Update on Amazon/Kindle Exclusivity

I have a longer and more analytic post coming up in a good while regarding this topic, but I just thought I'd let you all know now. I'm getting out of Kindle Select, and Kindle Unlimited, as soon as I can. I'll put the Dark Lust books into it for one period and then let them fall out, if only because I planned a few freebie giveaways of the first book. I'll advertise those via the newsletter if you're interested.

Basically, in spite of releasing new material for the first time in over 6 months, my sales are stagnating and very, very unreliable. And somehow, joining Kindle Select seems to have done something to the rest of my titles. Their rankings have all sunk like a rock. On top of all this, I haven't managed to get anywhere near enough borrows to compensate for not releasing the stories on other vendors.

If I sound a little annoyed, it's because I am. Not at anyone, I suppose. Just at me. For doing this stupid thing. In any case, once the Dark Lust series has had its time in Kindle Select, I'll be putting them up on other sites. This means that April and May will see a good deal more publishing activity than otherwise scheduled, though it'll just be releasing stuff that's already on Amazon.

To conclude: I won't be continuing with Amazon exclusivity once the Dark Lust series is concluded. It has turned out to not be worth it in the slightest.

Publishing Schedule (Jan-May)

One of the things I wanted to do in this new year was plan and schedule more. Try to treat writing with more professionalism. Build consistency. In order to give myself time to build this up properly, release schedule was reduced to once every 2 weeks. To accomplish it, I also planned my releases well into the future. Because of that, I can now give you the schedule for story releases in the first part (Winter/Spring) of 2015.

January:
--11th: 10-story bundle (Dickgirls #1)
--25th: Spiritbound (Dark Lust #1)

February:
--8th: Forestbound (Dark Lust #2)
--22nd: Soulbound (Dark Lust #3)

March:
--8th: Starbound (Dark Lust #4)
--22nd: Homebound (Dark Lust #5)

April:
--5th: Enslaved (Stand-alone title)
--19th: Lustgirl (Dickgirl Decorum #3)

May:
--3rd: Dark Lust bundle (1-5)
--17th: Stand-alone title (Sexy librarian cheating erotica! No title, yet)
--31st: Dickgirl Decorum bundle (1-3)

June:
--14th: Part 1 of a new series. It's going to involve a princess, that's all I can say right now. Still in the idea phase.



Notes: As you can see, if you'd prefer to get a bit more value for money, you can hold off on buying my titles until the bundles release. It just involves waiting, which depends on whether you -can- wait for my awesome writings or not. :d

Typically the bundle will be about 1½ month after the final title of the series releases, but it can vary. Also, while bundles likely won't be in Kindle Unlimited, they will still be Amazon exclusive due to the stories within being, well, Amazon exclusive. For now, at least.

Lastly, the schedule of one story every 2 weeks is not necessarily permanent. I am trying to build up a solid backlog to defend against real life happening, and to give time for longer projects down the line. Anything written once I have a solid 6-month buffer will instead be inserted into the schedule on no-release Sundays. Sadly, this is unlikely to happen until around July at the absolute earliest. In all likelihood, it's something that may happen moving into autumn and winter again.

My primary concern remains eliminating those stupid 6-month periods of no content published. And while it sucks in the moment, in the middle of waiting, I'm sure you also appreciate a steady stream of content from me. Even if my life should turn upside down, you won't be impacted.

To KU, Or Not To KU

That is, was, the question. I'm very glad that I have the sales I do outside of amazon, and on the good months they've reached somewhere closing on 10% of my sales. But I speak with other erotica writers too, and it seems like KU is a benefit for our kind. The short stories don't suffer as much in terms of royalties as novels do.

So... While it pains me to do it to the few but very loyal readers I have outside of Amazon, I think I'm going to put the upcoming series into Kindle Unlimited. This means it'll be in the KDP Select program, which requires exclusivity with Amazon. In other words, the series won't be going up on Smashwords, Kobo, B&N, Google, and so on.

I've heard from readers who aren't able to use amazon, and that sucks. If you're one of those and want to read the stories anyway, you have two options. Leave a comment beneath the publishing blog post of each part of the series with a way that I can send it to you, or send me an email requesting a copy. Both of those methods will, of course, be free for you. You can find my email on the "Contact" page.

