Superheroes, Self-Publishing, and Storytelling with W.T. Meadows
Matt: [00:00:00] Welcome everybody to write out Loud, the podcast about writing and storytelling, authorship, all the creative arts that we like to celebrate here on the show. I, of course, I'm Matt Cassem. I'm joined by the famous, the lovely, the amazing, the wonderful and magical Christina.
Christina: Hello. You know these, these intros get longer and longer and I know no one out there in podcast land can see my face. But I am totally red. I am totally red. Thank you for the introduction. My wonderful Matt,
Matt: Yes. You're welcome. You're welcome. We are also joined by our very special guest and we're, we're super excited to have him on. This is W.T. Meadows. Hi W.T.!
W.T. Meadows: Hey, so I am an author of the Shaman States of America, the South, or the Mantle Series. As part of that new adult series the. New world, excuse me. I, my newest novel introduction events[00:01:00] came out in October of last year following a, I would say, surprisingly successful Kickstarter run. I think we're gonna talk a little bit about that and all of the just myriad things I learned from there.
I'm a big old nerd who lives with my wife, my, my kids and my dogs and Austin play a bunch of games, do a bunch of wood carving, go to a bunch of conventions. That's what I do.
Matt: That's awesome. That's awesome. Well, we're super stoked that you've, you've agreed to join us 'cause we wanted to talk a lot about your process as a writer and kind of your journey as an author. And, I think helping. Everyone really understand what that's like. Right. And what it was like for you.
Because there's a couple of things I think that stand out about your journey that we wanna really kind of, focus in on. So, I know, Christina, you had a, a question you wanted to kind of kick things off with.
Christina: W.T. Can you tell us a little bit about your writing journey? I know introduction events is a solo effort, [00:02:00] but you also have co-authored, so I would just like to know a little bit more about, how you work with somebody else and then go to a solo project
W.T. Meadows: For sure, yeah.,
Christina: How was that for you? What was your process? What was your experience like?
W.T. Meadows: sure. Yeah. So I. I, I like to, to feel and believe that everyone's process is gonna be just wildly different. And that was because my, my experience was certainly a, a bit bizarre. So we're gonna start the, just take a, just the whirlwind tour through W.T.S writing experience. And it started when I was in college 400,000 years ago.
No, actually it was about, about 20 something years ago. But, I had the, my first idea for what I thought was gonna be the coolest fantasy novel, and I was like, ah, this whole thing. And it just hit whole cloth when I was in the shower one day, where those just like weird inspiration thing happened.
And so I tried to write it and I thought that would be really cool. And I got about a few thousand [00:03:00] words in maybe, and I got to some dialogue and it was terrible. It was just horrific. And I'd be like, I got discouraged. So I'd put it aside. Come a few years later, I'd be like, I still like the idea for that book.
I'm gonna try it. So I'd write, get to any amount of dialogue and it would be terrible. And so that happened for a number of years until I was outta college and I wanted to write a web comic, which, so it's illustrating writing and illustrating and web comics. The script is entirely dialogue. So I accidentally taught myself how to write dialogue after publishing a web comic for two years.
So let's, and a little little while after that I started, I went back and did my first nano rmo and na, national Novel Writing Month. If you're not familiar, and it is an experience in November where people get together in either physical or digital communities and try to write 50,000 words of a novel.
And [00:04:00] that first nano, I wrote the first draft of that fantasy book, and in retrospect, it's still pretty terrible. But the thing is, it was done. I wrote a draft, I got it on paper, and so. The next year I kept, I, I kept doing that for a few years and meeting different communities. And then about 10 years ago, well, in 2015 I moved to Austin and so nine years ago, and I met this Chrishaun Keller-Hanna person at my first nano event.
And she was talking about this other world that she was making. So I wrote. The first draft of introduction events as a like, keep in mind, this is nine years ago, wrote the first draft that year and a little while later maintained friendship with her and she developed this shaman states world and. Through [00:05:00] crazy random happenstance, I decided to shelve the introduction events book again as the solo project. And then she had, because she offered me a spot to write a five novel series in her world. And so that experience of writing co-writing a novel was not. A, it was not something I was expecting or, and I had, I had no idea what I was doing in that first novel.
And largely what it amounted to was, this is your world. You tell me what kinds of things will work and what kinds of things won't, and it was a lot of, I have this idea, this is the story I want to tell. This is the, this is the thing that I want to do. Does that work? And if not. How do we tell this story together?
So co-writing in my experience was so much of, I've got this idea, what do you think? And thankfully Chrishaun Keller-Hanna and I have worked together. [00:06:00] We've been friends for, a long time and have an immense amount of respect for each other. And so that has really helped in. Does this work or does it not?
