"Do you credit a Most High God?"

John Scalzi recently described himself as "an agnostic of the 'I'm almost certain God does not exist, but intellectual honesty requires me to admit I just don’t know' stripe." That's a belief I have a lot of respect for.

I'm both similar and opposite (yes, I can be both). I'm certain God exists and cares for us, but intellectual honesty requires me to admit I could be wrong.

I said I have a lot of respect for beliefs like Scalzi's, and that's because there isn't proof of a God -- not in the way we want there to be. If there were, the internet would have a lot less to argue about. And so of course I struggle with my own belief.

I'm certain God exists; I wouldn't be out here, doing what I'm doing, if I thought He didn't -- I'm just not that good. But why am I so certain? That's harder to quantify, and certainly I can't do it in a way that would irrefutably convince an atheist I am right.

But I don't believe blindly. As I said, I struggle constantly. I question why I believe what I do, and why others believe what they do. I question every word I teach my kids, refusing to teach the Sunday School lessons I was given unless I believe them myself. I frequently answer their questions with, "I don't know." I teach them what other people believe. Most importantly, I teach them that I won't ever make them follow God, that they have to make that choice for themselves.

To the point of this post, sci-fi/fantasy is usually so unabashedly atheistic, that I am always surprised -- quite pleasantly -- when it speaks directly to my own heart struggles. The passage below is from SFWA Grand Master Gene Wolfe's The Wizard. Sir Able, the narrator, is a knight more noble than any I have ever read about, who wrestles daily with what it means to be good and honorable. The sister of the king meets him in secret on an unrelated matter, but during the conversation, she asks him if he believes in God.

I'm sure it won't hit you the way it hit me, but I have to share it anyway, because I see a lot of truth in Sir Able's answer:

"Do you credit a Most High God?"

The question caught me by surprise. I said, "Why of course," stammering like the boy I pretended not to be.

"I do and don't." She smiled, and the smile became her laugh. It was music, but I never ached to hear it again as I did Disiri's. Even then, I thought her less than human, and that laugh was at the root of my opinion.

"I don't and I do." She cocked her head like a bird.

I bowed again. "Just so, My Lady. We can think only of creatures, of things He's made. Creatures are all we know, and can be all we know until we know Him. When we think of Him like that, we find we can't believe. He can't be like a creature any more than a carpenter is like a table."

Writing Game Dialogue

A lot of you know I'm a multiclassed programmer/writer. Before I drafted four novels and got an agent, I had a Computer Science degree, scripted for Planescape: Torment, and completed a few dozen Project Euler problems (until they got too hard). Unfortunately, since I've been more focused on writing, my levels in programming have gone largely unused.

Until now. It turns out game dialogue is the perfect job for my class combination. It's nowhere near as complicated as writing a program to solve Sudoku, but it's got all the puzzle-solving aspects of programming that I love.

And it's not as hard as it sounds. Here, I'll show you.

Typical dialogue in a novel goes something like this (excerpt from Post-Apoc Ninjas):

     "Tell me who you really are," the Marshal said.
     Here we go. The Marshal had already guessed much. Kai would have to be careful. "As I said, I grew up among mercenaries in Rivaday, though the mercenaries themselves were from all over."
     "Ah, so the story changes. How much did my grandson pay you, then?"
     "Pay me?"
     "In reward. Surely a mercenary would not rescue the Lord of Gintzu and take nothing in return."
     Kai hesitated. Marshal Aryenu was much sharper than his appearance made it seem. It felt very much like talking to Domino. Better to turn the questions on him. "How much of what Lord Domino told me was true?"
     "Your reward, mercenary?"
     Both sharper and more stubborn than his grandson. "Two thousand."
     "A lie. The boy doesn't pay anyone he doesn't have to."

Game dialogue is not so different from this, at least for a game like Torment. Prose-wise, there are only a few changes:

• Dialogue tags ("the Marshal said") are rarely necessary, since the character speaking is usually indicated on the game screen.
• The Player Character's thoughts (in this example, our PC is Kai) are not tied to the PC's lines, if they're included at all; sometimes all information is conveyed through dialogue or item description instead.
• PC lines are typically very brief. (In some games, you don't even get a line, just a motive or emotion that the game designers interpret for you).
• Any description is written in present tense and second person (though I suppose it doesn't have to be).

So a more Tormenty version would look like this (speaker tags added for clarity):

Marshal: "Tell me who you really are."
PC: "As I said, I grew up among mercenaries in Rivaday."
Marshal: "Ah, so the story changes. How much did my grandson pay you, then?"
PC: "Pay me?"
Marshal: "In reward. Surely a mercenary would not rescue the Lord of Gintzu and take nothing in return." He examines you carefully. Suddenly, he seems much sharper than his appearance first suggested.
PC: "How much of what Lord Domino told me was true?"
Marshal: "Your reward, mercenary?"
PC: "Two thousand." 
Marshal: "A lie. The boy doesn't pay anyone he doesn't have to."

Those differences are primarily cosmetic. The real difference, and the most fun, is that game dialogues allow the player to choose what they say.

Marshal: "Tell me who you really are."

1) [Lie] "As I said, I grew up among mercenaries in Rivaday." 
2) "I'm a ninja."
3) "How much of what Lord Domino told me was true?"
4) Attack the Marshal.

Each one of those choices goes to a different branch of dialogue (or exits dialogue and starts combat, in the case of the last one). It's pretty much exactly like a Choose Your Own Adventure novel combined with a combat mini-game.

But a game should be better than that, no? We can respond, not just to what the player chooses to say, but to their other choices as well -- things they've done in the past, how they've customized their character, who they choose to travel with, etc. We call this reactivity.

Marshal: "Tell me who you really are."

1) [Lie] "As I said, I grew up among mercenaries in Rivaday." 
2) "I'm a ninja."
3) "How much of what Lord Domino told me was true?"
4) Attack him.
5) (If the PC betrayed his clan) "I'm a ninja, and a fugitive from my clan."
6) (If the PC killed the guards outside the keep) "I'm the guy who killed your guards."  
7) (If the player took the Read Minds ability) Try to read his mind.

