I promised news, and here it is. I’m embarking on an experiment using indie bookstore-friendly services to self-publish a novella companion to my second traditionally-published hardcover release. I want to see how the two sides of the publishing world can be combined and support each other. So I’m publishing a novella called The Kairos Mechanism this fall, and I need your help to do it. The writing’s done, and I’m really pleased with the manuscript. But I need your help in publishing it.

The TLDR in advance: it’s a Kickstarter Project, and it’s here.

If this is as far as you get, just click the link above to go straight to the project home page.

My second book, The Broken Lands, comes out this September from Clarion Books, and to accompany it, I’ve written a novella that I am publishing in three editions:

• a beautiful paperback edition with a brand-new cover illustration by the very-brilliant Andrea Offermann and designed by Lisa Amowitz. This edition will be created using McNally Jackson Books’s self-publishing services and Espresso Book Machine.
• a digital edition through Google Play.
• a special digital edition illustrated by tween and teen reader artists. Each artist will be given a chapter and commissioned to create one illustration of his/her choice, in the style of his/her choice. This edition will be available here at clockworkfoundry.com, pay-what-you-like.

To finance this project, today I’m launching a Kickstarter campaign to raise the funds necessary to pay the contributors as well as the setup and printing costs. It’ll be a tiny printing; my budget covers 300 copies. The goal for the Kickstarter campaign to pay for all of this is a whopping $6500, and by the rules of Kickstarter, I need to raise the full amount within 60 days; otherwise no money is collected at all.

See where I need your help? I need backers, and I need folks willing to spread the word about this project. I repeat: with your help, I need to raise the full amount of the goal by June 9. If we raise more, I’ll first raise the artists’ paychecks; after that, I’ll print more books.

Want to back this project? Fantastic. Go here, as soon as possible. What’s in it for you, other than the satisfaction of being part of bringing this little book into the world? There’s a full menu of rewards for contributors at any level from $10 up. Those rewards include both digital and printed copies of the novella, signed copies of my books, signed prints by Andrea Offermann, school and library visits, weird mechanical ephemera you can use as paperweights, and more.

Got questions? Here are a few answers.

Q: Why are you self-publishing? Don’t you have a publisher and a book that’s coming out this year?

A: Very good question. I’m making an experiment. In part, it has to do with being curious about how authors can use the many platforms available for self-publication to support traditionally-published books. In part, it’s because I’m obsessed with the Espresso Book Machine. But the biggest reason is that I’m also obsessed with the worlds I write about. I never stop thinking about them, and I never stop having ideas about additional stories, and I’m curious about what I can do with that extra content. I’m hoping this experience will work well enough to continue doing something similar alongside each hardcover release. I’m calling this ongoing effort my Arcana Project. I’ll talk more about this in future posts in this series, but you can read a bit about my plans for the Arcana Project here.

Q: Why all this trouble to have a print edition?

A: Because I don’t have an e-reader, and I’m in love with books as objects. This could be done cheaper, but I wanted to make sure the paperback I wound up with was something I’d be proud to see on the shelf next to my traditionally-published books.

Q: If The Broken Lands is a companion and prequel to The Boneshaker, how is the novella you’re publishing related to those books?

A: That really deserves its own post, but the short answer is this: The Broken Lands is part of the backstory of the drifter Jack, who Natalie met in The Boneshaker and who, if I have anything to say about it, she will face again. However, The Broken Lands is set in 1877, and Natalie, obviously, isn’t in it. The novella is a self-contained Natalie adventure set just after the events of The Boneshaker. It’s related to both The Boneshaker and The Broken Lands.

Q: This all sounds kind of cool. How can I help?

A: Most importantly, you can become a Kickstarter contributor. Second-most importantly, you can help to spread the word. For instance, if you are so inclined:

• You can post Lisa’s beautiful Kairos Mechanism badge on your blog or website. It links directly to the project homepage. The code is here.
• You can invite me to your blog for tea and a discussion of this insanity I’m embarking on.
• You can re-tweet, comment, re-blog, etcetera.

Q: Is there a mailing list?

A: Yes. If you’d like to be emailed occasional updates on the project, email me (kate (at) clockworkfoundry (dot) com) and I’ll add you to it. Press inquiries, please use (press (at) clockworkfoundry (dot) com).

Q: Is there a waiting list for the book, or a place to pre-order it?

A: Yes and no. Yes: if you contribute to the Kickstarter campaign at one of the levels rewarded by a copy of the book (there are several levels rewarded by either the digital or print versions), you are guaranteed a copy as a thank you, as long as the project reaches its funding goal. No: there is no separate waiting list or preorder system at this time, because right now I need to focus completely on making the funding campaign a success. To paraphrase: if you want a copy, back the Kickstarter project as soon as possible.

Q: Where will the book be available once it’s released? When will that be?

