Category Archives: book two

Published: October 6, 2010

Book Two and a Reading in Duluth

Okay. In keeping with my tradition of slapdash scheduling. I’m going to be doing a reading/signing/Q&A session next week up in Duluth. It’s at the local Barnes and Noble on Tuesday the 12th at 7:00.

More details are over on the tour page. I also created a facebook event, if you want to use that to invite your friends without having to go to all the unpleasant work of actually talking to them.

If y’all would help spread the word a bit, I’d appreciate it. I hate doing these things on such short notice, but I only found out last week that I’d be up in the Duluth area.

And now, a piece of fanmail:

Dear Mr. Rothfuss,

As you are no doubt aware, in your April 28th blog post, you mentioned that the manuscript would be done by September.

I’m guessing you are furiously trying to put the finishing touches on the manuscript, but us fans would love an update about how the work is going. I really enjoyed your August 16th post about what revision work actually entails, and always enjoy getting a view of what your day to day work is like.

Thanks for updating the blog so frequently, it makes the waiting a lot easier, and we love hearing from you.

-Asa

Asa,

I did actually get the manuscript to my editor on schedule. She’s probably reading it even as we speak. Um. Type. Or rather, as you read what I have typed. In the past.

You know what I mean.

That means I get a little bit of a vacation while I’m waiting to hear back from her. Or rather, it means that I would get a bit of a vacation if I wasn’t still obsessively tinkering with the book.

Yesterday, for example, I re-read 87 pages of book two.

(Note that these pages aren’t the length of a paperback page or a manuscript page. They’re my own page layout that I use for editing.)

Anyway, I spend yesterday re-reading these 87 pages of the book. As I read, I try to winnow out the extra verbiage, making the book quicker and easier to read. My philosophy is that if I take out everything that is merely meh, all that’s left will be the parts that are really super-wow. That means that the book will be, in the parlance of our time, good.

Sometimes while I was reading I would get an idea for a different part of the book, and I’d skip off to another part of the book to make the change. Sometimes I would make a change that necessitated making a few other changes throughout the book to maintain consistency.

But mostly I was just word-winnowing.

So yesterday I re-read 87 pages of the book. Pages that I’ve already read at least 100 times. It took 8 hours during the time that is, theoretically, my vacation.

At the end of those 8 hours, the book was 600 words shorter. I hadn’t trimmed a scene. I’m long past that stage. All the chaff scenes were gone months and months ago. These days if I want to tighten up the book, I have to hunt out little bits and phrases. Lines of dialogue that don’t sparkle. Non-essential snippets of description. Single superfluous words.

As I was going home, I wrestled with a familiar thought. Specifically, I wondered if I was insane.

Again, I’d spent an entire day making changes to the book that nobody would ever really notice. And I have to ask myself, is it really worth it?

Then I did the math.

A paperback page holds about 340 words, less if you use a lot of dialogue. (Which I do.) So by trimming 600 words, I’d effectively made my book about two pages shorter.

I’m guessing a quarter million people will read book two. In the US anyway. Last I heard, that’s about how many copies of NOTW have been sold.

That means, taken all together, I’ve spared my readers 500,000 pages of *meh* text.

Let’s assume it takes about a minute for a person to read a page. Roughly.

500,000 minutes = 8333 hours = 347 days.

That means, taken all together, I’ve saved my readers a full year of meh reading. That’s not counting foreign translations, book club versions, and people who read the book multiple times.

When I think of it that way, I guess it doesn’t seem so crazy. Which is good, because I don’t think I could stop being obsessive like this even if I wanted to.

Later all,

pat

Also posted in appearances, Fanmail Q + A, Revision

|posted by Pat 108 Comments

Published: May 17, 2010

Beta Readers: Part II

First, a few excerpts from the many, many messages I’ve received recently.

“Do you need another Beta Reader? I’d be happy to help….”

“I read on one of your latest blogs something about beta readers. I had no clue there was such a thing, but now I know about it I want to be one.”

“I think beta-reading sounds like the best job in the world–next to testing the softness of puppy-tummy-fur with one’s face all day.”

