I'm halfway through the first draft of my next book, something completely new that isn't even in the Siglerverse. I'm doing 3k words a day against a thorough outline. The full book is slated at 80k words.

That's right, it's not an INFECTED sequel, and it's not a GFL novel or novella (I start GFL Book V in July, due for release in September, 2014). 

It's an interesting novel to discuss, as I can't tell what it's about or There Will Be Spoilers. If you've seen my panels at Dragon*Con or attended a SiglerFest, you may have heard readings of this book and some limited discussion as to what it is about.  

Hints:
• Dungeons
• Coffins
• Blood
• Biting
• Things that sparkle

Caveats:
• No, it's not a vampire book.
• I said it's not a vampire book, goddamit!
• DAMN YOUR EYES IT IS NOT A VAMPIRE BOOK!

The goal is to finish the first draft in a week, revise that draft in the last week of the month (a power read-through and polish), then kick it to my agent who already has plans for a content revision and for publishing targets. 

We shall see, Xur ... we shall see. 

Man, how time flies. 

For those who have been long-time Junkies, you might remember the passing of my best little buddy and writing partner Mookie the Violent (1994-2008). She mozied on to that Puppy Farm in the Sky back in June, 2008. Five years have already sailed past since that sad day, and that's damn hard to believe. 

The Evil Queen™ and I also had Emma (a.k.a., the prolific blogger known as the "Døg of Evil"), who herself shuffled off this mortal coil back in June of last year.

So, June is apparently a really bad month to be a lil' buddy of the FDØ. Who knew?

Five years is a significant amount of time. It's half of ten years, and we humans (with our ten fingers and base-10 system of measurment) do so love measuring things in decades. Half a decade? For some reason, that much passage of time makes us think about the major events on our lives.

Mookie the Violent was just such an event, both her long life and her passing.

I still can't bring myself to get another dog, because Mooks was just that awesome. Part of that is because the Evil Queen's back is still all kinds of fucked up, and we can't have an animal jumping about, but even this far gone from her final day I'm not sure I'm ready for a buddy to sit where Mookie sat, to sniff the trees Mookie sniffed, etc.

Sappy as hell, sure, but there it is. 

I still wear her little tag around my neck, a nice reminder of my best buddy from the time I was 25 until I was 39. The mid-20s are a key time in a man's life: if you attended college you probably graduated by then, you're on your own, probably still working that first "real" job, and generally finding your way in life. I'd had dogs as a kid, sure, but Mooks came into my life when I was the sole provider of All Things Scott. No girlfriend or wife to help take care of the pup, no mom or dad to bail me out if I had to work late. Every element of that dog's care and feeding fell to me. I was responsible for her safety, her food, her happiness and her health. It was one thing to be irresponsible with my own life (and trust me, Sirs and Ma'ams, I most certainly was), but I didn't have that option with the Mooks. Every day, that dog had to go out, get exercised and get fed. Granted, I took her everywhere and she practically lived in my Ford Probe (because that's where I mostly lived), but still, for someone who hasn't had a child it was an awakening to realize that everything she needed was on my shoulders. She was just so damn sweet, so damn nice, I wanted to make sure she was cared for at all times.

That unexpected responsibilty had a big impact on me. It changed who I was. Having that dog is part of who I am now.

And career-wise, it's kind of crazy to think where I was when she died. I had just released my first Big Publishing novel, INFECTED. I had yet to go into business with ARealGirl, and had yet to put out THE ROOKIE — let alone the next three GFL books — had yet to release BLOOD IS RED, BONES ARE WHITE, the GFL novellas, our downloadable audiobooks, etc., had yet to release CONTAGIOUS and ANCESTOR and NOCTURNAL ... hell, at the time I'd only been podcasting for three years. Seems like an eternity ago … and seems like yesterday. 

I'm sure I'll get another little buddy someday. And yes, I'll be the main person responsible for that pup, but it's not the same. There is no replicating the experience of being in my 20s and discovering adult life with a dog that thinks I'm the greatest thing since Milk Bones. Through all the times I was a total dick and a jackass, through all the times I let people down, through all the embarassing coming-of-age mistakes I made, Mooks acted like I was the greatest human being that ever lived.