And then each of those responses might have reactivity as well. The lie in (1) might succeed if you have a high deception skill, for example. What you learn from (7) might change depending on your level in the ability.

What you end up with is a branching, interlinking dialogue tree, hopefully one that is every bit as interesting for the player to navigate as combat or exploration.

It might seem overwhelming, but really such a thing evolves gradually as you write each line and think about what the player might want to say in reply. In fact, it's difficult NOT to write a huge, unwieldy conversation tree. For me, that's half the fun: trying to figure out how to guide the player to all the information I want them to get, without forcing them.

Here, if you want to play with a free, online example, try this online game where you play a dragon. But, um, don't blame me for any productivity loss.

So You Launched a Kickstarter Campaign

ARE YOU CRAZY? WHAT DID YOU DO THAT FOR?!

Kidding.

So, you know you're ready for Kickstarter, and you've put your entire pitch together. What can you expect from the campaign itself?

THE LIFE OF A KICKSTARTER CAMPAIGN
Most Kickstarter campaigns follow the same general trend:

1. A large amount of pledges on the first day.
2. A quick drop-off of pledges over the next couple of days.
3. A long "lull" where the amount of pledges per day is about the same.
4. A spike of incoming pledges on the last two or three days.

From this, I can tell you a few things.

First, don't freak out during the lull. It's perfectly normal, and there's nothing you can do about it (almost nothing; see below). Instead, interact with your backers and continue your non-spammy publicity (again, see below).

Make the first day of your campaign count. A lot of projects, even major ones asking for millions of dollars, like to throw their project up one day and surprise everybody. Mostly, this doesn't go like everybody thinks it will.

A better idea is to float the idea of a Kickstarter to your existing network (you do have one, right?). These are your core fanbase and your early backers. By telling them what's going to happen ahead of time, not only do you make sure that some people show up on that first day, but you can also get a sense of whether your Kickstarter is even a good idea. Are they excited about it? Worried? Do they have ideas for rewards you can offer? You can learn a lot from your core fans, so don't hesitate to include them on the idea.

Prepare for the last days. You'll have spent the lull interacting with the core backers who hang around the Kickstarter page, but on that last day you'll see an influx both of people who haven't been to the page in a while and who have never heard of your project at all. Make sure the information on your front page is still clear to someone who knows nothing about your project or stretch goals. Make sure your updates are inclusive.

THE LULL
Every Kickstarter campaign has a lull. It's perfectly normal, but your backers might not feel so. You can educate them on the basic life of a Kickstarter, but there are other, better things you can do to make them feel like the campaign is still moving.

Interact with, and listen to, your backers. I cannot stress this part enough: people want to feel like they're making a difference. If people suggest good ideas -- stretch goals, rewards, ways to improve the product -- take them, run with them, and don't forget to credit the people who submitted them.

Also answer their questions or just hang out with them in the comment threads. People are much more likely to invest in a person than a project, so make yourself real and personable to them.

Make stretch goals. Now, stretch goals are not appropriate for every project, but if they make sense for yours, then do them. In fact, plan them even before you launch (you never know when you might, you know, break the fastest to a million dollars record). They won't break the lull (more on that in the next section), but they'll give your core backers things to watch and root for.

Some of them might even plunk down more money just to meet a stretch goal.

BREAKING THE LULL
There is very, very, very little you can do to break the pattern of the Kickstarter lull. For the most part, there are only three things that can give you a spike in the middle of your campaign:

1. Get to within a few percent of your funding goal. If you look at the pledging stats for other projects, you will notice that almost every single one has a spike of new pledges and new backers on the day they met their goal. Once again: people want to feel like they're making a difference.
2. Get publicity to an audience that hasn't heard the news yet. This is about marketing. By the middle of your campaign, your core fanbase knows about the project. Their friends have heard about it. Is there anyone else in your target audience who might not have? Find them. Find the forum or news sites they hang out at, and tell them too. (But DON'T SPAM. Spamming only reaches the same audience repeatedly, thus annoying them. Even well-intentioned fans can be guilty, so be careful.)
3. Make an announcement that changes the nature of the project (in a good way). For example, say you launched a Kickstarter to get internal illustrations for your book. Halfway through the campaign, you announce that Tony DiTerlizzi(!) has agreed to do the illustrations. Whether it's a newly revealed stretch goal or not, this sort of announcement can give you a huge spike in pledges once people hear about it.

Don't freak out if these spikes don't create a new level of daily pledges. Very likely, the pledges will jump up for a day or two then go back to the normal lull. But that's okay. You've created excitement, given your core backers something to talk about, and made just that much more money. And that ain't bad.

Hopefully this little mini-series (written while my novella is in the hands of the most awesome critique partners in the world) will help you, should you ever decide to Kickstart a novel. Or anything, really. You can't predict everything, but neither is it all completely random. Let me know if you have any more questions.

So You Want to Launch a Kickstarter Campaign

I think one of the reasons 56% of Kickstarter projects fail is because people tend to believe it goes:

1. Have idea.
2. Click 'Publish.'
3. Rake cash.

But a Kickstarter campaign, a good one, is a lot of work. Not as much work as writing a novel, but it's not something you just post on a whim. Before you click "Launch," you need to know (or have) ALL of the following.

WHY KICKSTARTER?
This is every backer's first question: "Why are you coming to me for money instead of doing it yourself?" There are lots of great answers to this question. For example, you might want to:

• Gauge interest before spending a year of your life writing it (though be warned: if you have no writing experience, people are going to wonder what, exactly, you're gauging).
• Fund a nice print run, limited edition hardcovers, etc.
• Fund a marketing campaign for a novel you've already written.
• Hire an illustrator for the book cover, a map, or internal illustrations.
• Hire an editor to give the book you've already written the polish it deserves. 

Whatever your reason, it's part of your pitch, and part of the reason people are going to back you. They want to be a part of something important, so make them feel that.

