Please Stop Giving Authors 1 More Thing To Do (We Need Help, Not Homework)

Do you remember when you were a small child, and you first read the book If You Give A Mouse A Cookie? The short version is that the book describes a situation that seems simple at first, but which spirals out of control due to one unexpected step after another. If you give the mouse a cookie, he'll want some milk to go with it. If you give him some milk, he's going to want a comfortable place to sit and enjoy the snack. And so on, and so on, and so on.

This is, unfortunately, what a lot of creators receive as feedback when we try to reach out to the public. Because instead of just helping us in the ways we ask for (watch a video, read an article, buy a book, like and share, etc.) what we get instead are homework assignments. "You should consider posting on this social media site!" or "You should write a book for this other genre," as well as the infamous, "Hey, come to this event, you'll be a hit there!"

We're already operating as maximum capacity... please just do the things we ask you to do, instead of giving us even more assignments to complete which are never as one-and-done as you think they are.

Please... don't go down this road.

Before we get into the nitty gritty this week, don't forget to sign up for my weekly newsletter to get all my updates right in your inbox. Lastly, to be sure you're following all of my followables, check out my LinkTree!

Lastly, don't forget to check out my Vocal archive for additional fiction, articles, explorations of weird history, and more! And, of course, check me out on Blue Sky, since that's what we're talking about today!

Ask If You're Helping, Or Dictating

I've talked about this topic before, but it has come up more and more frequently in the world we're currently living in where everyone has less disposable income, and where creators are operating on thinner budgets than ever before. Because I scroll through my social media every day and see fellow authors, game designers, YouTubers, etc. asking for folks to please support them and their projects, but rather than actually listening to what the creators are asking for, and following instructions, people want to make suggestions, and offer their own input.

Without unnecessarily criticizing anyone, I want to offer a simple test that more people out there should use regarding their behavior. In short, are you taking actions to help the creator, or are you simply suggesting (or demanding) that the creator takes even more actions than they already are?

Because if you want to help, you need to be the one performing the actions.

Because it matters whose boots are on the ground, here.

As an example, if you want to help a creator, here are things you can (and should) do:

 

- Subscribe to their social media accounts

- Consume their content

- Buy their merch (books, supplements, tee shirts, etc.)

- Share their content (repost on your own social media pages)

- Become a patron (support their Patreon, Kickstarter, or tip them on Ko-Fi)

- Leave ratings and reviews

In all of these situations it is you, the audience member, who is taking action. Whether you're subscribing to a creator on social media, leaving comments on their posts or videos, reading their articles, or just putting cash in their tip jar, you are an active participant. Whether big or small, those actions add up, and those are what actually help creators pay their bills so they can keep making things.

If your entire plan is to put the onus on the creator to do even more than they're already doing, you are not being helpful. You are, and I say this with all the compassion and gentleness I can, making things worse.

Helping is an action, and helping takes effort. If all you're doing is sitting on the sidelines and shouting for someone to run harder, throw better, or to just go faster, you're not helping; you're just catcalling from the stands.

As A Caveat, Ask If You Are Providing An Opportunity

There is one other category that is important to mention, and which I feel should be kept in mind. Because if you are providing a legitimate opportunity to a creator, then you are working with them to make something happen, instead of just expecting them to do more work than they're already doing.

So what's the difference between just yelling from the sidelines and providing an opportunity? Well, let me give you a few examples.

- Just telling someone, "You should collab with other creators," is not helpful. Saying, "Hey, I run a channel where I interview authors, RPG writers, and other folks, would you like to be a guest on my show?" is helpful.

- Telling someone, "You should just post on Discord!" is not helpful. Telling someone, "Hey, I have this really popular Discord, and my community would love your stuff. If you want to join, we'd love to boost your signal over there," is helpful.

- Telling someone, "You should vend at conventions!" is not helpful. Telling someone, "I attend X convention, and it's been really good for me. I'd be happy to split a table with you, or see if we could get you invited as a guest of honor," is extremely helpful.

At the end of the day, you need to be providing something concrete that is an actual resource for a creator to use for it to be an opportunity. Giving them access to your community, helping them attend an event they could not otherwise afford, or even giving them a job opportunity they otherwise wouldn't have, could all be very valuable.

Just make sure you aren't trying to give them yet another homework assignment.

Lastly, for an example of how quickly this whole If You Give A Mouse A Cookie situation can get away from you, check out this video I made a little while ago about the realities of actually attending conventions as a vendor.

