Posted by Amanda S. Green
Good morning, all. I fell down on the job — literally and it hurt! — this week and forgot to follow up with our guest blogger until it was too late. So, the floor is yours today. As us any questions you might have about publishing, our books — new and old, writing habits, etc. You know the rules: no politics and, to quote the late, great Jim Baen, don’t be a butthead.
Also, as a very unscientific experiment, tell us what you’d like us to discuss on Saturdays. We’ve spent the last six months or so using Saturdays for promotion. Do you want us to continue that? Do you like the guest columns (warning here, we love them, but getting one for each week is hard). Would you like to see snippets more often?
The floor is now yours. Have fun!
Mad Genius Club 
I like having different “things.” I like it, that every time I open MGC I may get anything from a business summary to a nostalgic journey. A lesson, a rant. Someone old, someone new. You never know.
I’ll never complain about a guest post. But say once a month how about an out takes post where y’all post pieces that have been trimmed from the final (or current) wip?
Also, being who I am I find research fascinating…
What about an infrequent mention of websites and books used as reference material? Just a short description of “what and why”, granted I may be the only person to find that entertaining…
Oddly, two authors did things this week that seem related to me. First, Howard Tayler (Schlock Mercenary) opened his ovalkwiki wiki (at http://ovalkwiki.com/Welcome ) up. Second, Sharon Lee (Liaden Universe (r)) at http://rolanni.livejournal.com/679756.html asked the musical question — which of my postings in my blog do you find useful/inspiring/yaddayadda? The thing that seems to connect these to me is that they are both asking their fans to help them pull together a body of stuff. Now, would it be any easier for the fans (and the authors) if they started out with the idea of putting a background collection together? Or is this something that no one sees until it’s too late?
When do you start putting together your “reader’s guide” to your stories? And do you do it, or ask the fans to build it? What is the right role for the author in this? Fun to think about!