People have given many credentials and uttered many a plaintive plea. There have even been blatant attempts at bribery. People have offered me cash, computers, and promises of their undying love. About the only thing people didn’t offer is livestock and sexually explicit pictures of themselves.

I should have seen it coming, but honestly, I didn’t.

I know a lot of people would love to help me out by giving a beta read…

Wait, that’s not entirely true, is it?

What I meant to say is that a lot of people would love to read an early copy of the book, and, largely by coincidence, help me out with a beta read.

But I just can’t feel good about it. ** [See edit below.]

“I’d like to volunteer. I know there is probably some precautions you have to take to make sure it’s not leaked, but I’ll do whatever you need, sign a contract, send in a testicle, mail in a kid for collateral, whatever… seriously though I can keep my mouth shut.”

Ultimately, this strikes at the heart of the issue.

Back when I was working on The Name of the Wind, I would give a copy of the book to anyone who even hinted they wanted to read it.

Getting other people’s feedback on the book is a key element of my revision process. You see, I’ve read this book so many times in so many versions, that I need an external view of it. A triangulation point, if you will…

But these days, I can’t just hand it out all higgledy piggledy. Things are more complicated. These days I have to worry about people leaking early, crappy versions of the book onto the net months before the pub date.

I know, deep in my heart of hearts, that most people would never dream of doing such a thing. But all it takes is one jackass….

And yeah, I have a non-disclosure form. Everyone signs it before they get the book. Even Sarah signed it.

It’s a vicious fucking thing that goes something like this:

You, by signing below, agree that you’ll do everything in your power to protect this manuscript and keep its contents secret. If you fail in this, and are a big chatty Cathy about it, I, Patrick Rothfuss, will fuck you up.

I will do this on all possible levels: financially, socially, physically, and spiritually.

If you lend it to your girlfriend who leaves it on the bus and then some jackhole finds it and it ends up on the internet, I will de-corn your cob. Seriously. Your entire cob. Every single kernel of corn. I am not even fucking kidding….

It goes on like that for some time. It is so terrifying that one of my friends said he didn’t feel comfortable leaving the house with his copy of the book.

But really, the non-disclosure form isn’t going to help. If the book gets leaked, I’ll be pissed forever, and suing some daft bastard into the ground won’t fix that.

“Do i have to invade a small nation? Do I have to sing show tunes in Times Square? Or is it just one of those “inner sanctum of friends” kind of thing?”

Ultimately, yeah. At this point it is. I have to know you personally, so I can trust you. It’s also important for me to know you because that helps me put your comments in context.

The other problem is that for me to really get the most out of a beta reader, I like to be able to sit down with them over coffee and chat about the book. I like to be able to leaf through the manuscript, ask them questions about their comments, and pick their brains about certain key issues. And seeing how most of you don’t live here in Stevens Point, that’s kinda hard.

So this blog is to say thanks to everyone who offered to help. I’d love to be able to take you up on your offers, but I’m afraid I’ll have to pass.

More soon,

pat

** Edit – May 18th

When I looked at the comments today, I was surprised to see people offering hugs of consolation, and giving me support, and telling me not to let the messages get me down.

This was kind of a surprise to me, as the messages I got from people asking to be beta readers were, by and large, lovely, considerate, flattering things.

So I re-read the blog and found the problem. It’s the following line:

“But I just can’t feel good about it.”

What we have here is a classic case of unspecific pronoun. It seems like I’m saying that I can’t feel good about all the people asking to read book two. But that’s not the case. I’m cool with that. As I’ve said, it’s really rather flattering, and I wish I could take people up on their offers. Because, as I’ve said, I love feedback.

That sentence should read, “But I just can’t feel good about handing out copies of book two to strangers.”

This, my friends, is why I do a lot of revisions. One misused pronoun and the entire emphasis of a piece of writing gets fucked up.

Just wanted to clarify.

Love,

pat

Also posted in the business of writing, the craft of writing

|posted by Pat 115 Comments

Published: April 28, 2010

I said I’d tell you when I knew….

So my editor has finished reading the great beastly draft of The Wise Man’s Fear I sent her a while back.

It’s the third draft she’s read, but it’s the first one I’ve really had any confidence in. The first one was pure crap. The second one was mostly complete but still pretty shaky in parts.

