Racing Toward Christmas
Hey,
It's your favorite fictional character, (Ran, son of Sarn, from the Curse Breaker series, of course) and I'm back to regale you with tales of my Christmas adventure, Stars & Angels Sing.
So what's happening with that book, you might be wondering.
I’m so glad you asked because I’ve been hard at work behind the scenes cajoling our Scribe, and I need to tell you about that.
So what did I argue for?
First let me go over where we are with the different formats, then I’ll get to that. I promise.
The Audiobook
The audiobook has a 53 minute chat taking you behind the scenes and discussing each chapter with musical accompaniment. Which is pretty cool. The commentary is split into chapters based on what chapter Melinda is commenting on, so you could go back and forth between the main narrative and the commentary if you want.
Audiobook is about 4 hours long. I say about because I get different lengths everytime I open the BookFunnel app. We were hoping it would say how long it is
And that's great but I had an idea I wanted to tell you about.
My bright idea
While Melinda did boring things like re-record and edit the audio files and add music, I wandered over as I do since that portal appeared in my cave. Now it's in a linen closet, and I'm just waiting for Inari to notice and ask about it. 😁
She's got to see it eventually. It's a person-sized glowing purple hoop, and that's not something you can ignore. Or I can't. But maybe it hides when she goes in there for sheets and towels.
I’ll have to follow her next time and check. I'll report back about my findings in a future email. But I digress is I often do.
I was about to tell you about my brilliant idea. The conversation with my Scribe, Melinda, went something like this:
"You know how they have all these neat AI things? Well, I found one that can make text from audio files, and you know how much I like to push buttons..." I trailed off as I often do when I’m not sure how my idea will be received.
"What did you do?" Melinda asked, but she didn’t look away from the computer screen.
"I might have pushed the upload button, and a window appeared. So I clicked on the commentary file. Then the window disappeared and--" I rocked on my heels and tried not to dance around.
"Why did you do that?" Melinda covered her face with her hands.
"It was a button, so I clicked it. I wanted to see what would happen. And you'll be glad I did because it made a file with lots of text. It got a lot of stuff wrong, but you can fix that and make a new script for the audiobook commentary. Then you could adapt it and add it to the ebook and paperback!" I threw my hands in the air to show how big my idea was.
Melinda just stared at me. No pat on the back. No, “Ran, that’s a great idea.” Oh well. But a thoughtful look did cross my scribe’s face. So that was progress, right?
The New Plan
It was actually! Melinda liked the idea, and she reworked the text the AI transcribed into a new script. She re-recorded it, edited it, added holiday music and split it into chapters for the audiobook, then edited it and formatted it for the ebook and the paperback version.
So now all versions have a commentary at the end. Isn’t that exciting?
The Paperback and eBook Versions
Both the ebook and paperback for Stars & Angels Sing are digitally signed by Melinda.
And have an update on the color images too for ebook and paperback.
You know I got more images. I don’t think anyone doubted that except maybe my scribe. But she often underestimates me.
We started the Kickstarter with 27 images, but the final version of the ebook and paperback have 42 color images!
The final book is 231 pages.
Here’s a preview of the images. Many are full-page images in the paperback:
Rewards Update
Backers will receive the paperback between Dec. 27 and Jan. 5. That’s as close as we could get to Christmas.
We had to use the printer in the UK that we use for the previous Kickstarter because the printers in the US were having quality or maybe it's QC issues. I don't really know. I just know Melinda saw lots of posts online of authors talking about books that they received with glaring printer errors.
But the printer in the UK we used last time has great QC and the books were perfect when they arrived from across the sea. So the extra cost to rush the printing (jump ahead of the queue) and to ship the books to the USA is totally worth it.
eBook and audiobook backers received their copies yesterday as BookFunnel gift codes.
If You Missed It
If you missed the Kickstarter or you didn’t feel comfortable backing it, worry not. You can order your copy here.
And that’s what your favorite fictional characters have been up to. I’ll see you next week for our annual Christmas adventure!
I need to go tell Melinda what we’re doing in it. Don’t forget to get your copy of Stars & Angels Sing in ebook, paperback or audiobook.
New Podcast Episodes & Videos
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Fantasy, Lore, & More: Blossom and Bone
Stars & Angels Sing: Christmas Story Preview
New Releases, Sales, & Other Book Stuff
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