Being in KDP Select isn't a permanent thing. You dedicate to it 90 days at a time. If it turns out that KU isn't an improvement for me, you can expect my stories to be pulled from it and put up on other vendors. If it is an improvement, then that's going to be my default from here on out. I'm leaving all my current work up on all vendors, though. Arguably they could benefit from going Amazon exclusive as well, but it doesn't really feel right to yank it all away.

Ultimately, while I want to make a living off writing eventually, I do it as much for you guys, the readers, as I do it for me. I'm feeling a bit iffy about KU due to this, but at certain points you do have to approach your business as a business, and see what's best for it. This is one of those times. I will say, though, that  KU will have to be very good to me for it to become a permanent thing. I don't feel good leaving those without access to Amazon out to dry.

Now, on to other news! The bundles are done with, and it is time to go on to new things. On the 25th, the first part of the new series will go live on Amazon. I hope you're looking forward to new content from me! And, just in case you didn't catch it, you can read an excerpt from the beginning of the story here.

2015, Looking In

A new year typically comes with resolutions. I plan to do x. I plan to do y. I have those as well. I have tried very hard to keep my goals for 2015 realistic, and that is why I will share them with you now.

My base goal for the year is to publish 1 short story or bundle every other week. This should result in 26 stories, and leave me at 50 published works at the end of 2015. In other words, you can expect a steady trickle of work from me, rather than an avalanche and then a wall of silence.

This goal of publishing a short story every 2 weeks is actually fairly modest. I haven't calculated the average length of my published short stories, but let's just say that it's around 7500 words. Forgetting for a moment that some of the 26 titles will be bundles, this leaves me at around 200k words for the year. That's the equivalent of 1-3 novels, depending on the genre of the novel.

Based on past writing speed, I could write 200k words in roughly 4 months. That's being realistic. I could write it quicker, but this writing thing is a marathon and not a race. That leaves 8 months technically free. What are those 8 months for, then?

This year, they're for finishing up remaining commission work. They're for starting a fantasy novel, or just writing more erotica because I'm not quite confident enough in myself as a writer to believe people would read my stuff without the sex. Definitely writing more erotica, then. Or those months can just be for relaxing, because I seem to be a binge writer. The point is, I set a manageable base goal, and anything beyond that will be a bonus both to me and to you lovely readers.

I set myself up for failure last time around, and I'm trying hard not to do the same now. I -want- to publish a story a week. Heck, I want to publish 5 stories a week. But I know that if I try, I will succeed for a few weeks or months, and then crash and burn. No one wants that, least of all me.

For now, look forward to a 10-story bundle coming this Sunday, and then a 5-part Fantasy Erotica series. After that, who knows. The Dickgirl Decorum series never got finished, but it deserves to be. It will be. And honestly, I want to write more series right now. I have a bunch of good ideas, and it's really just a question of getting time to write them.

Stories. Stories! STORIES!

As I write this, a few days earlier than when it will be released (I have a final project to turn in, don't hate), I'm quite sick. That sucks, but in a way, it's also why I want to do one of the things I'll talk about here.

Story Schedule: In the past, I was on a rather heavy schedule of 1 story a week, plus whatever commission work I had. Some might scoff at that. 1 story a week, pfh. But in the end, everyone functions best at different levels. Along with a bunch of real life trouble, I ended up simply wildly overestimating my own productivity. So... From now on, I will release one story every 2-4 weeks. I'll endeavor to make it every 2 weeks, but at least for now, I have commission work to catch up on, and more importantly, the below.

Story Backlog: I used to have one of these. And then, for various reasons and over time, it evaporated. That, really, was the nail in the coffin. Coupled with me being a binge writer, I quite simply need to place more of an emphasis on having a backlog of stories. Yes, this means that my releases will be slower, but it also means that they will be steady. When life strikes again, like right now where I'm sick, I won't just fall off the edge of the earth. There'll still be a new story at the minimum every month.

So, this is the new thing. The new promise. 1 story from Maria a month, EVERY month. And yeah, sometimes every 2 weeks, when I can. It'll take months to build up a steady backlog, so I'm afraid people will have to be a bit patient until I have that built up.

On Series & Stand-alones

Last week, I mentioned that I would begin focusing on writing series instead of stand-alone short stories. I'll explain a little more about that today, and also provide a little information on the upcoming series at the end.

So, when I first started writing, there were several factors that kept me away from writing series:

First, having been around some writers that treated writing erotica in a very mercenary way, mirroring stories and generally just focusing on the money to the exclusion of all else, I wanted to move away from that. I saw a series as a cheap way to draw readers in, because humans have a natural need to finish things.

