First Cup of Coffee - February 12, 2024

Happy (almost) Mardi Gras! I'm talking planning author finances over the longer term, offering some predictions on the rise and (inevitable, eventual) decline of Romantasy, and looking at the 10 year anniversary of THE MARK OF THE TALA.

You can find a recording of our Beastly Books panel on the FaRoFeb Instagram account.

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Transcript

00:01.97
jeffekennedy
Good morning, everyone! This is Jeffe Kennedy author of epic fantasy romance I'm here with my first cup of coffee.

00:13.70
jeffekennedy
Delicious today is Monday February Twelfth it is um the day before Mardis Gras - Fat Tuesday tomorrow and so I am celebrating in a style with my great big. Huge. Mardis Gras earrings if you're not on video. These things are ginormous they're masks on each side and then with beads hanging down they they reach my shoulders. They're nearly bigger than my own head not quite but close. And I'm also wearing beads not mardi gra beads I used to have lots of lots of Mardi Grasbeads and I finally got rid of them. Ah, but I'm wearing pearls Hawaii pearls. So I realize that's not exactly the same thing but ah one does. What one must ah I used to have all kinds of mardigrus stuff some of it's like stored away in and the garage but at our old house in Wyoming I had a Mardi Gras bathroom. It was this ah small windowless bathroom that had been added. Under the stairs and this old house. It was a 1913 house I think or 1906 crafts arts and Crafts House it was really neat house I loved it. But this bathroom was sort of sandwiched under the stairs that went up to the second level so it had a sloping ceiling and i.

01:48.40
jeffekennedy
It was mine. It was the one that I claimed and had a shower in there and a toilet in a sink that was about it in a mirror and I hung my big mardi gras posters in there and I beads on the walls and I had purple and gold towels which are the Mardi Gras colors and my mom even made. Had little hand towels made for me that were embroidered with mardi gras symbols. It was awesome. I may have been the only person who liked that bathroom but I liked it a whole lot and there's something to be said for um. Setting up the house the way that you want it to be Ah yeah I realize it's kind of sideways of our usual topic but you know that is the brand here at first cup of coffee. You know people who buy houses and spend a whole lot of time. Thinking about what will improve the value of the house which is useful to think about. But if you're only ever thinking about this mysterious buyer that you may have someday that you're only decorating for them then you know it's kind of like what's the point of. Living right? What's the point of living your life and enjoying having a house if you don't get to do what you want to? you know? maybe it'll turn up on like 1 of those creepy ah real estate agent photos someday and people will say how could anyone do that to their house but also.

03:20.19
jeffekennedy
You always know that when you see those bizarre things and you're like oh what were they thinking? you know that they loved it. They did it because they love it and I have been meaning to mention for some time now. Ah I think I you all know that I had like painted the bookshelves and painted 1 wall in the living room. Well, the other thing I've been doing is I've been doing some tiling and I tiled one of the nichos. It's something that's characteristic of Northern New mexican architecture where they build little niches. Into the wall. So. It's ah a flat bottom with a curved top called a nicho and there are two nichos in this house 1 facing the front door and so I posted a photo of the tiling work that I had done with the one facing the front door I wanted it to stand out more. So I put in some welcome tiles and then some other glass tiles and then I have another niche that I'm going to do that I've not yet done but I will and then there are the 2 fireplaces on the house. There's one in the living room one in the primary bedroom. And I have done the the flat surface of the fireplace which I think is just called the hearth I just went and looked it up because every time I've been telling like my friend said this is what I'm working on I've hesitated over the words, but it says a fireplace hearth.

04:49.55
jeffekennedy
Because I thought well maybe it's also the part you know like the great where the actual fire is but it says a fireplace hearth is the floor or ledge on your fireplace that extends into the room as well as the wall around the fireplace. Ah so it's it's the whole thing is actually the hearth is so that's good to know. So I've been tiling that and I may add some more I will I haven't finished the grouting yet. But maybe I'll post another in progresss I did post a photo like a week ago without explanation. No context for you. Of the niche facing the front door I'm very pleased with how it turned out. So maybe I'll post another in-progres one and then do the the finals. Yeah, so that's been a fun project. That's been a good example of a non- monetized. Ah, quite the reverse because I've been buying tiles. Um, it was kind of cool because or I'm sorry finish your sentence jeffy non-monetized creative project. It's been really fun to put the tiles together and I got them from a local place which is um. Mexican owned. The people who work there I think are all related and speak varying degrees of english but I was there last weekend on a very snowy greeting day greeting in the scottish sense of like this rain that.

