sarahlin
patreon
Happy New Year!
🕑 Added 2022-01-01 19:45:04 +0000 UTCWelcome to 2022, everyone! By coincidence, Saturday falls on the first day of the year.
As I write this between 2021 and 2022, I find myself on other kinds of fences as well. This year gave me some reasons for cynicism, but there's also been an outpouring of enthusiasm for TWC. I'll do the best I can in 2022 and we'll see how things go.
Here's what you can expect over the coming year:
TWC4 Release: It's happening later this month! A ton of new people have gotten into the series since the last book release, so if they all take a look at the fourth book that would be good, but there are no guarantees.
TBS3 Release: The third book in The Brightest Shadow, titled The Unnecessary Victory, will be releasing at some point in 2022. Likely in the latter half of the year, depending on when I can juggle editing time and other releases. It's another big one, almost tied for longest in the series, finishing out the first trilogy.
TWC5-6 Chapters: The (mostly) finished chapters of Bondsfungi will be released right here over much of the year. In theory I will also find time to write the sixth book at some point in the year and you'll see those chapters. Title still TBD, since the sixth will be a tricky book to tackle. The fifth book should go to Amazon at some point as well.
More TWC Audiobooks: I wish I could give more info about this, but since it hasn't been a full month since the first release, I don't have sales reports (and the author dashboard is nearly worthless). But at minimum you can look forward to the second and third books narrated by Travis Baldree! Then there will be a combined version of the first three, likely paired with an ebook collection for the sake of reader convenience.
Potential Side Novels: In an ideal world, I would find time to write other things as well, but you never know how life will go.
And more? I wanted to float an idea by all of you: would you be interested in a webtoon adaptation of TWC? Do any of you use Tapas.io? This is more plausible than I thought, but I put off consideration of this last year because I want it to happen at a time when I have the focus to do it right. But please, let me know if this would interest you, either mildly or being willing to support the illustrated series.
That's what I'm planning for 2022! In the nearer term, look forward to the book release and many more chapters. Thanks for reading. ^-^
Comments
Sarah Lin
Appreciate your thoughts on this! This is still on my list of goals to consider at some point, but I don't intend to take action until I've wrapped up some other work.
Inv7ctus
Im an avid webcomic reader, and would be delighted to have a TWC webcomic. However I must caution the webcomics are a very signifigant investment to do right, and while tapas is a good site that makes posting it easily accessable, its a high risk endeavour, and a bad webcomic is worse than no comic. Having said that, a good webcomic would bring in a new audience, as there is a lot of people out there who only read content in webcomic form. (I used to be one of them). All in all, its a big investment that will definatly take time away from other projects you might want to do, though I personally would love to see it.
Sarah Lin
I appreciate negative feedback too! There will be further information on this at the hypothetical future point where I decide to revisit this question.
Robin
cool, but... I do read webcomics and there are certainly a few good ones, but books do have a whole different way of doing pacing. And there are quite a few webcomics out there...
Sarah Lin
I appreciate the vote of confidence!
Corwin
What you said makes sense on some authors not doing pre-orders. Whatever you do works for me. Patreon let's me get my fix in while I wait. But I think you will soar the more people read your books. You have an amazing talent. I read your books long before I went searching on Patreon. And you were definitely an influence for me to download the app
Sarah Lin
Appreciate the feedback! I do know two others authors going a similar route, so hopefully I'll have some fresh data from them before I make any decisions.
Sarah Lin
I do short pre-orders, around a week, so that Amazon gets the series info linked properly. But (as near as I can tell from talking to other authors), pre-order sales trickle in slower and drain sales that would otherwise have counted toward the algorithm when the book launches. This can work for major releases that are guaranteed to hit the top 100, but for me I worry that it would just drain away what momentum I have.
Sarah Lin
I appreciate all feedback on platforms!