And having and at times some really, really hard conversations I learned so, so much by being told with love that some of my stuff was just not great and I had to really change. A lot about how I approach developing characters and representing things through some pretty tough feedback from both my editor for that series.
I. And also from Chrishaun herself, but thankfully through, due to the respect and the love that they had in being able to share those things, that hard feedback, I was able to push through that. But again, push through it with the help and support of others. So like my wife was [00:07:00] incredible and pushing me to do these things like the the, the I'm of course blanking on the word. That is the, at the epic, the, the beginning of a book. I dedicated dedication. Let's go with that word. about that? The dedication for introduction events is for Sues who punched me and told me to, to finish a novel because that's literally what happened. It got me, get me writing.
My first nano was, there was a, a, a, a cloud syncing thing that happened with my notes and an o an old novel note that I had written on the bus one day, synced to my computer and she saw it and was mad that I wasn't done. And so I got home and she punched me and I was like, what is going on with this?
Like, what? And so, and she said that the story, the one that just showed up, I don't know how or when you wrote it, but it's not done and it needs to be done. Dear reader, it is still not done.
Matt: Nice.
W.T. Meadows: But really the, the is, in my experience is, is really comes down to [00:08:00] stepping out of the comfort zone and asking for just the, the most honest feedback you can get.
Matt: Mm-Hmm.
W.T. Meadows: it is hard to hear at times. But it really, it is so helpful for creating something that's authentic and. Like, you really need to hear that because if Chrishaun Keller-Hanna's gonna tell me something isn't working for whatever reason so she is, she's a black woman.
I am just the most vanilla, straight, white, middle-aged dude. And so like I need to know that those voices that are not my own. Are not reading correctly because she loves me, and if she tells me that it's for my own good. If someone on the internet says that because of my ignorance and I, I do something that's gonna hurt someone on the internet, their feedback is not gonna necessarily come from a place of love and or necessarily from empathy.
[00:09:00] So I need to know kind of what I'm going into so that I'm not saying something that will, A, be incorrect or B. Through my own ignorance and ignorance has has taken on a very strong tone of things. But I mean this by not knowing, not willful ignorance, by just the fact of not knowing something. I do not want something that I have said to come across through my ignorance to hurt someone. Never want that.
Christina: Yeah, well, as, as an editor, I will say this, we never, ever, ever want to hurt someone's feelings. We just want to help them become a better writer or most of us anyway. So yeah, it is, is from a place of, pure, genuine. Let's
Betterment whatever yeah.
Matt: Yeah. Yeah. I have a question for you about something you said. 'cause in, in terms of this sort of lens we're looking at through, which is you've got, you've been co-writing with Chrishaun. You've got introduction events, which is your own work, [00:10:00] right?
And in that process, obviously your own work, you're calling the shots you get to make happen, whatever happened.
Like you don't really have to bounce it off anybody now. We'll talk about some of the ways that you did bounce it off other people, but when it's co-writing with somebody else, were there ever difficult conversations about the direction that it was going? Not necessarily the, the tone of the character that you just talked about, but really like, you wanted to take it one way and Chrishaun Keller-Hanna was like, eh, and I don't need tea or anything, but I'm just saying, did you have those types of conflicts as well?
W.T. Meadows: I mean, to an extent, yeah. I mean there were, there were a few, so, humorously enough it wasn't until the third book of five that Chrishaun Keller-Hanna said, I need this particular scene to be in the book. So I got a hold to and change books without really any, I guess, editorial leaning. Sure.
Like the scene that she, a, i, I don't even remember what it was that she a, that she specifically [00:11:00] said, I need this to be in there.
I was like, okay, cool. Like, no big deal. I think it was that I needed to introduce an important character into that at that point from someone else's story. 'cause like one of the fun things about writing in a, a larger literary universe is that like characters that other people make. Are still in the world.
So like for instance, if Tony Stark rolls up in an Ironman comic, like you still know who Tony Stark is. Like, it's not like. It's not a huge surprise. So when characters from her books or somebody else's books like show up, it's just like, okay, how do I write that character more effectively? And I think that was what happened in the third book.
But there was definitely a, a, a fairly major plot point in the fourth book that I was extremely uncomfortable with how she wanted to do it. And, it wasn't because it was a bad thing. I think that where we ended up going was because, [00:12:00] well, so it worked out very, very well because we worked together
Matt: Nice.
W.T. Meadows: because my name's on it, so I'm not gonna, I. Well, no matter what I put out there, my name's on it. So I had to find a place that I was gonna be comfortable with and that she was gonna be comfortable because it's her world, it's her stuff. And so we had to find a way to make that work great. You just, you do that or you leave the contract or whatever, like, but you have to find a way to be. Do to do a thing that you are comfortable with having your name associated with? Thankfully Chrishaun Keller-Hanna and I, through lots of love and respect with each other, never have put each other in that, in that. Position. But we had to find a place that was a thing that would work for the two of us.