06:18.77
jeffekennedy
Very fine and kind of turning to snow and slushy and I went there after yoga and bought like $300 worth of tiles I have been going back and forth I bought a whole bunch of different ones to see what I wanted and brought them home and tried them so then I went back and exchanged some and. Were very accommodating and then the gal who I think is one of the owners or maybe 1 of the primary owners um thanked me for coming in. She said. Thank you so much for coming and buying these today you may be our only sale the whole day and I thought it was so nice that she said that she also gave me her card. Ah, because I was showing her my in-progres pictures on my phone and she wants to post to the website when I'm done not just another pretty face I had a busy weekend and ah we did the we're in the midst of doing the faro feb. Ah, celebration fantasy romance in february and this weekend we had a gig at beastly books and had a fabulous time there Vela Roth came up from el paso and then a k mulford and a j lancaster joined us from australia and new zealand online and it was broadcast on instagram live so you could still see it on the far off web account I will link to that.

07:48.45
jeffekennedy
So it was interesting talking about the rise and the romantasy trend and um and looking at my own history. It's ah you know it's a time flies kind ah kind of thing I am looking at I should do a celebration.

08:07.52
jeffekennedy
I could get Kensington to play along but may is the tenure anniversary of the Mark of the Tala and it was interesting hanging out with Bela Roth this weekend and it was interesting with vla being here who. Is much younger than I am um like 22 years younger than I am I discovered and she read the mark of the talla when it first came out and it started her was one of the books that began her love of fantasy romance which of course there just wasn't that much of it then. Um, it's just funny to think about that. It's been ten years since that book came out and looking at my struggle to be writing cross genre before that you know and that now what I write is kind of the hot thing but um. You know wasn't for so long. Put me in a reflective mood know so it was um, it was a busy weekend. Good conversations about writing and books I spent. A lot of time and energy molling. Ah the first order of the fay realms formerly known as the amethyst run ah last week was a slow week I did not do amazingly well last week ah I think I just sort of hit a slow down point.

09:44.80
jeffekennedy
And they got 3500 words on it the whole week and I am up against the act 2 climax and trying to figure out where it goes from here or trying to help my heroin figure out how to solve this massive problem. That she's gotten herself into so I think it was just a I think it was a regular process slowdown and hopefully we'll speed up this week I would like to have this finished in the next two weeks um alert listeners will recall that I'd hope to have it finished by now. But so it goes um I've also been mulling and I know that I am I am preaching to the choir here. But I've been thinking a lot about. And I don't know why I'm even bringing this up because I know you're all just going to tell me that you want Elisa's book um which I am going to call reluctant wizard. Um, but I was looking at renegades of magic. And that that trilogy has not really lit up the world I'm not sure why? Ah and I feel like dark wizard bonds of magic has kind of stalled out like it's not continuing to gain readers and ratings.

11:16.48
jeffekennedy
So and and shadow wizard and the renegates of magic trilogy has never done as well as the initial trilogy did and I'm not sure why I've kind of been mulling that over and we have conversations we did this weekend Some um. You know, like when do you decide to bail on a series. So I know you don't have to message me you all don't have to tell me how you really want me to write a Elis's trilogy because I know you do I'm just wondering if anybody else as um, yeah, we'll think about that.

