Karavansara

East of Constantinople, West of Shanghai

Category Archives: Patreon


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Missed posts, books and hangouts

And so I missed a post, yesterday.
Boy I hate it when it happens – it broke a streak that had lasted more than two months.
Drat!

But I’ve been busy – I’ve spent most of the day editing and setting a new book that will be out soon, in Italian: a collection of eccentrics and their adventures.
Strictly non fiction, what I usually call pulp history – spies, adventurers, loose women.
This will be a 280-pages paperback, fully illustrated – and putting it together, and clearing the typos and everything else took all of the day. Now Amazon has it.

La storia fatta coi cialtroni smallThe book was overdue – I had announced it for Christmas, and never got around to finishing the design work. Then, Saturday night, during my hangout with my Patreon supporters, one of them mentioned the book, and how she had planned to give four copies as gifts for Christmas.
It’s very bad letting our readers and supporters down.
So I got to work, and finished what I had started – and while I was at it I added some 10.000 words of extras.
Should, as I hope, the book hit the shelves this week, it would be my fifth title published in five weeks. Not a bad track record.

And this leads me to my hangout with my supporters, and its immediate effects on my state of affairs.
Because it was absolutely great, and the sort of thing that I must absolutely do again.
Writing is a terribly lonely business, and solitude piles on solitude when you are living in a hole of a village in the back of beyond.
Feedback becomes a lifeline – a cure for depression, a sign that what we are doing has an effect out there.
And there is nothing better than a long friendly chat with intelligent people – and my patrons are all very intelligent.
So I’ll do it again – maybe next week already.
And this week I’ll open my hangout for English-speakers. This Saturday, 11 PM UTC.
What do you guys say? Anyone cares to join in?


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Of Seances and Egyptian Goddesses

And so we did it.
Oh, what a night! (yes, just like the old Frankie Valli & the Four Seasons hit.)

Part 1 – The Seance

Google Hangouts acted up a bit during my hangout session with my Italian supporters from Patreon. A lot of

“Can you hear me?”
“Are you there?”
“I can Hear you, can you hear me? Give me a sign if you can…”

Next time we’ll use a Ouija Board. And there will be certainly a next time, because it was a lot of fun and, for me, a mighty injection of good cheer and positive attitude.
Writing, we have said it before I think, is a lonely business, and we often wonder at what’s happening out there, with our readers. Well, Patreon and this hangout thing is certainly helping bring writers and readers together in a fun way.
We’ll do it again.

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Part 2 – The Boy’s Night Out

In the end that guy was right, and three thousand words were on the page after about two hours.
Ooops.
In the end, I ditched my plan for a 2-characters/3000-words story, and let Nennius Britannicus and the boys take the story where it needed to go.
End result: 6000 words in 5 hours, making lots of pauses. Good going.

This, despite a 2 AM call from a call center somewhere, with a guy trying to sell me a table & chairs set for my garden. Continue reading →


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Twelve hours to go

Tonight’s the night.
No, not a rather sucky and sinister Rod Stewart song.

patreon_iconAt 9 PM, local time, I will set up a hangout with my Italian Patrons, to have a chat after months the guys support me. I’m really excited about this, because I owe big time to these people, and it will be great to finally talk to them, and discover what they like, what they think.
It will also be a way out of this hole of a backwater country village in the Astigianistan hills.
I can’t wait.

Then, at the stroke of midnight (actually 11 PM UTC), I’ll fire up Google Docs, and I’ll do my first session of public writing.
One-Two-Three: One problem, Two characters, Three thousand words.

Gray Vintage Typewriter English Language Day Social Media Graphic

So here’s some preliminary notes on how I’m preparing myself for the event, in case you are interested. Continue reading →


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AMARNA, the Special Edition

I have just launched a crowdfunding campaign to finance the publishing of the Italian edition of AMARNA.

While the story is being serialized in English, the Italian readers will only get a one-volume edition, revised and corrected. I am offering different levels of pledge, and both digital and paper-bound editions of the book.

amarna book

Also, I am doing a Special Edition for the Italian readers – a deluxe paperback with photos, maps and about 100 pages of extra contents.
Only 12 copies of the Special Edition will be available in Italian.

And what about my long-suffering English-language readers?
Will they ever get the expanded and corrected edition of the story?
I am currently looking into the matter and I am getting the details about doing a deluxe paperback of the Special Edition on Amazon, via KDP.
For sure, all my Patreon supporters in the Ten Bucks Club will receive a digital copy of the Special Edition, in English, just as they have received each chapter of the serialized version.
It’s the least I can do for them.


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Two new experiments

It must be the spring, or maybe the insomnia – sleep deprivation does have a lot of weird side-effects, after all…
Anyway, I get lots of ideas, these nights. So I’ve decided to try two experiments. One of them will involve only my Patrons, while the other will be open to the public.
Both are unashamedly self-promotional.
Both will probably be quite fun. Continue reading →


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Welcome to Funeral Point

mana bros base squareI am happy to announce that the first… hmm, the first thing branded with the Mana Bros logo is about to hit the shelves.
As I mentioned a few days back, I’m working on a number of project, one of which is the translation of Il Sonno della Ragione, the indie horror/adventure game by my friend Alex Girola. The setting is very fun, and it’s the sort of gaming universe that gives you ideas.

Last night I went through a bout of insomnia – as it sometimes happens to me – and I started writing to pass the time. The end result is Welcome to the Neighborhood, a short story set in the universe of the game, and the first episode in a series that will go under the name of Funeral Point. Continue reading →


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Meet Garr the Cunning

unnamedThis post was published three days ago for my Patrons, who got to see it first.
They also got a full preview of the first scene of the forthcoming 12.000-words story I’m writing, and that they will get for free.
It’s good to be a Patron of mine.
Just saying.

I have been working on the 12.000-words “caveman fantasy” story I have promised my patrons as a celebration for reaching the 100-bucks-per-month tier.
As I usually do, I planned this story as a first in a series. I grew up on series and serial fiction, and I like exploring and expanding my characters and my worlds. So there. And once I started, it’s been a highly educative experience.
So, here is a preview AND a look at my process – hoping you are interested.

Let’s start with the learning side. Continue reading →