Publishing 📚, TV 📺, and Podcast🎙 Updates
Hidee-ho boys and girls,
Seems like it’s been “5eva” since I’ve written you. 😉 I’m hoping to do a lot better at staying in touch. (That’s ADHD speak for, “Your guess is as good as mine as to when I’ll write again. 😂)
But here are a few updates on what’s happening on the DnD front.
The Book
A lot is going on with the book. First and foremost, a couple of weeks ago I officially signed the publishing contract! (Woot!) I had a meeting with my editor last Friday and based on the editing, art, development, publishing, and marketing timelines, the book won’t hit Amazon and other book stores until next year this month. Since wacky Trump supporters and racism are core themes of the book, I can only hope those two things will still be in existence next year at this time. 🤣🤣
The other thing I have to do is cut down on the book’s length. It’s currently 79K words. My editor says we should work on getting down to 55K to 65K. That’s a lot of “K” to cut. Below are the chapters I’m thinking of cutting. I chose ones that were mostly about my past and history. Since I’m not famous I figured those would be the less interesting to readers. Here are the chapters I’m thinking of cutting:
Chapter 3: Wypipo Trigger Warning ~ 1,431
Chapter 5: Stupid Shit Trump Supporters Say ~ 1,436
Chapter 6: All I need are dreadlocks and a sward ~ 1,346
Chapter 15: Me and Mr. T ~ 2,020
Chapter 18: My George Costanza Moment ~ 1,120
Chapter 19: Newsflash--America Was/Is Still Racist ~ 1,274
Chapter 29: Nerdy Negro People Pleaser ~ 1,352
Total pages aved: 9,979 + ToC = 10,000 +/-
All of these chapters are available to read on the Medium version of the book. Let me know what you think. Are these good? Would you miss them?
The Animated Series
In addition to that, my creative partners and I have been pitching the animated TV series to a number of producers and production companies. Some of the pitches have been for practice and feedback. Some have been to have the show picked up. We’ve pitched to writers and producers of HBO’s Insecure, to Funny or Die, Lena Waithe’s production company, Will Packer, and a few more writers/producers.
The overwhelming response has been great. Everyone has cracked up and has said they love the story and characters. Of all who’ve heard it, Funny or Die seemed the closest to actually biting. But they just don’t have the bandwidth.
I think if I were a known entity with TV showrunning experience, we would have been picked up by now. So, for now, we’ll keep cranking away. Our current plan is to make a simple animated spec short to give potential buyers a better idea of how the show would look and feel. If you know of any animators, or voice actors who can do celebrity impressions, hook me up!
The Podcast
I have a bunch of interviews already recorded. I also have interviews with some TV writer/producers, friends from my high school alma mater, and of course, plenty of “tape” of conversations with my creative partners and BFFs, JD and Yolanda. We have discussions about the show, preparation and recaps of our pitch meetings, book discussions, and discussions about movies and TV shows. All of it is great fodder for the DnD podcast. I just need to figure out how to make it all flow. I don’t just want to throw a bunch of random episodes on the feed.
Whenever I decide to publish the podcast, I promise it’ll be enjoyable and enlightening. I’m also toying around with sharing with you all links to some of the full videos of our pitch discussions. We’ll see. 😀
That’s it for now. If you have any questions about any of this stuff, or just want to say hi, I’m all “ears.”
✌🏿&❤️
~ Ron