When you screw up in your 20s, sometimes you don't have the life experience to put things in context, to realize that what seems like the Worst Thing Any Human Has Ever Done is really not that big of a deal. But Mooks? She always knew. She tried to tell me. The conversations usually went a little like this:

Mookie: "The Pope? Screw that guy. You are the best thing ever!"

Me: "Well, I'm happy you think so, but I got pretty drunk last night and I think I pissed a lot of people off."

Mookie: "Oh, that? Wasn't your fault. There was a meteor. It made you crazy. And besides, those people are crap. I can prove it — have you ever given one of them a rawhide filled with peanut butter?"

Me: "Well, no, that's not really how humans—"

Mookie: "You haven't given them a rawhide filled with peanut butter because they don't deserve one. If they did deserve it, you would have done it, so ispo facto, who cares if they're pissed at you?"

Me: "I think that's a logical fallacy."

Mookie: "See there? Logical fallacy. You are the smartest person that ever lived! Since we're on the subject of rawhides filled with peanut butter, look how cute I am!"

Me: "Well, you are pretty fluffy."

Mookie: "I am! Say, is that a ball? You should take me outside in the sunshine and throw it! Watch, I'll spin in circles to show you my utter conviction for this idea!"

Me: "Well, sure, I guess we could go for a walk."

Mookie: "See? Like I said, you are a genius and you are the best thing ever! Bestthingeverbestthingever!"

Me: "Huh. Well, from your point of view, I guess I'm not so bad after all."

Mookie: "Throw it NOW or I swear to god I will have an aneurysm!"

So yes, our imaginary conversations were fairly philisophical, but they did usually end in panic attacks about tennis balls of a questionable hygenic state. Seriously, I know dogs are dogs and all, but they get excited to put those things in their mouths? Sheesh.

I miss that damn dog every day. There will never be another like her. To all the Junkies who've lost buddies (or who are in the process of losing their buddies), I feel you. 

Nothing can make you wish the afterlife exists more than a creature that genuinely deserved it. 

I had many reasons to write the GFL series. First, I love sports and I love scifi. Second, I believe that athletics gets little credit for being the primary racially integrative force in American culture. I believe a whole lot of us get along a whole lot better than we would have were it not for borders broken down by American heroes like Jackie Robinson, Fritz Pollard, Bobby Marshall, Earl Lloyd and countless others. Since many scifi fans are not sports fans, the GFL series was a way to show how sports brings people together, binds them into new tribes that superceed the inherent prejudices of our old tribes.

Click here to read about the lad at right, who discovered football through the GFL series and is now an active member of the Essex Spartans American football club in the UK. Here's a wee little excerpt: 

"Since picking up that helmet, I've really found myself," Jack said. "I’ve never been happier with my life. Whenever I put on those pads, my helmet, and my Spartans jersey, I feel at home. I feel like I’m part of something, and my confidence in the outside world has shot through the roof. I was always the self-conscious, shy, nerdy kid, and now I feel like I can do anything. I think one of the proudest days so far was when I was presented with my number 60 jersey."

We've got the new trailer for THE WORLD'S END, hot pics of Megan Fox in TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES, and a sneak-peek at the Disney/Marvel crossover flick BIG HERO 6. Also, Rowdy Roddy Piper! Bubble gum! Ass-kicking!

Leave a comment on the YouTube bit. That gooses something in the YouTube maths, so try it for me and see if it gets the show some promo. 

You guys! You guys! Check out his new PACIFIC RIM trailer. Who else is going to see this giant monster spectacular on opening night?

Ray Harryhausen passed away today. If you don't know that name, he was a filmmaker who pioneered the use of stop-action animation and made some of the greatest monster flicks ever seen. His SINBAD movies and JASON & THE ARGONAUTS inspired me to build Lego monsters and create my own stories at a very early age. And, of course, his CLASH OF THE TITANS from 1981 stands alone as a classic piece of special effects awesomeness.

I watched his movies over and over. As a kid who loved creatures and monsters, there was none higher than Harryhausen. Without a doubt, you wouldn't have seen the creatures of the INFECTED series without him, nor would you have probably seen the well-developed and truly alien species of the GFL series. He set my imagination aflame.

