Magic is power, and only the Kirosz Empire’s oneiromancers can wield it.
When a Nirsuathan professor engineers his own magic, Tyatavar, a failed printmaker stuck running the family bakery, steals a magic vial.
As Nirsuathu’s own laws and traditions clash with imperial power, Tyatavar’s theft proves even more disruptive than the magic itself—and forces choices between truth and power, lies and friendship, home and self.
The Stars Fall Out series launches in early 2024 with Book One, A Chain of Lights, but for now, I’ve set up two early access versions of Stars Fall Out, one on Kindle Vella, the other on Laterpress.
The Kindle Vella version is fairly straightforward: it’s a pay-by-chapter serialized story. While the series will contain six books, they’re written as a continuous story, and both early access versions will (eventually) contain all six books.
If you’re not familiar with Laterpress or are wondering what this whole “early access” thing even means, I’ve written some possibly helpful FAQs.
FAQs that I made up myself
(like most FAQs, if my suspicions are correct)
What does early access mean?
It means that while the Stars Fall Out series—as listed on regular ebook retailers—is still in preorder, you can read an early version.
It still needs edits, covers, and decent (by my standards) formatting. But it exists.
While I’m uploading scene-by-scene to Kindle Vella, Laterpress has a bulk import feature, so the updates will be coming book-by-book. Slower to release, but saves a ton of time. And that time goes straight back into revision.
Currently, all chapters are uploaded for Book One: A Chain of Lights.
What if I want to get the final version later?
I plan to upload the the completed version to Laterpress, the service I’m using to host the early version. So ultimately, if you go with the early access version, you’ll end up with a finalized boxset.
All books with also be available on regular storefronts.
Do you have a pro-con list?
You know I do.
PROS
- Updates as new books completed and edited.
- Cheapest the series will ever be.
- Downloadable epub that you can load on many different devices.
- Get one book now with a boxset coming down the pipe.
- Nice web reading experience.
- Available internationally (unlike Kindle Vella).
- Support the author and project in its early stages, and also a platform that looks like it’s genuinely trying to do right by readers and authors.
CONS
- Not part of a platform such as Kindle or Nook that you might have your entire library on, and that automatically syncs with your device.
- Formatting is not up to the persnickety standards of someone who both formats ebooks and copyedits, and if you have strong opinions about paragraph indents or that weird thing people do now where they try to use a hyphen like an en-dash, it might bug you.
- Slim possibility author will run off with circus before completing work (but only very slim, due to chronic plantar fasciitis).
- …insert your own cons here. I don’t know your life.
Again, you can check that out here. And if the early access cons outweigh the pros for you (fair—I hate that hyphen thing), the first chapters are still available for preview: just click the link, and you’re there. No sign-up needed.
If you still reading, you might still have one big question:
Why bother with an early access version if you’re just going to release a better one later?
Book launches have something in common with weddings: you prepare for months, only to have everything riding on a single day. In my case, “prepare for months” only meant three months, but still, that’s a lot of months sucked into the gravitational pull of a single day. Both experiences exist on a continuum from exciting to stressful, and for me, they’re too close to the stressful end.
After my wedding, I had all these ideas of what do to better next time. To relax more. To have more fun. To make sure people understood that, yes, it would be cold outside on Halloween night, or alternately, to have the whole thing earlier.
But there wasn’t going to be a next time. (And yeah, people get divorced about 50% of the time; I’m just assuming I won’t want to bother with the remarried part.)
I disliked being unable to practice having a wedding.
Shocker, right? An introvert who enjoys learning new skills, but not parties.
While I’ve already done a couple book launches (and hence have some practice), there’s still the stress of everything riding on a single day.
Indie authors often talk about having more control, but that’s not just about stories and covers. There’s an idea of indie authors stuck in a complex of being simultaneously rejected by and turning up our noses at traditional publishers who won’t take our art, and wouldn’t understand it anyway.
But control isn’t just about artistry and perfectionism; it’s about day-to-day life.
I’m an indie author by choice, not because of the depressing traditional publishing statistics out there. And because I made that choice, I can have a book launch that isn’t like a wedding.
People talk a lot about expanding your comfort zone, something that’s extra difficult when you have an anxiety disorder. But there’s another way; rather than expanding my comfort zone to include book launches, I change the book launches and drag them right into my comfort zone.
Far from making more work for myself (of which there’s only a small amount), I’ve given myself a solid reason to finish it early.
By launching iteratively, I’ve already released pressure from the actual upcoming launch day.