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Category: Patreon

I’M STILL HERE

I’m just mostly not here here.

Most of the daily action is over at my twitter.

I also do a fair bit over at my Patreon, and even if you don’t give me money (but, please, give me money), I’ve got some public posts there, including capsule reviews of books I’ve read recently.

I am pondering doing a giant site overhaul next year, and making it all shiny and nice. In the meantime, here’s what’s new:

The Fractured Void is out now, and it’s great fun, space opera set in the world of the Twilight Imperium strategy game. It has lots of gay space crime! I’m writing another book set in that world right now.

Doors of Sleep will be out in January! It’s a multiverse adventure about a guy who ends up in a different universe every time he falls asleep. It’s certainly one of the best books I’ve ever written. Publishers Weekly says it’s “Part high adventure and part travelogue of alien locales, this sci-fi romp has plenty of YA crossover appeal and will prove just the thing for mature readers who appreciate a classic Golden Age vibe. “

State of the Me

So. How’re things?

I have been writing a lot, and I’ve gotten so much done, that now the only thing on my to-do list is “Write the rest of Queen of Nothing.” It is indicative of how busy I’ve been that “write a novel” seems like a very restful schedule. (This month I’ve written a story, revised a novel, revised sample chapters for a proposal, contributed to a round-robin collaboration, and other miscellaneous bits.)

Our vacation in San Diego (where I went for Westercon and my wife and kid went for Legoland and swimming pools, mainly) was very pleasant. Returning to real life was bumpy initially, but I’m back in the flow now. I love summer. We’ve been going swimming a lot, grilling in the yard, reading in the hammock, drinking beer on patios, walking in the sunshine, watching movies, spending time with friends. Soaking up all the light. I’m enjoying the present and excited about the future. (Saying that will doubtless summon a devastating meteor strike directly on my house, but so it goes.)

In weird project news, I’m up to 101 supporters for my story-a-month Patreon! It’s not life-changing money, but it’s definitely life-improving money. I’ve done three stories so far, available to anyone pledging at least $1 a month: “A Wedding Night’s Dream,” about a strange wedding in the woods; “North Over Empty Space,” revisiting a couple of the supernatural mercenaries from my story “Cup and Table”;  and “Not a Miracle But a Marvel,” which I’ve been describing as my “polyamorous fairy abduction story.” Plus some excerpts from works-in-progress and forthcoming books and a piece of Batman fanfic, extras made available for those who pay $5 a month or more.  Basically, if you like my fiction, I encourage you to check it out and consider kicking in. I think I’m giving great value, and it’s a really exciting model for direct support of artists.

My Patreon: A Story a Month for $1 a Month

The short version is: I’ve set up a Patreon at www.patreon.com/timpratt. For as little as $1 a month, you can read a previously unpublished story from me a dozen times a year. (Give more if you’re feeling rich and generous or want goodies.) For those who don’t know, Patreon is a crowdfunding site, but rather than raising a bunch of money for a big project all at once (a la Kickstarter), it’s for people who want to give regular donations for open-ended or ongoing projects on a recurring basis. You become patrons, basically. I expect to make the first story available to supporters in the next couple of weeks.

The slightly longer version is: I’ve been thinking about doing this for years. I tweeted back in late 2013 that I was thinking of doing a story-a-month subscription service via Patreon, but my interest goes back much further. I’ve watched with interest things like Bruce Holland Rogers’s ShortShortShort story subscription service and Caitlin R. Kiernan’s Sirenia Digest “monthly erotic vignette subscription service,” and her subsequent collections. I’ve been thinking for ages: “Wow, I should do something like that.”

I love writing novels, but writing short stories is the closest thing I have to a calling. It’s my favorite art form to read and my favorite to write. I’m also pretty good at it. I made my name as a story writer.

The problem is, as I’ve become more successful as a writer, my time has been given more and more to novels. I’ve gone from writing twenty stories a year to maybe two or three, and then mostly only when commissioned. It’s a loss I’ve felt keenly, but, well, it just makes more financial sense to write novels.

Wanting things to make financial sense is important since I have a family to feed and all that, but it doesn’t always make for the best artistic decisions.

So I’ve been contemplating story subscriptions as a way to justify writing more short stories, but I hesitated for various reasons. The main ones are, I already crowdfund a project at least once a year, and didn’t want to be constantly going “Pay me pay me pay me” on twitter and facebook. The organizational aspect was also daunting. But with Patreon I can set a really low threshold to entry for backers — a buck a month gets you access to new stories — and a lot of the organizational stuff is handled through the site itself. It’s also an ongoing thing, so I won’t feel the need to beat the drum constantly to get interest. I’ll send out this initial announcement, and will probably mention on social media when I post a new story, but it won’t be an annoying bombardment.

Another reason I hesitated is, since I can reliably sell stories I write on spec,why don’t I just do that? Write more stories, and send them out to magazines, instead of only writing stories when they’re commissioned? The simple answer is… I can do that, but I haven’t been. Without a deadline, writing stories on spec simply goes to the back of the queue of things to do, and so, I never do it. With a monthly deadline, and people waiting for stories from me, I’ll actually prioritize doing this thing I love.

So, if you support my Patreon: Thank you for helping me psychologically trick myself into writing more stories.

Here are links to some free stories, if you want to see what you’re getting into: http://www.timpratt.org/?page_id=10