Welcome to the October 2020 edition of The Peschel Special: Pieces from Peschel Press.
My goodness but how time flies. It seems like only yesterday that I was writing the September 2020 edition of the Peschel Press newsletter and I was late because of extenuating circumstances and here I am.
Late again.
Next month I will do better. I’m positive I will. Unless the universe intervenes once more as it has been known to do.
So, dear reader, this is what we’ve been up to since last month. I announced the publication of Career Indie Author in trade paperback. It was generated a lot of excitement here because of our drop-dead deadline for the Story Makers’ class we taught at Cupboard Maker Books on Sunday, 20 September 2020. We had to have the books in hand, and yes, we made it. By two days. That last week was a nail-biter too, because Amazon first insisted that the 36 copies we ordered would arrive on Friday, 18 September, then they moved it to Saturday, 19 September and then, the agony, to Tuesday, 22 September.
They’d be too late.
Then the books actually arrived on Thursday, 17 September.
I am not privy to Amazon’s decision-making process so I have no idea what was going on. This is why we recommend, based on painful experience, that you order your print-on-demand titles three weeks (or more!) prior to when you need them. That lets you use the cheapest shipping, an important consideration if you’d like to earn more money with the sale of each title as opposed to breaking even.
The books look good too. Of course, once they arrived, the typos we’d missed leaped off the page so it was back to the editing table for corrections and a new upload to Amazon.
In the meantime, Bill got busy and put Career Indie Author on IngramSpark for bookstore and library orders. And, even more important, he finally got the ebook version done. It is now live. It’s also in Kindle Unlimited. At this stage, we’re unsure if we’ll go wide with the ebook as we have with the trade paperback.
One point about the ebook. Because of file size restrictions, we can’t load up the digital version with art (although it still comes with a file size warning; it’s that big!). The trade paperback has far more book covers, logos, and other visual treats than the ebook does. Or rather we could, but then we’d have to charge $19.95 for an ebook and why would anyone pay as much for the ebook as they would for the trade paperback?
It makes no sense. This is also why we do not have an ebook version of Sew Cloth Grocery Bags. The art in that book is vital: explanatory photographs, charts, sewing diagrams, pattern layouts, and schematics showing bag construction. None of that art could be dropped so we didn’t.
Here’s the page showing what Career Indie Author looks like and how to get a copy of your own: https://peschelpress.com/career-indie-author/
For comparison, here’s the page for Sew Your Own Cloth Grocery Bags: https://peschelpress.com/sew-cloth-grocery-bags/. You’ll note that we say, upfront, that no ebook is planned.
Now that we’ve got those books covered, what is upcoming for Peschel Press?
I’m so glad you asked!
In addition to collecting vintage Sherlock Holmes fan fiction, Bill also collects interesting quotes from writers about writing. Plenty of those quotes adorn Career Indie Author. However, he has collected so many of those quotes that they’ll be getting a book of their own! We hope to publish the Career Indie Author Quote Book by Christmas. When we publish, we’ll let everyone know via the newsletter.
He’s been toiling away on The Complete, Annotated Secret of Chimneys by Agatha Christie. As always, we give Dame Agatha the full Peschel Press treatment. We all read the book (we dragoon our children into the project because they notice things that we do not) and underline anything that seems worth a discussion. Then Bill researches and writes up hundreds of footnotes, finds the period illustrations, and researches and writes up several essays on some of the fascinating background surrounding The Secret of Chimneys. I had never read Chimneys before and I really enjoyed it. Dame Agatha introduces one of her lesser-known and lesser used characters in it, Superintendent Battle. Our hero, an adventurer with a past, is the dashing Anthony Cade. If, when you read Chimneys, and detect hints of The Prisoner of Zenda, you’re right!
The plan (do you hear God laughing? I do.) is to publish The Complete, Annotated Secret of Chimneys on 1 January 2021 when it comes out of copyright within the United States. The rest of the world will have to wait for our version until after 2046 (life plus 70) to read the history behind the mystery of Chimneys.
As for me, I’ve been posting regularly on Peschel Press’s website for a few months. I’ve been writing book reviews. I only review what I’m interested in reading, so don’t expect to see a common theme nor do I stick to current bestsellers. I’m a very eclectic reader, so if you want to see my thoughts on books both old and new, stop by at https://peschelpress.com/category/teresas-book-reviews/. I’m trying to stick to a book a week schedule (every Tuesday), interspersed by the occasional Agatha Christie-related movie. Those are here: https://peschelpress.com/agatha-christie/
The other thing I’ve been working hard on is the newest installment of The Steppes of Mars series: Escape to HighTower. For those of you who have not been following the serialization of The Vanished Pearls of Orlov, this is the sequel, concluding Lannie and Fen’s adventures and how the repercussions of Lannie’s decision will echo across Mars and down through the generations. As you may guess, I have a huge story arc in mind, with many upcoming titles in The Steppes of Mars roughly plotted out.
Have you ever considered how a stone cast into the pond causes ripples out to the far shores and permanently disturbs where it lands? Lannie, like Debbie before her in The Bride From Dairapaska, causes changes she cannot control. No, the books are not related, other than being set in the same, larger world. The Vanished Pearls of Orlov can be read separately from either of my previous Steppes of Mars titles, although you’ll notice connections because they’re in the same world.
The Vanished Pearls of Orlov is finished but not yet publishable. When I finish working on a current project, I’ll be able to resume my editing of Pearls. I want to make it the best book I can before passing it along to my two beta readers. Then, when Anne and Angel are done, Pearls will come home, I’ll make more corrections, then Bill will edit it, I’ll make still more changes, and then, hopefully by Valentines Day of 2021, we’ll publish The Vanished Pearls of Orlov. I’ve got a great cover waiting in the wings. I know what the bookplate will look like, although I haven’t made it yet, I know the fleurons will be strings of pearls. Like the other Odessa Moon books, it should be beautiful as well as a fun read.
Keep in mind that the versions I serialized on Wattpad and Archive of Our Own are first draft material. The finished books are rather different. In particular, in Pearls, Walter DelFino’s character changes. He demanded it and I acquiesced. Walter may get a novel of his own, The Pride of DelFino. The idea I have for Walter’s story arose a few months ago and I dutifully made notes. But his story will have to wait in the queue.
I expect the same thing will happen as I write and then rewrite Escape to HighTower. I know the main outline of the story, yet characters announce themselves as being critical to the narrative and they are correct. I’m not sure who will show up as Lannie and Fen ride up the Pole-To-Pole Corridor while everyone else scrambles to find them. I don’t know who will turn out to be important at a later date. I certainly didn’t expect Ulla DelFino to be more than a walk-on when I started, yet her story has become very important.
Ulla will get her happy ending. Eventually. In The Wardogs of Barsoom, I think, or that’s how my rough notes are shaping up. I won’t get to Wardogs until after Escape is finished. Once I’m started, I’ll announce it in the newsletter.
So that’s where we are today. We’ve got freshly published titles and we’ve got books in the pipeline (like The Cases of Blue Ploermell) and we’ve got still more books planned for 2021 and beyond.
Thanks again for joining us! We write for readers like you.