Pre-order for The Death of Dulgath by Michael J. Sullivan

Thanks for hitting Goal #10!
almost 9 years ago – Tue, Jul 14, 2015 at 08:45:07 AM

Yep, another stretch goal down. Because we hit $63,000 there are now two t-shirts: 

• Riyria Design
• The Rose and Thorn Design

I'll get started on the design for The Rose and Thorn right away. Also, now that we have "women's cut," t-shirts I added them (and an assortment of colors) to the Riyria design so the "gals" can have a shirt that fits them better - such a great idea - thanks to Cara for the excellent suggestion.

Depending on the design, The Rose and the Thorn t-shirt might work for both genders, or it might have a more "feminine"  feel. Not sure yet, but any opinions on the matter would be greatly appreciated.

So we are down to the final few days here's some updates on where we stand:

• $1,414 to move up another notch on the "Most-funded rung" (will take us to #4th Worldwide rather than just US fiction
• $2,591 to hit stretch Goal #11 - providing sneak peeks of The First Empire books to backers of the Kickstarter.
• $4,112 to move to the 3rd most backed fiction Kickstarter worldwide.
• 1 more backer to move into the 2nd most-backed US fiction project.

Wow, another honor from the Kickstarter Staff
almost 9 years ago – Sun, Jul 12, 2015 at 06:40:19 AM

I must admit to being thrilled when The Death of Dugath project was named a Kickstarter Staff Pick. Only a small percentage of projects get that distinction, so it was a great honor to have one of the staff championing the project. So imagine how I felt when I learned that it was selected to be The Publishing Project of the Day! 

This means we are the featured project on the Publishing Discovery page, which will no doubt get it seen by a lot more people. This is no small feat. At the time I wrote this blog post, there were 629 active publishing projects and only one gets to be the top dog for any given 24-hour period.

Why was it picked? To be honest I don't know, but I'm sure the "chatter" from enthusiastic supporters on Facebook, Twitter, Goodreads, and other social media sites certainly helped to get it it noticed...not to mention it's raised nearly $60,000 in just a bit over a month. We are now down to the final 5 days of the project, so please keep up the good work about spreading the word. If you know someone who you think might like to travel with Royce an Hadrian on this adventure, please reach out and let them know about it. Your generous support has given The Death of Dulgath a fabulous launch which we should be able to parlay into bookstore and library success. What's more, I'm glad to provide all the perks and extras for the backers - it's a win-win for all of us.

Oh, and did you notice? We now have a six in front of the total pledge amount. Yes, that is more than $60,000 raised!  You all are definitely awesome.

A very big day...
almost 9 years ago – Fri, Jul 10, 2015 at 08:49:04 AM

Yesterday was a very big day for The Death of Dulgath.  Here's what happened.

• I finished the book!  This is a whole month ahead of schedule. I still have to go over it one last time before sending to Robin, but the story is done and I anticipate only minor changes. I'm reading through it while keeping my notebook handy, and I've started a page of tweaks to incorporate but they shouldn't take long.

• We reached Stretch Goal #9 so there will be a "Making of The Death of Dulgath" ebook. I already started outlining it (as it looked like we were going to reach the goal), and I'll be working on that while Robin and the beta readers are working their magic. Among other things, you'll see the notes I talked about above and a lot of other stuff as well. I think both readers and writers will enjoy this peek into the writing process, and hopefully I can get Robin to add some chapters regarding the publishing end.

• We became the fourth highest-funded US fiction project of all time and also hit fourth in total number of backers. To date there are 5,709 projects so that puts us in the top .07% -- pretty impressive. But what is even more impressive is if you expand this beyond the US borders and include projects from all over the world we are 5th out of 25,960 which means the top .02%!!

• We received an email from Kickstarter saying The Death of Dulgath will be the featured project on the publishing page. This should get the project even more exposure than it has.  Which will be important as I added a few more stretch goals.