The first story I ever wrote, "Tentacles, Tentacles and More Tentacles," was, in my young mind, a Harryhausen monster begging to be brought to life.

It hits hard when heroes die. I raise a glass to one of the greatest entertainers of all time.

Back in March, Scott visited Google in New York City to be part of the "Talks @ Google" series of author interviews.  

Google NYC is awesome. Our host Jeffrey Kohl is awesome. It was a grand 'ol time, as Sigler would say. 

The teaser for the talk:
"As traditional publishing models began to shift and change, Scott leveraged some new techniques and new technologies to successfully navigate the traditional system.  As the whole system changes again with advancing tech and more direct-to-consumer outreach thanks to social media, the successful content creator (like Scott) must embrace new technologies and still understand the successes of the traditional methods, and use both."

It's a little less than an hour long, and Scott and Jeffrey talk all over the Siglerverse map, including the Junkies, the NOCTURNAL television show, the future of Dark Øverlord Media, and more! Enjoy!

Way back in the long-ago time of 2009, I did a keynote presentation at Balticon titled "The Future of Content Delivery." I covered a lot of ground in the burgeoning eBook/podcast/self-pub/freemium areas, including a breakdown of the pre-order system ARealGirl and I used to sell over 1,000 hardcover copies of THE ROOKIE in the first week, sans any help from publishers, media coverage, PR or advertising. 

If you want to listen to the presentation, click here. You can skip past my bombastic intro and listen to just the presentation by forwarding to the 5:00 mark. It's got some naughty language, so be warned. It covers a lot of ground, some of which is still useful to aspring authors contemplating if they should pursue a traditional book deal or strike off on their own. I get to the eReader and eBook analysis at about 35:00. 

A focus of that speech, however, was how eBooks offered a way for aspiring authors to reach the masses, and how cell phones were going to become the dominant consumption device for reading digital content. This was in the heyday of the Kindle 2 launch, when Amazon was really ramping up efforts to change the game. Change the game it did, sure, but at that time I was convinced that consumption on eBook-only devices would soon be dwarfed by people reading on smart phones and other smart devices. I predicted that while Kindle sales were huge, the numbers sold were statistically insignificant to the sales of smart phones, and that the day of the dedicated eBook readers would soon pass.

So let it be written, so let it be done! At least that's what app maker Flurry states in a recent study. I found this info through Junkie Gmork (Carmen Wellman), who saw it in this Activity Press article. 

According to mobile app researcher Flurry, almost 90% of time spent reading eBooks, globally, is done using smartphones, not tablets, and not dedicated eReaders. Flurry's study beaks it down to small phones, large phones, "phablets" (my new favorite word), small tablets and large tablets.

So, Kindles, Nooks and Kobos are great. Tablets? Also great. Kindle Fire and Nook tablets? Even greater. But, still, the amount of eBooks read on all of the above pales in comparison to the amount read on smart phones. 

WHAT DOES IT ALL MEAN?
People carry smart phones around with them 24/7. More and more of these people are discovering they can read eBooks on the devices they already use for dozens of other purposes, that they constantly have at their fingertips. Right this very moment, there are over 1 billion smart devices out there (phones and tablets). It means there is a huge, as-yet-untapped market for eBooks, where the reader doesn't need to buy anything new other than the book itself. 

In other words: there are millions of potential customers who can enter the market at a price of "free" to about five bucks. People buy smart phones for many reasons, then later understand their fancy device gives them this cool eBook thing. 

This is for a market segment (eBooks) where some experts say a 41% increase in annual eBook sales is a "growth slowdown." 

But, does this massive increase in "digital consumption real estate" (I'll coin that phrase, thank you very much) mean anything for the indie writer? Absolutely. Blogger David Gaughran's analysis states that indie publishers have 30% of the top-selling Amazon eBooks. That is staggering to me. Sure, you can expect a few home-run hitters like Hugh Howey or Amanda Hocking, but for 30% of the top eBooks sold to be indie titles?  Gaughran goes on to estimate that indie writers have captured 25% of all of Amazon's ebook sales. And Amazon? That's a big-ass store right there. A quarter of that is lot of sales. 

