Dear Ellamir Diary,
It is, I assume, a fundamental truth that authors write because they want their stories to be read. Whatever our other motivations for starting a story are, a great deal of effort in the development process goes into attracting and engaging readers: we carefully self-edit our drafts, we pass them onto professional editors for development, correction and sensitivity checking, and I imagine most of us also seek the opinion of our families, our friends and other contemporaries too. Of the many questions we might hope to have answered, one of the most important for me is "Did you want to keep reading?"
It's with some apprehension that I get closer to (hopefully) gaining some insight on this fundamental issue, as volume one of Ellamir is scheduled to be shared with alpha readers this month. It will be the first time I've shared any of the manuscript as it is intended to be read, as opposed to the little snippets I post on Bluesky or the sketches I've asked my friends to look over. But I'm also excited - for me, part of the joy of self-publishing is planning the development process, and it's been fun to work out how I can encourage feedback in innovative ways. Pretty soon I'll find out if it's worked or not!
One Third Only
One innovation (though I'm sure I'm not the first) is that I'm releasing the first volume of Ellamir - about a third of the book - to alpha readers before I've even written the words "Volume Two" anywhere in the manuscript. The reasons for this are manifold: firstly, I want to make sure I'm not wasting my time! Do people like the premise? Regency romance meets high fantasy is perhaps something of a niche genre, so although the comments I've had on social media and from those friends who have read the first few pages have all been extremely positive, getting other authors to try it out will, I hope, be the real acid test of the idea.
Asking these contemporaries to read the first six chapters and then providing feedback will inform whether I make any major changes before moving forward. I want to know whether the style was engaging or a bit rocky (as I've deliberately made the text a little difficult to follow for modern readers, just as my principal inspiration, the work of Jane Austen, often is) and, most importantly, did they want to read on once they reached the end of volume one. How did they respond to the characters? Were there any major misunderstandings, and could this be a good thing for evolving suspense or misdirection? Are there elements that were particularly unpopular? Getting alpha comments at this stage could, I think, be really valuable in honing the story before it's too established.
How will my alpha readers respond to my characters?Group Therapy
I'm also experimenting with giving the alpha readers a space to discuss their thoughts and comments together in a closed discussion forum with me, on my Discord server. I've always liked Discord (recent controversies notwithstanding) as a collaboration platform, and this is one area in which I think it can really shine. I know other authors are also interested in finding out how useful a Discord community could be to their development process, so I'm really looking forward to finding out just what its potential is. We've already seen the power of social media in helping authors - I believe, certainly in my case, it's been more helpful with development than it's likely to be for marketing - and I'm hoping that combining social channels with a spontaneous and encouraging collaboration tool will prove extremely fruitful.
What Do You Think?
What do you think about the topics I've touched in today? If you're a writer, perhaps you're looking for new ways to hone your story's development? Or would you find my approach less than helpful. If you're a reader, how do you feel about reading stories in very early stages? Would you relish being part of the creative process early on, or would you rather wait and read the final, polished product?
I would love to hear your opinions! Visit my Connect pages to discover the ways you can reach out to me, including details of the Discord server and my Bluesky account. You can also find information about ARC reading Ellamir later this year, and signing up for my newsletter to get regular updates.
