The A.L.I.C.E. Files Crosses A New Threshold (As We Get Closer To Our Season 1 Finale)

It's been 5 months and some change since the trailer debuted on The A.L.I.C.E. Files, and we've been fighting the algorithm every step of the way. Since the series started we've explored the Cthulhu Mythos, the world of Exalted, stories of Old Testament angels in modern-day Los Angeles, tales of Victorian horror, and more! And in addition to that, we also have announcements from the Carroll Institute's staff, and an independent rendition of the original Alice's Adventures in Wonderland.

However, we recently crossed a rather important threshold that I wanted to tell folks about... and to ask those willing to listen to give us a hand up so we can blow past the next limit by the time we wrap up season 1!

Maybe two hands up... we're a lot further away than we'd like to be.

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!

1,000 Hours... Or 25% Of The Way To The Finish Line!

For those who haven't checked out the channel yet, The A.L.I.C.E. Files is an audio drama series with two separate but concurrent stories going on. The first story involves a young woman recruited by the Carroll Institute as a witness cataloger, and the job for the new "Alice" is to review the reports brought back by the Institute's agents from the other side of the rabbit hole... the colloquial name for the machine that opens rifts to other dimensions. The second track of stories are the reports themselves, where we see dramatized tales from these other dimensions, watching/listening to them right alongside Alice.

And we recently crossed the 1,000 hours benchmark!

Celebrate!

On the one hand, that's sort of a big deal. We've been recording, editing, and releasing stuff pretty regularly, and trying to get as many folks onboard for it as possible, so it's nice to get into that 4-digit range. On the other hand, though, YouTube's rules don't allow us to monetize any part of the channel until we have 3,000 watched hours, and 500 subscribers. We won't get a cut of the advertising revenue until we have 4,000 watched hours, and 1,000 subscribers.

 

We're currently at just over 1,000 watched hours, and we have 332 subscribers. Which isn't bad... but hoo boy do we have a long way to go from here!

So What's Happening Between Now And The Season Finale?

At time of writing, we're 11 chapters into Alice's Adventures in Wonderland with 1 more to go, we're 9 episodes into Alice's experience in the Carroll Institute, and we have a couple of small asides and announcements from Director Harrington as he breaks the 4th wall to keep the audience updated on what's going on.

Such as his update on the real Alice's basement flooding during the 4th of July storms that tore across the Midwest.

So, that comes out to 24 videos, and a total of roughly 6 hours of content for folks who want to sit down and listen to everything. But there's more on the schedule, and I wanted to lay it out for folks who are interested.

Despite the flooding, Alice managed to get the final chapter of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland recorded, and it should be out August 8. We have two more "regular" episodes of Alice at the Institute (one that is a cross over with the SCP Foundation, and one that delves into the grim darkness of the far future), which will go up on August 1 and August 15 respectively. And once those three videos are up, we'll have the season finale which ties everything together, and sets Alice up for the events of Season 2.

To sum up, that's a month or so of solid releases from where we are now, and an outline of what we'd like to do going forward... but we won't be able to get there without all of you!

Which is why if you'd like to see the channel grow, please consider doing the following to help us out:

- Subscribe to The A.L.I.C.E. Files

- Watch the episodes we have up (many of which have clues for the sharp-eyed who enjoy playing ARGs)

- Like and comment on the episodes you like (and to leave your theories about what's happening)

- Share the episodes around on your social media pages so we can drag some more folks into our orbit

If we could get 668 people to subscribe to the channel, that would get us over the subscriber requirement. If all of those new folks watched all of our videos, that would put us well over the 4,000 watched hour requirement as well! Hell, even if all the new folks just watched the Carroll Institute playlist, that would put us only a few hundred hours away from the goal.

On the one hand, this would take a lot of eyeballs and a lot of people to get done... but on the other hand, it's theoretically possible that we could get all of this done by the end of August, and then we could stride into season 2 with the ability to turn this show into a genuine income stream... and it won't cost our listeners a single dime!

So please, if you haven't checked out the channel, we could really use your support. And if you have 1, 2, or maybe even 668 friends (in person or online) we would really appreciate you putting in a good word for us.

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.

How Much Content Do You Need To Make A Living?

The Internet is full of seemingly contradictory advice regarding exactly how much stuff you need to write before you'll accumulate an archive large enough to make a living. So whether you're trying for that 20-books-to-easy-street, or you're trying to peg exactly how big your audience has to be in order for you to make a living, I want to take a moment to throw a particularly large bucket of water right in your face.