A FUNDING GOAL
How much money are you trying to raise? This is more critical than you think. People often judge a campaign based on how much it asks for. If you ask for $1,000, people don't expect much, but you lose some respectability. Ask for $10,000, and now people expect something serious -- a midlist author or a book that had a publishing contract but backed out for some (respectable) reason, for example.

Obviously it's not just about appearances either. How much do you actually need? What are you using it for? Are you barely covering your costs or did you build in a profit? Did you remember to take into account Kickstarter's fees? Rewards? Shipping? Once you are successfully funded, you are responsible for all the promises you made during the campaign. Make sure that, if you hit your minimum funding goal, fulfilling all those rewards will still be worth your while.

BACKER REWARDS
What are you offering your backers in return? Obviously a copy of the novel, but in what format? For how much? Do you have more rewards for people who want to back you at a higher level? Think carefully about this, because fulfilling rewards (especially physical ones that have to be mailed) can eat up a lot of your budget. But at the same time, people won't back a project if the reward they want is too expensive.

ART
You're a writer, so what do you need art for? Well, you don't have to have it, but if you can get good-looking art -- maybe concepts of your story, a map of your world -- it can make an average pitch look great.

Be careful, though. Bad visuals are worse than no visuals at all. 

THE PRODUCT
You might think that because the Kickstarter is meant to determine whether or not you'll even make the product, you shouldn't have to do any work on the product at all. This couldn't be further from the truth. The more work you put into your novel (or whatever you're pitching) ahead of time, the more faith your backers will have that you can pull it off.

There's a balance though. If your product is completely finished, people will wonder why you need to raise x-thousand dollars for it, and they could be more hesitant to put their faith in you. Again, people want to feel like they're making a difference.

THE VIDEO
This is the first thing people see when they hit your Kickstarter page. You don't have to have one, but some people are more likely to watch a two-minute pitch than read all the text on your page. How to make a good video is beyond the scope of this post, but in general:

• Keep it brief.
• Pitch what you're doing, why you're the one to do it, and why you need the backers' help to do it.
• Show off any art you've got, even if it's just concepts.
• Don't show anything that makes you or your product look bad. Kickstarter is about transparency, but you can go too far.

THE PITCH
This is the meat of your Kickstarter page. It's got to have all the information listed above, plus more to pre-emptively answer any questions a potential backer might have. The better you anticipate and handle potential questions, the better your launch will go.

What happens after launch? I'll deal with that in the next post.

So You Want to Kickstart a Novel

Kickstarter has funded the hopes and dreams of thousands. Could it do the same for you?

Maybe.

First things first: Kickstarter is not the new self-publishing. A quick look at their own stats will prove it: less than half of the projects put up on KS have been funded. The statistics for the publishing category are even more grim: only a 31% success rate.

Still, it's better than querying, amirite?

I want to spend a couple of posts talking about what you can do to get yourself in that 31%, and why you might want to do it at all. Kickstarter isn't a magic bullet.

NOTHING IS.

But it does have a couple of benefits over publishing straight to Amazon. Specifically:

1. It shifts the risk. Instead of spending a couple years writing a novel only to discover nobody wants it, you can learn the same thing after only a couple of months.
2. You can get input directly from the people you're writing for on what they like and don't like.

What Kickstarter can't give you is writing experience, which is admittedly kind of critical. So I can't really recommend it to inexperienced writers. But if you've been writing a while, and you've got this great idea for a story, but nothing of yours has ever sold really well and you're not sure if it'll be worth your time, well.... you might look into it.

There are 3 things you should probably have to run a successful Kickstarter. If you're only asking for a little money (say $1,000 or less), maybe you can get away with one of these. From $1k-10k (where most of the successful publishing projects are), you want at least two out of three.

(1) A great idea. Be careful here. Everybody thinks they've got a great idea. You've got to have an idea people want. No, more than that: an idea they need. It's hard to pitch something innovative, and a lot of great-but-untested projects fail right here. This is why nostalgia and spin-offs sell really well. But if you're an author looking to self-publish, you don't have the luxury of a license. High concept is your friend.

(2) Evidence that you can pull it off. Because everybody has great ideas, people are hesitant to back someone if that's all they've got. They want to know why you're the person to put this together. Anything that proves you can write: short stories, a blog with a following, even a popular Twitter feed. If you don't have anything, try an excerpt of what you're planning to make.

(3) A network of people to spread the word. Kickstarter does not mean instant visibility. While it's true your backers have a vested interest to spread the word on your behalf (another benefit of Kickstarter), you have to get some backers first. Having a platform to start from can help a lot.

If this looks a lot like what you need to succeed in self-publishing -- or querying agents and editors, for that matter -- you shouldn't be surprised. Kickstarter doesn't change the playing field. It just shifts things around. Instead of WRITE => BUILD PLATFORM => MAKE MONEY, now it's BUILD PLATFORM => MAKE MONEY => WRITE.

These are all just guidelines, of course. It depends very much on how much money you're asking for, and even then there's no guarantee that any of these will make your Kickstarter successful (see what I said before about magic bullets). Though if you've got an idea people are craving, a history that shows you can pull it off, and an audience just waiting for you to launch so they can tell their friends about it, well . . . then you might have something interesting indeed.

But you still need a campaign. We'll talk about that next time.

First Impact: THE ANKULEN by Kendra E. Ardnek

It's been a while, but we have another First Impact Critique, where we take a look at your queries, first pages, back cover copy, and more. You want to make an impact right from the start. We're here to help you do that.

If you'd like to submit your first impact material, send it to firstimpactAE@gmail.com. Details here.

---

This week we have the back cover copy for a fantasy by Kendra Ardnek (I see what you did there) called THE ANKULEN. My overall thoughts are at the end. As always, this is just my opinion. Your mileage may vary.

Back Cover
When she was seven, Jen had an amazing imagination - one she could make real. Then her parents adopted Chris. He disappeared a few weeks later - and with him went her imagination. But when her adopted brother Chris disappeared, her imagination went with him.

