Today's blog post is different - but in case you need some editing done, it is hopefully also helpful:

My friend and co-author Gillian Polack, known for a list of books both fiction and non-fiction, has an unexpected opening in her schedule... and she is thus taking on editing work (which she normally doesn't). This will be possible until February 2017, so it's sort of a special offer.

I've had the pleasure of working together with Gillian with her editor's hat on, so I know that she does a very good (and very thorough) job.

In a similar vein, if you would like her to give you private consultation for your writing, or research, that would be possible per chat (or, I guess, if you're in Australia or willing to travel there, it might even be possible in person).

If you are interested, you can reach Gillian via this contact form on her website - she'll give you her rates for the job you are asking for, and you can discuss details with her, too.

I'm not entering a title, though. I'm not. Because today is somehow... weird. I did manage to get a stack of stuff done, most of it in preparation for the next fairs, but I'm still feeling way behind, and would have liked to be much, much faster. Story of my life.

Parts of that stack of stuff done today include:

Updating and printing my spinning instructions. (While the downloadable version is available for free through my shop, you get the printed-out instructions in the spinning kit, so I need to print some more from time to time).

Getting together with Gillian for a chat - we're planning a crossover blog interview in celebration of the Beast's release as paperback, and it was my turn to get interviewed. I'll have the pleasure of pestering Gillian with questions next week, and you will see the results here on the blog.

Taking photos of the oil lights in action. I'm still totally in love with these things - they have been produced for ages (the three-bladed swimmer has been made, unchanged, since 1808) and they are just so incredibly nice to use, both for atmospheric lighting and for keeping your tea hot. However, the concept of using these swimmers is rather forgotten today, so people often stand in front of the swimmers at my table, looking puzzled. So I obviously need some explanatory thing to sit around on my stall table at a fair - and this, also obviously, needs photographs.

[caption id="attachment_2574" align="alignleft" width="265"] Atmospheric lighting. With a wineglass, a bit of water and some oil... and the swimmer, of course.


[caption id="attachment_2580" align="alignright" width="265"] Keeping tea hot. Because life is better with tea, and tea is better when hot. Obviously, right?


Actually that was the main bits I did today, as these things all tend to eat up more time than you'd guess at first. (Photos, in particular. Never underestimate the amount of time needed to take good photos - especially if they involve tricky lighting conditions. Or gold embroidery.) The rest was eaten up by the usual day-to-day things such as sorting out emails and working on the current paper/presentation projects. And having coffee. Plus tea. Tea was obligatory since I had to take teapot warmer pictures!

I'm back home from the forum lanarum, which was lovely - there were lots of very nice visitors, the organisers were incredibly well-organised and nice and helpful, the workshop room had plenty of tables and was light and spacious, and there was a coffee source just a few metres from the stall. Margit and I also got to have delicious food in the evening and enjoy wonderful, sunny and summery weather, plus relaxing knitting time - so there was absolutely nothing to complain about, and plenty of things to make us happy.

[caption id="attachment_2548" align="alignnone" width="640"] My booth at the forum lanarum, with the tables crammed full of stuff - as usual...


I even got to have a corner table. I like corner tables - especially as people look at one part, then think they have seen it all, move on and - surprise! - there is even more around the corner. Makes me grin every time.

Another reason to be happy: Today is release date for The Middle Ages Unlocked in its paperback incarnation. The hardcover book has done well enough to get a paperback sister - so my and Gillian's thanks to all of you who bought a copy of The Beast and made this possible!

And now... I am going to go celebrate!

The sun is shining, we've been promised the hottest day in June today, the car is mostly cleared out of things from the weekend, and I'm utterly busy prepping for the next weekend. There's a lot of odds and ends to still take care of - from printing out price tags and my inventory list to checking if I have enough change; from planning the layout and packing the decoration and display materials to packing clothing and planning what to eat during the fair days.

So I'm really busy - especially since I had this nice idea for displaying the many small items I have for sale... but the idea did not convert into reality all by itself. Which means I am working on this today, and it's not all sure whether I'll be able to get the new display put together in time or not...

While I am doing things with wood, cloth and paper for this shiny new thing, maybe you would like to read the latest review of Middle Ages Unlocked (well, at least the latest that came to Gillian's and my attention)? You can find it here at Medievally Speaking, along with a lot of other reviews and a few interviews.

