The Drovers: Update

ByJohn Brown

Folks, I have finally finished draft 1 of The Drovers.

Let there be much rejoicing.

It clocked in around 75,000 words, and as soon as I finished, I realized I had two shorter novels. And this is exactly what I had originally planned. I wanted to tell a very long story in many shorter chunks. So I now have two 35,000 short novels. Since only writers think in word counts, here are some other books to give you a comparison.

  • Louis L’Amour’s westerns: most average around 50,000 words.
  • James Patterson’s Maximum Ride and Witch & Wizard series: average around 60,000 words.
  • Richard Paul Evans’s Michael Vey series books: average around 77,000.
  • The first three of Horowitz’s Alex Rider books: around 55,000.
  • Brandon Sanderson’s Steelheart books: around 100,000.

My books usually get a bit larger with the second draft, so I expect these will probably end up around 45,000 words. We’ll see.

What I’m really looking forward to is telling a long story in these smaller chunks and unrolling the story like it’s done on TV.  You can do things over 20 or 30 episodes that you simply can’t in one big novel. This doesn’t meant I won’t be able to have big climaxes. Of course, I will. It just means that I’m going to do it in a slightly different form. I already have the basic ideas for the next dozen or so books. And now that I’m rolling, I expect things will go faster.

The working title of book 1 is “Hireling.” The working title for book 2 is “Outcast.

The cast so far:

  • Ferran: the main character, a scrappy boy that’s trying to keep his mam and sister from bondage
  • Itch: his dog
  • Krov: the big woodsman’s son, aka the Lover
  • Winwalom: Ferran’s best friend who is manifesting forbidden powers
  • Ranoc: the boy who wants to be one of the king’s rangers
  • Caswal: the mean one who has it out for Ferran
  • Borros: the drover and former grimsman
  • Lagash: the cook and foreigner who once beat Borros in battle
Share

Similar Posts

  • Library Journal gives Servant of a Dark God a starred review

    ByJohn Brown

    Library Journal just gave Servant of a Dark God a starred review. Yesss! BTW, that’s not one star out of four or five. The review gets a star or it doesn’t. Those with a star are “highly-rated.” I just wish I could lick it and put it on my forehead.

    Brown, John. Servant of a Dark God. Tor. Oct. 2009. (The Dark Gods, Vol. 1). c.448p. ISBN 978-0-7653-2235-7. $25.99. FANTASY

    Suffering under the oppressive rule of their Mokaddian conquerors, the Koramites hide ancient magics that draw power from a person’s “days,” thus shortening the lives of the donors. A young boy becomes caught up in a personal and political struggle when one of the Divines who knows how to wield this power disappears. Brown’s first novel, the opener in a new fantasy series, creates an elaborate new world with a rich and deep spiritual and political background. VERDICT Reminiscent of L.E. Modesitt Jr.’s “Recluce” novels and David Drake’s “Lord of the Isles” series and David Farland’s “Runelords” books, this well-wrought tale of families in conflict against both politics and religion represents a welcome addition to large-scale fantasy.

    Share

  • NEWS: The Man is going all indie for the next little while

    ByJohn Brown

    After discussions with my agent and a few others, I’ve decided NOT to shop BAD PENNY to New York publishers. In fact, I’ve decided I’m not going to be shopping anything to NY for the next 12 – 18 months.

    My agent was certainly willing to take the property out, but given the average expected advance for thrillers ($15-20k per book; maybe up to $100k for three books) and the terms that NY currently wants, I thought that it might be worth it to try to build something on my own.

    I do not hold the illusions some do about indie publishing (I probably hold others). For example, I know quite a few authors who have published indie and are selling very low numbers each month–single digits and teens. Of course, I know others, a smaller portion, who are selling just fine.

    But then what’s the bar? How many copies do I have to sell on my own over a three to five year period to match what NY can do for me via brick and mortar?

    Let’s look at that from a revenue and a unit perspective.

    The average advance for a fantasy, according to Tobias Buckell’s survey, is about $7,000 for a new author. $12,000 for an established author. We saw the numbers I gathered for thrillers above.

    So lets see how many copies I’d have to sell indie style to earn as much as I’d get in an advance from New York.  Why not select a higher number? Well, my understanding is that most books don’t earn out their advance. That doesn’t mean the publisher doesn’t make money; just that a publisher’s profit isn’t dependent on an author earning out.