Support The Literary Mercenary

If you want to see me produce more work, consider some of the following options!

- My Facebook

- My Blue Sky

- My LinkTree

- My Weekly Newsletter

- The Azukail Games YouTube Channel (where I contribute video content)

- The A.L.I.C.E. Files (an audio drama channel I launched with Alice Liddell)

And if you happen to have some spare dosh lying around, and you want to be sure my supply doesn't run low, consider become a Patreon patron, or leaving a tip by Buying Me a Ko-Fi!

Also, if you're curious about how to write for tabletop RPGs, don't forget to check out my show Tabletop Mercenary, which you can find on both the Azukail Games channel above!

Like, Follow, and Come Back Again!

That's all for this week's Business of Writing! For more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, or at My Amazon Author Page where you can find books like my sci-fi dystopian thriller Old Soldiers, the Hardboiled Cat series about a mystery solving Maine Coon in Marked Territory and Painted Cats, my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife, or my most recent short story collection The Rejects!

 

And to stay on top of all my latest news and releases, collected once a week, make sure you subscribe to The Literary Mercenary's mailing list.

Writers Can't Take Breaks (Because The Wheels Don't Stop)

I do a lot of complaining, both on my platforms, and on my socials. Because sometimes it's important to open the vents, and let some pressure out so the engine can keep working. However, time and time again I find myself getting well-meaning comments from folks out there about how I should take a break. Go on vacation. Just set everything down and breathe for a little bit. I need to stop working so hard, and all this stress can't be good for me.

And while the diagnosis about what I (and so many of my fellow creators) am dealing with is accurate, the suggested course of treatment is a death sentence. Because we need to rest, relax, and stop pumping every bit of energy we have into this struggle, yes... but the only way to do that is if something breaks out way, and we can be successful.

Because we live inside a machine that eats money, and if we can't feed it, it will kill us. I am not being hyperbolic here... that is literally the stakes most of us are playing for.

And the machine is hungrier with every passing day.

Before we get into the nitty gritty this week, don't forget to sign up for my weekly newsletter to get all my updates right in your inbox. Lastly, to be sure you're following all of my followables, check out my LinkTree!

Lastly, don't forget to check out my Vocal archive for additional fiction, articles, explorations of weird history, and more! And, of course, check me out on Blue Sky, since that's what we're talking about today!

No Days Off For Good Behavior

So, this is where I want to discuss the problem of how people in the audience don't usually understand how creators make money. This is a topic that needs to be understood by folks who wonder why it is authors, artists, YouTubers, etc. are working themselves to the point of burnout every day.

We don't do this because we like to. We do it because it's a necessity. We would love to stop, but like sharks, if we stop then we die.

Hey, have you heard about my Patreon?

I know a lot of folks are academically aware of this, but creative professionals generally don't make money the way other folks do. Because most people either earn an hourly wage, or they make a salary, meaning that you are compensated for the amount of time you work. Creators, though, don't have that. We get paid either based on the project (meaning that we get a check in-hand once the work is complete and we turn it in), or we get paid based on the amount of activity our work generates.

An example of the former was that when I accepted a writing assignment for the project Night Horrors: Primordial Peerage, I was paid 6 cents per word when I turned in my portion of the book. And it didn't matter if I wrote those assignments in 1 day, or 30 days, I was paid the same amount of money for it. And with projects like my article Henchmen And Goons, I earn money based on how many people actually read the article; if no one reads it, I don't make anything. And while I earn 30% of the sales for any of my 100 Kinfolk supplements, if no one actually buys them, I don't make any money off of them.

All of that is to say that when it comes to our earnings as creators, the amount of work we put in is often wildly disproportionate to the amount of money we make. Because we could put weeks, or months of work into a project, but if no one reads it, watches it, or buys it, then that was all shoveled into a hole to disappear forever with no return on that investment. And we might put only a few hours into something, but if it explodes for no reason that we can put our fingers on, it doesn't matter, because we still get paid.

I had that with my video essay The Problem With Pentex, which is still the most-watched thing on the Azukail Games YouTube channel.

And if you are lucky as a creator, and something you made goes viral, you can afford to take a few days off. If you get really lucky, you might even be able to lower your overall output, because when more people are watching your videos, buying your books, or reading your articles, you have a steady stream of money flowing into your bank account, which allows you to relax a bit.