• Having run out of stretch goals I went back into the suggestions and found this one, "So I know that Royce and Hadrian are the stars of this series, but I really love the strong female characters. So how about something to celebrate them? If I had a 'Rose and Thorn' t-shirt in a women's fit I would wear it all the time. Or maybe just adding a women's fit t-shirt and maybe some other t-shirt designs and or colors?" What a great idea!  So I added this as Goal #10

• Also in the suggestions was this, "It would be nice if the backers could be a kind of "exclusive club" where we get things before other people, perhaps early looks at the books?"  Again, a great suggestion. I just wasn't sure how to do this. I talked it over with Robin and she thinks she has a system that would work and we'll try it out with the books of The First Empire.  You already have a REALLY early sneak peek of it as part of this Kickstarter but as the book goes through editing that will change. So, once we get that book (and all the books of The First Empire) to the "approved stage" we'll post any public excerpt to for people in the Kickstarter before they are released to rest of the world. So I added this as Goal #11.

• If we reach those two goals, it will put us past the #4 spot for worldwide fiction projects and within reach of #3. Given that projects usually have a bump near the end, these might be possible.  What I don't think is possible (although I've been proven wrong on several occasions) is  ending above $70,000. So, for this goal I wanted something really special.  Like the Death of Dulgath "behind the scenes"  Robin has long been wanting to write a behind the scenes regarding Riyria as a whole. The project had a Wild Toad's Ride on its way to publication and there are all kinds of questions people ask through email that we could answer to a broader audience. She's wanted to write it for several years now, but other things always got in the way. Having a real reason to write it (such as a commitment to the bakers) just might provide the incentive to get it written, so we added this as a kind of "ultimate stretch goal.

See, I told you it was a big day!  We are down to the last six days, so one way or another we'll see how this all turns out in the end. You guys have been amazing, and  I'ms starting to sound like a broken record with regards to my expressions of gratitude, but that still doesn't change how grateful I am for all the amazing support.

Stretch Goal #8 Unlocked...and another milestone is close
almost 9 years ago – Wed, Jul 08, 2015 at 07:26:57 AM

Well hitting stretch Goal #8 was easier than I thought, we cleared thorough it and are now more than $1,000 past it.  I'll start doing the video diaries and will let you know when they are posted.

That leaves us with one stretch goal, so I'll go back into the suggestions and dig out another one.  I'll do this tomorrow (trying to finish up the book today) so you have some time to add your suggestions to the list.

We are now within a stone's throw of moving to the 5th highest funded US fiction project (just $545) to go.  And while we are talking about levels...I asked Robin to make me a graph for the guesses.  Here's where we stand:

There were 250 guesses and more than half of them have already been exceeded. There was a surprising number who guessed over $100K (and a few even at above $200K) that's just crazy talk - but I'm glad there were some that had such high hopes.  Just one more day before we reach "the final" week.

On the short story submission side of things, they have been coming in, but not nearly as fast as we would have thought. I expect we'll get a lot on the last day as people are using all possible time to polish. Currently we have just 55 entries so changes are pretty good if you are still thinking of entering something.  Full details about how to submit are in the FAQ section. 

I wonder if you guys are going to get tired of me expressing my thanks, but I can't help myself, this is such a cool thing to be a part of and I couldn't do it without you - so thanks so very much.

We are the 6th most-funded US fiction project!
almost 9 years ago – Tue, Jul 07, 2015 at 06:13:25 AM

Yep, that's right we catapulted from spot #8 to Spot #6!!  We weren't even at spot 7 long enough to make it worth mentioning.

 Here's a little breakdown of the movement.

• 15 days to get to #10
• 13 days at #10
• 2 days at #9
• 3 days at #8

• My Backer Kit fees are 5 times higher when you add-ons are bought after the fact, so increasing your pledge now, and distributing it in Backer Kit lowers the fees substantially.
  
• Any additional fees will get us closer to the next stretch goal (we are only $489) away from stretch goal #8
  
• We'll continue to climb the "most-funded" rungs.

Just click it and then there are links to share the project on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and a few other sites.

Again, thanks for the amazing support!  It's because of you all that this project is doing so phenomenally well.