Important Notes

on July 20, 2013 in MU Blog

A quick note on continuity, scheduling, and my move to Maryland.

First, the chapter that went up yesterday should actually be Chapter 168… there’s another chapter that goes before it. It’s a small error in the scheme of things, but it’s mine and I intend to fix it.

I’ve been working ahead but not always on a chapter-by-chapter basis, so some of the roughs in my folder aren’t labeled by number because I’m not sure how many chapters there are between now and them when I start them. I’ve never done this method of working ahead before that time a few weeks when I took a couple days off from posting to build up more of a cushion and I grabbed the wrong one on Friday to finish. On Monday I’m going to finish and post the real Chapter 167 and renumber this to Chapter 168… the two chapters can be read in any order since they don’t interact in any way except one happens before Mackenzie goes to sleep and the other after. They’ll remain out of order in the archive until the next chapter goes up, so the new one is at the top when people look at the front page… I don’t think anything I do will prevent all confusion at this point, but this seems like it will minimize it.

Note that I said I’ll be posting a main story chapter on Monday. That’s not just because of this small snarl.

Due to ongoing refinement of my work habits, my plan right now is to go to a three main chapters a week schedule with bonus stories coming on the weekend, to give you a taste of what things will be like after I’ve settled in to my new home office set-up. If August gets much hotter than July has been this, experiment might not last long. The main benefit to you from my move is that I will have a place I can work during the summer that is both quiet/private and temperature controlled… here, I have to pick one or the other, which may have contributed to the hasty nature of the error on Friday.

I never intended to stay here for as long as I have, and the house is a lot fuller (with people, stuff, and cats) than it was when I moved in, which makes working from home more complicated. On the subject of the move: there’s just three weeks to go in the moving fundraiser, and just a bit under $300 to go to reach the goal. We’re at the point where the end is clearly in reach, but not close enough that we can just sit back and coast. There hasn’t been much confusion over the fact that I’m holding the fundraiser while separately running the counter for bonus stories, but just in case anyone is wondering: the fundraiser is money I’ll need to accomplish this big thing down the line, the money the site brings in in donations/subscriptions is what I live on now.

If you look towards the top of the page, you might notice there are some new links in the menu area… it took me a little monkeying around to figure out how to add arbitrary links in line with WordPress’s automatically generated page links, so I finally have one that takes you to Jack’s store where you can buy MU fantasy diplomas. There’s also a page where you can get the current MU e-book offerings… that’s currently just the first book of volume 1 with author commentary, but you can finally buy it directly from me without going to the Amazon and Nook stores.

Book 2’s commentary is nearing completion and I expect it to be available very early in August, and for people who don’t care about the commentary and just want to be able to read the series offline, on Monday I’ll be adding links for an “Omnibus” edition that has the first three books (82 chapters and the first five bonus stories) with no extra content. The Omnibuses will come out pretty regularly since the conversion process is pretty simple, the enhanced-with-commentary ones will come out a bit slower. The intention here isn’t to trick people into buying things twice… I expect most MU readers won’t feel a need for either edition, but the demand is strong.

Both the yet-unfinished enhanced book 2 and the already-on-the-docket Omnibus 1 should be included in the possible choices for fundraiser rewards if you choose the “Novel” perks, as I expect them both to be done (or very nearly so, in book 2’s case) before the fundraiser is concluded.

And that’s the news from Lake Wobegon it for now. Thanks!


Update: The first omnibus has gone live on Amazon! Other options to follow. To prevent confusion/disappointment, I’m going to emphasize: this is chapters 1-82 (and the first five bonus stories) without commentary or anything else extra.


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16 Responses to “Important Notes”

  1. pedestrian says:

    Thank you Alexandra, for offering Book One available directly. Since Amazon still pretends I do not exist and I try to pretend that I’m not totally pissed at their incompetence.

    The links worked perfectly, Paypal handled the transaction without fault, the download was instantaneous. The files unpacked right on my desktop and voila, less then five minutes and i was greedily re-reading about Mackenzie’s arrival.

    And the links back and forth between the chapters and the new commentaries are working A-OK! In all a sublime experience. Brings a tear to the eye of this ol’cynic that the technology actually worked so well!

    Sniff, Thanks again, Richard

    Current score: 1
  2. pedestrian says:

    AE, I affirm your reasoning in your comments for chapter 3.

    I do have the bad habit, drove my wife crazy, of automatically going for the joke or pun or alliteration, even for serious subjects.

    Current score: 0
  3. pedestrian says:

    Reading your comments for chapter 13 about trying to figure out what is actual consent and what is a rationalization for someone to do to you as they please.

    My explanation is; that however your body responds to stimuli, your body is not You the Person. The horse is not the rider, the vehicle is not the driver.