But if you don't have that, then you're just spending entire days earning no money. That's stressful as hell, I can tell you from first-hand experience.

The thing to keep in mind here is that if you're a creator who already has a loyal fan base, or has popular material out there that pulls in regular sales, you're already not stressed. You're probably even saving a little money for a rainy day. The creators you see who are pulling 10+ hour days, and releasing content on a ridiculous scale and schedule, taking no time for themselves, and not leaving the house? The problem those creators have is that they aren't making enough money to cover their bills, and to buy them the security they need to take a break, or let their foot off the gas a little bit. We aren't addicted to working... we aren't being paid enough to stop.

And if you want them to be able to afford the rest that you acknowledge they need, then you (and all the other folks who want them to rest) are the only people who can make that happen.

Care And Feeding Of Your Creators

I've said this so many times that my soap box is starting to get serious wear and tear, but I'm going to say it again because there's folks out there who don't seem to have gotten the message yet. Authors (and other creators) don't make money because of how hard we work. We make money because of the amount of support our audience gives us. Period, flat out, that's the way the machine works.

It does no matter how much we write, or what kinds of projects we make... if no one buys our books, reads our articles, etc., then it's all for nothing. And it is people like you, the audience who actually make up the numbers we receive which determines our earnings at the end of the day.

So if you want that creator you love to be able to buy food, pay their bills, and rest, ask yourself what you're doing to make that happen... because your efforts are what matter!

And if you don't know what you can do to help a creator, well, consider all of the following steps.

If You Have Money To Spend

- Buy their books/merch

- Send them a tip on Ko-Fi

- Become a Patreon patron

If You Don't Have Money To Spend

- Subscribe to all their socials (bigger subscriber numbers make the algorithm support a creator)

- Comment on and share the posts they make (this also makes others likely to see them)

- Consume their free content (watch YT videos, read blogs, etc., with ad block off to get them paid)

It might not sound like a lot, but creators generally don't have huge needs. As long as they're making enough money to pay the rent, keep the power on, and maybe go out for tacos every now and again, they will keep making stuff... but it takes a dedicated group of at least 50-100 folks just helping boost their signal and regularly consuming their content to actually make the wheels turn.

And yes, that takes some effort on your part as a fan. You need to visit creator's pages, make sure you leave comments, upvote them, and help spread the signal... but we literally cannot do it on our own. We are basically trees, rooted to the spot. We're trying to make the tastiest-looking seeds possible, but we need you to act as the wind the scatters them, or the animals that consume them to spread them out far and wide.

Because unless you do, we're probably going to wither and die. Maybe literally (especially for those of us who have medical debt to pay off), or maybe figuratively... but if your favorite creator has to stop creating because they're forced to work a minimum wage job that leaves them no time to make videos, write books, or do anything else... what's the functional difference from where you're sitting?

Support The Literary Mercenary

If you want to see me produce more work, consider some of the following options!

- My Facebook

- My Blue Sky

- My LinkTree

- My Weekly Newsletter

- The Azukail Games YouTube Channel (where I contribute video content)

- The A.L.I.C.E. Files (an audio drama channel I launched with Alice Liddell)

And if you happen to have some spare dosh lying around, and you want to be sure my supply doesn't run low, consider become a Patreon patron, or leaving a tip by Buying Me a Ko-Fi!

Also, if you're curious about how to write for tabletop RPGs, don't forget to check out my show Tabletop Mercenary, which you can find on both the Azukail Games channel above!

Like, Follow, and Come Back Again!

That's all for this week's Business of Writing! For more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, or at My Amazon Author Page where you can find books like my sci-fi dystopian thriller Old Soldiers, the Hardboiled Cat series about a mystery solving Maine Coon in Marked Territory and Painted Cats, my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife, or my most recent short story collection The Rejects!

 

And to stay on top of all my latest news and releases, collected once a week, make sure you subscribe to The Literary Mercenary's mailing list.

A Single, Viral Success Can Make A Huge Difference For Creators

A majority of writing advice when it comes to the business side of things is to remind authors that their career is a marathon, not a sprint. Generally speaking you get a lot more out of just putting one foot in front of the other, writing one story, and one book, after another so that you can build up your archive over time. Because the bigger your archive gets, the more your readers can consume, and the more people will have to enjoy when they discover you exist.

