Tag: skylights

Oh god damn it not again

On By Luther M. SilerIn ReadingLeave a comment

skylightsSo I wrote this science fiction book called Skylights.  You may have heard of it, I’ve mentioned it around here once or twice.  Skylights was written in 2013 or so but didn’t come out until September of 2014.   It’s about Mars.  You may remember another book about Mars that came out in February of 2014, a book by a guy named Andy Weir that I liked one enormous hell of a lot named The Martian.  Other than being set on Mars, there’s not actually a whole damn lot that the books have in common, but a lot of times people assume one inspired the other– and, well, nobody is assuming that the book that came out second was inspired by the way more well-known book that came out first– and that’s not the case.  I actually used “Like The Martian, only not quite as good” as a tongue-in-cheek advertising line for a little while.

Part of the reason there was such a long dry spell in between the releases of Searching for Malumba and Balremesh and other stories is that I tried to write the sequel to Skylights, got halfway through or so, and realized I was telling the wrong story.  It was garbage and I had to throw it all out.  As it turned out, the important story was Book One, which I’d already written, and Book Three, tentatively titled Moonlight.  Book Two was treading water in between.  It was unnecessary.

You may see where this is going.  Book Three, now Book Two, of what I’ve been mentally calling the Johannes Cycle was going to be Moonlight.  One guess where most of the action was going to take place.   I’ve even got the cover done!  It’s gorgeous and I love it!  And let me be clear that I’ve had this book at least tentatively planned for like five fucking years.

And I just started reading Andy Weir’s second book.  This fucking thing here:

41rdzW8wCHL._SX327_BO1,204,203,200_

God dammit, Andy.

Want some free stuff?

On By Luther M. SilerIn Writing2 Comments

I’ve not written anything in the last few days, mostly because my options were “paralyzing anger” and “more paralyzing anger.”  Today upgraded everything to “so angry I can’t breathe,” and rather than indulge myself in that at the moment I’m just going to put a bunch of my books up for free.  I’ve done a Star Wars Day promotion pretty much every year since my first book came out; I completely flaked on it this time.  Let’s fix that.

Tomorrow and Saturday only, all four of my books will be free on Amazon.  I don’t think I’ve done all four at the same time before.  Check them out:

The Benevolence Archives, Vol. 1
The Sanctum of the Sphere: Vol. 2 of the Benevolence Archives
Skylights
Searching for Malumba: Why Teaching is Terrible, and Why we Do It Anyway

In which that went well

On By Luther M. SilerIn Work, Writing3 Comments

IMG_4024.JPGToday was my first day as a Real Boy on the sales floor, and I did pretty damn well for myself, I think– just under $5000 in sales.  I spent all day joshing back and forth with our sales leader that I was aiming at him, and I thought I had caught him with what would have been the store’s last sale of the day, only to find out that the customer had talked with him about what she bought on a previous visit and there was a quote in the system already.  From the guy I was chasing, meaning that he beat me by whatever amount he was ahead plus the stuff I just sold.  If it had been my sale, I’d have caught him.

Curses!

On the plus side, I came home to birthday steak and birthday baked potatoes and birthday cherry pie, so all is right in the world.

Speaking of my birthday: my birthday sale starts tomorrow!  Beginning late tonight, Searching for Malumba will be free for the next five days.  In addition, The Sanctum of the Sphere and Skylights will be $2.99, on sale from their usual $4.95 price point.  The Benevolence Archives, Vol. 1 remains $.99 at Amazon, although you can get it for free from Smashwords if you like.  The sale prices will be good for a week, and there will be a post up in the morning to remind you.  Sale!  Buy buy buy!

Or, y’know, give me a birthday present and buy them in paperback at full price.  That works too.  🙂

Ten more stars!

On By Luther M. SilerIn Reviews, WritingLeave a comment

I’m having a good day, as two of my books picked up five-star reviews today over on Amazon.  There’s a short one for Sanctum of the Sphere and here’s another for Skylights.  Check ’em out!

An unfortunate announcement

On By Luther M. SilerIn Writing2 Comments

to-do-list-learn-goal-failure1.jpgOkay.

I discussed this a bit the other day, but it’s official now: Sunlight is on hold, and when it comes back it may not be Sunlight anymore.  I remain deeply unhappy with the manuscript as it currently exists, and it badly needs a massive restructuring.  Basically a page one rewrite.  There are bits of it I can salvage, but even those are going to need restructuring and moving around.

So I’m putting it aside for a while.  The new goal– and I think this is possible, but y’all know how I am about hitting my own deadlines– is to have the next Benevolence Archives book available by IndyPopCon in June.  That’s going to be crazy tight, I’m not gonna lie.  But I’m already 1/3 of the way to my target wordcount for it, so it’s not impossible.  I still want the Skylights sequel out in 2016, but it’s going to have to be later in the year.  I need to put it away for a while to get a clearer perspective on where I want the story to go.