 

Because the answer is very simple... you have to make as much as it takes.

It is, unfortunately, the answer no one wants to hear.

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 Man Knows The Day (And Only Liars Say They Do)

There's a reference to the end of days in the Bible that tells readers no man knows when that time draws nigh. Anyone who claims they know is either a liar, or a charlatan. This is something all the folks panicking on rapture-tok should have kept in mind, but it's also worth remembering for when it comes to making a living as a writer, artist, or professional creator of any stripe.

 

Because there is no guarantee. Your success could come with your next release, or the one after that, or the one after that. It might not come until you've been rotting in the grave for 20 years, and people rediscover your work. It might never come at all. There's no way to know.

 

Buy from living authors. In case you had doubts for some reason.

Now, as I've said before on this blog, the more swings you take, the more likely you are to be successful. The more books you write, the more videos you make, the more articles you compose, the better and better your chances are of finding an audience. That is not what's in dispute here. What is in dispute, though, are people who claim they have a system, that they can tell you exactly what you need to do to be successful, and that they know exactly how much stuff you need to make in order for you to get paid.

 

And that's a lie for two reasons.

 

The first, and most obvious, is that not every author is going to create the same kind of work. Everyone is writing their own books in their own style, and just because one author managed to finally start cashing checks when they released their 5th, or 10th, or 20th book, that's no guarantee that someone else is going to achieve the same feat.

 

The second reason, though, is that the environment has likely shifted between when one author managed a particular feat, and them giving this advice. The world is constantly changing, and what worked yesterday isn't going to work today, and by tomorrow it will actively harm you. It's the same reason you can't use the same social media strategy today that you would have used 5 years ago, why email newsletters haven't been a viable strategy for a decade, and why you can't just write another book and trust your publisher to handle the rest... the world has moved on since then.

These promises have taken all sorts of forms over the years. When I started off this blog, it was that you needed 400 posts before you had enough regular traffic to generate ad revenue. And guess what? The entire ad structure of the Internet shifted so badly that making money from ads became impossible. I've seen folks swear by the 20 novels formula, saying that if you get 20 books out on the market that will give you enough penetration that you'll build a following. Alice Liddell, who runs the YouTube channel Alice The Author, has over 30 books on the market, and she's scraping by just as hard as I am, if not harder some months. There are people who swear that once you hit 10,000 followers on Instagram it's all easy street from there, or that if you can build your YouTube archive to 100 videos and 5,000 subscribers or more that you'll be able to start coasting.

 

We need to recognize all these promises for what they are... piss in the wind.

 

Just like how crash diets and bro science swear up and down that if you do this cleanse, or adopt that workout routine that you're guaranteed to hit your goals, you should be extremely suspicious of anyone promising that once you release a certain number of projects that you'll be able to kick up your feet and relax.

 

Because as of right now I have half a dozen books on the market. I have over 200 roleplaying game supplements, including the full RPG Army Men: A Game of Tactical Plastic. I've made over a hundred videos for YouTube over the past several years. I've put out over 300 articles in my Vocal.Media archive, and thousands of posts on my two blogs. It's a rather impressive amount of work, in my opinion, but when it comes to coin of the realm, it's all just barely enough to scrape by on rent in government housing. With a roommate.

If You Want Us To Succeed, We Need Your Help

I've said this a dozen times or more before, but it's worth repeating. You, as the creator, cannot force your own success. You can write dozens of books, produce massive series of stories, or put together several long-running podcasts... but if no one watches them, reads them, or buys them, then you won't earn anything for them.

The only thing that gets authors paid is audience effort and interaction. Period. Because if 10,000 people all went out today and bought my cat noir books Marked Territory and Painted Cats, that would give me a bigger payday than I've had in 15 years. I would be able to rest, relax, and slow down for the first time in a decade. And if 25,000 people all decided to go and check out The A.L.I.C.E. Files and watch the episodes we have up so far? That would monetize the channel with a finger snap, and get money rolling in to help with expansions.

 

If people decided to keep buying my books and RPG supplements, and watching my videos even if I stopped making things tomorrow, I would still get paid for that consumption. And if I keep making things at a fever pace until I drop dead, but no one reads it, watches it, or buys copies, then I'm never going to get paid.

 

It doesn't matter how much you make... it matters what people interact with. No audience, no money. But for most of us it's a lot easier to focus on writing X number of books, or making Y number of videos, than it is to actually try to expand our audience. But if you want money, you don't need more books; you need people to read the ones you've already written while you work on the sequels.