With that said, though, it's important to understand the effect that a single, big success can have for a writer... especially if they're depending on modern digital infrastructure and algorithms to work in their favor.

Because sometimes that single bump has long-reaching impacts.

Before we get into the nitty gritty this week, don't forget to sign up for my weekly newsletter to get all my updates right in your inbox. Lastly, to be sure you're following all of my followables, check out my LinkTree!

Lastly, don't forget to check out my Vocal archive for additional fiction, articles, explorations of weird history, and more! And, of course, check me out on Blue Sky, since that's what we're talking about today!

Engaging The Machinery That Moves More Books

Authors have to worry about a lot of different numbers. So, I want to take a moment to talk about the kinds of numbers authors have to contend with, and the effects they can have on your career. And while a lot of these numbers are very small (especially in terms of the Internet), these goals can be hard as hell to actually reach. So if you have authors out there whose work you enjoy, keep some of these things in mind. And if you're an author who is looking for a call to action for your audience, consider trying to rope them into some of these options to see if it will give your career a bit of a boost!

Book Reviews

Book reviews are one of the most basic numbers authors are generally concerned with. After all, reviews mean that people are reading your books, and it provides a running commentary that might get new readers interested. However, consider that when a book receives at least 50 reviews on Amazon, this causes the algorithm to start advertising it to other users who are looking for similar books. And the more reviews someone gets, the higher up their book will show in searches, with the possibility of it being on the front page.

And while these numbers are for Amazon, remember that whatever digital platform you prefer, the more reviews a book has, the better off it is for you as the author.

Now consider the impact that receiving a few hundred reviews on your book might get. Perhaps you sold a bunch of books at a convention, or you had a Kindle Unlimited giveaway and readers chose to rate and review as a way of paying you back. This essentially kicks off the website's algorithm, which both gives you a permanently higher rating than books that don't have as many reviews as yours does, but it also provides you a jump in attention. Because when the site sees that your book is doing well, the machine registers that it is currently popular, and it starts pushing it to other people browsing the site, doing a bunch of free advertising for you.

Free advertising which could lead to you finding more readers, and making even more sales, than you otherwise would have without that boost from a big review number.

Social Media

Social media platforms are the lifeblood of all sorts of creators because they let us reach our audience... in theory, at least. And the algorithms that govern social media work very similarly to the ones that run the online bookstores. After all, these websites want to promote things that are popular, because that keeps people on the website and scrolling through their feed.

So what happens when you start acquiring big numbers on social media platforms as an author? Whether it's for your book, one of your other projects, or just sharing some of your thoughts on the issue of the day?

When you make a post that gets popular on a social media platform (particularly a big platform like Facebook or Reddit, but this also applies to Blue Sky and similar upstarts), the algorithm starts up and begins boosting your signal. For Facebook or Twitter, it's more likely to show up in the For You feeds for users who may not know you, since the algorithm is showing it around to people that are statistically likely to have a reaction to those posts. And on Reddit your post may show up on the front page of the site, meaning that anyone who shows up might see exactly what it is you were posting about. This exposes you to more people, and makes it very likely you're going to pick up a lot of fresh subscribers and followers.

And what does that do for you? I'm glad you asked!

Social media platforms favor people who have a large number of followers. So if you had 1,000 followers one day, and then after a successful post you found yourself with 10,000 followers, you'll find that your posts are now getting more distance, and being seen far more widely than they were before. The reason for that is the algorithm supports you in ways it didn't before, because one of the major priorities for the algorithm, and how it treats you, is the size of your audience. This, at least in part, determines your reach.

If you do very well you can even get paid by the platform, but I gave details on that in Can You Get Paid By Social Media Platforms As A Writer? Probably Not.

YouTube

Not every author is on YouTube, but there are a lot of us over there who are trying to court an audience by making book commercials, audio adaptations of our work, or just talking about the behind-the-scenes of being an author. Speaking of, shout out to Alice The Author, whose channel is packed with great writing advice and information!

However, a single viral (or even nearly viral) success on this platform also shows how a big splash can lead to permanent changes!

For those who haven't read my older entries on this platform, YouTube requires creators to have a minimum of 1,000 subscribers and 4,000 hours of watched content within a single 365 day span before the site shares ad revenue with you. That is both a tiny number in terms of the Internet, and an impossible number in terms of what most creators can accomplish. And this is something I have some experience with, because I was with Azukail Games for their journey.