Eight years later, he reappears and makes a startling revelation. He was her imaginary friend. Indeed, she has an entire imaginary world - and it still exists!

That's a mouthful :-)

The world-building is confusing me
here a little. See my thoughts below.

But it's dying - eaten by a horrid creature called the Polystoikhedron. She must find her Ankulen - the special bracelet that brought her imagination to life in the first place, and fight for her world. She's willing to fight.

But is she willing to die?

I'm assuming these are two versions
you want me to critique.

Or ...

Not a fan of this opening sentence.

Why is she wishing it now? Also it
seems odd that what she's worried
about is her imagination, not her
probably-kidnapped brother.

Stuck outside until her notebook shows signs of a story, Jen makes a wish that the adopted brother who disappeared when she was seven, shows back up and tell her what happened to her imagination. Which disappeared the same day. Of course, she never expected him to actually do so.

How did she not know she had this
bracelet? Wouldn't she have noticed
it ALSO disappeared the same day
Chris did?

I don't understand her 2nd task.

Turns out, he was actually her imaginary friend, and she had an Ankulen, a special bracelet that brings imagination to life. With her imagination in reach, there are only three things she needs to do to get it back: find the Ankulen, find her missing memories of building her imagination, and fight off the Polystoikhedron, a hydra-like monster that has been making a feast of her imagination in her absence.

All in a day's work, you know?


Adam's Thoughts
I like the concept, but I don't know if I'd read the book based on this back-cover copy. It raises a lot of questions for me in a not-good way, which makes me wonder if the author has thought the implications of everything through.

Here's the thing. As soon as I read that her imagination became real, I immediately begin thinking what *I* would do with that kind of power. I'm willing to grant a lot of leeway because she's seven at the time, but still, I'd expect unicorns and dragons and princesses in castles. Or SOMETHING totally fantastic that doesn't belong in this world. (And that's not even counting things like infinite candy/pizza/video games ;-).

But then what does it mean that it became real? Could her parents and other people see this stuff? If so, wouldn't that have freaked everybody out? And if not, what does "real" mean? Was it a world she went to? Did anybody believe her? Because the opening makes it sound like it was really, definitely real -- especially since her parents could presumably see Chris. But then why is she the only one who notices when it goes away?

Two other overall comments: (1) this feels like Middle Grade, though the submission labeled it as simply "fantasy." That probably doesn't matter for the back cover, but it's something you might want to know as you seek out your target audience. (2) This feels a LOT like The Never-Ending Story. That's not necessarily a bad thing (as I said, I like the concept), but I do think your back-cover copy could add something to distinguish it from that classic.

What do the rest of you guys think?

Dead Boys, Invisible Girls, and Teens That Can't Read Minds

I apologize for the blog silence. I'm deep in the drafting tunnels of a certain science fantasy novella and/or role-playing game. I'll resurface once I get this novella worked out. Until then, please see the last part of the official blog schedule.

But I'm sending this missive via miner's canary* because there are three very important books I need to tell you about. All of them are cool, written by exceedingly cool people, and I think I'm in the acknowledgements of two of them (which ones? You'll just have to read them to find out!).

* Please send the canary back, by the way. The air in these tunnels is starting to smell funny.

Jack of Hearts by Ricardo Bare
Jack lost someone, causing a deep pain he could no longer endure. Most boys would take their own life. Jack gave his heart to the Lady of Twilight and has become her heartless assassin. Now he feels nothing, even as he does the Lady's bidding in hunting a thieving wizard.

But when he meets a beautiful girl trapped in a mirror, something stirs inside of him. A shadow of what he used to be. He wonders if he made the right decision after all, but getting his heart back from the witch will prove more difficult than any mission he's been on.

Jack of Hearts, is Ricardo's debut novel that came out just a couple weeks ago. He is one of my most awesome critique partners, and also happens to be the lead designer of the critically acclaimed stealth action/adventure game Dishonored, released last year. Check this book out, folks.

Transparent by Natalie Whipple
Touted as X-Men meets Godfather. Fiona McClean was born invisible, which makes her the perfect daughter for Vegas's biggest crime lord. But when her father pushes her too far, she goes on the run and tries to live a normal life in a small town far from her father's reach. Far, but not far enough. When her father tracks her down, she has to decide how far she'll go to protect the people she loves.

Transparent is Natalie's debut (that doesn't actually come out until next week, but you can pre-order it now). She's a good friend of mine, and it's been both heartbreaking and exhilarating to watch her journey to publication these last few years. She is (as I've said) hugely imaginative, and it shows in her ideas. She is also part of our writing team for Torment, which makes her and Torment extra awesome. 

Open Minds by Susan Kaye Quinn
Kiera is a zero, a non-reader in a world where everybody can read minds. Until the day she accidentally control's her best friend's mind and discovers she's an entirely different kind of freak: a mindjacker. It turns out she's not the only one, and she's soon drawn into an underworld that she never suspected existed.

As it happens, this was Susan's debut as well. Yes, okay, this book came out two years ago, AND I've already talked about it. But I'm bringing it to your attention now because Open Minds is, now and forever, free to download.

So what are you waiting for?

On Objectivity

First Impact: HARD TRUTHS by Anonymous

It's time for another First Impact Critique, where we take a look at your queries, first pages, back cover copy, and more. You want to make an impact right from the start. We're here to help you do that.

If you'd like to submit your first impact material, send it to firstimpactAE@gmail.com. Details here.

---

This week we have a query for an upper middle-grade fantasy called HARD TRUTHS. My overall thoughts are at the end. As always, this is just my opinion. Your mileage may vary.

Query

Not sure what a "peacekeeping"
dragon is, but otherwise okay.

Fourteen year old Reyna longs for more in her life. High tea behind higher castle walls isn’t enough. But she gets more than she bargained for at an annual festival where she becomes bonded, by blood and magic, to a peacekeeping dragon.