    So what are the numbers? Well, here are the numbers for NY. Down the first column you’ll see the different formats. Across the rows you’ll see how many units I’d have to sell to make the advance specified at the top. And how many units I’d have to sell if I wanted to spread the total over three years.

    IndieNYComparisonNYNumbers

    Okay, and here’s what I’d have to sell if I went indie to make the same numbers. I put in the trade paperback format for both 600 and 400 pages because that’s about how big SERVANT and BAD PENNY are going to be.

    IndieNYComparisonIndieNumbers

     

    What does this tell me?

    It tells me I have to sell a heck of a lot more units with NY at a much higher price than I do indie.  It tells me that a $5,000 advance is not even close to being worth the control I lose with NY.  And if it’s true that most books don’t earn out, then it tells me the units that are being sold by NY on the average book.

    Back in 2009 I shared this: How Many Copies Do Average Authors Sell? This was from an editor at Tor Books. Seems like my numbers are in the ball park.

    It’s true that NY could get me into brick and mortar stores. But if the book gets shelved spine out in the back, how many people will discover it?

    It’s true that NY produces some spectacular hits. I looked at the USA Today bestseller list yesterday and it appears only about 10% of the books there this week are indies. But I can’t bank on becoming a NY wonder. The vast majority of NY published books DON’T make the bestseller lists.

    Finally, even if I sold BAD PENNY today, it still wouldn’t hit shelves for probably 12-18 months from now. And then it would only stay on the shelves for 12-18 weeks. Going indie, I will have it up by September. And it will stay. For years and years and years.

    There’s no guarantee of success either way. But the indie numbers look good to me. We’ll see how it goes.

    Share

  • Woof Woof Yip! (that’s doggie fanfare)

    ByJohn Brown

    Servant of a Dark God in Paperback, Tuesday, November 2!
    For those of you who have been waiting for the cheaper version — Be happy, pre-order the book today! Alternatively, you may vote in the national elections then immediately reward yourself for being such a responsible citizen! Or make someone else happy for Thanksgiving, Christmas, or some pagan solstice ritual with 624 AWARD-WINNING pages of thrilling ACTION, cool MONSTERS, wicked MAGIC, and a Ginzu KNIFE! (okay, so there’s no knife, but the book does feature the most awesome weapons ever; I’m talking about the three living silver spikes called Hag’s Teeth). Whoever gets this book will love you forever*. Book info in the Fiction part of my site.

        

    *tested on a statistically valid sample of gerbils, hamsters, and various other intelligent rodents who all cheered with wild delight at the reading and then asked for more peanuts and crackers

    Share

  • Curse now available in audio!

    ByJohn Brown

    I’m very happy to announce that Curse is now available in audio format. The other nice thing is that the audio performance of Servant is getting great reviews. Wyndham did a fab job.

    And for those who graciously leave reviews, well, you never know when you’ll become famous. A reader, Jared Smith, left a review of Curse some time ago for the text version. Who knew the publisher would have decided to slap a quote from his review on the cover? Thank you, Jared!

    audiocovercurse

    Share

  • Servant of a Dark God: Coming October 13, 2009

    ByJohn Brown

    Tor Books’ production department has moved my book’s release date out one month. I’m getting so antsy to have it hit the stores, but October’s actually a better month, it being closer to the holiday season.

    You still might be able to get it earlier if you pre-order. The books actually start shipping in the second half of September. But it takes a few weeks to get them out to all the stores.

    Share

2 Comments

  1. John, great updates, insights, and reflections -all. I’ve been pretty busy lately and just catching up. Congrats on draft 1 of Drovers. Extinct and RadioWest both sound intriguing. Too far away to enjoy Ruca’s. Deep sigh and sad face.

    Lastly, thanks for explaining Mormonism – i did indeed have a misconception to some extent (albeit i did understand the emphasis re Jesus Christ) Nice to know our fundamental source of hope and strength is shared. And very nice of you to share the videos.

    You are, as always, ‘da man! Be well.
    Regards.

  2. 🙂

    You’re going to love RadioWest. I, in the meantime, will continue to feast at Ruca’s and think of all those in your same boat in sympathy.

Comments are closed.