The Creative Penn interview: How to Make Money Selling Short Fiction

YYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYIf you're a writer as well as a reader, you'll be interested in this. NY Times and USA Today best-selling author, Joanna Penn, recently interviewed me on her webcast / podcast, The Creative Penn, about my guide for writers, Playing the Short Game: How to Market & Sell Short Fiction. Much of the discussion focused on how writers can make money from a short fiction career or by adding short fiction to a novel career.

The interview covers a lot of topics, including:

  • The differences between short stories, novellas, novelettes and novels
  • How to know the ‘size' of an idea – whether it's a novel or a shorter piece
  • Finding good markets for short fiction
  • Submitting short fiction vs. publishing it indie
  • How to track submissions and why it's so important
  • Has the magazine market been disrupted the way the book industry has?
  • On rights, including language and territory
  • The audio market for short fiction

You can watch the video interview, listen to the podcast or read the transcript here

Playing the Short Game is available in both trade paperback and as an ebook from all major retailers

"Out of the Light" reprinted in Black Infinity

Black Infinity #2My urban fantasy shapeshifter story, "Out of the Light," has been reprinted in issue #2 of Black Infinity. The theme for this issue was "Blobs, Globs, Slime, and Spores." Check out the great retro cover at the right.

"Out of the Light" first appeared in Dark Wisdom Magazine (#11) in 2007. It was nominated for an Aurora Award, but as I had another story on the ballot that year, I asked for it to be removed from the ballot so I wouldn't compete with myself. 

Black Infinity #2 is available now on Amazon and will be available shortly on Barnes & Noble, iTunes, and other ebook retailers. From the Amazon page:

Black Infinity #2 features 13 tales of blobs, globs, slime, and spores, plus a brief history of gunk and goo in SF magazines, movies, TV and comics; not to mention science fact, retro movie reviews and comics. 200 pages of slimy fun, with new stories by Rhys Hughes ("Swallowing the Amazon"), Gregory L. Norris ("The Tree Surgeon") and Marc Vun Kannon ("Boarding Party"). Plus Douglas Smith's "Out of the Light" and Kurt Newton's "The Old Mill."

I also had a story in the debut issue and will have a story in issue #3 as well, which will be the first time I've been published in three consecutive issues of any magazine. Very cool.

A great deal on the best in Canadian speculative fiction

Aurora Awards Storybundle 3 coversHow would you like to own, at an incredible bargain, ten books that readers like yourself have already voted to be the best examples of speculative fiction published in Canada? Well, here's your chance. I'm once again curating an ebook bundle for StoryBundle.com of winners and finalists for Canada's premier speculative fiction award, the Aurora Award.

The Auroras are awarded annually by the Canadian Science Fiction & Fantasy Association (CSFFA) for excellence in Science Fiction and Fantasy. Introduced in 1980 as the Casper, it was renamed the Aurora Award in 1990. I'm honored to have won the Aurora three times and to have been on the final ballot another sixteen.

This Aurora bundle again delivers a great mix of speculative fiction genres: SF, fantasy, urban fantasy, horror, steam punk, as well as young adult. The titles reflect the long history of the Auroras, spanning nearly a quarter century of Canadian speculative fiction from 1993 to 2016.

This bundle also provides a great introduction to several wonderful series, including the first title in three separate series and the second book in two more (which can be read as stand-alone titles). And the bundle lets you sample the rich tradition of Canadian short speculative fiction, with two acclaimed anthologies and a collection.

For StoryBundle, you decide what price you want to pay. For $5 (or more, if you feel generous), you'll get the basic bundle of four books in any ebook format worldwide:

  • Destiny's Fall by Marie Bilodeau
  • Maddie Hatter and the Deadly Diamond by Jayne Barnard
  • Evolve edited by Nancy Kilpatrick
  • Scream Queen by Edo van Belkom

If you pay at least the bonus price of just $15, you get all four of the above titles, plus six more:

  • Far-Seer by Robert J. Sawyer
  • Tesseracts14 edited by John Robert Colombo and Brett Savory
  • Thunder Road by Chadwick Ginther
  • Steel Whispers by Hayden Trenholm
  • Eutopia: A Novel of Terrible Optimism by David Nickle
  • Relativity by Robert J. Sawyer

The bundle allows easy reading on computers, smartphones, and tablets as well as Kindle and other ereaders via file transfer, email, and other methods. You get multiple DRM-free formats (.epub and .mobi) for all books!

Check out the bundle here for more information and details on each of the included titles. And remember, it's available for a very limited time only, from today until November 30 at midnight.

#SFWApro

"Going Harvey in the Big House" reprinted in Black Infinity

Black Infinity coverThis news is so cool from several viewpoints. First, my story "Going Harvey in the Big House" is being reprinted in the very first issue of the new SF magazine, Black Infinity, now available here on Amazon. This issue is titled "Deadly Planets."

That's great all by itself, but check out the awesome retro-SF cover. Isn't that great? Love it.

But the absolute best part is getting my name on the cover on top of a list that includes Clifford D. Simak, Harry Harrison, and Jack Kirby. I loved Simak's short stories when I started reading SF, especially his novel Out of Their Minds. And I devoured Harrison's Stainless Steel Rat books. And Jack Kirby? The "King of Comics"? Yeah, definitely made my day.

"Going Harvey in the Big House" first appeared in the US young adult magazine, Cicada, in 2005. It was a finalist for Canada's Aurora Award in 2006.

I hope you'll check out the issue and help support a new magazine. Amazon link is here.