Last paragraph makes it sounds
like she doesn't want to have a
dragon. Now she's determined to
be the best Dragoneer.

Fiercely proud, Reyna is determined to become a great Dragoneer, even though she lacks any useful skills. Seriously - any useful skills. Etiquette and embroidery don’t exactly prepare you for endurance and espionage.

I'm a bit confused here. Don't know
what his scheme is or why the
dragons are in the way.

Her father, however, has different plans. His nefarious scheme will lead to the death of the peacekeeping dragons that stand in the way of a war to expand his kingdom. He will let nothing, not even the safety of his own daughter, stand in his way.

Not sure about "be a good person,"
but I'm glad to see a choice :-)

Confronted with the truth Reyna must choose to either be a good daughter or be a good person. Maybe if she were any good at being a Dragoneer maybe the choice wouldn’t be so hard.

Hyphenate "50,000-word".

DRAGONEER: HARD TRUTHS is a 50,000-word upper middle-grade fantasy.

I am a member of SCBWI and have written commercial scripts. HARD TRUTHS is my first novel.

Thank you for your time and consideration.


Adam's Thoughts
If Reyna ends up being the queen, her name might be too on the nose ;-)

Overall, this is pretty good. It's clear and easy to read, with just a hint of voice.

I would like a little more voice, if possible, but it's not critical. Part of me also wants to know more about Dragoneers and their peacekeeping dragons, but that might clutter the query.

What I'd really like is to better understand Reyna's father's plan and (therefore) the choice she has to make. What makes her father's scheme nefarious? (The query says, but it's not as clear as it could be). What does it mean for Reyna to be a good daughter? Does she kill her own dragon? What does it mean for her to be a good person?

I think it's close, because I get the feeling from the query that you have answers to these questions; they're just not coming across yet. I'd request pages, but I think this query could be even stronger.

What do the rest of you guys think?

Three Kickstarters I Would Throw All My Money At

1. A successor to Crusader: No Remorse. This game destroyed an entire quarter of my second year in college. Oh, man, but it was a good quarter.

You play an elite super-soldier, trained by a dystopian government that you spend the entire game betraying and fighting against. Technically, it's an action game, but it's a smart action game. You have to decide which weapons you will bring with you on each mission (of those you can afford). You can either sneak through missions or blast your way through them. And because what you bring with you is limited, you have to figure out how to conserve your ammo or find some more during the mission.

And the story is just cool. The government you served betrayed you, but the resistance you join in the beginning doesn't like you much either. So you have to prove yourself to them by undertaking increasingly dangerous missions. And then, of course, there's secret dystopian weapons projects, double agents, betrayal, and even a full-on dark night of the soul before you have to decide to get off your butt and save the world.

2. A successor to Chrono Trigger. I'm not gonna lie, I'm a fan of JRPGs (technically, I'm a fan of all RPGs, but JRPGs comprised most of my childhood, so...). And Chrono Trigger was probably the best. It had everything I loved about Final Fantasy (I), Crystalis, and Secret of Mana plus: time travel.

And not just time travel -- where you go to different eras the same way you take your airship to different islands -- but time travel that mattered. Plant a seed in the past, collect magic fruit in the future. Tell your robot companion to spend the next four hundred years restoring a forest, then travel forward to see the results. All the while trying to stop a giant alien parasite that crashed to Earth millions of years ago, awoke in 1999, and created a post-apocalyptic world for the remainder of time.

Or not. Cuz, you know, you can change things.

3. The reanimation of Tony Jay. Or, you know, at least his voice.

Obviously I'm not thinking about this very hard, because this is all nostalgia, but what would you Kickstart?

First Impact: THE FIRE LOTUS (First Page) by Renee Ahdieh

It's time for another First Impact Critique, where we take a look at your queries, first pages, back cover copy, and more. You want to make an impact right from the start. We're here to help you do that.

If you'd like to submit your first impact material, send it to firstimpactAE@gmail.com. Details here.

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This week we have the first page for THE FIRE LOTUS, the YA urban fantasy from Renee Ahdieh, whose query we critiqued last week. My overall thoughts are at the end. As always, this is all just my opinion. Your mileage may vary.

First Page
The storm was closing in on the family of five.

Not sure why this paragraph is
separated from the previous one.

In the distance, a grumble of thunder gave a final warning.

“Hurry! Wrap everything up!” the mother urged.

I'm used to YA being 3rd-person
limited, so this detached viewpoint
threw me.

Two teenaged girls packed away the remnants of a picnic. Their father discarded the trash while their mother shook a blanket in the air to dislodge the lingering crumbs from its surface.

“Please, don’t throw away the silverware, Jia!”

“I won’t, Mom!” Jia yelled. Under her breath, she added, “Chill out,” she continued under her breath.

“Where’s your brother?”

Jia shrugged and started lugging a cooler towards the parking lot. Droplets of rain began to splash on the hot asphalt. Wisps of coiling steam rose in their wake.

Tolls? The thunder?

The echoing tolls rolled closer as grey clouds swirled above and the horizon hissed with a charge of menace. Wet moss and bitter earth perfumed the air, leaving behind a metallic tang as an afterthought.

“Quick! Use ‘ominous’ in a sentence!” Jia joked to her sister Minar.

“Such a Nerd Queen. Help me with this friggin’ basket or I will go ominous on you.”

“Yeah, not quite, Mini. It just lacks that sense of impending doom,” Jia said with a chuckle. “By the way, have you seen Daniel?”

“I saw him a few minutes ago; behind that big tree over there. He was still practicing with his bow and arrows.”

Jia sighed and held up her right fist. Minar mirrored the gesture without a word.

One, two, three . . . shoot.

Minar’s rock smashed with triumph into Jia’s scissors.

“Yeah, buddy. I guess fortune does favor the—what was it? The bold?” Minar teased.

Mirth, even though she lost?

“In this case, I think you mean ‘the wicked.’ As in, downright twisted.” Jia’s green eyes sparkled with mirth.

“You wish.”

