Amazon sent me a nice request to consider publishing on the new Kindle Vella platform. The concept is an old one — serialized fiction published one episode at a time. Since all of my books are built on short fast chapters hung on a classic three-act frame, I thought I’d experiment with the platform for the latest REVENGERS novella. If I understand the platform, the first three chapters/episodes will be available for free once the public side goes live, sometime in June or July. After the first three, there is payment with tokens (Amazon bit-coin or doge-coin, maybe?) per episode. We’ll see how it works out.
As a writer I appreciate writing in small 600-5000 word bits. Doing one of those a week is actually, for me, much more doable than the daily grind of working through a 45,000 – 100,000 word manuscript. The fun of an episodic structure is holds you to the discipline of ending each episode in a way that leaves the author wanting more — and it’s a manageable size to work your craft within.
With all the current demands on my time (ongoing business dealings as I’ve said in the last two previous posts, health issues, and dealing with my summer adventurous wanderlust) I feel as though I’ve left my readers hanging longer than they deserve. So we’ll see how this platform works out for me and for them.
It’s also the perfect platform for a horror-thriller story I’ve been messing around with for years. THE ACHY MAN is the story of a demonic family from a demonic town (Hell Hallow), who move from victimizing the poor and minority community in their small town to larger hunting grounds in Minneapolis. After their activities in human trafficking, organized crime, and money laundering are discovered during the Minneapolis riots, they flee a Department of Justice investigation to hide in the Black Hills of South Dakota. They begin investing their criminal proceeds in real estate…and begin to stalk the Native American population for new prey.
But there’s a small quiet Native American woman in their way. And she’s of a long line of Lakota warriors.
And she knows what they really are.
Coming soon! I’m not sure if I want to do both series at the same time, maybe alternating chapters. Any ideas? Shoot me an e-mail. I welcome the diversion from the CEO and applied researcher duties my partner and legal team are handling. It’ll be fun to be a fiction writer again for awhile.
Stay tuned!
In the mean time, I’m taking a break from work in the great outdoors.
Have a great Memorial Day!