 

"Fiddleheads" in Group Hex, Vol. 2

Group Hex 2 Anthology CoverI'm thrilled to have my story, "Fiddleheads," included in the upcoming horror anthology, Group Hex 2, which, as the number implies, is the second such volume containing stories from members of the Ontario chapter of HWA (Horror Writers of America). I also had a story ("By Her Hand, She Draws You Down") in volume 1, so it's great to be in the second volume as well.

Volume 2 again has an excellent lineup of authors, with a mix of best-sellers, cult faves, and impressive newcomers: Kelley Armstrong, Suzanne Church, Brian Clement, Derek Clendening, Alessia Giacomi, Sephera Giron, Danann Hawes, Repo Kempt, Nancy Kilpatrick, Monica S. Kuebler, Shebat Legion, John R. Little, Stephen B. Pearl, Mary Rajotte, Lou Rera, Andrew Robertson, Douglas Smith, Robert Smith, Julianne Snow, Jessie Turk, and Jason White. Collected by Andrew Robertson. Art editor Brad Middleton.

The book will be released with an official launch on October 26, suitably just before Halloween, at the Glad Day Bookshop at 499 Church St. in Toronto, starting at 7:30pm. After release, it will be available on Amazon for Kindle, with other retailers to follow for both print and ebook editions.

Fifty free fantasy books

Fall Fantasy ebook bundle promotionAnother great ebook bundle promotion from BookFunnel is launching today. This one offers fifty fantasy titles and all for free!

The promotion works like others from BookFunnel. You can download any or all of the books in the bundle just by signing up to the author's mailing list by providing your email address. And BookFunnel is fantastic in getting your ebook onto your ereader, no matter what type of device you use. If you encounter any problems getting the book onto your ereader (unlikely), BookFunnel technical support is there to help you.

There's no downside to these promos for readers. You can always unsubscribe to the newsletter(s) after at any time. But you might not want to. Many authors, like me, give away free stuff to their subscribers on a regular basis or offer other perks to followers such as discounts, special offers, or chances to be beta readers or participate in cool contests (like getting a character in a book named after you).

So check out the bundle here. It runs from October 16-30, then it's over.

Over 70 free ebooks in the Booktoberfest bundle

Booktoberfest ebook bundle promotionBooktoberfest is another great ebook bundle with a great selection of 70+ paranormal romance, urban fantasy, science fiction, horror, and suspense titles. The bundle is a promotion from BookFunnel, which means that all the titles are FREE! Yep, over seventy ebooks for free.

As with any BookFunnel promotion, you can download any or all of the books in the bundle, provided you signup to the author's mailing list by providing your email address. And BookFunnel is fantastic in getting your ebook onto your ereader, no matter what type of device you use.

There's no downside to these promos for readers. You can always unsubscribe to the newsletter(s) after at any time. But you might not want to. Many authors, like me, give away free stuff to their subscribers on a regular basis or offer other perks to followers such as discounts, special offers, or chances to be beta readers or participate in cool contests (like getting a character in a book named after you).

So check out the bundle here. It runs to October 31, then it's over.

SFWA Fantasy StoryBundle

SFWA Fantasy Bundle coversI'm delighted to have one of my books included in the first ever fantasy ebook bundle from the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA) and delivered by StoryBundle. The bundle runs from today to Thursday, November 2.

This bundle offers twelve excellent fantasy titles, all from SFWA pros. Pay a minimum of $5 to get the basic bundle of four titles. Pay $15 or more, and get all twelve titles. Buy the bundle here and check out this page for more information.

Founded in 1965, SFWA is an organization for published authors and industry professionals in the fields of science fiction, fantasy, and related genres. Some of the proceeds of this bundle will go to support SFWA in its mission to support, promote, inform, defend, and advocate for professional fantasy and science fiction writers. #SFWApro

Sunrise Lands Anthology: The Red Bird reprinted

Sunrise Lands coverMy short story "The Red Bird" has been reprinted recently in the Japanese fantasy anthology, Tales of the Sunrise Lands, from Guardbridge Books in the United Kingdom. Love this cover, shown here at the left.

"The Red Bird" first appeared in the long-running, award-winning, Canadian speculative fiction magazine, On Spec, way back in 2001 in their "World Beat" issue. The story was an Aurora Award finalist in 2002, and remains one of my personal favourites.

I'm proud to see it in such good company in this wonderful anthology of fantasy tales, all set or influenced by the Land of Rising Sun. It's also quite cool to get a cover credit.

Tales of the Sunrise Lands is available from Amazon worldwide and in the UK from Guardbridge Books.

Heroic Tales ebook bundle (and an interview)

Wolf at the End of the World in Heroic Tales ebook bundle coverMy novel, The Wolf at the End of the World, has been getting a lot of love lately. First it was featured in a BookBub promotion earlier this month, and now it's part of an excellent ebook bundle called Heroic Tales available here from BundleRabbit.

This is a huge bundle, folks, featuring nineteen (!) titles for only $4.99. You can buy directly from BundleRabbit or, if you prefer, from any of the major ebook retailers, including Amazon, Kobo, B&N, and Apple. Nineteen books for under $5! Come on, that's hard to beat. Grab it before the bundle goes away.

And to help promote this great bundle, the hero of The Wolf at the End of the World, Gwyn Blaidd, agreed to come out of seclusion in his Northern Ontario retreat to talk a little about himself and the story with fantasy author A. L. Butcher. Read Gwyn's interview here.

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