If you've started a series (or just one book), you will want to finish it. Even if it isn't the best thing you've ever read. That made writing series feel manipulative. This is, in the end, hogwash. Not that we want to finish things, but that it's necessarily bad. We just come to care about characters and want to see what happens to them.

Second, I feared that either I or readers would get bored of writing a series, and either or both would end up disappointed. When I instead wrote a large amount of varied stand-alone stories, I tried to appeal to as many subsets of readers as I could, forgetting of course that if they only like one or a few of my stories, I'm doing them a disservice anyway. In some sense.

What actually ended up happening, of course, was that I only wrote on a given series once a month, and therefore had a lot of trouble making them flow naturally. I had to get into the story again all over every time I wrote them.

Third, I felt there was some value in exploring more characters, settings and stories in general. There is, to be sure, but I very often felt hampered by the length that I had to stick to in each story. Multiple stories I've written almost begged, in my mind, for a sequel. And perhaps more. But I moved on. I wanted to appeal to more people. I wanted to never get bored.

What I've learned after considering these opinions is that, well, I was focusing too much on the downsides of series, real or imagined, and not giving myself a chance to see what I could do if I actually focused on a series. There's also the unavoidable fact that readers like series. I don't think there's any shame in writing what readers like. Anything else inevitably leads to useless navel-gazing. So, to conclude: I will be trying out writing series for now. At least for a few months. And if the glove fits, I'll continue. If it doesn't, I'll try something else.

The first series I'll try will be fantasy-erotica with a solid story to go along with it. With fantasy comes magic, and in this world, at least in this particular place and for the people I'll be writing of, magic and the ability to wield it is connected with sex. The story will, as is par for the course with me, be Futa/F. Right now, I have no idea how many installments there'll be. That depends on where the story goes as I write, to some degree. And it depends on reader response.

Flame Off, Flame On

Phew. So, what happened? I'll write a little on the matter for the benefit of those interested.

Right when I was burning the brightest, I flamed out. It was a culmination of a lot of things, I think. Debt, months of pressure, uncertain living conditions... A bunch of stuff. I just caved, and completely shut off the writing side of myself for a good while. And I did this, of course, while I was in the middle of rising. Admittedly July was worse than June, but even so. I was selling an amount of stories a month that amounted to ridiculous (for me). Something tantalizingly close to what I could live off.

I've let down readers and commissioners, and I've also let down myself. I tried to do too much, for too long. Writing became a chore instead of something I loved. Not because I was writing too much, at all, but because of the pressure I was under with real life. It -had- to succeed. And in a lot of respects, it did. But I couldn't quite carry the weight personally.

So, here we are. I have an education to see to for the next year and a half at least. I have a steady living for that time too, at least. I've found the passion for writing I had, but this time, I won't be writing to live, I'll be writing because I love doing it. And when or if I should ever get to live off writing, I won't be starting from nothing.

There won't be weekly stories, at least not for now. It's something I'll re-evaluate every now and again. The next time will likely be after this semester's exams in January. But, for now, my focus is a healthy balance, catching up on commissioned work, and releasing a modest 1 story a month. I should like to release more eventually, but commissioned work will come first.

I stumbled and fell, but rose and dusted myself off again. Hopefully I've taken a few lessons with me from this incident.

1) Commissions will be shut down. I will finish the current work, and will from then on, for the foreseeable future, not take on further work. Perhaps in the future, short work will be a possibility.

2) I will be focusing more on writing series, likely to the near-exclusion of stand-alone work. I'll write a more in-depth blog post on this topic in the near future.

3) Fighting for my financial life is not conducive to a good writing environment. My finances are taken care of for a year and a half, for now, but what the future brings is, of course, hard to tell. In any case, I will supplement with temp work and the like in future rather than madly try to stay purely a writer.

4) Rather than 1 story a week, as said above, I will instead commit to a minimum of 1 story a month. This is likely also something I'll write a separate blog post about.

5) I let my back log of stories dissipate, and didn't have enough writing time to build it back up again. For writing to be sustainable for me, this can't happen. This is the main reason for point 1, and a big contributing reason for 4. I'll write more about this in the same blog post that point 4 will be expanded on.

