Lockdown Projects

Over the weekend Brisbane became the third Australian state capital to lock down because of a Delta-variation outbreak of Covid-19, and we’ve already hit our first extension because the contact tracing did not go well. Some folks are cheerfully making plans for after the current deadline expires, while others are merrily settling in for a much longer wait before things open up again.

Not that a lockdown means much when you’re running a publishing company from your couch. I’ve rescheduled a bunch of important-but-not-urgent meetings, and tried to think of ways I could turn the lockdown into an opportunity. Weeks like this are typically bad times to be announcing and releasing new books — any time attention is on the news, I’ve struggled to move the needle on sales — but that means it’s a great time to be working on some “when I get time for it” projects.

Such as, for example, the print release of Not Quite The End Of The World Just Yet.

The USA has technically had a print version of this for a year or two now, albeit one that was only available through Amazon’s print on demand service. That print version has — inexplicably — outsold the ebook edition by considerable quantity, and was probably the profitable book I’ve ever done until Brain Jar 2.0 unleashed a bunch of new Angela Slatter titles unto the world.

This is a new edition, though. I’ve cleaned up a few things, re-done the layout, and played with the cover a little. Not enough that you’d be getting anything new if you’ve already bought a copy, but it’s definitely the prettier edition compared to the Amazon one.

The official release date is set for August 30 if you order it through most bookstores, but you can get it discounted (and possibly early, COVID shipping willing) if you order direct from Brian Jar Press this month.

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An interesting side-effect of the latest lockdowns and turmoils seems to be the resurgence of blogs as proper blogs again, with various writers and editors I followed in days of old posting journal entries and random thoughts for the first time in years. Many of them are citing a frustration with social media and a desire for more control over the spaces in which they engage as the reason, and I can see the logic behind their choice. It does my heart good to see the equivalent of short missives from friends and colleagues every time I log into my RSS reader (and it is, surprisingly, a damn good reason to check my RSS feed instead of Facebook. Half the reason I signed up to the book of face in the first place was because it made following people’s blogs a little easier… and they’ve removed that function a few years back, and it’s been less fun ever since).

There’s some interesting rumbles that Google may bring back an easy RSS reader in future editions of Chrome, which would be a welcome return. I’d like to see a little blog renaissance somewhere down the line, and there’s something to be said for a service that just shows you the things you’ve subscribed too, in the order they were posted, without messing with your timeline or weighting everything according to what they think you’ll engage with.