And we found like by talking through, okay, why do you want it this way? Why do you want this thing to happen? I. We figured out what the, [00:13:00] again, again, like, if you have a disagreement, you find the thing that is the, the minimal point where you have an agreement and you work from there. And so we backed it off and we've then built up from where the place where we agreed and it turned out great.
I'm super proud of the way that that book ended up. But there's a reason, there's actually quite a few reasons why I published the first three books within like a month. I had written 'em all, of course, months ahead of time I. Then there was over a year wait for book four, because that was another one of those things where we had to kind of take it back to the studs and see how we could make this work.
Part of that was I had a whole lot to learn from my editor because she, she very kindly brought it back to me being like, I've been telling you these things for three books and you've not either listened or whatever. And again, that's on me. I need to learn to do these things. And so like thankfully, due to her very strong feedback, I pushed through that.[00:14:00]
And I'm a much, much better author now because of that. And so working through those things with my editor and also with Chrishaun, really, really allowed for fine tuning of the craft of that book. But at the same time, that was, oh man, those were hard
Christina: Yeah. Yeah. Well there's actually an author out there Sylvia Day, who has said in the past that you actually need to write three books before your fourth one is actually good.
Like
I mean she, yeah. Yeah. She said it's not until that fourth book that you actually kind of know what it is that you're doing, so she actually suggests not publishing those first three books, but I'm not, I'm not for that at all.
I think, let them be what they are. Let audience see a growth or whatever.
W.T. Meadows: I I could absolutely talk more about that process and getting [00:15:00] similar from a comic artist that I love and respect. So, yeah, hundred percent agree with you there.
Christina: Yeah. So let's talk about introduction events and this Kickstarter that you did. 'cause I'm really interested in that. We haven't had anybody on the podcast yet that has experienced Kickstarter for but I do know people that have done it. So tell us about that, how that started, how it worked.
W.T. Meadows: Sure. Yeah. So, I'll pick up the story from like after I finished publishing the Shaman States books because I, as I was waiting to publish the fifth one, I was like done with editing and all that other stuff, and I, and I was reading through, I was like, I want to go back. The story's good. I wanna do introduction events.
So I went and read it through again and I was just like, oh, oh. After publishing five novels, this book is nowhere near as good as I thought it was. So I completely rewrote it. It was a third person limited perspective initially, as were the Shaman States books. And by the [00:16:00] time that I was done with those, I was like, this book really needs to be first person. So I rewrote it into first person, and it, it is so, so much better by that, but also by the having honed my craft for a number of years and having published a number of books. So all of those things added together to do that. But what got us to Kickstarter was my alt, my plan was to go from working with Chrishaun Keller-Hanna and her publishing group to, I wanted to have it traditionally published, and so I sought representation and I saw, started talking to agents and editors and that kind of thing for about a year and a half. And then I started seeing the, the people that agents were looking for and I started talking to, specifically , I worked a convention where there were some LGBT publishing companies that were in representation there.
So I was talking to them about [00:17:00] introduction events, the themes and the stuff that was with it. And like, but I, I, I, as soon as like I, I started seeing like, oh, this could actually be an interesting story from their perspective. I had the, the realization in horror of, if I. Seek representation with these people.
Who am I excluding from getting representation from them that are actually within the community. I can't even, that's not even remotely close to appropriate. And so I, I'm still friends with them, with those publishing companies and I, and like we still, like share each other's work on socials and signal boost and that kind of thing.
And that's awesome. But. That was when I realized that all of the agents that I wanted to work with really seeking straight, white, middle-aged men, and I don't wanna work with the people who are. And so I [00:18:00] said, you know what, I got plenty of, I got plenty of advantages on myself. I'm gonna do it my own way and I'm not gonna take a spot from someone else who might not have all of the whatever that I have.
And so I was like, I have friends who do Kickstarter stuff. Chrishaun has done a number of very successful, wonderful Kickstarters. I have other friends who have also gone through that. I'm literally wearing the shirt from my friend's bakery who kickstarted their physical location two weeks after mine started.
So like, I'm a huge believer in going out and finding the crowdsourcing because if the people believe in it, then like I. It, it'll, they'll make it happen. So I started the Kickstarter thing with my little video. 'cause one of the things that that really helps is having, the good hook, the, the elevator pitch that works in that regard.
