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mylorolfereads: My icon on social media, a pig with a book (Default)
Mylo Rolfe

December 2024

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mylorolfereads: My icon on social media, a pig with a book (Default)
I don't want to stop blogging, but although I want to support the small web, I am going to move my blog over to my Buy Me A Coffee page for practical reasons.

The number one reason for that is that through my book work I slowly realized that all my WIPs were for my "alternate" pen name, Etta Green, and that I had almost no "Mylo Rolfe" projects to speak of. So this pen name is officially on hiatus while I focus on my Etta Green stuff.

So with that being said, here's my shiny new blog on my BMAC page. Some of the posts will be behind a paywall cuz I need to eat. Most of them will still be public, though!
May. 3rd, 2024 08:24 am

Small Town

mylorolfereads: My icon on social media, a pig with a book (Default)

Little update to breathe life into this blog.

A few days ago my gig delivery job took me to a tiny town I'd never been to before. While I was there I discovered an artist's market with indie author books for sale AND a tiny local used bookstore that also had indie author books for sale just a few doors down! I had no idea any of it was there. I took some business cards and filed them away immediately--I need places to sell my stuff!

While I was at the bookstore, I got talking to the shopkeep, who commented on me looking at the cookbooks and asked if I cooked or baked. I got overexcited and started yammering on about the vintage recipes I'd been making over the past year. She asks me if I'm going to enter anything in the county fair this August, gives me some anecdotes about how a local woman won't give up her lemon curd recipe, and as we're talking the only other customer in the store comes up and proudly tells us his spaghetti sauce got a blue ribbon at the fair last year.

I want a blue ribbon too!

The entire exchange would have felt like it was from an episode of Andy Griffith if the front counter wouldn't have been covered in 3D printed pokemon and other pop culture memorabilia. I'm definitely planning to find out how to enter that food competition. I think I know what I want to enter, but there's a few recipes I want to make before I come to a decision...

And, of course, finding new potential places to hawk Tethered to the Trickster is always a bonus.
mylorolfereads: My icon on social media, a pig with a book (Default)
CW: Brief mentions of abuse by medical personnel 

(You can let out the breath you didn't know you were holding; I'm not talking about the current issues with the NaNo forum)

In October I got some sleep studies done. To nobody's surprise, I have a severe case of sleep apnea, so severe that the sleep tech actually told me it was like I wasn't actually sleeping at all because I kept choking on my own passageways. The result was a CPAP machine.

Ten years ago my dad was prescribed a CPAP machine and he hated it. It was too loud for him to sleep with, and the mask (which wrapped around his entire head) kept him up all night. So of course I had my reservations about the whole thing! But it turns out CPAP technology has progressed a fair bit in the last decade. The machine makes absolutely no noise when it's on and there are mask styles that don't make you feel like you're stuck in a cranium cage because you can sleep on your side while wearing them. 


Some of the masks still fit like this, though

Where am I going with this? Well, it's been a game changer for my productivity. My previous two NaNo attempts went the same way. I'd make quota the first day, then slip off because I was just too tired to put any words onto the paper. The fact that I got 13000 words down both years felt like a miracle writing feat. 

With the CPAP machine I no longer feel like I'm on the verge of collapsing. I don't feel like I'm going to throw up half the day and I don't get these waves of debilitating exhaustion where I have to lay down and take a nap immediately because I can't function. The result is making (and often surpassing) quota in a timely manner. I hit 5,000 words in the first 48 hours!

You'd think this would feel great, instead it just feels weird. The last time I was able to sit down and just get lost in writing for a long stretch, I was a scrawny 17 year old writing a vaguely racist YA novel about ninjas in America fighting demons called "Shadows." (Actually, I'd kind of like to make an improved version of that book at some point. There were a few cool ideas in there that I'd like to revisit.) That was 2009. Fourteen years ago! 

As you might guess by the era, it was heavily based off this.

 
To say that I thought I'd never go back to that level of productivity is an understatement. The last year of high school was a crazy productive time for me. I was working on a book, a comic series, and an animated cartoon short that ended up being five minutes long--and all I had to make it with was Windows Movie Maker and MS Paint.