A: Kickstarter contributors will get their thank-you copies between July and mid-August. The novella will be released officially at The Broken Lands’s launch party in September at McNally Jackson. On that day, it will be wildly cheap with purchase of The Broken Lands, and free with purchase of The Broken Lands and The Boneshaker.

After that, it’ll be available in print from McNally Jackson Books, and I’m working on making arrangements so that it’ll be available as a print-on-demand title from other bookstores and libraries with an Espresso Book Machine. The digital editions will be available through Google Play and here at clockworkfoundry.com

Other questions? Comment here, or email me. In the meantime, the clock is ticking. Here we go!

I have worked retail what seems like forever, but in past day job incarnations I was In Charge Of Something and could not therefore rant about customers. And I promise you, I don’t plan on making it a habit now, but this one’s relevant to my quote-unquote Real Job (i.e. the writing of juvenile literature). I present it to you in the form of a play. 

Me: (Waving at CUSTOMER DAD and TWEEN BOY and HIS BROTHER.) Hi, sir. Let me know if I can give you a hand with a few recommendations. 

Customer Dad: Yes, actually. I am looking for some classics appropriate for a thirteen-year-old boy. 

Me: Oh, great! I love this project. Now, when you say, “classics,” tell me what you mean. 

Dramaturg’s note: I ask this because I am figuring this could mean anything from Shakespeare to Jack London to Anything So Long as It’s Old and Venerable. 

Customer Dad: Not necessarily old, but literature. Something good and meaningful. None of this science fiction or whatever.

Me: Er…okay, we’re going for quality writing, not specifically Old and Venerable. (CUSTOMER DAD nods in agreement. Kate turns to TWEEN BOY.) Tell me a few books you’ve liked recently. 

TWEEN BOY looks uneasily at his father. 

Tween Boy: I don’t really know. 

Okay, I’m done with the play now. At this point I would like for you to picture the scene in A Charlie Brown Christmas where Lucy asks Schroeder to play “Jingle Bells” and he plays it in four beautiful ways, and each time Lucy says, “No, no, I mean ‘Jingle Bells!’ You know, deck them halls and all that stuff” until finally Schroeder plays it with one finger, one joyless note at a time, scowling at her, and she listens for a minute, then screams, “THAT’S IT!” Keep that scene in your mind, only instead of Lucy it’s Customer Dad and instead of Schroeder playing beautiful variations on “Jingle Bells,” it’s me, showing him and his kid amazing, beautifully written books of undeniable literary merit, and Customer Dad saying, “No, I mean LITERATURE! A Real Book! I mean, what do American kids read in school?” as his son starts looking more and more disappointed.

I’m not exaggerating. When he demanded to see “school literature,” I showed him things like Hatchet and Jacob Have I Loved. But I also showed him A Wrinkle in Time. I showed him The Graveyard Book, explaining how it was inspired by The Jungle Book. I showed him Ship Breaker, and as I described the story and the world, the boy’s eyes lit up. I’m not exaggerating. His eyes went wide and excited, and he smiled at me and I smiled at him and said, “It’s brilliant, really wonderful writing, really a wonderful message with wonderful characters, but it’s a great adventure, too.” 

And the boy, who had not been able to verbalize what he liked, spoke up then and said, “I think that’s what I like. A little bit of an adventure.” 

The boy’s father then scowled at the book (complete with National Book Award Finalist and Printz medals), and said, “But this is exactly what I don’t want. In two years, nobody’s going to know who this guy is.”

And the boy’s face just crumpled. At which point I fell over myself pointing out the awards, listing all the awards Paolo Bacigalupi has won (which, thank you very much, I can do), trying to explain all the ways that this is a truly great book. Somehow, to the boy’s delight, I managed to convince his father that this was worthwhile reading. Encouraged, I went on to talk about The Graveyard Book. That was a non-starter, which started the thing about what American kids read in school, and also started the boy looking really disappointed. 

Now, this is where I got a bit manipulative. I suggested we go upstairs, and I started walking fast. I don’t know if this is a thing other kids’ booksellers do, but this is what I did. Just like I figured, the Tween Boy was right on my heels, but his father was about six steps behind us because he had to gather up his younger son. So I had about thirty seconds to ask the kid if he could give me any more information about what he liked to read, now that we’d looked at some books (and now that his father was out of earshot). And what he told me was this: “I liked what you said before about a really good story that’s also a good adventure.” 

So I took him to our staff picks and told him about Megan Whelan Turner’s The Thief (which he took off the shelf and held onto until his dad nixed it). I talked about Ray Bradbury. There were others; I probably could’ve made things way easier on myself and gone for stuff I knew would be exactly what the father was looking for, but I couldn’t give up the idea that I could find something that would make that boy’s eyes light up again. At last, I had a stroke of genius and remembered The Phantom Tollbooth. 

I think in the end, the kid went home with that and Ship Breaker. And I sat there for about the next hour, thinking about how there’s this perception out there that boys are reluctant readers and wondering how much of that is just because adults don’t know how to listen when they try to talk about what they want to read. 

Rant over. Good night, world.