Two years deep

Thanks, Devin. If comment count is any indication, you are my biggest fan.

It might interest you to know that the first character ever created in Lothere was Maud -- N004_User00000!

Thanks, Jade, and especially since I clicked through to your site and found it was back up. I will be stopping by when I have time.

& Tiana, too... I owe you thanks, actually, for a lot of laughter. Calling your Mom in distress over what was happening in my story... (What an indulgent mom you have, really.) As I was writing I began to wonder "Oh Noes!! What will Tiana's mom say about this??"

Devin, I was just talking about that on Verity's story... at first I put everyone and everything in the main neighborhood, but lately I have been creating tons of Downtowns (once I figured out you can have more than one) and putting different areas into those. Not just Scotland and Ireland, but also moving Bernwald and Raegiming and everything out into separate downtowns. I will eventually move Nothelm probably, too, since I am engaging in a reconstruction of all of my older, unrealistic castles. We've already seen a bit of that in Sigefrith's castle.

Heh, I wish I knew, Taryn. Myself, I tossed the first stone around nine months after I started writing (until then I had no readers) by posting to the Royal Kingdom Challenge Yahoo group. Yicke started reading right away, and a few other people from there.

I think what happened was that she and (over time) a few other people posted on their own blogs "Sorry I haven't posted in so long... I'm too busy reading Lothere!" And so I acquired my first readers that way.

Someone (again Yicke, I believe) mentioned my site in the LegacyLand forum and I got a few more, so I was invited to join there and did post a little info on my blog.

So I guess I have the "If you build it, they will come" luck. With the exception of those two times (and the latter was as much out of politeness to thank these mysterious readers who were talking about my story in a forum I didn't even belong to ) I have never done much to advertise. I post comments in the few blogs that I have time to read (including my blog URL), and I have posted comments a few times at mts2 with my link in my signature. The rest is word of mouth.

That is all I can really handle... I am the last person who would go out there and say "Hey! Look at me!" One reason why I will never be a full-time writer, since self-promotion is so important in modern publishing.

One thought I had about your site, in particular, is that I had a hard time finding my way around. What software do you use to run it? For me (despite being a developer of software for the Web ) I get scared and want a hand to hold when I get out of the confines of a user interface I know, and your site doesn't follow the blog paradigm I am used to, with new posts sorted to the top, comments per-post, RSS feeds, etc. (Or if it does, I in my cluelessness was unable to find them.) In fact, looking just now, you have two new chapters up which I would have read already if I had your site in my RSS reader.

Blog software is not exactly well-suited to story-telling, but it's what I've grown used to, and probably a lot of other people as well. This is probably not the advice you were asking for, but I would suggest that if you want to get the casual readers hooked in the first place, you need to make the barrier of entry extremely low. Make it easy to stumble into your story, make it easy to keep reading, and especially make it easy to for a user to remind herself to come back.

And especially, if you have the possibility to have RSS feeds, do enable them! My server stats tell me a great many of my readers come to my site through Google Reader or Bloglines or that sort of site, and I know that impulsive me likes to click on a bright shiny Sims story link as soon as a new post appears in my feed reader. Nothing like spontaneous opportunities for procrastination!

I hope I said all this with grace, and I hope it at least answered your question even if it didn't help... I now have 10 minutes to get ready for work so no time to reread.

Ah, you can tell your hubby that I was suspicious that your site was custom-made... I was looking at the source code this morning in search of clues about what software generated, and I was thinking "This code is way too clean to be generated by Wordpress et al." Proper indentation and everything. *thumbs up*

I don't know what you're using in terms of a database to store your entries, or if they're just HTML files included in, but if he could rig up an RSS feed, that would already go a long way to addressing usability from my standpoint... just give me an XML-encoded shout when your site is updated with a direct link to the new chapter and I will be there. Otherwise I have to remember to check back, which is asking a lot of my poor head.

I often say my story is a medieval soap opera so I can see the appeal to you. I try not to take it seriously, so I let loose with the lies and the cheating and the intrigue. And lately the mythical and supernatural beings as well. Everything that sounds fun to me gets thrown in. If people are reading I must be doing something right.

Ha, I was wondering which reader was Taryn's friend. You're almost up to the present, so your housework will be back in the schedule again. Sadly mine will still be neglected as ever.

Try putting just this in your site URL: http://soniasstorycorner.blogspot.com/ That should work.

I must have figured that out myself at one point because I remember looking at your blog before. I was thinking Cool, a priest character! I seem to have a liking for those.

Thanks, I was quite curious actually. Poor Cameron, his life is like nightmare upon nightmare upon nightmare. I was really struck by some of the descriptions -- I think I have stopped doing those so much because I have the pictures. Especially the breath puffing out in plumes, I loved that line. Are you planning on writing more? I will check back to see what happens.

