular.  Discerning readers will have noticed that there are many people in play, and many. . .unsettled situations left at the end of those two novels.  You will also notice that there are several. . .Big Problems still on the board to be solved.

Solving those Big Problems is going to take the combined talents of All of Those Characters.  (Even Rys, who, when "his" book was pitched, was never intended to survive his redemption.) Theo, for instance, can't solve All the Problems by herself.  Theo doesn't even know what All the Problems are.

(We, ourselves, don't see Theo and her adventures as being a spin off books.  In our view, Theo is very much entangled in the troubles that were introduced in Agent of Change, and which have only gotten more tangled since.)

The only way that we can proceed, being the writers that we are, is to continue as we began, and braid the character and story arcs until we reach the Thrilling Conclusion.

What this means is that it's extremely doubtful that we will be writing a one character/one problem novel within the Five Book Dash.  The reason we pitched five intertwined novels is that we knew we couldn't reasonably cope with all the necessary characters and arcs in one novel, and to write another Theo novel at this point in the Universe. . .would be cheating.

So, we've broken the characters and the problems out into sets, all aimed at the Thrilling Conclusion.  Some characters will move through several novels.  Some will vanish on a mission, and not be seen. . .for a while.  This will probably produce some very odd books and some folks will grow impatient with us for writing endless stories where "nothing happens".  (Just got our first reader review of Dragon. . . in which the novel is described as being an unending series of lunches, tea breaks, and dinners in the snowy summer of Surebleak.)  We expect to see some readers lose patience.  We hope that most of you will stick with us.  We really think that we can pull this off, and that ultimate arrival will be worth the journey.

. . .that's all I've got.

And now I need to go to work.

Today is your lucky day.