Promotion.
I mean, emails, of course I’ve sent emails, I’ve been sending emails since (checks) December, yes, but see, the thing about December is, in December I was still writing the forty-third novelette? of forty-four? And though I was pretty sure I’d finish it all within the year to come, I mean, writing an epic is hardly a precision enterprise, it’s not like I can point to a section of the back wall and hit a home run over it right there, bang, so, see, those emails that I started sending in December? They all said the next book would be coming out at some point most likely in 2024 but that was as specific as I could get and, the thing about the sort of people who coordinate reviews? who prepare lists of eagerly anticipated titles, and arrange thoughtfully chewy interviews to whet appetites? Well, that sort of person tends to prefer a little specificity in their dealings, some actionable detail in the announcements and releases, in the emails they receive. There’s just not that much to be done with “coming soon, within the year, most likely” unless you’re already inclined to be generous, and who has the time or space for generosity, these days?
So, yes. I’ve sent emails. I’ve been sending emails, and one thing I’ve noticed on this go-round is there are fewer places to send those emails. Not that I have hard numbers to back this up, it could all just be subjective, personal experience, you know, anecdata at best, and you should take into account the fact I’m tired, you know? I mean, eighteen years (and more), I’m just not as game as I used to be, maybe, but still. And many of the fewer places have specialized. Everyone’s more discriminating now, settling into as they define this niche, or that, so I have to weigh and balance : is the epic a political fantasy? Sure? An anticapitalist fantasy, even, heck, anarchist, I could make that argument, but is it also as well a dark fantasy? unsettling? per se? —And the epic is very much concerned with queerness, along a number of axes, and yes, I do, however primly, identify as queer, but : as a queer author? of a queer epic? —It helps, it does, already having a place to stand, well-lit, finely appointed, a striking lectern on a goodly podium, a rostrum, even, a pulpit, so that attention knows where to look when you begin to speak, but any such already space brings with it constrictions, restrictions, preconceptions, and if you don’t fit, not entirely, not expectedly, not as such, well. The sharp-elbowed arriviste and the shrinking wallflower are equally fatal postures in this game, so one—or at least I—more often than not will end up demurring.
But even if one finds a place to fit, and I have, you then find out they only publish fiction that fits your niche. Or if they do maintain some sort of critical apparatus, it’s not the sort that solicits manuscripts and ARCs and books and looks them over, then reaches out to match them up with someone who might be interested; it’s instead the sort that solicits critical pieces already composed or at least conceived, by critics already invested, and so the email I’m to send to get noticed by the place doesn’t go to the place, but—where? Everyone who’s written for them before? Anyone who someday might? —It saves them no little time and bother, I’m sure, but abdicates some portion of the steering function they are presumed to fulfill in the critical conversation; curation gets dispersed, along with that time and bother, to many more divers hands.
So, yes. I’ve sent emails. I’ve been sending emails since December, and the moment I finally felt I could point to a section of that back wall where I was gonna hit a homer I did, I sent out honest-to-God press releases, save the date, but by that point which was (flips back) July, the problem wasn’t anymore of specificity, but quantity, because, see, from July 9th to October 22nd, that’s only a hundred and five days, barely fifteen weeks to clear space, commission a review, read the book(s), think of something cogent to say and get it written, it’s less than four months to find someone cognizant enough to ask the sort of questions that might be chewed, to place judiciously and appropriately on this list, or that : there are so very many books out there in the world now, and more of them every day, but only ever so much time, and never enough attention, I get that, I do, so yes, I’ve been sending emails, but I haven’t sent one of this sort of email in over a month now, I mean, I’ve sent a lot, well for me it’s a lot, and some of them to the same place more than once, and anyway, we’re running out of time, as noted, and I wouldn’t want to be a bother, no, and anyway, I haven’t gotten a single email back.
Only now I have to go and spoil the punchline because I did just get one back! In response to an email sent in (scrolls back) August. They want a physical book, which won’t go out till next week, at the earliest, two weeks to go, barely enough time to say hey, nice cover, so I’m not sure what that might mean for their production schedule, or my marketing plan, such as it is, but what the hell, right?
And there are reasons for this (relative) silence? Most notably, given the nature of the epic itself : sequel fatigue. —There’s any number of reviews out there of volume one, because who doesn’t love to catch a thing in its early, promising days; there’s a sparser scatter of chatter on volume two, because by that point you need to read (some of) two books, not just one, to have anything to say; and as for volume three?
Let’s face it : by the time a fourth volume rolls around, by the time you get to (tots up) six hundred and fifty thousand words, by the time it’s (closes eyes) eighteen years, the lift’s too great, the mountain’s too high, the mass is just too much. If you aren’t already being talked about, you won’t get talked about, and while, I mean, I’m in conversation, after my fashion, to be sure, I’m yet to ever be of it.
So here I am, laying one word after another in the epic, inching as I do so ever further out along a branch that all the while grows more slender, and the forest below so (almost) entirely silent, and not, I don’t think, with breath-held wonder; we’re well past the point when most publishers would’ve looked at the numbers and cut the branch for firewood. —Luckily, I guess, maybe, I’m not most publishers?
And yet. But still. It would be best for all concerned to simply do the work and set it out, here, it’s done, make of it what you will, and none of this pushing or cajoling, the endless sleeve-tugging and half-considered brand-building and (shudder) influencing and and and, I mean, just do the work. Do the work, and let it speak for itself.
(But : to whom? There’s two reasons, largely speaking, why it might’ve gotten so quiet as one crawls further and further out along an oh so slender branch, and one is the inertia mentioned above, the fatigue, into which we can mix a much larger pool of people who just don’t know, who’ve no idea there’s even a book, you’ve written a book, how about that, because, as we have noted, there are so very many books out there in the world, and more of them every day, but only ever so much time, and never enough attention. —The second reason? Would be that they do know. They’ve been informed. They see you, up on that creaking branch, the work that you have done to get there, they’ve read it, and they’ve decided : eh. Why bother.
(So you send the emails. Because the notion of the first silence is preferable, by far, to the second.)