Mindful of their mother’s ever-watchful gaze, Jia quickly gave her twin the finger before traipsing the distance to the large oak tree.


Adam's Thoughts
For me, the main problem I have here is I don't feel connected to Jia at all. I think you did a great job making the scene feel ominous (and I think I like that you even lampshade it in the dialog (warning: TV Tropes link)), and I thought the dialog between Jia and Minar was fun. But I didn't understand why Jia was so flippant about a threatening situation.

For me, part of the problem is understanding what point of view we're in. I'm used to YA being 3rd person limited, meaning we get focused attention on one character's thoughts and feelings. That doesn't mean you have to do it that way, of course, but for me, it's a little jarring that the narrator clearly feels the scene is ominous, but Jia doesn't. I kind of expect one or the other to mention that fact.

For example, if this were 3rd person limited, then we'd see the storm from Jia's point of view. Stuff along the lines of, "In the distance, a grumble of thunder gave a final warning. Jia snorted in reply."

If it were 3rd person omniscient, however, I'd expect the narrator to point out the fact that Jia either didn't know or didn't care about the threat. Something like, "Jia shrugged and started lugging a cooler towards the parking lot, oblivious to the looming storm."

So that's my advice: be aware of what POV you're using and who your narrator is (whether omniscient or in Jia's head). There's a lot of fun writing here, but foundational things like that can lost your reader's trust.

What do the rest of you guys think?

First Impact: THE FIRE LOTUS by Renee Ahdieh

It's time for another First Impact Critique, where we take a look at your queries, first pages, back cover copy, and more. You want to make an impact right from the start. We're here to help you do that.

If you'd like to submit your first impact material, send it to firstimpactAE@gmail.com. Details here. 

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This week we have the query for THE FIRE LOTUS, a YA urban fantasy from Renee Ahdieh. My overall thoughts are at the end. As always, this is all just my opinion. Your mileage may vary.

Query

Nice hook.

Jia Ryan was supposed to start college in three weeks, not get struck by a bolt of lightning and die in front of her family.

I like the voice, but there's a lot of
stuff going on here all of a sudden.
Simplified sentence structures might
help.

What’s more, she’s pretty sure she wasn’t meant to wake up in a lab days later with a scientist hovering over her, welcoming her into the world of the living dead.  Yeah, and that’s not even calling to question the irritatingly serene genie nearby.  Or his strange request that she take up arms in their ongoing struggle against reanimated corpses held under the sway of a powerful sorcerer.  Right.  Not so much, Master Yoda.

After all, this isn’t her fight.  She’s only eighteen, for crying out loud.

I feel like the questions are getting
to be a little much. Just my opinion.

Wait.  She gets to train in a slew of martial arts?  Learn how to wield a katana?  And, hold the phone, somebody probably should have mentioned that the young samurai teaching her is darkly enigmatic and sexier than sin.

Okay.  This might not totally suck.

As she settles into her new role as an undead warrior, Jia soon learns that the aforementioned baddie sorcerer intends to unleash the full brunt of his mind-controlling blood sorcery onto mankind.  Once she begins to grasp that the idyllic world she existed in for eighteen years is being threatened, there’s no going back.

This is now her fight.

THE FIRE LOTUS is an 80,000-word work of YA urban fantasy with series potential.

Adam's Thoughts

This is pretty good. I love the voice, and there's a clear conflict here. There's no sadistic choice like I keep harping on, but I think the mentions of samurai and undead warriors sufficiently distracted me from that fact ;-)

One thing to be careful of is to make sure the voice doesn't get in the way. It's a great voice, like I said, but there were a couple of times I felt it was a bit too much. Now that's totally just my opinion; others might feel differently. And really, it's just a nitpick.

And if you did have a sadistic choice to build up to at the end, I think this might be perfect.

But that's just me. What do the rest of you guys think?

7 More Things You Never Wanted to Know

A follow-up to this post.

8)
Cardboard people freak me out.

9)
Most days, I sit down at the piano to plunk out the Pirates of the Caribbean theme. Also, I cannot pull out my guitar without playing "The Ballad of Serenity" at least once.

10)
When I count things slowly, I always end up saying "two-WHOOO" like that owl from the Tootsie Roll commercial.

11)
In 6th grade, I spent an entire church service drawing the map of Bowser's Castle from Super Mario Bros 3.

12)
I have seen every single episode of So You Think You Can Dance.

13)
Surf Ninjas is awesome, and you cannot convince me otherwise.

14)
I am pathetic when I get sick. If my wife is to be believed (and she's very smart, so I do), I am so pathetic that it makes the times I wasn't sick seem even more pathetic than they were at the time. So basically, my patheticness transcends the space-time continuum.

Tell me something about you.

First Impact Update

First, the randomly chosen winner from among March's critiquers is . . . . . KayC! Please e-mail me to let me know whether you'd like the 20-page critique from me or the $10 gift certificate from Amazon or B&N.

Second, as you may have noticed, there have been no First Impact posts for a while. This is not due to my over-busyness, but rather due to the fact that we have run out of First Impact submissions.

Honestly, no submissions is okay with me (see the aforementioned over-busyness), though I will continue to publicly critique any submissions that trickle in.

I think I will not, however, be continuing the monthly prizes. For one, there's really only a few faithful of you who've been critiquing anyway, and I tend to end up handing out prizes to the same people over and over ;-) But two, offering prizes doesn't make as much sense if we're only critiquing things once a month or so.

I do hope that you faithful will continue to critique things if and when future First Impact posts come up. I know most of you do it because you're awesome, not because the prizes are awesome. And for that I thank you.

Final Torment Info

So the Torment Kickstarter is in the last week of its campaign. We've raised over $3.25M, but we hope to raise even more to make this game bigger and better, to make a game that truly lives up to the Torment tradition.

So this is the last you'll hear me plug it, but I wanted to bring to your attention a couple of things, including one bit of news that hasn't made it to the Kickstarter page.