The good news is that I’m really happy with the stories I’ve written so far for Tales from the Benevolence Archives.  This is good stuff.  You’ll like it.  I promise.  🙂

SALE! SALE! SALE!

On By Luther M. SilerIn Writing1 Comment

510Cy7ZwEHL._SX338_BO1,204,203,200_…sooner or later.

So since last weekend was Valentine’s Day, and Skylights … has a red cover?  Sure, let’s go with that– we’re putting it on sale for a week, starting just as soon as Amazon decides it’s 8:00 AM.  One of these days I’ll figure out what time zone Amazon is on.  We’re doing one of those Kindle Countdown dealies, so it’ll start at just 99 cents (a full 80% off!) and every so often the price will go up a buck until it’s back to regular price sometime on February 22nd.

I’ll keep y’all posted.  But for now, or at least for soon, Skylights is 99 cents, and you really ought to get on that deal.

In other news, the first Prostetnic Publications newsletter finally went out yesterday, and not only did those folks get advanced warning of the sale, but they got an excerpt from Sunlight, due out … sometime!  Wow!  You should sign up for the mailing list; I really don’t send out a whole lot of emails and I’ll make sure when I do they’re worth reading.

In which I am way ahead of myself

On By Luther M. SilerIn Writing2 Comments

510Cy7ZwEHL._SX338_BO1,204,203,200_I am telling this story primarily so that I can find the date I did this a year or so from now when I need it.

I am currently approximately one third of the way through the sequel to Skylights, a book I’m calling Sunlight.  It was originally called Starlight but I decided the new title was better so I changed it.  The series is going to become known as The Johannes Cycle (the Johannes is the name of the ship they fly to Mars on) once the second book is out.

Like I said, I have the first third or so of Sunlight in first-draft form and hope to have it finished within a month.  I also have the first few paragraphs of the third book in the Johannes Cycle written, along with the last few sentences of Sunlight.  I already know what the title of Book 3 is, too.

I still tentatively plan on Casey Heying, who did the cover for Skylights, to be doing the cover to Sunlight, provided that I can afford to pay him what he’s actually worth.  But we haven’t discussed the cover to the third book at all, and I already had a strong concept for it in mind.

Last night, in about half an hour, I sat down with an image editor and created the cover for the third book.  As in, other than some tweaks to text, it’s, like, perfect.  So I have no cover to the book I’m working on and a damn-near completed cover to the sequel to the book I’m working on.

The kicker?  I can’t tell you the title of the third book, or show you the cover, because they both constitute mild spoilers for Sunlight.  So I just have to sit on this awesome thing I did and not show anybody.

Well, okay.  I showed Casey’s wife today.  And she thought it was awesome too.  But not anybody else.  🙂

A few announcements of less than staggering importance

On By Luther M. SilerIn WritingLeave a comment

venus-topFIRST!  That upon careful consideration of the known elements of the story, the in-progress sequel to Skylights, formerly known as Starlight, has been renamed to Sunlight.  While I am not officially participating in NaNoWriMo– in other words, you won’t be able to find an account for me on the site anywhere– I expect to be caught up on a 5oK words in November pace by the end of the evening tonight.  I hope to have Sunlight‘s first draft finished before winter break, or at least before what would be winter break if I was currently working at a school.  The progress bar is over there to your right, and you can expect that to be updated frequently as the month rolls on.  The name of the third book remains the same, and also remains a secret, because I like pretending I am important and keeping secrets from people.

SECOND!  The Sanctum of the Sphere still remains free, and will stay as such through the end of the night tonight.  Its performance provides me with further evidence that the best sign of how good a free book is going to do on any given day is how busy Amazon in general is– the book is higher ranked than Skylights was the last time I made it free, or at least close to it, but Skylights had an even hundred copies downloaded over the course of the day and Sanctum is currently sitting at twelve.  That’s ebb and flow at Amazon and there’s nothing I can do about it.  Go download it anyway!

THIRD!  Which is MORE THAN TWO, but SO WHAT!  I keep forgetting what the third announcement is supposed to be.  Oh, right!  I currently have my next three books planned out, which is vaguely ridiculous.  I expect Sunlight to be out in or around April of 2016, then the next Benevolence Archives book in fall of 2016, which will be a novel-length short story collection, and then in April of 2017 a stand-alone science fiction novel called The Imorah Protocol.  I am considering moving Imorah into 2016 and pushing back the next BA book a bit.  I don’t know who will care about this, but I’m telling you anyway!

Actually, I probably have my next five books planned out, because after whatever’s in early 2017 would be the third and final Skylights book, and then my fantasy novel that I have no idea for yet but I really want to write.  That means I’m set until late 2018!  That’s completely ridiculous!

That is all.