Darknest: A Dark Fantasy Anthology

Amazon US | Smashwords | Kobo 

This is a bit of a milestone for me. I'm participating in my first multi-author bundle! All of the authors in this bundle come from the same little corner of the internet that I do. A site called Darknest. It started out as a hub of all things related to WoW erotica. Stories, art, screenshot manipulation, ads for people to find partners, but has since expanded into a bunch of other online games. It's a regular old community now, though WoW is still it's main thing.

In the many years since Darknest started, it has gone through multiple sets of owners and moderators, yet the community has endured and, for the most part, grown stronger and stronger. This bundle is a way for the participating authors to pay a little back to the place where most of them started posting their stories. As such, all profit (Until a certain limit that I don't expect we'll hit) generated from the bundle goes towards Darknest's upkeep.

The bundle contains one of my stories, A Different Prince Charming, and 6 other stories. There's even USA Today bestselling authors in there. I'm in fine company. Anyway, the shared theme is dark erotica, though the specifics vary. There are orcs, shifters, demons and more. I should note, as well, that the only Futa/F story in the bundle is mine. Just a heads up to my very loyal readers who prefer that particular niche.

If the bundle looks interesting to you, pick it up! It's cheap, and great value. Heck, even if you only want it for one of the stories in there, it's cheaper than getting that story on its own. And even if you don't want to spend the money, but think the bundle looks interesting, please consider sharing its launch with your friends. A good launch means everything for these sorts of bundles. :)

I'll be back this Sunday with this week's release, Lost In The Wilds.

One Year In

Purity Taken.

Exactly one year ago, I published my very first ebook, Purity Taken. Incidentally, this is also my 100th post on this blog. Anyway. I allowed myself lofty expectations that I knew were unrealistic, back then. I wrote an awful lot of drivel about writing on this very blog, when I really had little idea what I was doing, and certainly wasn't in a position where I should be advising anyone. Hell, I'm still not in a position now where you should listen to anything I say, really. Other than when I say I've published something new. You should listen to that.

I have learned a lot over this one year, and I know I will continue to learn more. About writing, about self-publishing, and about the ever-changing publishing business. I learned the value of non-shitty covers. (See below)

It feels as if I have been at this far longer than I really have, too. I'm not sure why. I know that it's not unusual to spend many years, decades even, for some writers, without being successful. I suppose I had the hope and dream that I would not be one of those waiting a decade.

I'm not so certain about that one anymore, mainly because I'm not sure what to qualify as success anymore. Making a living as a writer? I can do that right now, thanks to gradually increasing sales and a generous commissioner whom I appreciate very much. Am I successful simply for receiving payment for my work? Obviously I do that. I'm fairly sure Stephen King qualified anyone who got paid for their writing, whether once or multiple times, as a writer. I write what I love, and that's really what matters in the end, I guess. Not the amount of money on my bank account. So I suppose I am a success. I can still be more of a success, though.

The thing is, I have difficulty quantifying a goal. Originally, I wanted to make a living writing when I was

Aphrodax

thirty. Here I am, still 3 years away from that, and I'm making a living. What is the goal then? To make more? To write a bestseller? That's out of my control. All I can do is to keep writing and writing. In the end, I don't think there is a goal. Probably just the journey. Keep writing, keep publishing, keep improving, keep living off being an author.

With all that said, though, I love looking at my sales. I'm not sitting in an office handling someone else's crap, no offense to any manure dealers out there, I'm watching something I've crafted myself be bought and (I should hope) enjoyed. There's an entirely different feeling to that than working in an office. Which I did. It was what cemented in my mind that writing was what I had to do in life. But with this, I've had a direct hand in everything sold. I'm at a point where I think I understand the joy of creating more. And it took business to really push that into my mind. Other people are seeing my work and liking it. How awesome is that? Seriously. That's awesome. And Strange.

Of course, it doesn't get any less awesome when you see what has happened after I got my act together again in mid February and started the process that has now seen me release a story or bundle every week since the start of March. You can see the effect it had for yourself, right here:

That graph only counts sales as a number, too. A bundle is worth more than a short, obviously. But still only counts as 1 sale on that graph. As you can see, effort really does equal reward. I think I open that graph almost every day (Even if I only update it once a week) just to kick myself mentally at that long, 6-month break I had with publishing. Where could I have been today if I hadn't had that break? It's difficult to say. And it doesn't help anything to wonder. Still, it makes me a little sad and annoyed. It also makes me lucky, because I have read many authors out there who waited until they were well into their 40s, 50s or 60s with writing. They feel like they've wasted time, too. I'm not even 30.

