I first came up with the idea for what has become Thrilling Adventure Yarns in late 2017. It was generated in short order when there was concern among some of the Crazy 8 Press team that one of our other books might not make the schedule. While that crisis was averted, the notion of a book celebrating the pulp magazines cemented itself in my mind so I was determined to do this.
Assembling the writers was an interesting challenge becausebeyond the C8 team, I wanted some friends and some new voices, conscious ofensuring it wasn’t predominantly male. Thankfully, Mary Fan maderecommendations from her Brave New Girls anthologies and two of the C8spouses also write. I also needed to make certain all the usual genres werecovered which proved not to be a problem as people started making their claims.
When Will Murray told me I could gain rights to anunpublished Lester Dent short story, I realized I needed some operating capital.That led me to launching the Kickstarter campaign in late January and as I havediscussed previously, the response was fast and overwhelming. By the time theclock counted down, I had most of the manuscripts in hand and was activelyediting.
Wrangling the artists was a little tougher than I imaginedas they fit this in around their other commitments and in some cases that meantwaiting far longer than I had hoped. At least Aaron Rosenberg, busily designingthe book, knew the save pages to slot those in. He fully understood what I waslooking for and I think the finished book provides that pulp feel from typefaceto two-column pages, and overall design, complete with distressed covers.
The final files were ready in early June and were sent offto be printed and last week, the printed books arrived. I couldn’t have been happierto hold them in my hands. But then I had to get to work. I needed to carefully segregatecopies that needed to be autographed before shipping, which ones were beingpicked up at Shore Leave, which backers upgraded to hardcover, etc.
I had already screwed dup and ordered the wrong size paddedenvelopes, something easily fixed but took time. Then, I looked around for theeasiest way for me to send out over 200 individual books from home and settledon stamps.com. I ordered a scale from them (something I had been toying withfor a time) and then practiced by sending out the contributor copies,discovering in the process how expensive it is to send a two-pound package toItaly, Brazil, and the United Kingdom.
Speaking of money, I remain astonished at the $11,000 weraised and just how much of it has been spent before calculating postage forthe individual books. Trust me, I am not making a significant profit from thebook. I am tempted to show my P&L when all the expenses are done todemonstrate, feeling I owe my backers, my investors, a report.
Of course, as I grew happier with each step of the process,I began thinking about all the people who asked to be a part of the projectonce it was announced, and how much fun we all had. Should this sell and shouldthe readers tell me they liked what they read, I believe I am ready for a secondgo-round.
It’s available for pre-order at Amazon and the official Kindle on sale date is Saturday giving Shore Leave a one-night exclusive.. The softcover and hardcover editions go on sale Tuesday. By all means, if you pick up a copy, post a review so I know if this met your expectations. It has certainly met mine.
Bob's Test Import 