Bit #1: Pat Rothfuss is on our writing team. I know, right? MIND. BLOWN. It might even be part of my job to review Pat's areas which, if I remember correctly, is one of the signs of the apocalypse.

Bit #2: Natalie Whipple is on our writing team. I know that's not as big as Pat (which is one of the main reasons this hasn't hit our Kickstarter page), but though this announcement might not excite the internet at large, for me this is HUGE.

I've been following Natalie's career since way back when she won one of Nathan Bransford's 1st Paragraph Contests, and since then I've been lucky enough to critique a few of her novels. I even got to read the first chapter of her upcoming "X-Men meets Godfather" debut, TRANSPARENT. Guys, it would not be a mistake to pre-order that.

Natalie is hugely imaginative, and she brings a cool, new perspective to the Torment team that I'm really excited about. Seriously, I cannot wait to work with this team and see what we come up with.

If you want to help the project, you can still do so. I, personally, would really appreciate it, considering the bigger this game gets, the bigger my job gets and the better I can support my family :-) We've added new tiers and rewards since the Kickstarter began, and you can see them all here. Some of the new rewards are additional novellas and a digital comic book (which it sounds like I might be co-writing :-).

I know not all of you are gamers but are still interested in supporting us, or maybe in reading the novella I'm going to write. Well, you can get certain rewards -- like the digital novella compilation -- without even getting the game. Information on how to get these "add-ons" is here.

I still cannot believe the series of events that has led me here. It's like the weirdest road to publishing ever, but I ain't complaining :-)

First Impact: THE EYELET DOVE by Lindsay Kitson (First Page)

It's time for another First Impact Critique, where we take a look at your queries, first pages, back cover copy, and more. You want to make an impact right from the start. We're here to help you do that.

If you'd like to submit your first impact material, send it to firstimpactAE@gmail.com. Details here.

Remember, anyone who offers their comments this month is eligible for either $10 for Amazon or B&N OR a 20-page critique from me.

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This week we have the first page for THE EYELET DOVE, a dieselpunk novel (yes, that's a thing) from Lindsay Kitson. You might remember we did the back cover copy of this book last year.

My overall thoughts are at the end. As always, this is all just my opinion. Your mileage may vary.

First Page
Claire wanted to fly.

The last sentence here makes me
immediately think of LEVIATHAN.
I'm hoping this differentiates itself
from that soon.

It was an overcast day but the clouds were high up when she walked out onto the River City Base tarmac for pilot tryouts. Claire had tucked her shoulder-length hair up under her flight cap and drawn her goggles down over her face. With any luck, no one would guess her sex until after she’d proved herself in the sky.

She’d never felt so lucky to have a less than feminine jawline and small breasts.

That was why she’d joined the Ladies Division of the Avaline Air Guard in the first place, whatever she told

I'm confused. If there's a Ladies' Air
Guard, why does she have to hide?

people. She didn’t tell people the truth because she knew they would only laugh at her.

The truth was, working alongside the men who flew the machines that sailed among the clouds was the closest she might ever come to flying them herself.

But even that wasn’t enough for her any more.

The concrete airstrip stretched out to her left, bright white in the diffused sunlight. Some of the dreadnought crew had come out to watch the tryouts. Some of the hangar deck crew were out of their canvas coveralls, but the fly-boys wore their leather flight jackets like badges of pride.

Creepy. I hope the very next sentence
explains why she's still with him. I
guess because he teaches her?

Thomas wasn’t there though, thank Pete. Her boyfriend would have recognized her for sure, and he wouldn’t have hesitated to out her. It had taken no end of cajoling to convince him to teach her. He was a
creep—enough that the other girls wanted nothing to do with him. He made her skin crawl every time he laid his hands on her, and he bragged to the other pilots that she liked to do it in the sky, with no end of uncreative puns applied to the word cockpit.


Adam's Thoughts
I like the setting, but if you recall my comments from your back cover copy, you knew that.

I think I get the Ladies' Division thing, but it took me a couple of reads. I guess the Ladies' Division isn't allowed to actually fly, yes? That could be clarified.

I don't have a lot to add beyond my comments in the text. It does immediately bring LEVIATHAN to mind, perhaps too much for someone who has read that. So I personally want to know what makes this novel different as soon as possible. And the last paragraph creeps me out, so to keep Claire sympathetic, I want to know why he's still "her boyfriend," rather than her ex or something.

Other than that, I'm anxious to get to the action :-) What do the rest of you guys think?

Torment News and Me on Video

If you head over to the latest update on Torment: Tides of Numenera, you might see a familiar face. (Or maybe not so familiar, since some of you have never really seen my face).

This, by the way, is why I'm a writer, not an actor.

Also talked about in today's update is the series of Torment novellas we offer as a reward. I'm really looking forward to writing one of these, and I hope you guys will read them. Cuz listen: you don't need to know anything about Torment (neither the old game or the new) to enjoy the novellas. Each will be a self-contained story within a ridiculously cool world.

Sorry to go all salesman on you for a sec, but you can get the (digital) novella compilation at the $39 tier along with the game and the strategy guide. Or if you're not into games, you can get just the digital novella compilation as an add-on for just $15 (see this page for how add-ons work).

Plus, you know, you'd be helping me get a more stable job, and you'd be helping us make a really epic game. So, you know, there's that.

Or you could just watch me talk about state-of-the-art RPG alignment systems. You know, whatever.

First Impact: INGENICIDE by Joan He (First Page)

It's time for another First Impact Critique, where we take a look at your queries, first pages, back cover copy, and more. You want to make an impact right from the start. We're here to help you do that.

If you'd like to submit your first impact material, send it to firstimpactAE@gmail.com. Details here.

Remember, anyone who offers their comments this month is eligible for either $10 for Amazon or B&N OR a 20-page critique from me.

---

This week we have the first page for INGENICIDE, a YA dystopian from Joan He, whose query we read last week. My overall thoughts are at the end. As always, this is all just my opinion. Your mileage may vary.

First Page
It’s the first dance I’ve gone to in years.