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.

If We Don't Need To Know It, Don't Put It On The Page

In addition to being an author, I run a lot of tabletop roleplaying games. These games combine storytelling and math, allowing players to explore a realm through their characters, and to weave their own narrative as things progress. And whether they're playing knights and wizards, or vampires lurking in the shadows of the modern day, these kinds of games are great for really getting people immersed in a story.

 

However, when you're the Game Master (the person crafting the plot lines, making all the extra characters that inhabit the world, running the world itself, and so on), you generally acknowledge that the players are only going to see about 40% of what you put together. Maybe 70%, if they're really curious. And it is so tempting to find some way to shoehorn in all that lore you worked on that supports the world, the characters, and the plots... but you need to resist that urge.

 

If something isn't important to the narrative, don't let it eat up table time. And if you're an author, do not dedicate word count to things people do not need to know... all you're going to do is weigh down your story, and potentially bore your audience enough that they'll close the book and walk away.

 

There's so much to know... and a lot of it is for you, not the readers.

 

But before I get into the meat of today's post, remember, don't forget to sign up for my newsletter to get all my updates right in your inbox. Also, if you've got a bit of spare cash that you'd like to use to help keep the wheels turning, consider becoming a Patreon patron! Also, be sure you're following all of my followables, check out my LinkTree.

Lastly, for hundreds of extra articles on gaming, weird history, and for more free fiction, check out my Vocal archive, too!

 

Backstory Is Necessary... For The Author

 

I've talked at length on this blog about the necessity of research, proper world building, and understanding character motivation, the law, and more. However, most of that is for you, the author. Because writing a book is like an ice berg... most of it remains out of sight, deep below the surface of the story. While it's important for holding up the framework, it isn't the sort of thing your readers need to know.

 

Until it is.

 

After all, didn't you wonder why they called it Skull Island?

Consider for a moment a private detective protagonist. You, as the author, know his full history. You know he was born in farm country, and that he signed up for the marines to get away from that tiny patch. You know he was dishonorably discharged for punching a superior when he was a military police officer, and that he couldn't get a job in civilian law enforcement after that. He was a prize fighter for a while, and then he hung out his shingle as a PI.

 

Now, you might want to find a way to shoehorn all of that into conversation through the book. You might also want to talk about his extended family, their lives, and even lay out the history and genealogy of his family tree and ancestors to show your readers that you did the work... but until that becomes somehow relevant to the story you're telling, you need to keep all of that stuff behind the curtain where it belongs.

 

And this is where an earlier post I made, Lore Drops Instead of Lore Dumps, becomes relevant.

 

Because the purpose of a lore drop is to give a small chunk of relevant information to the audience, either in a subtle way, or in a direct way, to help enhance your story without bogging it down with unnecessary details. For example, your PI might have a client come to him. He doesn't trust cops, but he knows a guy who recommended the detective. Harry White? Yeah, we did a tour of the sandbox together. Client relaxes, knowing that he's talking to a fellow jarhead who's here to help him out. Alternatively, our PI is expecting a call from a contact, but instead his brother calls from back home. He's gossiping about the kids, his wife, the current crop, and can't get to the point, and our detective can feel his old accent trying to claw its way back up his throat. Then he has to cut the call off when another number dials him. This gives us a glimpse into the detective's life, and can provide a kind of tension breaker before we get back into the case.

 

Before you bring a piece of backstory onto the page, whether it's a historical event that happened in the setting, where your protagonist learned to shoot, or the details of a holiday celebration where everyone wears leather masks made from the preserved, peeled faces of their elders who have passed on, ask yourself if this adds to your story, and serves a purpose in the narrative. Because if this information isn't necessary to provide context to your readers, and it won't reveal something important, then you probably need to leave it under the water.

 

And that can hurt trying to hold yourself back from explaining everything that you spent all this time working on. But if the audience doesn't need to know, all you're doing is gumming up the works. And if your audience does need to know, you need to find a way to convey that knowledge as smoothly as possible. For more on how to do that, though, check out my older posts How To Avoid The Dreaded Exposition Dump, as well as 3 Ways To Avoid Info Dumping In Your Story.

 

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 (a channel full of short stories, many of which are mine)

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!

Like, Follow, and Come Back Again!

That's all for this week's Craft 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. 

If you'd like to help support my work, then consider Buying Me A Ko-Fi, or heading over to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page! Lastly, to keep up with my latest, follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and now on Pinterest as well!