Before I drift off into the blissfulness of the holidays, with nothing to do but hang out with loved ones, have yummy food and too much caffeinated hot beverages and the other usual silliness that accompanies this season, one more non-fluffy blogpost for you - related to gender, and work, and making enough money to live:

Get rich or die vlogging - the sad economics of internet fame tells about the dilemma of those trying to make an income off their youtube videos. (Hint: it's really, really difficult.) Another piece of proof that doing a job you love, and doing it well, does not necessarily mean you'll be able to live on it: Mallory Ortberg from The Toast on Work, Writing, and the Cost of Creative Freedom.

Also related to getting an income: Why Women Don't Apply for Jobs Unless They're 100% Qualified. Harvard Business Review lets you read 5 articles for free - I think this one is really interesting and worth spending one of your five on. The TL;DR? Job descriptions are more like guidelines, and if you think you could do the job well, give it a try. (Another article on HBR, somehow related, is Women Need to Realize Work Isn't School.)

On an unrelated note - I've installed a spambot blocker for the comments, which should not be noticeable at all for you. My test, at least, was successful...

It's Friday (why is it Friday already?), the cat is napping after a long walk outside and a bowl of cat food, I have coffee, and things are coming along. Which is good, as I will spend all of next week with fellow textile people at the European Textile Forum - one week of textile nerdiness and intensive research. Bliss.

Somebody needs to pack my things for that, though. That same somebody also has to take care of a few other things, so she should not get sidetracked with other stuff (again) - even though life is throwing her things such as this lovely review of The Middle Ages Unlocked at Skiffy & Fanty.

Sidetrack lures aside, I have now finally managed to submit my most recent publications to the VG Wort, which means my writing (non-fiction writing, as I lack the whatever you need to write fiction) might earn me a few Euros. How this works? You make a contract with the VG Wort that basically gives them the right to handle your claims to a part of the fees that libraries and copy-machine producers and copyshops have to pay each year for secondary rights.

That wasn't very helpful, was it? Let me try again. Copying and lending books and similar publications means that the author will lose out on income, so there's a fee that has to be paid. This fee goes to the VG Wort, and they split it between their authors due to a specific key. It's all full of legalese and stuff, but the important thing is: it's for authors, and you only have to tell them "yes please I would like some money for my writing thank you so much" and then hand in the information on what you wrote in time. (The deadline for online reports? Tomorrow.) Then, with a bit of luck, you will get a bit of money to your account a while later. (It's usually not much, but hey - even if it will only buy me a coffee, I do appreciate it!)

If you are writing and publishing things, you might want to look into getting registered with a similar association in your own country. Here's a list of copyright collection societies, for writing and other kinds of things - chances are high that your place will be among them. It can't hurt to try!

Somehow Friday's Patreon-related thoughts ate so much of my brain capacity that I totally forgot to give you the Beast blog tour links. So here you go - the rest of our blog tour:

Q&A at A Literary Vacation
A post about spinning at The Freelance History Writer
and the last in the series at Edward the Second.

It was a lovely tour, and we had lots of fun. So much fun, in Gillian's case, that she did another blog tour on the side, so you get bonus posts from her -

the first one in Felicity Pulman's blog, here, where she answers questions about the Beast, and her writing.
She also has a post over at SF Signal, where she talks about writing both fiction and non-fiction.
Not related to the Middle Ages, but also an interesting post is this one at SFFWorld, where Gillian writes about local stories going international. And finally a fourth one at the Skiffy and Fanty Show.

And that wraps up our US release blog tour! Thank you again to everyone who hosted us, and thanks to you for bearing along with us and reading our posts. We hope you had fun!


So now, after the tour, we actually get to celebrate, because - amazon.uk:




and amazon.com:


and amazon.com kindle store:



See? We're in the Top 100, several times, in both electronic version and print version. Woot!

(Note that we have no clue whatsoever on how this relates to actual sales numbers. Amazon has so many books in its listing that a single sale might mean a huge jump in the sales rank, so we're basically still in the dark on how many books are selling. Personally, I'll celebrate even more if the sales are going through smaller bookstores and not the Big River One, or through our publishing house directly, as I'm not really a fan of The A. However, just like it's a good place to read book reviews, it's also a good place to get a rough idea how a book is doing, sales-wise. And that means being in the top 100 of these categories is definitely something worth celebrating, which we are now doing at our respective ends of the world... with chocolate.)