11:54.33
jeffekennedy
I think I know I need to to finish the story and maybe that's reason enough to do it. But ah yeah, I'm kind of wondering why that series hasn't done so well I was thinking about going to go look at my reviews and see if there's a clue maybe I just didn't get it out there. As much so I don't know it might not be worth thinking about I would like to finish Alise's book the other thing I'm thinking about is I guess Alise's trilogy is. Putting these books in k you just for grins. Ah yeah I might I'm gonna try it and just see I know I've tried it before but not with this particular series. So. These are these are all my many thoughts. Ah I did watch the super bowl yesterday afternoon David wanted to watch it and so we put it on because we already had a subscription to Paramount plus so we could watch it on streaming. And I was finishing up laundry I was finishing up doing a few things on the laptop but it you know it was nice for a Sunday late afternoon evening thing. But then the game went on so long and went into overtime for only the second time in super bowl history and into 15 minutes

13:21.64
jeffekennedy
Of over time and David went to the grocery store before it closed our little store closes at nine. So it was like eight thirty here and so he went and I was putting laundry away and listening to the game with half an ear because I really wanted Taylor's boyfriend to win i. You know? Ah I have no fandom involved otherwise but I wanted Taylor's boyfriend to win and then the stream cut out and I was invested at this point and apparently paramount plus streaming. Completely crashed and they like went to having faced the nation on there and um so I did not see the miraculous last minute win by the chiefs and I probably would have been. Jumping up and down with my hands at my throat and I really wanted to see Taylor's reaction so I'm going to have to like look it up on the internet today like like a dinosaur. Ah um, yeah, so. So I just was um I'm curious to see if there's fallout on Paramount plus today because apparently a lot of people had trouble trouble getting on the streaming from the beginning. So yeah.

14:49.19
jeffekennedy
Ah, back to writing issues and so forth. Um, people have been asking me for advice on if you write fantasy romance or romansy and considering moving into a traditional deal I do think now is the time. My. Prediction for what it's worth is that the traditional publishing houses and editors will be continuing to acquire for probably pretty voraciously for probably the next year. Um I'm guessing that in 2025 is when we are going to start seeing some drop off because a lot of the books that are being acquired now are going to come out in 202051 and some of them will not do well. Right? That's just the way of it. Um, you know some won't do well for no good reason. Others are books that have done well in Kindle Unlimited where readers read them essentially for free and. Will those readers convert over to paying for a $12 ebook is always the question. We don't know to we? Um, sometimes I do a lot of times they don't and.

16:21.18
jeffekennedy
So some of the books that editors are acquiring now a few people in the industry ah in the self publishing community are kind of side eyeing. It's like really, that's the 1 you wanted to pay a bunch of money to acquire. Well we'll see well I'll find out but those. Particular crows are not going to come home to roost and I know I mixed that metaphor until 202051 so up till then there is still a realm of possibilities. Um. Vela and I did have some conversations. It was kind of funny because she was talking about it being ah fantasy romance being hot right now there a wholecy trend and she was saying that she hoped that it would still be a thing when it inevitably dies down which I kind of thought was funny and she meant this. Totally Earnestly. She didn't mean it as anything but thinking about that she hopes that she'll be able to continue to write and sell those books. Ah, but I was like well I was doing it before it was hot and doing okay been making a living at it. 1 of the things I did do over the weekend speaking of author finances was I went ahead and planned out my budgeting through up to September um, you know that's one of the things with author finances is that you have to look at um.

17:52.30
jeffekennedy
Money coming in over the long term because you know you might have a good month but then you might have low months and so I did figure out that I am okay to pay the bills through like September without a new release so that helped. Helped to know that I'm not sure if it's good for me to not be feeling the pressure to get books written because I feel like I slow down when I don't feel that way. But so it goes ah. Oh and but then my other piece of advice if you are wanting to go to trad. Yes, try to query an agent first and I really think that right now you should have a full manuscript written you could try querying agents with a partial but to sell to traditional publishing. Just think you need a full manuscript now and I think it would be better to go ahead and query an agent with that full manuscript too. So my predictions for what they're worth That's how I'm planning to do things so um, hope you all had a great weekend. I. Hope you got to watch the last gripping 10 minutes of the super bowl which I did not. And yeah, if you know some good clips send them to me I my feed is full of Taylor Swift anyway the algorithm knows me so I'll no doubt find it. But yeah.

19:25.80
jeffekennedy
And I hope you all have a great week, Happy Mardis Gras! Laissez Les Bon Temps Roulez! I will talk to you all on Friday you all take care bye bye.