Then I went through a traumatic disaster at the beginning of 2010. The short version was that I rapidly fell to rock bottom due to untreated bipolar disorder (at the time my symptoms were so atypical that doctors didn't realize they were related to manic-depressive swings) and then was abused by hospital staff for a full month with no way to leave. I'll save the full story for another post when I have the energy to talk about it.

The takeaway is that I never went back to my teenage productive rate. After being discharged I kept getting bounced from medication to medication as "experts" tried to figure out how to treat my unusual symptoms. It wouldn't be until 2020 where I got properly diagnosed (THANK YOU DR. DUFFY) and actually reached a stability point where I could start to get my creative life back in order. Even then, the constant exhaustion I felt from poor sleep quality meant I couldn't make art at the pace I wanted to.

I really thought that the reason I couldn't keep up my art pace was because I was getting old. And I think that's a huge problem with the millennial generation; a lot of us, for whatever reason, tend to view aging from a teenager's perspective where if you're over 21 you're "old" and 30s is "ancient" because you're smack dab in the parental age range, and parents are uncool. (Side note: "rizzler" is absolutely the funniest tween/teen slang word of the year) Lots of people I could have gone to school with (myself included) complaining about easily treatable aches and pains as if they're chronic.

I'm starting to wonder how many of these "constantly exhausted because of my old age" people just need to get a sleep study done. Sleep Apnea is pretty common.


Sweet dreams, Popeye.

All in all, I feel like I've been given a second chance at being a creative entrepreneur, and I intend to take it this time. 25k words so far on my NaNoWriMo and I'm not even breaking a sweat. Hooray for being awake!

Anyhow, it's my day off and I want to go nuts doing art and music while I have the extra time. For now, here's this morning's illustration of Screwy the Gremlin, the unconventional love interest of my NaNoWriMo 2023 venture.


The inspiration behind this guy was The Noid. Can you tell? Hopefully not.
mylorolfereads: My icon on social media, a pig with a book (Default)
NaNoWriMo approaches, and I have just one question for you: What if The Noid was SEXY!?



Hear me out first, I swear I'm not nuts!

 
As those of you who've browsed my content on TikTok have probably already seen, I've been a bit preoccupied with The Noid for the past few months. And, as my gremlin brain often does, I ended up asking myself the question: "What if there was a sexy version of this?" I presume this train of thought is how a lot of women's Halloween costumes come around, but I'm not thinking scarlet bunny girls, I'm thinking macho kemonomimi men.

I tried to brush off the idea the moment it came into my head but unfortunately my thoughts drifted back to a conversation I'd had with another creative. She'd bemoaned that in smutty stories with fantastical height gaps, the larger character is always the more dominant one. She then gave me a couple of loose scenarios where only a smaller character would fit the dom role, and I had to admit, it was a tantalizing--and seldom seen!--trope to play with.

And so I set myself to the challenge of making a Noid-ish character who's also smoking hot. It's proved to be very difficult, but I think I'm onto something. 



I don't want to give away many details yet for this particular project, because most of it is still up in the air and I'm not even sure I won't get bored and leave it unfinished, but his name is Screwy, he's a six-inch-tall beefcake who never wears a shirt, and he HATES pizza. Oh, and he's killed at least ten humans. I feel this last factoid needs a disclaimer that I'm not riffing on the Kenneth Lamar Noid hostage tragedy. Screwy is a gremlin, so, for better or worse, he's brought down some fighter planes.



Fun fact: the original Noid concept art depicts him as a
more traditional gremlin with a bomber pilot outfit and tiny weapons!

Speaking of NaNoWriMo, I'd like to get back to the superhero book I started last year sooner rather than later. Meanny and the Dust Bunnies feature pretty heavily on the Goodies section of my site with no book to pair them with and I think that's a shame! Maybe I'll bang out some paragraphs today to get myself back into the writing habit.

And hopefully I'll be able to keep up a blogging habit for the rest of this month, too!
mylorolfereads: My icon on social media, a pig with a book (Default)
This is just me rambling to get some content on my blog to show that I haven't given it up, but I sometimes wish being a pantser writer was more predictable.