What does the future hold that'll help me prevent such a 6-month breakdown from happening again? I can't say 100% for sure, of course, but I've already decided that I will keep this 1 short a week schedule up for at least a full year. By next March I should have 50+ works out there, and I should be able to make a real judgment of how I'm doing as an author by then. If I'm making a living (800-1000 sales/month minimum) or on my way to it, sweet. I'll probably keep the 1 story/week stuff up in that case. Probably until the end of 2015, anyway. I want to get into writing novels eventually. Not necessarily erotica novels, either. Fantasy. Under another pen name, of course.

I do know that if it turns out I can't live on writing then, I'll have to move to a place with lower living expenses. Writing is all I can do to live. Which is why I'm doing it. The "Don't write if you can do anything else" adage is probably really a reference to that. Writing for a living isn't "worth it" if you can do anything else. If you can be satisfied doing something else. Me, I can't.

Anyway, let me take stock a little. I've released over 20 stories so far, amounting to almost but not quite 2 a month over this last year. Really, though, I released 4 stories in the first 8 months and the remaining in the last 4. A few bundles and a lot of short stories. I feel like I'm beginning to get a little traction. And I feel like every month, every week's release, brings me a little closer to some immaterial dream of "making it" as an author.

I know I've abolished most of this touchy-feely crap on the blog for a while, now. I don't intend to change that. But since this is a special one-time post, I'll allow myself to delve into it just for a moment. I've had my problems. Everyone does. An up-and-down (No innuendo, now) depression since around the time I was 14, give or take a year. I'm 27 now, and it's still going. Especially now, these last few weeks, I've felt a real downturn. It's the reason I've been quiet. It's the reason why I didn't release anything last week. I don't think the depression will ever go away, though this episode will pass. I've accepted that, in a way, even as I work daily to improve my state of mind and my life. And writing, well, it's cathartic. It's the real reason I do this. It keeps me sane in a way that working in an office never could.

So I guess I want to round this post off by saying that.. I might be in a little trouble right now, but don't worry. I will come back. Writing is what I want and have to do. It's the only thing I -can- do.

I hope to be writing a similar post to you again in another year.

May Publishing Schedule & Your Opinion: Newsletter

First, a brief update. My titles are now available on Google Play! Check individual posts for links, if you're interested. The individual books can now be found much more easily with my swanky new books page. Anyway.

A proper newsletter may be incoming soon, but for now I'm still considering my options with regards to P.O Boxes and frequency of the newsletter. On one hand, I want to use it to alert my fans of my new work whenever it's published. On the other, I can't help but wonder if a weekly newsletter more or less just to say "Look at the new story I wrote" and not much else might be a bit too much. I don't know, and I have precious few places to get feedback.

I'm considering two models, and I would love feedback on either. In comments or mail.

One. Weekly newsletter, probably with a freebie or discounted title and the week's new release. This is good because it helps me get more eyes on a title when it's released, and it's also good because it prompts me to do more freebies/sales. Which benefits my readers! It's bad because, well, one newsletter a week. Would you feel like that'd be too spammy?

Two. Monthly newsletter, definitely with a freebie and one or more discounted titles, and both the past month's releases and the upcoming month's schedule. This is good because I won't be sending quite as many mails at people. I don't know if a weekly newsletter counts as spam, though. I'm uncertain, and that's really why I'm considering this option at all.

I'll keep pondering. Without further ado, the titles to be released in May.

May Releases:
4th: Another Rose (Virtual Me: Book Three) - Futanari/F, Submission, Oral
11th: Prayers of Perversion - Futanari/F, Clergy, Exhibitionism
18th: Caught Short - Futanari/F, Menage, Anal, Coercion
25th: Princess Sophie - Futanari/F, Monster, Dubcon, Breeding

Notes: After the hand injury I mentioned in last month's schedule and burning my finger in the middle of April, it was a bit of a struggle to catch back up on writing. As a result, my wordcount for April is not quite as impressive as I'd like, but at least I've got the stories I need done ready. And I'm also finally settling into a good groove.

