It’s been a while since I checked in with news and thoughts for the future, so I thought I’d do that now.
To begin with, I want to really thank everyone who’s donated. Seriously, your contributions do mean so much more than just the dollar amount. Along the same lines, I want to thank those of you commenting on the story, here and in person. It’s good to know it’s not going out into a vaccuum.
I’m working now on getting the first ebook collection of the story together. That’ll be Parts 1 to 3, the first codex (I’ll probably give it a title when I’ve got it together, but for now, it’s just ‘the first codex’). I’m planning to sell it for $2.99, and I’m kicking around the idea of putting up other, smaller collections — maybe Part 1 (chapters 1 to 6) for free, and then Parts 1 and 2 together for 99 cents. Someone could try Part 1 for free, put down a dollar for the next chunk of story, and then still get the equivalent of a full novel in Part 3 (which is longer than 1 and 2 together, if I’ve done my math right) if they then want to go on. As I say, I’m kicking around ideas.
It shouldn’t change much for this site. The ebooks are basically meant for convenience, and as a way for people to support the story if they choose. Everything will still be free here on this site.
What will be happening, though, is that I’ll be giving the old chapters another proofreading pass before I put the ebook together. I’m not anticipating many major changes; I do a goodly amount of editing (with Grace’s invaluable assistance) when I post them. But I also know that you’ll always find new things when you edit; it’s just the nature of the beast. So there’ll probably be minor wording changes made, small typos or inconsistencies fixed, and similar things. It’s even possible I’ll drop some physical descriptions of the characters in, since that’s the sort of thing I too often forget about.
All the changes I’ll make will be enumerated here. I’ll flag bigger ones as particularly important. If I do end up adding a character description, I’ll try to reinforce or ‘repeat’ that description in an upcoming chapter. If I add, say, “Lina was a slender but strong-looking woman, with long brown hair tied behind her head,” then I’ll try to get a passage echoing that somewhere in the next few chapters: “He stared at Lina; she was strong, he knew, for all her slenderness. Her hair, tied behind her head like a mare’s tail …” and so on. Ideally, then, it all works out for both ongoing readers and new ones, with clarity all around.
Finally, then: if anybody has any ideas on ebook format or the like, please let me know. And if anybody has any ideas on cover art (which I’m still trying to figure out), I’d love to hear that, too. And also any thoughts on length. It looks like Codex One will be pretty long; Parts 1, 2 and 3 are a bit over 200 000 words together — about two or three times the length of an average novel, or about half the length of a George R.R. Martin book (no joke; that’s literally how the word counts break down). Probably Part 4, which I’m hoping to do as its own book in early December — Codex 2 — will be significantly shorter. I’m hearing that ebooks seem to be popular at about the 70k mark, about what a regular novel is. Any thoughts?