Because while Azukail Games had subscribers aplenty, the channel just could not get the view hours. Videos kept going nowhere thanks to changes to the site's algorithm, and it kept losing ground because the channel was several years old... this meant with every passing day it was having hours taken off the total view count.

What put us over the top (netting us over 1,000 hours) was a single video, The Problem With Pentex. This video essay about a niche aspect of the RPG Werewolf: The Apocalypse garnered a lot of interest (perhaps for the mention of the infamous copper merchant Ea Nasir), but more importantly the boost it provided to the channel's view hours (and to our subscriber count) permanently boosted the channel up to a new tier.

So while this one video didn't launch the channel into the stratosphere (it got 10,000 views, not a million), it put us on a whole other level that we have been climbing from ever since.

Your Numbers Make A Difference (Especially En Masse)

I've said this before, and I'm saying it again because more people need to know this. What determines the success of an author (or really a creator of any stripe) is how many people show up for them. It's your purchases of our books that determine whether or not we get royalty checks, it's your views and listens that determine whether we earn any ad revenue, and it's your likes, shares, and subscribes that determine whether social media websites are actively restraining our signals, or boosting them because the machine believes our posts will keep more people on the platform.

And while having an engaged and growing audience is great, those big jumps when something gets popular can be a serious hand-up.

Now, that doesn't mean that as an author you should bend all of your attention and will toward going viral, and that you should only make posts, write books, etc. that are geared toward said virality. Generally speaking, going viral isn't something you can really engineer (without a lot of money and effort, at least). However, a lot of folks don't realize that those kinds of successes have long-term effects, even if the initial event seems like nothing more than a flash in the pan at the time.

The Reason This Is All On My Mind Lately...

The reason this has all been on my mind of late is (shameless self-plug) that I've been hammering hard on a new ongoing audio drama channel over on YouTube called The A.L.I.C.E. Files. A dark sci-fi reimagining of Alice in Wonderland, the channel will feature an ongoing narrative about the events happening inside the mysterious Carroll Institute, as well as smaller, independent stories that act as stand-alones.

And those numbers I mentioned earlier, the 1,000 subscribers and 4,000 watch hours? That's proving EXTRA hard to manage.

Which is why I wanted to ask everyone who read this far to please do me a favor. If you could subscribe to the channel, and listen to the stories we've posted so far (but especially the most recent installment, 50 Two-Sentence Horror Stories where we meet Dormouse), I would greatly appreciate the effort.

Because while we're doing our best to get as much great stuff out there as we can, we basically need something to go 10,000+ views viral to boost us up to the level we need to be at. And every click, view, and comment on the video gets us that much closer!

Support The Literary Mercenary

If you want to see me produce more work, consider some of the following options!

- My Facebook

- My Blue Sky

- My LinkTree

- My Weekly Newsletter

- The Azukail Games YouTube Channel (where I contribute video content)

- The A.L.I.C.E. Files (where many dramatized versions of my stories can be heard for free)

And if you happen to have some spare dosh lying around, and you want to be sure my supply doesn't run low, consider become a Patreon patron, or leaving a tip by Buying Me a Ko-Fi!

Also, if you're curious about how to write for tabletop RPGs, don't forget to check out my show Tabletop Mercenary, which you can find on both the Azukail Games channel above!

Like, Follow, and Come Back Again!

That's all for this week's Business of Writing! For more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, or at My Amazon Author Page where you can find books like my sci-fi dystopian thriller Old Soldiers, the Hardboiled Cat series about a mystery solving Maine Coon in Marked Territory and Painted Cats, my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife, or my most recent short story collection The Rejects!

 

And to stay on top of all my latest news and releases, collected once a week, make sure you subscribe to The Literary Mercenary's mailing list.

Asking For Support Is Not "Begging For Money"

There is, apparently, a lot of confusion among folks on the Internet about how artists get paid. For some reason a lot of people out there seem to believe that once a creator makes something that it is submitted to the council of Art Warlocks who vote on whether the creator of this work will be given the standard Rich and Famous contract, or if they are to be turned away and told to try again.

Unfortunately, that isn't how it works. So I wanted to take a moment to explain to folks out there how it is artists actually make their money, and how important our audience is in making sure we actually have the ability to pay our bills.

For folks who wondered, we can't do this without Viewers Like You.

Before we get into the nitty gritty this week, don't forget to sign up for my weekly newsletter to get all my updates right in your inbox. Lastly, to be sure you're following all of my followables, check out my LinkTree!