On the sales front, I've seen a relatively steady increase. I'm uncertain if that's because of making Roguish Delight free earlier in the month, or just a result of having more titles out. Still a long way from making a living just from self-publishing, but it's going in the right direction. I doubt anyone's too interested in my gushing about sales and spreadsheet graph porn though, so I'll end it here. I hope May's stories are enjoyed by all. As always, check back on Sundays for specifics and links to the given story. :)

Goals

First, brief note. Roguish Delight is now permafree on Amazon as well! It has been quite popular these last few days.

Brief note 2: A Different Prince Charming got reviewed by the wonderful Sylvia Storm!

One of my unspoken goals for this year was to sell more than I did last year. Now, granted, I only sold 160 copies of the 4 ebooks I released last year. It should seem easy to outdo that. And as it turns out, yes, it was fairly easy. In fact, the first week of April saw me sell the same amount of copies that I did in my best month in 2013. And that's awesome. The first week of April was also the week where I got to 165 sales for 2014.

Maybe Aphrodax is just that awesome, or maybe my release schedule is starting to work, or maybe I have enough of a body of work out there that I'm being found more easily... I don't know what it is, exactly. But things are going better. I'm feeling justified in this publish once a week thing. The second week of April managed to outdo the first, too. In moments of weakness, I'm allowing myself to feel vaguely optimistic about this "career."

My second goal is more ambitious and long term. It is to sell 500 copies a month by the end of the year. In order to accomplish that, I need to sell around 47 more copies each month until December is over. It means, for example, that the 81 sales of my very successful March was just a first step. This month, the goal is to end up at 127 sales. I was on target the first week with 31, and the second week of April managed to squeeze a few more sales than that out. I doubt it'll last, though.

Perhaps growing to 500 sales a month in 1 year is too ambitious for a writer who pretty much only creates work in one relatively small subgenre. Futanari, if anyone should be in doubt. Maybe it is. At any rate, even if my sales should stagnate at 30-40 a week, that's still good enough to continue paying for covers. It's not enough to live (At least not in Copenhagen), but it's something.

Might as well reach for the stars. Even if you fall short, you still got pretty far.

Oh, and, I wrote my first police story. It's coming out this Sunday. Two cops have their way with a poor girl on the side of the road. They sandwich her, and they impregnate her. It'll be delicious, give it a look.

Freebie! Roguish Delight Now Permafree!

It's my birthday, so what do you get? A free story! Permafree, actually!

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00IVU2I38
https://itunes.apple.com/us/book/id839598201
https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/416983

April Releases and Other Things

For the few, dedicated fans out there, I wanted to bring out a release schedule for the month. Since I can't run a newsletter just yet, this will simply have to do as a replacement for now. I'll probably also use these release schedule posts as an opportunity to briefly ramble about how the past month has been.

April Releases:

Rendezvous (Virtual Me 2) - 6th

A Twisted Pact (Futa/F succubus/mind control short story)- 13th

Hard Shoulder (Futa/F menage/breeding short story) - 20th

The Grove's Gift (Futa/F breeding fantasy erotica short story) - 27th

Notes: Due to a break from writing for the last week caused by an injured hand, I haven't been able to finish the fourth title for April just yet. On the positive side, maintaining a month's backlog of stories has allowed me to keep publishing in spite of being out the game for a good week. It feels like I'm finally doing better now, though. I expect I'll pick up writing again today or tomorrow, and then settle back into my schedule. I'll update this post with the final title for April once it's hammered out. In case anyone cares. :p

In other news, March was my best month ever for sales so far. And contained my best weeks, too. I don't want to gush too much since I know nobody but me really cares, but March more than doubled February's sales. It more than doubled my previous best month's sales, actually. I'll still need to sell 10 times what I did in March to live off this, but this is a great first step. I keep this graph of monthly sales, and after I plugged in March's numbers, everything else just flattened. With some luck, even March's pillar will be flattened before the year is out. :) As it is, though, I'm very satisfied with 80 sales. I doubt April will be quite as strong, but I can hope.

Commission Update, Again!

After some talking back and forth with a few trusted friends, I realized that what I was offering still wasn't really what it needed to be. So here we go, a second, and hopefully final change to commissions for the time being.

Two rates:

0,05$/word:
You keep the rights to everything written. What you do with it once it is written is entirely in your hands. You have all rights to the work, and it will be yours until copyright runs out. Which will be way after you're dead and gone. Point is, it's 100% yours to keep to yourself or strew around as you please.

10$ for the entire work:
This is a token payment. You give me a suggestion, vague or relatively specific, and I write it. It's for your entertainment, and perhaps to challenge me and what I write a little. Bear in mind that I'm not writing a novel for 10$, we're still talking short stories and novellas.