    This is what tears us all up, when we are forced into compliance, whether enjoyable or painful. When someone else decides?/pretends? that our body’s response is deliberately misused to be authorization, overriding Us voluntarily giving explicit permission and consent or denial and refusal.

    Current score: 0
  4. Zukira Phaera says:

    buying the book direct but — how does one get it to open in a kindle for pc ereader?

    Current score: 0
    • I’m pretty sure you got the epub edition, since nobody’s bought the mobi version yet (and I pulled it because it had issues)… I’m afraid Kindle is the only major platform that doesn’t do epub, because Amazon likes its proprietary technology. You can open up the raw HTML files like pedestrian described below to read it in browser. Otherwise, there are free epub readers out there.

      I will do research into whether/how adding a mobi file to Kindle apps works (I know mobi works on actual Kindle devices), and if I can make that work I’ll send you a copy of the mobi file.

      (Edit: Found it – http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/13169/add-mobi-ebooks-to-kindle-for-pc/ )

      So I guess I’ll be reinstating the mobi format!

      Current score: 0
    • Okay, so the Mobi version has been reinstated and I’ve now labeled them on the page which is for Kindle and which is not for Kindle. If you have already bought the EPUB version, please let me know what email address you bought it under and I will send you the MOBI version. If you haven’t, here’s the link to get it: https://sellfy.com/p/BYxM

      Either way, if you have any trouble getting the MOBI to open in Kindle for PC, let me know. I’ve just downloaded Kindle for PC and it does open automatically when I just double-click the file.

      Current score: 0
      • Zukira Phaera says:

        Thanks for looking into this! I’m new to kindle, and e-reader programs in general since I prefer having the actual weight of the book in hand, but a few books recently that I really wanted to read came out only in e-book versions. I got the email from you about a fix to the epub versioning and will reply to that a little later (I’m about ready to dive into a much needed nap).

        Current score: 0
    • Seajewel says:

      Calibre is a great program that will convert epub to mobi and etc. I’m not sure if AE uses DRM though, in which case you won’t be able to, but if she doesn’t, you can download it and use it. It is a great ebook management tool.

      Current score: 0
      • Not only do I not use DRM, I use Calibre to handle some of the formatting… going from epub to mobi caused some of the oddities that made me to briefly pull the mobi in the first place, though. The end product was usable, but not what I’d consider even indie-level presentable.

        I consider it a consumer’s right to reformat electronic media to a format they can use, but I’d prefer to provide a product tailored to the format in the first place.

        Current score: 0
  5. pedestrian says:

    Now I’m on a Mac {snicker} so i’m not sure how helpful this will be for you. I clicked open the OEBPS file then clicked on the Text folder.

    That gave me a list of about 50 files starting at Index_split_000.
    The first three are just title pages, the fourth is index of links to each chapter when you are searching for a specific event.

    _004 is a very interesting introduction, I urge you not to skip this page.

    _005 is the first page of the first day of the story of Mackenzie’s arrival at MU

    At the bottom of each page is the link to the Authors Commentaries. If there is a problem, do the arithmetic. The story text is _005 thru _026. _027 is for ordering. _028 thru _050 are the Authors Comments. For instance for Chapter 16 comments you can manually click Index_split_044. The link at the bottom would then take you right to Chapter 17.

    If this does not work for you, perhaps one of the readers who uses a Kindle could better advise?

    Good Luck & Good Reading

    Current score: 0
    • Zukira Phaera says:

      That was the way I ended up getting started reading it 🙂

      Current score: 0
  6. erianaiel says:

    Perhaps instead of renumbering chapter 167 to 168 and insert a chapter after 168 that really should go before it but is after to avoid even more confusion …
    Why not keep the order as is and subtitle chapter 168 (monday’s) “In which things happen out of order”

    Current score: 0
    • I feel like you missed the part where chapter 167 won’t be after 168, except for during the brief window when it’s the newest chapter on the site, and only then so that it stands out as new.

      Your way would make events permanently out of order for no reason that would be discernible to future readers. I don’t see how that’s less confusing.

      Current score: 0
  7. Potatohead says:

    Do you have any plans to put the omnibus up for sale in a physical format, maybe if the Kindle omnibus sells or if a reputable print-on-demand self-publishing source (I have no idea if these exist or not) can be found?

    Current score: 0
    • There are plenty of reputable print-on-demand publishers… they tend to be very reputable, in the sense that they do what they advertise. A lot of them also sell “marketing packages” that can be a scam, but the print services? Yeah, they’re on the up-and-up.

      Cost tends to be a bit of an issue, though, and the omnibuses may actually be unfeasibly large for print. It’s something I’ll look at as long as the demand is there, but it might not work.

      Current score: 0
      • Brenda says:

        It’s so easy to lose track of length when scrolling down on a screen – I can’t imagine how thick a physical volume would end up being!

        Current score: 0