And that's your video for the most part. And so I started it being like, Hey, so this is my deal. I get asked two questions [00:19:00] every time someone asks about my books. Is it available in hardback? Is it available in audiobook? I'm still an indie publisher and like I'm, I'm doing this all on my own, so absolutely it is not available in audiobook yet because I cannot afford that.
They are expensive, but I figured hardback might be doable. I can, I can make that happen. And if we can cover the cost of those, the books, the hardbacks that people have been asking for for years. Can get those and one of those people who've been asking for it for years, me can also get one. And so really it was kind of a selfish way that I could get my own hard back, but. So part of the thing was, you have to figure out the plan. You have to figure out what are my rewards gonna be? What are my bonuses gonna be? What are my various tiers gonna be? How's the shipping gonna work? You have to figure a lot of those things out, ideally before you get rolling. [00:20:00] Otherwise, you accidentally have success and shoot yourself in the foot like, I did.
Because I had a lot of those things planned out even up to and including getting artists to do things like stickers and prints and like those kinds of things along the way. And I was like, cool, these will be stretch goals. There's no way we're gonna hit these stretch goals that I've got planned.
For like at least two or three weeks, we'll probably have hit the stretch goals by the time we hit the mid, the mid, campaign slump. But not really before that. Dear reader, we hit my goal within I think two hours of launching the campaign. I, I was completely floored. No, no, no. Part of me was expecting that, but like.
Part of that happened due to the prepping [00:21:00] for the, the, I mean, a, the, the cover is gorgeous. So again, looking for I, I'm biased of course, but the the, if you get someone, you shouldn't judge a book by cover, but we all do. Every single one of us Or does, and that's why I have an editor. But, so Danny Danny from DL Creative Solutions did my cover and my graphic design. So like she did the logo work, she did the the cover work and is brilliant. And so finding someone who. Is willing to take your vision because none of these things, none. Like even as an indie author, I'm not an island.
I ab absolutely have to do this for the help of other people. And so it really helps that the people who I've gotten involved have also been big fans of the, of the work. So like, I don't think Danny will mind me sharing, but she's. As the graphic designer who is part of the reason why the, why the i, I credit her [00:22:00] with her beautiful design, with being part of the reason why it stood out so well on Kickstarter.
So like they see those gorgeous clouds and the girl falling and like, what's up with that? And then the, the shapes with the images there. I absolutely attribute Danny's beautiful art with part of why that stood out. And so we hit the goal in like two hours and I was like, huh, this is not expected. So I started making graphics because my, my, I have a degree in graphic design, so like, I was like doing the graphic work for that. And I was about to put out the, the graphic of, okay, so here's the stretch goals. By the time I was done making the graphic, we had already passed where the first stretch goal was, which was for stickers.
That were designed by another local artist friend of mine. But of course that wasn't ready because I had told her, you, you don't need to worry about this like this. We're not gonna hit the stretch goals for, for two weeks. So yeah, within a day I had bumped the stretch [00:23:00] goal thing twice, and by the time I posted it, we had passed both of the stretch goals that I had created and bumped twice.
Yeah, I, so, but the other side of why I think this worked in that success was getting the, again, getting the buy-in of the other people who were involved. So these other artists that I, that I looped into the process by talking to them about the process and getting them interested, they shared it with their audiences. And so I had not only my stuff, and Danny of course was a huge proponent of like sharing it like, and so her stuff, not only is her design work brilliant, but like her social media presence is fantastic. And so like her signal boosting this thing was helping because that's the other thing with these, with this process, even as an indie author, you are still part of a community.
And every time that that [00:24:00] community. Signal boosts it out. That helps them and it also helps you. So. Sharing out Monica Gallagher, who is the, the person who designed one set of stickers there. She does such great work. And part of the reason why I wanted to get her to do stickers, 'cause I wanted people to see her great work.
And then Kay Ray Creations and now Kay Ray sketches, who's the other the person that did the, the art prints, which are gorgeous. And because she was. Interested in the project. So you get the buy-in from them and it, it becomes cyclical and that's where you find success is when you can get the people who are interested to share it out on their own because they want to, a number of the people who I pay. I paid my editors, I paid my, all, all of the, the, all of those things. A number of those people still return invested and [00:25:00] ordered copies through the Kickstarter as well. I didn't ask 'em to do that. I wasn't expecting that, but I'm extremely honored by the fact that that was something they opted to do.
Chrishaun was, she was actually upset that she wasn't the first person to back it. And like. It's pretty incredible. This is actually her copy, to be honest. So one of the last couple I need to personalize. So Danny's, Danny's and Chrishaun Keller-Hannat are the last two I need to sign. Um, uh, so I just happened to have it on hand.
