Happy WordCount Wednesday!
Got a bunch of updates this week so let's get right to it. Here you go:
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1. Invasion 3: 54,000 words. Chapter 30 is done. Beginning to close out Volume 17. One note about this book: The first volume of the book is indeed from Aria's POV. The original version had pretty mixed reviews. Some liked having it a little bit different from the MC, others not. All I can say is, it is staying. But it is also only about a dozen chapters out of a book of between 80 and 100. If you liked that news, yay! If not, sorry. But it is part of the story too.
2. Jade Phoenix 3: Hit the 25,000 words milestone. I'm pretty much all done writing the first draft of PART 25 (the first of book 3) with only a single flashback left to write. Part 25, in case you wanted to know, is titled Old and New. Part 26 starts with our MC leaving the sect for... ummm... something important. Yeah.
3. Jade Phoenix 2 AUDIOBOOK: The audiobook will be launched on May 16! WOOOHOOO!!! It is officially up for pre-order on Amazon and Audible and you can pick up all 28.5 hours of content for 1 credit. A damn good deal if you ask me. Here are the links:
-- Amazon: https://www.royalroad.com/amazon/B0C3DH3ZVR
-- Audible: https://www.audible.com/pd/Revealed-Audiobook/B0C3DJFR7S
4. Update on posting stories online: So, I have gotten a handful of requests for updates on when I will be posting content again and where. I'm going to answer the second first.
-- I will always post my content on Royal Road before anything else. There. With that answered, here are the specifics: It will be first draft, it will be unpolished, it will be missing things like interludes and epilogues, and it will hopefully receive feedback. But most importantly, it will always be free. For those who've read my stuff on RR for a while, you know I am a huge believer in free reading and literacy. I am a supporter of local public libraries because of this. I just don't think people should have to pay for reading. On the other side of that coin, I receive feedback from you on how to make the story better, which I super duper appreciate. For those who read the comments, you know that I read them all and, while I can't respond to everyone, I often use that feedback in the books. I find it to be an awesome exchange.
-- That said, I am a professional author. Meaning writing books is my career. I use it to pay for my mortgage, my electric bills, my daughter's college tuition, my frog-print socks, etc etc etc. In the end, I write books to sell them. So what goes on RR, while free, is never as good as the final product because it is unedited, which costs money. Money that puts food on my family's table.
-- So what does all that mean? It means that I will continue to post content on RR. I will also be starting a PATREON, where I can sell advanced and future content.
Here's my plan for that:
1. Once I have a full backlog of content, and not before, I will post on Royal Road again. Do I know when that will be? Not really. I'd guess it's a month away at least. If I had to give you something, I might prognosticate that 100,000 words in each book at the soonest. It will be both Invasion 3 and JP 3.
You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.
2. At the same time that I start releasing content on RR again, I will being my Patreon that will have additional content.
3. Ok, so what will the Patreon have, you ask? Well, it's important to me that if you are investing in me and my work, that I make sure you are getting something of fair value. Here's what I'm proposing:
a.) Updates and news - This a normal thing for authors to offer for the $1 tier. It allows readers to know what's going on, what to prepare for, and usually grants some sort of advanced notice for releases, covers, opportunities for feedback/polls, etc. I will also probably include art, although I'm not 100% on that. NOTE: I'm pretty sure I'll be moving WordCount Wednesdays to here as well to increase its value. Sorry for RR-only readers, but almost no authors offer weekly updates for free on this website. I will definitely post the rare important updates on RR though. Just not the weekly WW.
b.) Advanced chapters - This is also a classic approach to authoring and I will use it as well. You will get a certain number of advanced chapters based on tier-level/price. I don't have a specific tier system set up yet, but I will keep it fair and reasonable and comparable to what most authors in this genre do. Probably pretty market standard. NOTE: This includes any work currently published on RR. So that would mean Invasion, Jade Phoenix, and Soul Warrior. It will also include any work that I end up publishing on RR in the future, but you won't get access to them at this tier until the story is publically available on RR. That leaves the last offering.
c.) Early access to secret projects and IPs - This one is pretty exciting I think. It will be a more advanced tier, but in exchange, it will grant a sneak peek into future work. This means you'll get in on the ground floor of projects that I have started but are pretty far from being published. This includes not only the draft content itself, but also outlines, discussion, requests for feedback, opportunities to participate (e.g. potentially having characters named after you or names you come up with), ideas you've offered, and all that good stuff. I don't expect a lot of people to sign up for this level, but I do hope it will be rewarding for those who do.
d.) What about other free stuff? So this one is a little complicated. I can't offer free downloadable PDFs of books that I did not self-publish. That is taking money away from my publisher and just not fair to them. I definitely can for Invasion, and any future self-published work, but for those that are published through Portal Books, I can't. What I CAN do is offer signed author copies of paperback books. I will probably offer them in the mid to high tiers from bullet B above. I'm not sure what else I can offer. I'd love to hear your thoughts.
And that's it for your weekly update. I hope I answered your questions and provided the info you were looking for. Now for the weekly art.
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As promised, I returned to Jade Phoenix in this week's "attempt at art by Freedcats".
I wasn't sure who to work on, and bounced around a bit. I decided to give Gui Ai a try. So here she is:
[https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/1008571251733844048/1102712640062640258/D.I._Freed_Freedcats_anime_cute_16_year_old_girl_sad_expression_95439f42-7f1a-4ee4-9fb9-1dc5692981c2.png?width=910&height=910]
The eyes aren't quite bright enough (supposed to be bright azure), but otherwise it isn't too bad. It was important to me that the facial expression be somewhat representative of her. I tried for something shyish, but I could have gone sad too. I wasn't sure. As always, the clothes aren't right, but I think the hair, braids, face, and expression are pretty on the money for Ai.
Who do you want to see next week? It doesn't have to be from JP. Could be from any of my stories.
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There you go, folks. Hopefully, I'll update next week with bigger word counts. As always, thank you so much for reading my stories, and have a great week!
- D.I. Freed (a.k.a. Freedcats)