When I wrote Fated Maids and the Royal Slug, my characters sprung from my mind onto the page almost completely fully formed. There was no period where I decided which traits to give who, there was very little in tweaking their physical designs, and all in all coming up with situations to put my beloved Milky-Maids in was smooth sailing, once I convinced myself to sit down and write the chapters.
 

My next project, a novella, is technically my "previous" project -- I've written the entire thing and edited it many times, it just needs to see a professional editor at this point. But when I started writing it during the tail end of 2020 (yowza, has it been that long!?) I had a very hard time characterizing one of the lead supporting characters. I had no trouble coming up with the physical design; much like my maids he'd just sort of tumbled out of my pen and onto the tablet touchscreen. But personalitywise I drew a blank. I tried writing test dialogue with him but he turned out too childlike for a character who was supposed to be in his early 30s, and even if I "aged up" that kind of personality, it didn't mesh -- or harmoniously contrast -- the loud and outgoing personality of his best friend. 

Then one day, while I was browsing stock music for video projects, I found a niche psychedelic comedy track that was unlike any song I'd heard before. I thought to myself, "This is the kind of thing you'd hear off of a weird vinyl you took a chance on at the thrift shop."

And that did it. Suddenly in my mind was the image of my normally laid-back character jabbering away with his best friend about possible interpretations of the lyrics to a song nobody but them knew, like a grown-up geek version of a secret club code.

The rest of the character flowed easily from there. He became an artist, a toker, a kind soul but a bitter critic at the same time. And it all fits together naturally, I think.

I'm sure at this point some of you are thinking this is a brag about how easily I can come up with ideas, but it's really me expressing complete confusion. I honestly don't know what causes some characters to just appear all at once after months of puzzling over traits that just don't feel right.

There's this gag in Arthur where the titular character lies to his best friend Buster about coming up with a song really quickly (in actuality he copied it off of something his sister DW made up). Buster says something along the lines of, "That must be how all great art is made! Nothing, nothing, then, out of nowhere... something beautiful." I figure it's supposed to be a joke, but with certain characters -- sometimes entire short stories! -- it really does all just appear at once. That includes music, too -- Drink Me In! (the theme song for Fated Maids) appeared vividly in my head when I was nowhere near a computer and I had to loop it over two dozen times in my head so that I wouldn't forget it before I had a chance to write it down.

Which brings me back to the first point in this post... yes, sometimes I get these whirlwind inspirations where the creative process is smooth sailing. And then the rest of the time... nothing. Zilch. Nada. I stare at blank screens and everything I write turns out wrong, or it'll be decently written but the characters feel "off," or the story derails and goes somewhere it doesn't need to (infodump ahoy!). 

Then, after months, I'll find that "one thing..." and be off to the races again... 

...which is very bad when you're supposed to be pumping out steady content! The world is not fond of "one big burst every six months," I suppose.

I highly suspect this is an ADHD focus thing but can't be sure. If it is, I guess it can only be controlled by more coffee.

(Did you know caffeine is in the same drug class as Ritalin? But much tastier and safer to mix with other meds.)

mylorolfereads: My icon on social media, a pig with a book (Default)

I'm baaaaaaack! Missed me? (Mya!)

It's been three weeks since Fated Maids and the Royal Slug debuted. To everyone who's supported me so far, even if you didn't like the book, THANK YOU! Book reads make the world go 'round!

With that being said, what I'd like to talk about tonight is NOT intended to be a callout post for anyone, simply a passing thought.

Fated Maids currently has two websites where you can browse reviews for the book. One's Goodreads. The other is Amazon on the book's page itself. As of this post, the current Amazon rating is 3.8 stars. While I'd like to pretend my book is perfect, it's not, and I think 3.8 with a handful of mixed but honest reviews is an accomplishment.




My Goodreads page, however, is sitting at a not-so-great 2.5 stars. I try not to obsess over unfavorable reviews and of what I've seen, none of them have been malicious or overly mean which is good, too. (I did get a snort out of the person who said the plot must have gotten lost in the maids' cleavage.)