I AM CHERRY PICKING
This is just one study. I haven't done serious legwork to see if other studies support or contradict these findings, nor have I looked into the methodology (not that I am an expert in such matters, to say the least). This Publishers Weekly article only talks about dedicated eReaders and multi-use tablets: it doesn't mention phones at all. Which is weird.   

CAN'T FIND THE SLIDE DECK
A bummer, was kind of nice to see these stats and the fancy pictures I put together. But hell, this preso is four years old, which is equal to eight lifetimes in the tech world. 

WHAT DO YOU THINK?
Are we going to see more indie eBook successes, or will Big Publishing catch up to what's going on and commandeer the market? Are you frightened that eBook sales improved "only" 41% from 2012? Will we get a second season of FIREFLY?  

You may have heard that some peeps are trying to turn my novel NOCTURNAL into a series. Yesterday I finished the "series bible." From Wikipeida, a series bible is "a reference document used for information on a series' characters, settings, and other elements."

This bible outlines the first season, which is projected at twelve episodes. It contains a one-page write-up on each episode, character write-ups and other information that a showrunner would use to make the series a reality. It also contains the pilot script (which I consulted on but did not write, and is awesome), and hopefully some new art.

This is just the first complete draft of the document. The series writers and the producer are reviewing it now; there will be substantial edits in the future. So, while it's "finished," it will probably never be "done."

In effect, the bible for NOCTURNAL is primarily a sales tool. When the producer pitches networks, he can use the bible to show there is a clear vision for the show: characters, plot arcs, settings, background, etc. And not just for the first season, mind you, as we've mapped out the plots of seasons two through five. The bible is a way of saying to the potential buyers: "You're not just buying a log-line and a partial script, we've done the work to make sure you're going to have a cohesive, consistent product that has a logical and satisfying season finale." Considering how expensive it will be to shoot this series, network execs are going to want to see that there is a clear vision.

In that way, a NOCTURNAL series is much closer to DEXTER than, say, LOST. Meaning, we know exactly how the last episode will tie up all the plot threads before a single frame of the first episode is ever shot. At this point, at least, we know exactly where the story is going and the main points that will be in each episode. There are significant differences from the book; those differences are also mapped out in the bible.  

Hoo-boy, this was a lot of work. It's 47 pages long. It happened to hit right when I was writing PANDEMIC, was doing a short story for a Charlaine Harris-edited anthology (she wrote the Sookie Stackhouse novels upon which TRUE BLOOD is based), another short story for an anthology edited by Daniel H. Wilson (author of ROBOPOCALYPSE), audiobook recording for BONES ARE WHITE, moving to a new office, and a bunch of other cats that ARealGirl is trying to keep in a tidy herd.

This is my second series bible. I wrote my first back in 2005 for EARTHCORE. Yes, that's right, I wrote a full single-season bible for a 22-episodes adaptation of my first book. I called it up just now to look at it for the purposes of writing this post. Last modified date: 12-21-05. Holy shit. It's been a decade since I wrote it. Looking at it now, I think it's pretty bad-ass. It's probably a good thing to have in the back pocket on the off chance that NOCTURNAL gets made, and on the off-er chance the series does well.

I gave the EARTHCORE series bible to my last three film agents. They all said they wanted it, I don't think a single one of them read it. That's a good lesson to learn: get your content to the movers and shakers that ask for it, absolutely, but temper your expectations: 99.9% of the time, not a damn thing is going to actually happen. But, you keep firing away for that .1% of the time when something might happen. 

Will something happen with NOCTURNAL? There's no way of knowing. The series bible brings us one step closer. We've got a great team, I think we've got a great product, and it seems that we're pitching it at an appropriate time in the entertainment world. There is a lot of scifi and paranormal fantasy out there right now, and a lot of it is doing well. So, that part helps. Only "helps," though, because this all comes down to the basics: will it be a compelling drama on television, and will a network look at it and think "hey, people will love this and we will turn a profit."

It's a business, folks. Let's hope NOCTURNAL makes business sense to the people who can write checks.