I will send you the story upon completion, and I will otherwise keep it to myself for a full month. I retain full and exclusive rights to the story, and keep it to myself as a courtesy to you. This means that you are not allowed to profit off the story, nor make it available at any retailer or at any public place on the internet. Once the month is over, I will publish the story if I wish to and find it suitable, or I will keep it to myself.

Of course, if you really really want a story written but can't come up with 10$, then... I don't know, try contacting me anyway. Maybe we can work something out, or I'll like your idea so much that I'll write it anyway. You never know!

Commissions Update

Pricing has changed! Jubilations! $10 per 1000 words!

Okay, let me explain. Previously, in order for it to make sense for me to spend time on commissions, I had to charge a price that was a bit high for many. $0,03 per word, which runs up to $30 per 1000 words and $150 for your average 5000 word short story. People hesitate to pay that much for commissioned pictures at times, so I can understand how they'd hesitate to commission me.

So now, price and circumstances have changed. The price has been lowered to $0,01 per word, or a much more manageable $50 for the above-mentioned average 5000 word short. The difference is, I now retain full rights to what I write for you. In other words, the commission is done for your entertainment, and you're free to share it with friends and the like, but I retain full and exclusive publishing rights. This means that I can make back the money I "lose" by lowering commission prices via ebook sales. Basically, you pay less now, and I recoup the loss over a longer period of time.

Now, if you don't fancy this arrangement, the old $0,03/word rate is still available and will ensure that what is written is yours exclusively. I try to cater to all needs and desires. Except the ones I don't. You can see which on the commissions page.

The Importance of Fans

I am by no means some writing guru. Anyone who has read this blog before (The few of you) will know this. I can certainly direct anyone who wants direction to several excellent blogs from people I'd consider my gurus, to the extent that having gurus is useful and healthy. But that's not what this blog is about.

This blog is about something I've come to learn about self-publishing online. Something that I don't think people new to the world of self-publishing ever really get told. It gets lost amid all the torrents of information that you struggle to absorb. A fanbase. All the self-publishing authors I've talked to had a fanbase when they started. Some had massive amounts of fans, some, like me, probably only had fans numbering in the tens. It doesn't matter.

The commonality is there. All the self-pub authors I talk to on Darknest, for example, had fanbases before they started publishing on Amazon and Smashwords and all the other places you can publish. Some larger than others, but the mere fact that they had people that were aware of them before they started publishing, people who loved their stories, helped.

This is the blog entry of an author who failed self-publishing: Blog.

It's quite a long read, but I think it's illuminating. Someone without friends in the self-publishing world, without online fans (Thank you Darknest and Hentai-Foundry for mine) failed in a competitive genre with fairly cluttered and bad covers. Shocker. This post isn't to harp on about the importance of good covers, though.

It's actually to say that I finally found out what fanfiction is really good for. It improves your writing as you do it, sure. But if you keep at it, you build a fanbase. However small, those fans will help you with the tiniest of kicks in self-publishing, and those tiny kicks are sometimes all you need to rake in a few sales from non-fans, who may then decide to buy the next thing you publish. And the next. Which will bring in a few more people, who'll also buy... You see where this is going.

Starting from absolute zero, you don't have this. So, what's the little bit of advice I can throw into the self-publishing pot? Spend a little time building a fanbase. Find a site to upload your stuff to where people can and will read it. Sure, you won't be making any money off it, but when you do start self-publishing, your fans will be worth more than the 2 sales you'd make a month otherwise.

And to the few fans I have that read this blog: Thanks for sticking with me for so long. I'm astonished to learn, in the occasional email or private message on Darknest, of people who have read my stories and waited for more for years. And you keep waiting. I still can't really get over the fact that -I- have fans.

Thank you.

Solon's Maiden Review

Just a brief note. I got reviewed! By the wonderful Sylvie Storm. You can find her review of Solon's Maiden here: Link.

Writing Update

Heya, I thought it'd be nice to do one of these. In case anyone actually reads this blog with an eye for what I'm going to release.