I'm totally sticking on this: should
technicolor be capitalized?

I want to know what she thinks her
mother's thinking.

Mom tells me to stay away from the spirits. She glances out the car window, at the Technicolor lights that dart across Kennie’s packed driveway. Her brows knit together—I know what she’s thinking. Music thrums in the asphalt, vibrating through the soles of my shoes as I swing my feet onto the ground.

Dad rolls down the window. “Enjoy yourself. Today’s your day.”

“We’re so proud of you,” Mom adds, the little knot of worry vanishing. I blow them both a kiss. Dad honks. They drive away.

I knock and wait, apprehensive. It won’t just be our School at the post-graduation party tonight. Fairfax, Georgetown, and DC should be here, too. Already, I catch drifts of new voices among the blasting speakers and the familiar lull of the old. I relax when it’s Tess who opens the door.

Ombre's a pretty modern term (I had
to look it up). Is this near future?

“Hey, Sibyl,” she yells over the song. Her eyes are heavily made-up, but nothing competes with her dress. It’s got a million iridescent scales that scatter in ombre from the hemline. Rainbow lights dart around her form. They make Tess sparkle.

“You’ve outdone yourself,” I yell back. She laughs.

“Did you expect anything less?”

Not sure why school is capitalized.

Kind of a non-sequitur from Tess to
the school system.

No, I didn’t. Not from Style Enhancer Tess Wittle of Alexandria, which is one School of five in the DC and Virginia sector. All the Schools belong to the Training Of Prodigies system, better known by its acronym: TOP.

Tess doesn’t wait for an answer. The door closes behind us as she pulls me into the mass of dancing graduates. She’s whisked away after barely a minute, but I don’t mind. TOP Peers who recognize me pull me into their circles. They ask me about my plans after the one-month hiatus and congratulate me when I tell them that I’ll be apprenticing under a team of Experts in the renovation of the White House. Between beats, I ask them the same question. One Flesh Weaver leaves late June for a Bioprinting conference in Japan. Russell, Alexandria’s resident Beauty Translator, will be hosting his first art show in New York. Slaps and fist pumps go around, and then again, until it gets a bit overwhelming.


Adam's Thoughts
I really want to know what she thinks her mother is thinking :-) It seems like she's apprehensive, but I'm not clear about what, exactly. What is she afraid will happen? That knowledge alone might carry me through this piece a lot more strongly.

There are some world bits here that are intriguing -- the Flesh Weaver, for instance. But I'm not picking up enough to keep me hooked. That doesn't mean you have to add more just yet, but it's something to think about.

I kept getting hung up on simple words that were capitalized, but I didn't know why -- like School and Expert. I'm sure there's a reason, but because I don't know what it is, I find myself wondering why it doesn't just say school and expert. Why are they special enough to mark them as proper nouns? The problem is they appear to mean exactly the same thing as the common terms. It's similar to the problem of foreign terms: if a "hobarjee" is actually a duck, then it's better to just say duck.

These are nitpicks, and that's a good thing. I can't say I'm hooked yet, but I'm not turned off either. I think it just needs some turns in the right direction.

So what do the rest of you guys think?

First Impact: INGENICIDE by Joan He (Query)

Despite all the noise ($2M in two days, guys! Keep it going!), it's time for another First Impact Critique, where we take a look at your queries, first pages, back cover copy, and more. You want to make an impact right from the start. We're here to help you do that.

If you'd like to submit your first impact material, send it to firstimpactAE@gmail.com. Details here.

The random numbers have favored critiquer Melodie Wright for February's prize. Congratulations, Melodie! And the rest of you remember: anyone who offers their comments this month is eligible for either $10 for Amazon or B&N OR a 20-page critique from me.

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This week we have the query for a YA dystopian from Joan He. My overall thoughts are at the end. As always, this is all just my opinion. Your mileage may vary.

Query Letter

I think the phrase is "the sky is the
limit," but also it's a bit cliche. You
can do better.

For sixteen-year-old Sibyl Kenschild, the sky is her limit when it comes to interior design--that is, until the Genocide reaches Alexandria, Virginia, and gatecrashes the graduation party.

Why is Peers capitalized?

What's Ingenium?

At the moment, I think her life is
more important than these things :-)

In a matter of hours, Sibyl’s world is shattered. Chaos erupts, Peers are slaughtered, and Sibyl has no idea why the Normals have resorted to mass killings of the Ingenium. All she knows is that she’s too young to die. She must survive and protect what remains most important to her--her heart, her spirit, and her sanity.

My confusion in the 2nd paragraph
is making this one impossible to
understand.

So when the leaders of the Genocide present a selection of Ingenia with a second shot at living, Sibyl decides play their game. Four Peers will have to summon all that they have learned to create unparalleled rooms for the enemy headquarters. It is a competition that puts at stake the dearest price; with each assignment, one Ingenium is exterminated. As she grows closer to her competitors—in particular, a troubled but gentle boy who designs chillingly twisted rooms—Sibyl is not sure if she has what it takes to win. And if she does, she just might not have enough strength to ignore the fates of the others.

INGENICIDE is a YA dystopian/adventure novel complete at 58,000 words.

Thank you for your time and consideration!

Adam's Thoughts
First of all, I love dystopian novels, and this sounds like it has some cool stuff in it.

Unfortunately, I'm having a hard time figuring out what that cool stuff is. Who are the Peers? Who are the Ingenium? Which one is Sibyl? And why are they designing rooms? That part, in particular, sounds potentially cool, but I can't tell because I don't understand it.

Now understand, the way to fix this is not necessarily to add the information into the existing query. Very often that leads to a bloated query that just raises new questions. Look for things you can cut so that you don't even raise the questions to begin with. For example, do we really need to know about Peers and Ingenium? Maybe you can just say "Sibyl's people," and use the space you save to explain the rooms. Which way you go is up to you and what you want to convey in the query. Just remember, it's okay to skip stuff; the goal is to make the agent want to read more.

What do the rest of you guys think?