But yeah, so like you get these people, you get people interested by investing in them as humans, and that will come back around and it will continue to perpetuate. of course, as long as you're actually telling good stories that are worth anything. So like, it's funny, the, so, Kirsten from Kay Ray Creations who again did the prints, and I'll show you all like this, this is one of the ones that, that she painted.
Um, [00:26:00] uh, great for audio medium of course. Um. Uh, but like she read the book as she was doing the painting stuff, and so like we fired back and forth any number of conversations and of course that would inspire her to tweet about it more or dawn Instagram or whatever. And so like, it was absolutely self perpetuating.
Matt: That's awesome. I two questions for you. One is sort of an aside so maybe it's not a question, but you know, you mentioned. These folks that kind of jumped in and, and you worked so closely with to make this come to reality and that they all, you, you're talking very highly of their work and, and all of that.
And you had asked us a question sort of in the midst of the early part of this where you said, I don't know if we're allowed to talk about other podcasts. I think it, it's. Always good to just uplift everybody, right? there's enough success to go around for everybody. So I think when, I think sometimes when we get afraid to like, Ooh, but if I mention them, then my [00:27:00] listeners might run away and listen to them.
cares? Go please. Like it's not a competition like we all want a seat at the table. So it's, it's great. I love so second thing is do, would you consider doing a Kickstarter for the audiobook?
W.T. Meadows: Absolutely. Absolutely. I would. So the, the 'cause and, and that is, so that's, that's there's, it's funny, there was a, I actually had a, a hidden thing that was for a hidden amount on the, on the graphics of like, here are the stretch goals. And it was just like, and, and that was, that was the, if we get to this amount, then I will, I will do the, the audiobook.
But like, I didn't wanna put that out there as a, because the amount that it would take is absurd. So, so I didn't want it to be like, didn't wanna guilt people into it, but if we hit it. I was certainly gonna unveil it. So the, but yes, absolutely I would. But the thing with, with that is helping explain.
The actual [00:28:00] costs that go into it. So it's hours of, paying an actor or a number of people brought up me potentially reading it. I, so like, I, I did read, I did live streams of the first few chapters during the campaign. And so those are available on my YouTube channel. But the, so a number of people were like, well, why don't you read it?
And I'd certainly be. Into that. I was, I used to be an actor as well. Like I have a degree in theater and so like the, that, that was certainly a thought, but still paying for that. And then absolutely. If, even if I were to do it, 'cause that would cut down the costs. actual engineer has to go through and make sure that it's right, so I have to pay them.
So whether I'm paying a for real, legit actor, voice actor to do this, and I've got a few that I've, that I've actually talked to about that process or whether or not it's me and paying just a studio to do that, that's a lot of money for like a nine hour book.[00:29:00]
Matt: Yeah, for sure.
W.T. Meadows: and so like explaining that in, in a way that people can like get their brain around in a Kickstarter is
Christina: Yeah.
W.T. Meadows: is complicated.
Christina: Yeah. Well, let's talk a little bit more about introduction events. Tell our audience a little bit about what the book is about and then we're gonna dive into some really juicy stuff.
W.T. Meadows: Oh cool. Alright, so, introduction Events is a young adult superhero novel with the hashtag of no spandex. 'cause they don't do that and they don't go blow up cities. But it's really about teenagers, about three teenagers who deal with the traumas of being a teenager in the first three chapters. You learn that the main character is a teenage girl who suffered some massive trauma with her social standing and is.
Was shunned by all of her [00:30:00] popular society as a former cheerleader. And now part of the way that she deals with that is through self-harm. And so that's a thing that is, there's a, a content mourning at the beginning of the book that is discussed. We'll go into more about how I, how I represent that in the book, but that's a trauma that she's dealing with.
In the second chapter, you find out that. One kid who's got all of his stuff together, his whole life is literally mapped out ahead of him. His dad is a state senator. The book takes place in west Texas, very small, fictional West Texas, west Texas town. And his dad is a state senator and he's got lots of power.
And so in the town, he's got anything he could want except for freedom. how his life is going to be going. So his life has been planned out by his father to go and be into politics and he find out, he finds out as he goes that he wants to be a teacher and [00:31:00] like it's not a, his, I guess trauma quote unquote, is not as much of a thing that is, you might not initially think of that as a traumatic.
Event, and it's certainly not as traumatic as the one we're about to get to or leave for that matter. But at the same time, it leaves him feeling trapped and he wants to get away, and he doesn't know how to do that. His dad's not even a bad guy, like he's just, he wants the best for his son, but his son. He doesn't want that. And then you also find out in the a little a shortly after that, that the third of these kids comes from a physically abusive home. His dad's been physically abusive to the point that he drove away his mom and, so the kid's been stuck with his dad for 10 years, and that sucks.