Lastly, don't forget to check out my Vocal archive for additional fiction, articles, explorations of weird history, and more! And, of course, check me out on Blue Sky, since that's what we're talking about today!

Where Does The Money Come From?

Allow me to pull back the curtain, and show you how it is authors get paid.

So, if you write books then you have to first write the manuscript. You then have to get it published either by a traditional publisher, or through a self-publishing platform. Traditional publishers do layout, art, etc., and give you a royalty for every sale, while self-published authors have to do all of that stuff themselves, but they get to keep a bigger percentage of every sale.

And if you're writing blogs or articles (or making videos), then you tend to have an option for traffic-based payments, as well as crowdfunding. For the former, consider the article If 90,000 People Read This Article I Can Pay My Bills This Month. It points out that 90,000 reads is what an article on Vocal.media needs to acquire in order to yield about $540 in payout to the author. And if someone wanted to support this blog, then you could go to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page in order to kick in a fee for every article I write in order to help me keep the train rolling.

It's all about numbers, baby.

However, the point of all of this is to say that authors do not get paid for making things... we get paid either by our audience buying things, or our audience giving us their time and attention on a platform which then gives us a fee for how much traffic we brought to their site. We could spend 20 hours a day putting words on the page, but if no one buys copies, or reads them on hosting platforms that actually pay the creator, then there's not going to be any money to be had.

This is why we ask our audience to support us. Because just like PBS says, "This program is made possible by viewers like you."

And there are a LOT of people our there who get vitriolically angry when you point this out to them.

We Literally Need Your Help To Do What We Do

I have lost count of the number of people who have left snide comments, telling me that if I need to "beg for money" then maybe I should give up and "get a real job" as they put it. However, the point that I feel needs to be driven home to so many people is that ALL creators are literally paid by the audience in one way, shape, form, or another. It doesn't matter if it's one of the biggest touring musicians in the mainstream, or somebody with a small YouTube audience talking about gardening. Whether it's you watching our videos so that we get a cut of the ad revenue from YouTube, you buying our merch so we get a piece of that sale, or you just directly handing us money as a tip for what we do, YOU are required for us to make money.

Period. End of story. And for folks who need the details spelled out, I made a video on it a while back.

Now, if you made it this far, I need you to read this next part very carefully.

You are not obligated to support artists whose work you don't like. Even if you do like a an artist, you aren't required to give them money. However, at the end of the day, you are what decides whether or not an artist gets paid. So if you want a particular creator to keep making things, it sort of behooves you to put in the effort to big up their signal, and make sure they're getting money in their hand one way or the other. Sort of like how if you want to see sequels to a movie, it's important for you to go see it in theaters, bring your friends, buy it when it's available to own, and so on, to send a message to the studio that there's an audience who wants more of this.

And it's something you need to work into your everyday. If you like a video, leave a comment of 7+ words, and give it an upvote. Get used to subscribing and following to people who you want to do well. Leave people tips, and buy some merch when you can. Being an active participant is worth so much to creators, and it is unfortunately so rare to find in an audience.

If you need a list, then just take the one at the end of this article, and apply it to all the creators our there that you want to see pay their bills, and keep making more art. Because it is a lot easier to keep doing this job if you have your utilities covered, and food in your cabinets. Just saying.

Support The Literary Mercenary

If you want to see me produce more work, consider some of the following options!

- My Facebook

- My Blue Sky

- My LinkTree

- My Weekly Newsletter

- The Azukail Games YouTube Channel (where I contribute video content)

And if you happen to have some spare dosh lying around, and you want to be sure my supply doesn't run low, consider become a Patreon patron, or leaving a tip by Buying Me a Ko-Fi!

Also, if you're curious about how to write for tabletop RPGs, don't forget to check out my show Tabletop Mercenary, which you can find on both the Azukail Games channel, as well as my Rumble channel listed above!

Like, Follow, and Come Back Again!

That's all for this week's Business of Writing! For more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, or at My Amazon Author Page where you can find books like my sci-fi dystopian thriller Old Soldiers, the Hardboiled Cat series about a mystery solving Maine Coon in Marked Territory and Painted Cats, my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife, or my most recent short story collection The Rejects!

 

And to stay on top of all my latest news and releases, collected once a week, make sure you subscribe to The Literary Mercenary's mailing list.