This draft was good. I’m verging on being proud of it. It still has a few problems, but they’re manageable problems. They’re problems I can percieve and get my head around, and that means they’re problems I can solve.

So Betsy got back to me with her feedback on the manuscript: a list of 27 things she felt needed attention in the book, arranged in nicely worded bullet points. (The formatting was at my request. I’m fond of bullet points.)

Some of her 27 points are small things. Some are bigger issues. We agree about most of them. Two or three will require a bit of negotiation.

It’s really not a long list, especially when you consider that my own list of things-that-need-fixing-in-book-two currently stands at about 50 or 60 items.

Every time I sit down to work on the book, I try to resolve a few of those issues. Sometimes I fix something and cross it off the list. Other times, a beta reader will bring something to my attention and I add it to the list. As I work, sometimes new problems occur to me, and I add those to the list as well. Sometimes I fix something, and that causes a new problem. So I cross something off and add something at the same time.

It’s kinda like trying to iron all the wrinkles out of a shirt. A huge, living, n-dimentional shirt.

As an example: tonight I worked on the book for about 9 hours. I crossed off four things on my list and added six things. But most of those six things are small, while two of the things I fixed were moderately big and complicated. So it was a good day’s work. (Unfortunately, because one problem tangled me up for four hours, I didn’t get home until 1:30 AM, which means I didn’t get to say goodnight to Oot, which sucks.)

Anyway, earlier today I talked on the phone with my editor about the book. We talked about her 27 points.

My editor asked me if I could have the book done by September.

I thought about it. I thought about her 27 points and my ever-changing 50-60 points. I thought about who I can still use as beta readers, and how many drafts I’ll be able go through in four months. I thought about how many times I will personally be able to read the book in four months.

I said I was sure I could finish it by September.

She asked me if I was sure. Really sure.

I thought about it. Back in 2007, I was sure I’d have the book done by 2008. But I was hugely ignorant and optimistic back then. So I was dead fucking wrong. That caused a lot of grief.

I told her I was really sure I could have it finished by September.

Come hell or high water? She asked me.

Come hell or high water, I said.

So we agreed that I’d have the book finished by September. It was nice. It made us both happy.

So that’s part of the news, that I’ll be finished writing The Wise Man’s Fear by September.

But here’s the rest of the news: that means that the book can’t come out until March of 2011.

Why? Well, for a bunch of reasons. Mostly because there are a lot of things that have to happen before a mass of text becomes a printed book on a shelf. It needs to be copyedited. The edits need to be confirmed. It needs to be proofed, checked for consistency, fiddled with. Fonts need to be chosen. It needs to go through layout. Then it needs to be proofed again. Marketing needs to happen. It needs to be sent to reviewers, and the reviewers need to have time to read it before they write the reviews. It needs to be put into catalogs of to-be-published-books so people who run bookstores can learn about it and order copies for their stores. It needs to be printed, boxed, warehoused, shipped. We need to sacrifice a black she-goat and pray to strange and terrible gods. Then we need to proofread again.

A lot of these steps are going to take longer than normal because my book is 2-3 times longer than most ordinary novels. Other things are going to take longer because this book is kinda important to a lot of people, and we want to make sure everything gets done just right.

The simple truth of the matter is this: that’s just the way it is. I wish it could be sooner, and I’m guessing many of you feel the same. Believe it or not, if the publisher could wave a magic wand and make that happen, they would. (Remember, they don’t make money on the book until they can sell it.)

But there’s no way the book can come out earlier and still have it be the best book possible.

So that’s what happened today: I found out the publication date for The Wise Man’s Fear – March 1st 2011.

Honestly, it would be way easier for me to sit on this information for a while. I could wait until the date was a little closer, thereby avoid some of the great wailing and gnashing of teeth I expect will follow this announcement. That shit brings me no joy. It damages my calm and makes it harder for me to write.

But I promised y’all I would pass along the *real* publication date as soon as I knew it. So that’s what I’m doing.

March 1st 2011.

pat

Also posted in Things I didn't know about publishing

|posted by Pat Comments closed

Published: February 26, 2010

Is it drafty in here?