So everything about his life is about trying to escape in a different way. So he, he's in school studying all, all over the place, and he's in football [00:32:00] and these kids as if their lives aren't, complicated enough, let's just give them superpowers. Why not? So the girl wakes up, Leigh wakes up on her ceiling.
Not really knowing how to control her powers. Peyton, the guy whose dad's a center. He, after football practice, he walks into the shower and ends up across the world in a desert with a big, old scary snake looking at him. And a little before that we've discovered that there was at the other football team across town.
Two kids at football practice were, there was a, there was a tackle and one of 'em ended up on fire. So yeah, it's
Matt: Startling.
W.T. Meadows: shenanigans. And so those are the three kids and they're dealing with all their own stuff. And then they have powers and they're like, what do we do with all this?
Christina: A teenager and then adding powers to it. What a
W.T. Meadows: exactly like, you don't need. You don't need [00:33:00] superheroes blowing up cities. You don't need all of the, action fight. Like they're, they're great. I love, I love superhero movies and like that kind. I love it. They're great. But that's not the story I want to tell. I wanna tell the story about kids. I wanna tell the story about these kids dealing with their traumas and the lens by which they have to deal with that is supernatural. So then we the, the, the additional perspective of the fact that there are schools kinda you can take whatever influences from, popular media of the schools where these kids would learn how to do things. But there's two different schools, and that's where I wanted to make things a little bit different because they both have varying very different philosophies as far as how the kids go and how the kids learn and how to get the kids to the schools.
So that's, so those are additional factions complicating this already convoluted narrative. So it sounded like I interrupted you. I apologize. Please go ahead.
Christina: That's okay. That's [00:34:00] okay. I just wanted to talk about something that you had mentioned earlier, and that is that representation really matters to you and representation as a whole, not just with race, but also with L-G-B-T-Q. Talk a little bit about why it matters to you.
W.T. Meadows: So I, I think it's, it's super, super important that we tell these, tell, tell stories that are not just us, because it helps, it helps us get into the mindset of understanding and leading. And because if we are, if we are learning, I. Empathetically about other people's journeys, then we are gonna be as humans more likely to treat them with respect and to treat them better.
So as part of, selfishly, part of my journey with this was I wanted to understand how, so like the My Friend's journey as they came out as as Ace around the time that I was started [00:35:00] starting to write this book. And Lee, the main character is, is Ace. And I didn't. Like I, I, I wasn't like judgemental or think it was bad or anything, but I just didn't understand.
And so I talked to them about it and I talked to other people that I learned were Ace and I was like, okay, cool. Like I wanna learn about you and your journey through this. So that, as I understand it, and my way as a, as an author and a storyteller, is I wanna share that. I wanna share that journey through my own understanding, my own learning, and.
Like I mentioned with the agents and whatnot, there, there are plenty of stories about middle-aged straight white dudes. And that's, I I I'm not as interested in telling those stories 'cause there are plenty of people that'll tell those and that's great. That's, that's fine. That I wanna learn more about how people tick and what makes them work and how their [00:36:00] journeys.
Have happened. And so if I can learn, hopefully I can share those kinds of stories, at least through an archetypal sense that is empathetic and understanding and is I. Emotionally engaging enough. So I mentioned that that Leigh's journey not only is, she ace in a West Texas good old boy town where she clearly is already, well she's already, been ostracized for.
From her she thought of was her community. Then now she has realized that she's ace and part of the LGBT community, and so like, she's not gonna be able to share that with them. Well, conveniently another guy moved into town and again, west Texas, not the most culturally diverse or racially diverse.
And so a black family has moved in and opened up a coffee shop. So she becomes best friends with the kid who's, who's whose mom's running the shop. As it turns out, he's gay. [00:37:00] And so like they can, they can bond over their shared experience there. Like, you know, he's black, she's white, they're not like interested in each other, but they can share in that relationship with, here's how I'm feeling about these things.
And they can love and respect each other and they can grow in how they go. So throughout the course of it, he's aware that she's self-harming and wants to help his friend, but he doesn't know how. And so he struggles with, how do I get my friend out of this destructive behavior when I don't know the words I.
I don't know what's gonna help her or what's gonna spur her into a downward cycle. And so that's a struggle that he has throughout the novel as she battles with it on her own and with him. And so the, these, these things, they're all, they're all connected and they're all, they all tie [00:38:00] together, but you have to have an understanding of the things in order to.
To make them work. And you have to have, you have to know what's going on. Like you have to understand how someone who is ace or how someone who is gay, or how someone who deals with self-harm or someone who would respond to the abandoned being abandoned by their mother to be stuck in a home of.
