my publishing story!
April 2023
Aloha kākou and e komo mai! I’m back with my April newsletter! E kala mai for going silent for the past few months, I’ve been sick with long covid and busy at work so lots of things fell to the wayside (including this newsletter). But I have lots of news, so here I am again! Read on for:
What I’m currently reading/watching/listening to
What’s up with my writing (news and updates)
What I’ve been researching (and all the weird things I learn as an SF writer)
What I’ve been cooking (and if I succeeded or failed)
What my cats are up to (cat happenings)
HOWZIT? 🤙
I found myself in the middle of five different books over the past few months. The aforementioned long covid made it very difficult for me to focus on any one thing, so I kept bouncing around between books looking for something to hold my scattered attention. Martha Wells’ ARTIFICIAL CONDITION, the second in the Murderbot Diaries series, finally broke my reading slump. One thing you’ll learn about me, I love AI. The questions of personhood, free will, and autonomy are a few of my favorite themes to explore in science fiction. I also adore the ability to explore different ways of thinking and experiencing—all things that Wells excels at in her series. Witty, funny, and thought-provoking, it kicked me back into a creative mode that was missing for many months.
Years ago, I watched a playthrough of The Last of Us and fell in love. I didn’t own a PS3, but I was so excited about the premise I watched the whole thing on Youtube. When news of the HBO adaptation broke, I was trepidatious. Video game adaptations are not known for their quality, and I wasn’t sure if the themes of the game that I fell in love with—grief, violence, and healing through love of another human being—would translate. Reader, I was delighted (read: bawling my eyes out) when I watched the first episode. Not only was it true to the spirit of the game, it enriched the story through backstory and worldbuilding that extended on the existing lore of the game. Also, it’s so gay!
Nickel Creek is back from hiatus, and I was lucky enough to see them live on their return tour! I was never much of a bluegrass person, but I learned to appreciate it while drafting my first novel, BLUES FOR A RED PLANET. My wife suggested many a Nickel Creek song to fill my playlist, and it has forever messed up my Spotify algorithm. Reasons Why is the first song of theirs I listened to, and it will forever be a Poʻokela song in my head. A cowboy who turned away from their family, culture, and cause after tragedy broke their heart, taking quiet steps away from the life they once lived… that’s the stuff.
WRITER KINE STUFF ✍️
Of course, the big news from the past few months is: I’M GOING TO BE A PUBLISHED AUTHOR!!!
I’ve been saying I would do a “how I got my agent” post for the longest time (I was really waiting for this news to drop, HAHA), and it feels like now would be an apt time!
So let’s start at the beginning.
The very first inklings of this idea came from a tweet from @proyearner:
I loved that trope, but wasn’t sure how to incorporate it. While spitballing some ideas, I tweeted this out:
Scrappy childhood friends turned accomplished thieves, separated after one betrays the other. My earliest comps were Ocean’s 8 and THE COUNT OF MONTE CRISTO, but lesbians. So I started rewatching all my favorite heist movies, picked up THE COUNT OF MONTE CRISTO, and got to outlining.
I drafted HAMMAJANG LUCK—lovingly referred to as “heist lesbians” in its untitled form—from August 2021 (a year after the first tweets) to March 2022. I revised in April of 2022 and started querying after participating in APIpit. I got a couple of likes on APIpit tweets, including a fateful like from Keir Alekseii.
Now here’s what everyone is curious about: the query stats. Feel free to skip if these are anxiety-inducing for you! I’ll continue on in the next paragraph. I queried from May 2022 to July 2022. In total I queried 30 agents, including Keir. I received 20 rejections, 1 partial request, and 9 full requests. Keir emailed me in mid-June to set up a call, then offered me rep in the meeting.
I signed with Keir in early July. We worked on edits for HAMMAJANG LUCK over the summer and into the fall. Keir didn’t have any larger structural edits for me, but had a lot of great ideas for how to tighten up the plot and weave in the themes. We went on sub in late October.