So today I was going to pass along some news about the book in a blog titled, “Why I don’t talk about Book Two.”

The blog was proving rather difficult to write until I realized it was really two blogs. So today we’re just going to get the news, and I’ll talk about the other stuff later.

Here’s the news: I’ve finally finished my latest draft of The Wise Man’s Fear.

Oot is shown in order to give a sense of scale. And because my baby is frikkin adorable.

This manuscript is about 200 pages longer, and about 500 pages different than the last one I took a picture of. I’ve fixed plotting, tweaked characters, cut scenes, added scenes, re-written, re-organized, re-read, and re-re-organized sections of it so many times that I couldn’t even begin to give you a number of versions it’s been through.

Now last time I posted up a picture of a manuscript on the blog, people got all twitterpated. They saw that big stack of papers and said things like, “Yay! That means the book will be out next month!!1!” and “Wow! How are they going to bind something that big?!?”

So before we all go leaping to a bunch of unfounded and erroneous conclusions, let’s talk about a few things.

First, this manuscript is printed in….(wait for it) manuscript format. That means it’s one-sided, double spaced, and printed in courier new font. That’s what makes it look so big. Typesetting the book comes later in the process. That’s one of the many, many steps that comes later.

That said, The Wise Man’s Fear is going to be bigger than The Name of the Wind by at least 100,000 words or so.

Second, let’s discuss what a draft is. A draft is a version of a piece of writing. Almost always it is an early or preliminary version. You can have things like a rough draft, which is… well… rough. A second draft, which comes after the first draft. Or you can have things like a final draft, which is… well… final.

Is this going too fast for anyone?

This is not the final draft of book two. If it were, I would have said something like, “This is the final draft of book two.” But I didn’t. So it’s not.

But it isn’t a rough draft either. The one I turned in several months ago was rough. There were some bad plot holes, some logical inconsistencies, pacing problems, and not nearly enough lesbian unicorns.

This draft is tighter, cleaner, and all around better. I’m really pleased with it, but it’s not quite perfect. Not yet.

What this *doesn’t* mean.

The book will not be out next week. The book will not be out next month. Right now there’s no publication date. Remember when I said there wasn’t a publications date? There’s no publication date.

What this *does* mean.

The book is a big step closer to being done.

The book is way better than it was before. That last draft of the book was okay. It had some great parts, some parts that were “meh” and some that were “huh?” Overall, it averaged out to about 70 percent awesome.

Which isn’t bad, but I’m not content with a C-minus book. This draft is way better. I’m guessing about 90-92 percent awesome. Way better. But still not perfect.

I’m working on the book, even if I don’t constantly talk about it here on the blog. More about this in the upcoming blog: Why I don’t talk about Book Two.

What happens now?

This manuscript goes to my editor, Betsy. She reads it carefully, maybe twice. She makes notes, then we talk about what she thinks might need to be changed/tweaked/fixed.

Then, depending on how much work we think it needs. We put it into the production schedule. That means we’ll have a publication date. Which I will tell you. On the blog. With words.

Then I do another set of revisions. Or more likely, several smaller sets of revisions, as I’m a freak like that. Luckily, these next sets won’t be nearly so extensive as my last round.

In metaphorical terms, the last round of revisions was like an organ transplant. Invasive, complex, labor intensive, and with a long recovery time. The revisions I do after this will probably be more like cosmetic surgery. Or an appendectomy at worst.

But first, I get to relax. I’ve been working on this fucker nonstop for months. And now, finally, I get to take a break while I wait for Betsy’s feedback.

I’m pretty excited to be seeing more of you too, Oot.

You see folks, Oot is one happy baby, all laughs and smiles. But in order to get this revision finished, there have been times over the last several months when I’ve spent weeks at a stretch working 10-14 hours a day. That’s not counting e-mail, dealing with translators, and writing the occasional blog.

That means on some busy days, I only get to play with him for half an hour or so. If our sleep schedules don’t match up, some days I don’t get to see him at all while he’s awake.

I’m not mentioning this to get sympathy. I’m mentioning it so you can better understand my life. I’m mentioning this so you know what exactly goes through my head when someone sends me an e-mail or posts on my blog, saying, “Just finish the book for fucksake!”