A physically abusive person while they are trying to hide that about their life. So like all of these things are interconnected and you have to go about it very carefully because you gotta get it right otherwise like I mentioned with Chrishaun offering the feedback, she'll offer the feedback. Through love and empathy, but if I get it wrong and I hurt someone, like their, in their, their inclination is not gonna be like, I understand Mr.
Straight, [00:39:00] white, middle-aged person that you didn't mean to hurt me in this way. And that, like, I don't, I don't ever want to be someone who does that.
Matt: Yep.
W.T. Meadows: I need to know on the front end, so I need to talk to people. I need to request that feedback. I need to go out and hear from people who are not me to get those things right.
Matt: Yeah. I love that. It kind of, it, it reminds me of the, the phrase, and I've heard it from a friend of mine, I don't know who originally said it, but that, we judge ourselves by our intentions and we judge others by their behaviors, right? So. The audience who doesn't know you from Adam reads this, and maybe you did get it wrong.
And they think, oh, he's just trying to, he's just trying to like, make fun or stereotype or whatever. And that wasn't your intention at all. Right. So, yeah, I get that. I get that a lot. That's, that's it. glad
W.T. Meadows: concept of like authorial intent versus like reception into a, you know. There's, there's, there's a whole matter of like, it doesn't [00:40:00] matter what I, what I intend, especially if I've hurt someone. So, I, I've gotta do everything. I've gotta do my work on the front end to ensure that I'm not putting additional work onto and more of my work onto someone else to do,
Matt: yeah, for sure. That's awesome.
Christina: So, I think you spoke a little bit earlier that introduction events is gonna be the first. A series. you know how many are gonna go? When's the next one coming out? Tell us what's on deck.
W.T. Meadows: Yeah, sure. So the, the, the, the, this is, I don't know if I've, I don't know where I've officially announced it being. Yeah, it, it is, it's intended as a trilogy at this point. And the funny thing is if you look at the logo and then if you look at the logos for the other books, which, because, because Danny got excited about it, she went ahead and designed logos for the other two books.
There's, there are elements [00:41:00] for those other books in this cover. I'm not gonna say what are. But they are, when, when people read, eventually read the next two books, they will see elements, visual elements that are already in this cover. But so the though, and they're, they're, they're coming, I've got tent poles for, for the, the books two and three of the series, but the. As, as I've been saying, I also, I got about 20,000 words. This book is a hundred thousand words about 400 pages. So I've written about 20 ish thousand words of the, of book. Two ha. I hit a pretty hard research wall when I realized, oh, this one character, I need them, I need to know how they're gonna react to things, and it's a thing that I need to do a whole bunch more research on.
So. And because I need to get it right. So I'm, I'm in heavy research mode as far as that goes. So like, when's it gonna be available? No idea. [00:42:00] But at the same time there is work being done on it, but I'm also, I've also got a few other kind of irons in the fire. That's actually one of the thing that's some starting off a Patreon, it's.
There's not a lot going on over there yet, but the goal of that, not intended as a plug, but like this is the, the thought process behind is because I've got four or five different novels that I've got at, I'm on, I'm in varying degrees of process with here are the themes for those novels. without spoiling any of the things, which of these do you think that, that we should work on this month?
And so that month we vote in Patreon about like, okay, here's what, here's, here are the ones where are you all feeling great? I'll put the most work in that. If, if I get inspired, I'm absolutely gonna bounce over and work on that other book. But there, there, there's the I've got the, the novel vet's, the. Hitman driving across Texas late at [00:43:00] night, like Hitman Road trip while bleeding out. Like that's, that's an novel that I'm working on that I'm really excited to work on by the way. But so there's that, there's the shaman the well, I guess I'll just announce it. The Chrishaun and I've talked about doing a second Shaman State series.
We've tent polled. There's, a book that I've lovingly referred to as Pokemon Go by way of Stranger Things is Upside Down. And that's, I've written two drafts of that, so like that one's pretty far along. So that might be the next one. Then really, it just kind of depends on like what is getting the most traction with people and what my brain is leaning into, and B, what I am caught up on for research, because all of these projects are gonna require me to know people.
I'm, maybe, it's, maybe it's laziness, but I don't really want to go do all the research into the, like the military systems to write a whatever book about the whatever and the like. That's not [00:44:00] a thing I wanna research. I wanna research how people interact. I wanna research how someone's maternal grandparents immigrating.
And having a specific religion and how that goes down through the family. I want to know how, someone I want to know someone's journey as they experience a transition, like a trans person goes and goes through transition, and what does that look like from the, the, female, male, non-binary in all of that journey and all of that spectrum and represent that effectively.