I was just settling into the anxiety of being on sub—I requested monthly updates to spare my nerves—when Keir emailed me in mid-November to say we were going to acquisitions. I lost my MIND, readers! But I didn’t let myself get too excited—not everything makes it through acquisitions, I reminded myself. But then we got an offer. And then another offer. And another. And another. By the time we heard from everybody in mid-December, we were going into a four house auction.
I couldn’t believe it. I think I was in shock. Even in meeting with the editors and listening to their ideas for the book, it didn’t feel real. Or at least it didn’t, until Gollancz sent over their pre-empt. I burst into tears and ugly cried—I couldn’t believe that somebody believed in this book enough to buy it, let alone want two more!
When the dust settled, I had a deal. It was the week before Christmas, and I celebrated all into the new year.
Of course this means that I’ve been sitting on this news for months, now! I’ve been dying to tell all of you, and I’m so happy the news is out. One year after the first draft, just under a year after APIpit, and—I’ll brag for Keir because they deserve ALL THE PROPS—less than a year since Keir became an agent, we landed our first deal. I say the first because I’m hopeful for many more to come! And maybe there will be some other fun stuff in my future—who knows ;>
RESEARCH FIND 🔍
I didn’t always intend HAMMAJANG LUCK to take place on a space station. It wasn’t until I started drafting that I decided to set the story on a space station—inspired by games like Mass Effect and my friend’s TTRPG campaign.
Kepler itself is modeled after a Stanford Torus. The Stanford Torus was invented at Stanford University during the 1975 NASA Summer Study. It’s a doughnut-shaped ring connected to a central hub via “spokes.” The ring is for human habitation, while the hub is for the space docks. The ring itself creates artificial gravity through centrifugal force—similar to how a carnival ride keeps you in place as its spins.
The torus shown above is more like a suburb and agricultural space, but Kepler I envisioned as more of a cyberpunk metropolis, complete with skyscrapers and neon-lit streets.
Cool, yeah?
THIS MONTH’S GRINDZ 🍽️
This month’s recipe is beef stew! I like it because it’s got a pretty simple base, but you can riff on it very easily. I’ll throw in any extra vegetables I have around, things like parsnips and rutabaga and in this month’s case kabuto squash. Just adjust the cooking times accordingly.
INGREDIENTS
2 lb cubed beef stew meat
1⁄2 cup flour
1 1⁄2 teaspoons salt
1⁄2 teaspoon pepper
1⁄4 cup vegetable oil
1 onion, minced
1 carrot, minced
1⁄4 cup celery, minced
4 cloves garlic
1 tablespoon dried parsley
1 teaspoon thyme
½ teaspoon rosemary
5 cups beef broth
1 cup red wine
2 medium potatoes, diced
2 carrots, diced
1 large onion, diced
Extras: turnips, mushrooms, broccoli, etc
DIRECTIONS
Put flour, salt and pepper in a large ziploc bag.
Heat oil over medium heat in a large dutch oven.
Place meat in bag with the flour and shake until well coated.
Shake off meat pieces and add them to the oil and stir until slightly browned, Add remaining flour from the bag and the mirepoix and garlic.
Stir until well browned.
Deglaze with red wine
Add herbs and beef broth
Cover and cook over low heat for 1 1/2 hours (stirring every 15 minutes).
Add diced potatoes, carrots, onions, and any other veggies. Bring to boil then reduce to low heat and cook for another 45 minutes or until potatoes are tender.
POPOKI PICS 🐈
Everybody say aloha to Steve and Olive! Steve and Olive are nine-year-old and six-year-old brown tabbies, respectively. I met Steve when I met my wife, and Olive we adopted to be Steve’s emotional support animal (he gets anxious when he’s alone). Steve loves to snuggle and eat trash, and Olive loves sitting in laps and committing acts of violence.
Mom sent me a teddy bear when I wasn’t feeling well a couple of weeks ago, and the cats liked to snuggle with it just as much as I did!
SHOOTS! 🤙
That’s all for now! Thank you so much for your patience in waiting for this newsletter! And thank you all for your support in this publishing journey—I’m so excited for where it takes me next!!!
Until next time! A hui hou!