Kickstarter scheduled (?)

Clearly I have a commitment problem

“I’ll have more time in … um, when will I have more time, exactly?”

Life as the founder of Realm Makers, director of the annual writers conference, and awards director has filled my calendar to the deepest crannies this past year. So much of those roles yield blessings each day, so those tend to outweigh the challenges of finding time for other pursuits—but the fact remains that I founded Realm Makers because I’m also an author. Feeding that creative part of my soul gets back-burnered all too often.

I started my journey with contracts at small presses, learned some things, and am now publishing independently. It’s pretty amazing to live at a time when all it takes is elbow grease to get a book into the hands of readers.

Well, elbow grease and money.

I know there are ways to shave costs down for books, but I just haven’t been able to stomach premade cover art or virtual editing tools. That’s a post for another day.

But to finally finish The Rending Cauldron and release it to the world, a Kickstarter has always been in the back of my mind as the solution for funding and awareness. The great question of “When?” has been a major hurdle. After the first of the year? The Realm Awards are in full swing and require a LOT of hours at my desk. And then Conference registration opens with all its related labor. April slows down a little, but this past year, I had a high school senior preparing for a capstone trip to Italy and Greece, not to mention a host of other senior year parenting tasks on the calendar.

May 2025 served up graduation plus wrapping up the Realm Awards judging while traveling to homeschool conventions with the bookstore, and June-July was conference and expo go time, with so much work to be done. No suntan for me this year unless I make a serious attempt in August.

Before the Realm Makes cycle fully restarts, September is my one, small window to attend to all things Kickstarter. But since I’ve been pushing it off for the better part of a year, at least I’ve been slowly building up the necessary images and copy for the campaign.

You, my faithful substackers, get to be the first to know I’ll be launching the crowdfunding campaign around the third week of September. Ebooks, paperbacks, maybe hardcovers, fancy book inclusions, and character art are all in the works. If the campaign outperforms my wildest imaginings, an audiobook might also become part of the rewards.

I’ve only run two Kickstarters previously, and while they both funded successfully, I remember that anxious feeling of foreboding rejection. What if “my people” aren’t that interested? What if they can’t support during the time I’m running the campaign? Being rejection sensitive, I can’t help but always see the disinterest or outright scorn of others lurking somewhere ahead.

Running the Kickstarter will be one part funding attempt to three parts test of confidence. Marketing is not my natural mindset, but plenty of authors who feel the same about selling have come out on the other side of crowdfunding efforts with the support in hand to bring dreams to life. I have to remind myself I can certainly be one of them.

I’ll try not to bombard this space with tons of Kickstarter chatter after this, but I do hope when the time comes, you’ll check out the campaign for The Rending Cauldron. If it’s not for you, I’ll be grateful if you share with others who might be into a chunky book that fights its way through pain and despair in search of unlikely escapes into the light.