And that doesn't even take the sexuality into question. 'cause like the sexuality spectrum and then the gender spectrum are also important things to understand and to. Relate effectively and thematically. And so all of those things you have to understand before you put pen to paper and,
Matt: Absolutely. [00:45:00] Well, I like, I like that you talked about representation. We've talked about that a little bit in, in this episode, but I also, we mentioned heart stopper and we kind of talked about, the the colors, subtle colors and things they used in heart stopper. Right. And, and you mentioned that Danny had already kind of weaved some of those. Pieces from books one, two, and three kind of into the cover and were there other, without giving them away, but were there other little breadcrumbs or things that you kind of planted in this novel that sort of, you know, hint or foreshadow at those things?
W.T. Meadows: Absolutely. Yeah. So that, that's a great question. Thank you. So the, the, one of the major things that is an indication is the, the cover has itself, is hues of purples, grays, whites, and blacks. And so that is the, the, the kind of initials subtle framing of, of Leigh as Ace and then those kinds of colorations. Play in and are represented in the, in the novel as it goes. But yeah, so. [00:46:00] Color repre like colors in novels. The, the, the hues that are represented in the logos for books two and three are also very important to the characters as they are represented. Like ho-ho big spoiler for things that I'm not gonna talk about.
Sorry. But yeah, the, the, the cover is gonna be the, the, the, the easiest example. I also had a series of bookmarks printed with the kind of longer version of the logo, which is. Black, white and purple, which are, which are often represented as part of the ace flag. So those things are. If you're, if you know what to look for or if you're within the community.
'cause really the goal with that was not to kind of make it, shout it from the rooftops, per se, of any particular thing, but really to add kind of that, that wink and a nod, the people who already are aware of the community. Or who are already in that, in the mindset to be like, cool. That is clearly for [00:47:00] me.
The other thing that like is a nod to that in the very beginning is like in like the second or third paragraph, Lee's talking about. Like a, a, like a, a Dragon Ball Z poster. So like, oh, okay, so we're getting an anime influence in there and like those things. So really like the anime nerds, myself included, were, were like, those things are intended as the early homages to hopefully get the buy-in for those people to say, yes, I understand.
I'm not saying this. These things. As an outsider, I am saying these things as someone who hopefully understands where you are. And so come trust me and join me on this journey.
Matt: Okay. Nice. Well, Christina, any any final questions as we sort of wrap our episode?
Christina: I think he answered everything with the exception of, where do we find you? [00:48:00] people find the book?
W.T. Meadows: So you, you can find the digital copies of any of my novels in really actually all of the digital marketplaces. You can just look for W.T. Meadows. Introduction events is, of course the one that I'm gonna encourage most people to, to, to dive really straight in. But yeah, you, you can get that, you can get that digitally available.
Search W.T. Meadows and Amazon, books Barnes and Noble, wherever you can, I'm hoping to soon be making the paperbacks of introduction events available. I'm currently process of fulfilling all of those Kickstarter rewards and I did not wanna make.
A physical copy available on like Amazon or like a local Austin bookstore if I hadn't already given to the people who.
Made the project happen. So, but since I, we literally sent out the last of the shipments this morning. The, i, I can start, the ball rolling of hopefully getting those available on like Amazon and whatnot. But [00:49:00] also a few. So if you live in Austin I'm in like. Ask, ask at your local bookstore, the half price books or book people, and that kind of thing, because I'm talking to them in a couple local comic shops because I've, even though it's a traditional novel for, instead of a comic book, it, I, it's, it's intended to kind of resonate with the, the people who would be.
Going to a comic shop. So like
a couple of the local comic shops, I've already had conversations that they seem amenable to be carrying it, so that'll be pretty rad. But yeah, on on any of the social media stuff, it's @wtmeadowsauthor so
Matt: W.T. Meadows Author.
Okay.
W.T. Meadows: and Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, all that, whatever.
Matt: That's awesome. You can also check out our show notes and check out the social media that we'll push out as well. You'll have all that information there too, so if you miss it here, you're driving. You can't write it down. It's okay. We got you. Don't worry about it. We got you. Just be safe. Well, cool.
Well, W.T. Thank you so much for joining us. I think we, we've learned a lot about your journey. [00:50:00] We've learned about a lot about what it takes, to really. Go through that process and, and I think even more so around Kickstarter that, frankly, we, we just weren't familiar with, but we knew, we knew it's a thing, but we didn't know, what it's like to go through that.
So thank you for sharing that with us. We very much appreciate that. And Christina, thank you as always for being here and being my guiding light,
Christina: oh, nowhere else. I'd rather be
Matt: Awesome. Well, and that will, that'll do it for us for this episode. So thanks for stopping by. Bye everybody.
Christina: Bye.
W.T. Meadows: Bye.