Scheduled for March release:

Becoming His (M/F BDSM Novella)
Roguish Delight (Futa/F Impregnation Short Story)
Futanarium #1 (Futa/F Short Story Bundle)

These things are all done, and only need to be moved past the various stages of pre-publishing that they are in. Becoming His is going to be published near the start of March, most likely on the 2nd. I'm still waiting for the short story bundle's cover to be 100% done, but it's looking really nice. I'm getting a 3D boxset image. It probably won't be worth it from a monetary perspective, but I just love how it looks. Roguish Delight will be released as a separate story the week before the bundle, and will also be in the bundle.

Basically, you can buy my stories separately for 2,99$, or you can wait until I release them in a 5-story bundle and get them for just under 1$ each, as the price for the bundle will be 4,99$. This is something I'm going to be continuing. It'll also happen for M/F stories. It'll be a while since I don't write many M/F stories, but it'll happen.

Upcoming Works:

Fantasy Erotica Novella/Novel (Futa/F)
First part of Virtual Me, a short serial following a girl's exploration of a cyberspace sex server. (Futa/F)
First part of I-Haven't-Come-Up-With-A-Title, a series following a woman's gradual ascension through the ranks of the small domain in hell she is brought to. (Futa/F, also demons and devils, and stuff)
Short story of summoning a succubus for sexual service. (Futa/F)
Short story of an orc(-ess) having some fun. Not 100% on whether I want to make this dubcon (Taking a captive), or prostitution.

As you can see, I have a bajillion words to write, and only so much writing time. Luxury problem, I guess? It's just how writing is. You don't have time to get all your ideas down in writing. I should mention that I also have work on a private commission to do, so that takes time each week as well.

And that's about it! I don't have any 100% release dates on any of the upcoming stuff, but I'm probably about 40% done with the Fantasy Erotica Novella/Novel. Then it needs to be proofed, and it needs a cover. That's probably a couple months away. If I were to make a qualified guess, I'd say that the first part of Virtual Me would be the prime contender for April release, probably along with a short story or the first part of the other series. We'll see!

Making... A Living Writing?

For some wonderful 24 hours, Thursday to Friday, I seriously considered writing for a living. I made a budget. A pragmatic, realistic one. Unfortunately, there's one inescapable conclusion. I simply can't make a living writing, right now. Not yet. Even with a quicker schedule of releases, even with an amazingly generous commissioner who believes in my writing even when I sometimes don't, it just doesn't make sense yet.

I could have stretched the savings I have right now to last 3 months. I could've sold what little I have to sell and made it another 1½-2 months. I'd be living basically in poverty. 480$ of spending a month, 370$ of that rent. 55$ food, the remaining 55$ spent on my minuscule phonebill, a little bit of transportation, and the singular bit of entertainment I'd still allow myself. A WoW subscription.

And then, with a little luck, I'd be earning enough 5 months down the line that my at that point expended savings wouldn't be needed anymore. With the way my sales history has been since I first started selling ebooks, that's entirely up in the air, and it would also depend on commissions that may dry up. Even so, writing for a living is my dream. I wrote my first story when I was 8 or 9. I wouldn't mind living in poverty if it meant I could write for a living, if I could at least count on continuing being able to pay the bills.

But there is no such assurance. For any author. The difference is, some authors can save up in the good months. I would be in a far more precarious situation. Of course, here in Denmark, there's various state monetary aid programs. However, you aren't allowed to have your own registered company if you're on one of those programs. No registered company means I can't get an EIN. No EIN means Amazon, Smashwords and any other retailer keeps 30% of my earnings. Which means I -definitely- can't live off them. To be able to go on one of those programs, I'd have to entirely, completely shut down the company, unpublish my stories and then come crawling.

And I won't do that. So the only thing that makes sense to do is to do the 2 years I still need to to finish my education. I need to be a trainee, and then in 2 years, I'll be done. By that time, perhaps I'll be able to make a living writing. The opportunity won't be there until then, because if I'm starting this education, I'm finishing it too. At least I'll have a safety net, then.

So I suppose that's the depressing realization. I can't make a living writing. Not yet, anyway. I'll simply have to refocus my drive and write in the evenings when I get home from work. You get what you give in this business. You make a living if you work for it. I won't have as much time to work for it, so it'll be a slower process. That sucks, but sometimes, that's life.

At least in the mean time, I can actually create my company. I can get an EIN. I can start making money on the side, and I can actually reinvest that money in covers and editing, rather than trying to make a living with it. And then in 2 years, with a little luck, I'll have a finished education and the ability to make my living writing if I so choose.

Until then, it'll be cruising along, trying my best to keep up with commissions and release schedules.