So…. that’s the news. The book is going well. There are parts of it that I’m so proud of that I almost can’t help but talk about them here. It’s coming. Be patient. And rest assured that I’m not just lounging around, doing whippets and eating the cotton-candy underthings off nubile young catgirls.

As for myself, now that the book is out of my hands for a couple weeks, I’m planning on catching up on some family stuff and playing Bioshock 2 until I puke.

Oh, and I’ll be catching up on a few blogs I’ve been meaning to post, too. Tune in on Monday and I’ll be announcing some of my upcoming appearances for convention season.

There will also be a chance for you to get me to come do a reading/signing at your local bookstore if you live in the right part of the country. Specifically in between Chicago and West Virginia…

So stay tuned….

pat

Also posted in lesbian unicorns, Oot

|posted by Pat 261 Comments

Published: February 22, 2010

Powells

For those of you who have never been there, Powell’s Books is like no other bookstore I’ve ever seen.

It takes up a whole city block. As I mentioned before on the blog, I’ve only been there once, and that was only for a bare 45 minutes or so. Even so, that was enough time for me to get lost.

And I’m not speaking metaphorically here. I was actually physically lost. Lost as in, “I don’t know where I came in or how I can get out.”

Simply said, if heaven turns out to be something like Powell’s, I wouldn’t complain too much.

As if that weren’t enough coolness all by itself, a friend recently stopped there and snapped a few pictures of what he found.

(Click to Embiggen)

Awww…. Thank you Powell’s.

(Click to Embiggen)

Wow. That’s unprecedentedly forthright. Thanks again, Powell’s.

And just a couple days ago, someone sent me a link to Powell’s “Puddly Awards” where customers and staff pick their favorite books. Even better, Powell’s then sells those books at a discount until the end of February. So you’ve still got a week or so to take advantage of it.

That’s the hat trick. Thanks a third time, Powell’s.

More soon,

pat

Also posted in accolades, cool things

|posted by Pat 92 Comments

Published: February 18, 2010

Signs of things to come…

Well, it took a little doing, but at this point we’ve got 99.9% of the raffle prizes packaged up and in the mail.

(Note: Oot is not a prize.)

Valerie did most of the packing and mailing, with solid assistance from a few others including Sarah and Oot. Though really, I don’t know if what Oot does can be considered assistance. Personally, I think he’s the weak member of the team. But Sarah and Valerie place great stock in cuteness, cooing, and the desire to bounce up and down while being held.

I don’t doubt that some of the books have already started arriving at the winners’ houses. If you’d like to send in a picture of you loving you cool new books, feel free to mail them to: paperback.contest [squiggly atsign thinger] gmail.com.

I helped with some of the packaging, but Valerie has perfectionist tendencies, and I tend to be a hardline proponent of function over form. After one particularly ugly wrapping job, I was told that my time would perhaps be better spent doing something else, like bouncing little Oot.

Personally, I thought the package was a marvel of engineering. Nigh-indestructible, in fact.

Sure it’s ugly, but it gets the job done. (I’m talking about the package.)

Anyway, the upshot is that the girl members of Team Elodin did most of the post-fundraiser sorting and shipping. Which is nice, as it freed me up to concentrate on the book.

And yes, I’ll be posting up news about that soon, so y’all can stop asking.

And no, there isn’t a publication date yet, so y’all can stop asking about that too.

I mean seriously. If the book had a solid pub date, don’t you think I’d mention it? Do you think I’d sit here at home, rubbing my hands together and chortling: “Yes! If I withhold this information another week, I’m sure to get another 100 e-mails asking me about the book!”

Yup. That’s exactly what I’d do. Because obviously I am some sort of alien life form that lives on snarky fanmail and bitchy blog comments. Since I became stranded on your strange world years ago, they have been my only means of sustenance.

That’s really the only explanation that makes any sense… Unless, of course, the reason I haven’t posted up any news is simply because there *isn’t* any news.

Now that I *do* have some news, I’ll write a post about it. It’s that simple. These things don’t happen faster because you ask for them, you realize. Quite the opposite, in fact.

So, if you care about that sort of thing, stay tuned. I’m planning on titling the post: “Why I Don’t Talk About Book Two.”