Pete
My two cents: I only read one strip format (except for webcomics that come out page by page since they usually don't have it) even with manga (which aren't made for it.) Many things made for that do have increased white space (probably because it is meant for phones where scrolling through feels like less effort) but it isn't really mandatory. Still it is probably nice for people who do prefer paged to have the option. Normally one strip is a benefit for loading times (which is why i started using it originally before manga pages had preloading with paged) but checking out tapas and scrolling down i did notice a few pages that weren't loaded yet, it has been too long since I used it normally to say whether that problems happens for me at normal reading speed.
Pete
I would read a comic. As for tapas I don't really use it but have read a thing or two there, most webcomics I read have their own links, except for a few on webtoons. (Side note no idea how typical that is but i saw some tweet https://twitter.com/mayakern/status/1062018890593693696 about having rather bad view/subscriber to money ratios on tapas.)
Ferlin Sutton LÊo
> TWC4 Release: It's happening later this month Correct me if I am wrong, I have noticed you don't do pre-orders and I am curious why not ?
Runcible Technician
Also, I still read a comic or two and the site randomly fails to load individual images of the current post. Its the strangest thing to have a few panels mossing for no reason.
Runcible Technician
Word of caution on tapas. I once read a comic called Trash Knight on Tumblr. When they crushed creators, the comic was a refugee and went to Tapas. It lasted for another comic or two before the creator pulled the patreon, the comic, everything. Sort of an internet ghost story really, no one knows why.
Luke
Looks like a great year ahead. I use Naver Webtoon for my comic uses, but I'd give Tapas a try for a TWC adaptation!
Desertopa
It has an endless scroll format, rather than advancing from one vertically oriented strip to another, which loads as you progress to the bottom of the screen. But the loading can be quite slow, and worse, *unpredictably* slow, and the format tends to result in a lot of tedious scrolling through empty space between comics. It also lends itself poorly to chapter/archive navigation if you're not picking up the comic from the beginning. Different hub sites also tend to cater to different audiences, and I suspect that, like posting your work on Royal Road, Tapas may preferentially expose your work to a less-than-ideal audience. Tapas seems to cater mostly to Korean and Korean-inspired romance comics and isekai/cultivation action series. The latter of which, I guess TWC actually is... but in a way where mainstream readers of the genre have expectations which aren't necessarily suited to the work. I have no idea whether other websites offer deals which are comparably good from a business standpoint though. It's possible Tapas would be your best bet from a business standpoint even if it has drawbacks from a format/audience standpoint.
Gabe
I would read the hell out of a comic.
Corwin
If book 6th explores the waters of Fithe...Nauda and Fiyu will need swimsuit attire. Making an interesting read and comic. We really haven't discussed or looked at the Nines swimming or bathing practices. đđ I can just imagine Fiyu discussing what is wrong with certain swimsuit issues
I love the idea of a webcomic! I would definitely support it.
Sarah Lin
I appreciate the feedback, since you clearly have stronger opinions on the platform than I do. I've read on Tapas once or twice, and from my perspective it seemed the same as all the other vertical strip sites. Can you elaborate on what you disliked about it? In any case, I don't have a comprehensive understanding of the options, but I brought it up for a slightly different reason. Tapas has had success with similar stories before, and if you have enough success, they'll pay you for the rights despite giving creative control. It's not a certain thing, but it's the sort of deal I didn't think existed.
Sarah Lin
Any way this happens, it would be a slow process, but I'm glad there's some enthusiasm!
Desertopa
Regarding the prospect of comics, I'd say that the idea appeals to me in abstract, but I consider Tapas an exceptionally viewer-unfriendly format. Even though there are some genuinely good comics on Tapas, I don't think I've ever actually managed to *enjoy* a comic on Tapas, it hurts the reader experience that much. A friend of mine once said "Everyone seems to have this hatred hard-on for Tapas, but I don't really mind it that much." But a range of opinion from "hatred hard-on" to "don't mind it much" doesn't seem that great from a user experience standpoint. There are plenty of other hosting options, but I don't know how they compare in terms of ease of submission. Given your record though, I think you could probably get accepted to networks which some new comic authors might struggle to join. Maybe Hiveworks is worth considering? I find it a lot more user-friendly.
Corwin
I usually don't do comics but I will make an exception for a talented and lovely author