This leads me to wonder about perception of a book's quality when star ratings are so divided. It's my impression that lot of people don't read the reviews, simply see if a book's stars are high enough for them to hit that "buy" button. But what do people do when they see a book that's rated low on one site and high on another? Do they assume one of the sites has been gamed to get the book a higher rating than it deserves? Do they average it out in their head? Do they buy the book, cross their fingers, and hope for the best? I sure hope it's that last option, but my hopes aren't high.

If anyone knows, please tell me. I'm so curious!

The short version is this: I didn't expect differences in taste to also translate to differences in review site usage as well. It's probably one of the things that's surprised me most as a new author.

In any case I don't have much to talk about in the way of book stuff because something is making me horribly exhausted (like, 15 hours of sleep a day exhausted) and it's cutting into my ability to work. I've got a doctor's appointment coming up soon and I hope they can fix me!

mylorolfereads: My icon on social media, a pig with a book (Default)
Hey, Dreamwidth! It's good to be back, even though I'm pretty sure nobody's reading this stuff. This is just a quick entry with no fancy GIFs because I wanted to make sure I still looked active.

Imagine my delight when I was able to drum up 11 ARC READERS this month for Fated Maids and the Royal Slug! I realize this is small potatoes compared to other ARC teams in the three figures, but honestly, I'm surprised I have a team at all, especially considering the book itself got insta-dungeoned due to Amazon's new, stricter rules for hiding adult content. Word from the wise, you must have "view adult content" enabled AND be searching specifically in the Kindle eBooks category in order to find steamy books nowadays. Yes, I expect Amazon will be receiving a lot of pushback for this.

Over the last week or so the reviews have begun to roll in, and I couldn't be happier with the love that's already being shown for my humble little book about maids with big boobs. I'll admit that I keep refreshing my email at times hoping that another will have appeared. It's not just about getting praise and inflating your own ego, it's about knowing someone not only took the time to read through your entire book and ended up loving it. It makes you feel like you did a good job and that maybe you've got a shot at this author thing after all. At least, that's how I see it.

I also set my book preorder price to 99 cents in hopes of getting a bit of pocket money. Sadly, TikTok has not decided to open its collective wallet for me. This is partly because I haven't been making TikTok videos, I presume. 

In any case, for those of you who are browsing blog entries today, you can find my book at tinyurl.com/FATEDMAIDS
mylorolfereads: My icon on social media, a pig with a book (Default)
I can't believe I'm typing these words: Fated Maids and the Royal Slug is FINISHED, BABY!

Insert your favorite dance track here

 

What this means: Expect an early-to-mid July release date. Actually, I may put up a preorder page for once. Testing the TikTok waters has given me confidence that I can muster up at least ten preorders by Independence Day, if not more. A tempting idea for one with a wallet as empty as mine.

What it also means: ARCs time is here! I've uploaded my files to BookSirens and they're currently undergoing a quality review. I fully expect it to pass. I've got a tiny list of ARC readers who already want a piece of the Milky Maid action and I'm hoping they enjoy reading this book as much as I enjoyed writing it. (And if they don't, oh well. I admit it's not for everyone)

Basically, if the ARC copy gets approved this weekend, that sucker is getting a preorder page on Monday. And that's a Mylo Rolfe Guarantee.

I've learned a few things while writing this book, first and foremost that I don't need to hyperfocus on trying to add a bunch of hidden meaning and morals to write a story that I'll enjoy reading over. Sure, I am using the story to make a point about sexualization, kink, and romance, but on the whole this one's just a bunch of cute and sexy moe-style fluff with characters that are my age rather than high school age. And it was a blast to create!

I've also reaffirmed in my mind that I'm a master at heat, and I'm looking forward to coming up with new ways to make my readers blush in my next book. I'm not spoiling much yet, but for those of you coming here after reading Fated Maids, I sincerely hope most of you like cat girls as much as you like cow girls. Nya~

Sadly, no bunny girls... yet.

And finally, I learned that it's possible for me to write a book in under a year. I know this because this book could have been done in about eight months had I not taken a detour around NaNoWriMo to start an existentialist superhero story (which is on the back burner for now).

That's all for now, I suppose. See you on release day!

And, in other news, my special interest radar has glommed onto these goons and won't let go.
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