Oddly enough though, I *will* be talking about book two in that particular blog. Go figure.

pat

Also posted in Worldbuilders 2009

|posted by Pat 105 Comments

Published: October 15, 2009

So You Want to Be a Hero?

A while back, I said I’d be giving people a chance to get their names into my second book: The Wise Man’s Fear.

I’ve finally managed to work out all the details. So we’re going to do our best to kill two birds with one stone.

You want to get your name into book two….

…and I want to raise money for Heifer International.

So, as a prologue to this year’s fundraiser, we’re going to have a raffle.

There are three ways you can get your name into the book. Pay attention.

Option One: The Regular Raffle.

You buy chances to win, like raffle tickets. Tickets will be 10 dollars each.

That means if you donate 30 dollars, your name gets thrown into the drawing three times. Simple.

However, if you want to be a big spender and donate fifty dollars, you get a free ticket. So fifty bucks gets you six tickets total.

At the end of the lottery, I’ll be drawing a winner from these tickets. If you don’t win, your ticket will enter a second drawing combined with the free entries. (See below.) What this means is that every ticket you buy gets two chances to win.

You have two ways to buy tickets:

To Buy Your Tickets by Mail:

You only need two things.

A check, made out to Pat Rothfuss. Signed by you.

A 3×5 index card that looks like this:

(Click to Embiggen)

Remember folks, I have to read these. That means you should probably print instead of using cursive. It doesn’t need to be pretty, just legible.

And you see what I did up there? Where I wrote an “a” then wrote over it and made it a “u?” That’s not very clear, is it? I should have used some white out, or done something else rather than leave it ambiguous. That would have been the smart thing to do…

Lastly, mail the check and the card to:

Pat Rothfuss
PO Box 186
Stevens Point, WI 54481

To Buy Your Tickets Online:

[EDIT: Woo Hoo! After a relatively painless review process, the online option is back! Thanks for being cool about this, Paypal!]

Because international post is slow and expensive, I decided to make a paypal option available. (You can use the three custom buttons below to donate.)

Note – Tickets through paypal will actually be $11 each. This is because paypal takes a percentage of all the money it helps transfer. And, to be completely honest, because it’s going to be a bit of a pain for me to sift all these digital entries onto paper tickets.

(Click the picture to be cool and donate 11 bucks.)

However, if you donate an even 50 bucks through paypal, I’ll cover the extra fees myself, and you can still have six tickets.

(Click to be awesome and donate 50 bucks.)

If you’re feeling extraordinarily extravagant, you can donate as much as you like with this button. (Keeping in mind that it should probably be some multiple of 11 or 50.)

(Click to be a rockstar and donate according to your desire.)

Remember: when you submit your paypal order, you need to include all the information you would have written on the note card.

DO THIS BEFORE YOU COMPLETE YOUR DONATION! After you donate, there’s no way to go back and add this information.

Your phone number.
Your name.
Your e-mail.
The name you’re hoping to get into the book.

Option Two: The Poor-Boy Raffle.

I spent nine years as an undergrad, so I know what it’s like to not have a lot of folding money. This is the option that will give everyone a chance to throw their hat into the ring, even if they can’t afford ten dollars for a ticket.

To get into the free option, you just mail a 3×5 note card, filled out just like the one above.

To this address:

Pat Rothfuss
PO BOX 186
Stevens Point, WI 54481

And that’s it.

After I draw the winner from the paying option, I’m going to take all the non-winning tickets from that raffle, combine them with the free entries, and draw a second winner.

Important: If you buy a ticket, I will automatically enter you in the poor-man’s raffle.

That means if you buy a ticket, DON’T don’t send in an entry for the poor man’s raffle too. This will only waste your time and anger me.

Option Three: The Cool Name Option

If I look through the entries and see a suggested name that looks cool to me, I might tweak it a bit and use it in the book.

Simple as that. I’m always on the lookout for cool names.

FAQ:

When is the raffle over?

One month from now: November 15th.

What are the odds of my winning the raffle?

Just like all raffles, that depends on how many tickets you buy, and how many people enter. But it should be obvious that you’re (roughly) twice as likely to win than if you use the free option.

Edit: As of October 27th, we had raised a little more than 8000 dollars.

That means if you buy a ticket, your odds of winning are roughly 1 in 400. (Because I’m drawing two winners.)

Or, if you donate fifty bucks and get six tickets, your odds are about 1 in 70.

Those are pretty good odds.

Also, if we get a bunch more people participating. I’ll draw an extra winner from the group that paid for their tickets.

That means it won’t hurt your odds to spread the word to your friends. More participants will actually lead to more chances to win.

Can I use my own name as the one I want in the book?

Of course. I’m guessing this is what most people want. I’m just leaving the door open for people to suggest other options.

If I buy more than one ticket, should I send in more than one card?

No. There’s never any reason to send in/fill out more than one card.

Does this mean book two isn’t finished yet?

*sigh* Yes. That should be pretty obvious. I couldn’t add things if it was finished. The revision process for a book this big takes a long time, and I’m still fixing things. Adding more awesome. Taking out things that aren’t quite awesome enough. Making sure everyone’s eyes are the right colour. That sort of stuff.

So if I win, I get to put whatever name I want in your upcoming book?

No. What will happen is the two of us will have a talk about how your name, or a variation of it, will fit into my book. Something that will make us both happy.

Read this blog for details and reasons why.

Will I get any control over who I am in the book? Will the character with my name look like me?

This will be part of our negotiation. If you really want to be a student at the University, and your name will work for that, we can make that happen. I might be able to tweak their appearance a little so it’s closer to yours, too.

The short answer is that I’ll do what I can to make you happy. But the book comes first, and I’m the final arbiter of what goes in and what doesn’t.

Will you be doing this again for book three?

I don’t know. A lot of that depends on how well this raffle works. If people are excited and we raise a lot of money, then I’ll probably do it for book three.

On the other hand, if the response is small, and the whole thing ends up being a pain in my ass, there’s a real possibility I won’t do it again.

So all of the money you raise from this is going to charity?

Yes. All this money will be going to Heifer International. This raffle is actually just a warm-up to the bigger fundraiser that I’ll be running on the blog next month.

If you’re curious, you can look at last year’s fundraiser HERE.

What’s to keep people from swamping the free option with multiple entries?

There are several things that I think will keep this from being a severe problem.

1) Human Decency.

My readers are generous, kind human beings. Only a rapacious fuckwit would try to game the system on a charity raffle.

2) Human Laziness.

There’s no online option for the free drawing. I doubt very much people will be filling out dozens of note cards by hand and sending them all in.

3) The name and phone number required with each entry.

I’m using phone numbers to catalog and organize the entries. That means I’m just going to throw away multiple free entries that have the same phone number, or those with no phone number at all. It’s the classic “one entry per household.” Except in this case it’s not a house, it’s a phone.

And yes, I know it’s not a perfect system. But it’s the best we can have without going to ridiculous lengths.

Are these prices in American dollars?

Yes. Foreign payments are one of the mail reasons I’m including a paypal option. Paypal will convert from your currency to US dollars.

If, for some strange reason, you want to send me a foreign check you need to do the following.

1. Figure out how much you want to donate.
(Let’s say you live in London and want to donate 50 dollars.)

2. Add three dollars. Because that’s how much my bank charges me to cash a foreign check.
(That makes your total 53 dollars.)

3. Convert this into your local currency.
(53 dollars = 32.96 British Pounds.)

4. Write your check out for this amount in your native currency. My bank can’t cash it otherwise.
(So you write me a check for 33 pounds. Rounding up because you’re a generous human being.)

Keep in mind that the raffle will be happening pretty soon after November 15th, and international post is slow. So if you’re going to mail me a check, do it sooner rather than later.

I was really looking forward to this being an auction. I’m all full of money and was willing to pay whatever it takes to get my daughter’s/husband’s/dwarven monk’s name in the book.

I’m willing to entertain the thought. If you really want an auction, let me know in the comments below and I’ll think about setting one up, maybe in conjunction with the other auctions we’re going to be running for the main fundraiser in a couple weeks.

More FAQ over here.

I’m excited, folks. Let’s do this.

pat

Also posted in cool things, Heifer International

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