Funny I should read this the day before Thanksgiving, 3 years later. I am in agreement with so many others, this is a great story. I just caught up with the story this week. For many months now I’ve been saying that I would make a request of you if no one else had by the time I’m caught up, so here it goes. Would you mind setting something up so we could donate $? By now I would have bought your first novel and all the sequels, and I certainly wouldn’t have been able to wait for the paperback to come out. I truly would like to throw a novel worth of $ at you now and then. Besides, if enough of us do you can quit working a regular job and we all get more chapters.… I too struggle with housework. On top of working, parenting, writing, I have been struck with fatigue. I’ve always struggled with housework. I could give giant amounts of advice on it, but here is my short list, considering that much of you are neglecting it for reasons of writing and reading, which does make things different. (Sometimes you have to take the muse when it comes!) If you can afford it, hire a housekeeper that does more than “just clean”. Here in Washington state I go through Dana’s Housekeeping, which works off a priority list I create. They will even do things like dishes and laundry. Let’s face it, that’s a much bigger deal than a smudged mirror. It costs me $95 for 4 hours. That is how I’m managing my holidays! Set a timer for 15 minutes. Pick a housework task, work on it until the timer goes off without checking your timer. Work as fast as you can. This keeps you focused. The time is short to prevent burnout. Then set it for 15 minutes for a break – read, write, whatever. If you have a “good” day, do 3 15s of work (switch tasks when the timer goes off) then 1 of break. On a “bad” day, go back and forth between work and break. On a “really bad day”, whenever you stop your break, set your timer for 15 minutes and do a little housework. (Like you just can’t stop writing, but nature calls…) On a severely bad day, do your housework while your computer is loading (no matter how short or long) when you are on phone calls, and on commercial breaks. Depending on what is going on with you, this can either make things easier for you, or be survival! What housework to do? This is my emergency list: laundery, dishes, trash, whatever is seen first when walking in the door…and meals may make it to the front of that list if I don’t have something frozen I can pop in the oven or $ to order out.

Already three years later!

I find I can’t reread this post. I do vaguely remember what I wrote, but I don’t want to get back into my state of mind of that time. I wonder if this is why I have become so allergic to the earliest chapters of this story… maybe it’s more than despair about my shoddy writing skills. Maybe some of my feelings from that time still cling to those chapters, and I don’t want to revisit them.

I am flattered that you would consider offering me real money as a token of appreciation for this story. Believe me, I understand the impulse, and I don’t want to airily dismiss the notion, because I think it does you honor. I don’t believe that it debases an artist (writer, musician, or whatever she may be) to accept payment for her work. And I certainly don’t think the invention of Internet has changed anything in that regard.

I don’t ask for donations on this site because, at the present time, it only costs me $25 per month for the server, and if it ever got so popular that it was costing more than I could afford, there would probably be a book contract out there for me, so the problem would solve itself.

Aside from server costs, it only costs my time, which is either free or very expensive, depending on how you look at it. I make a good salary at my day job. I would have to get a big, ongoing stream of donations to make it worth my while to literally work less hours at my job so that I could spend more hours writing. (Again, there would be a book contract for sure if I had that many fans willing to give me moneys.)

So I am at a point where any money I would conceivably get in donations would not make a measurable difference in my lifestyle or working habits. Which makes it, in one sense, worthless.

All I really want at this stage in my career is comments and criticism. I get enough money at my day job, but I don’t get enough people telling me how great my work is, or alternatively telling me what’s wrong with my work and how I might do better.

Basically all I want is attention! Seeing my Web server stats tell me the number of silent readers is going up makes me happy. Getting a comment—even a simply “Loved this chapter” or “Beautiful pictures!” comment—makes me really happy. And when someone writes a long screed about my characters and their motivations, or tells me they laughed out loud at work or cried real tears, or turned in their term paper late because they couldn’t stop reading, or that they dreamt about my story when they slept, that just blows me away. Money can’t buy that feeling. (I wonder if I said something like that above.)

I like your 15 minute idea for housework. I should try that, because I actually do that sort of thing with writing when I find it hard to sit down and write. I tell myself, “Just try to write for half an hour, and if it isn’t working, then you can stop.” And usually by the time the half hour is up, I am busily writing away and just keep on going. The trick to getting started is telling myself the punishment won’t last more than half an hour.  

I’m glad Chicklet made a comment here as I have never seen this post until today. Reading it has been a gift … as I now realize the background to some of the comments made while we have been in chat. Life has seemed so difficult for sometime now, but reading this has been a revelation that it will get better. Those little remarks all make sense now. Thank You. For the chats, the escape via the story, the pictures and especially this post, even 3 years later. I wish I could give you a big ole bear hug .… so consider it done.

Thank you wawa.  

Wow I can’t believe its been four years already! Thank you Jenny for writing this amazing story. I hope one day I can walk into my Barnes & Nobles and find a copy of The Wodehead Family saga. 

Congrats on all these years, Lothere! Thanks for sharing this amazing story with all of us  

I know we’ll all be seeing your name on the cover of a printed novel one of these days (although personally, I do think that KoL itself needs a potentially infinite medium—something as finite as a printed book or even a series of printed books just wouldn’t do this story justice).

I’m glad things have picked up for you in the few years since this post and I hope you know that you are a rare artist in this superficial world of ours:

“It’s like food, little Sim. Our people are starving.”

Poetry isn’t the only artform Imin’s bit of wisdom applies to these days. Keep on writing, Jenny  

Your writing has improved through the life of your story. However I see this in part as getting to know your characters. I still love some of the very early storylines. Like Alred enjoying getting a certain young lady to blush as she put ointment on him.…and not realizing there was anything wrong with it. That also gave me hope that he’d eventually find happiness again when he was devestated by Matilda’s death. I guess I’m trying to say, the early chapters are not bad writing. They are a lighter easy read type of writing, but that isn’t bad. I like the story from begining to current. At first it was simply the most interesting sim story I’d found that wasn’t blocked on the computer I was on. I also liked that it was RKC. And now? I keep telling people that it’s my favorite story. People tend to be impressed by that because I’m known for reading a lot. They are also amazed that I’ve been reading it for a year, that it’s longer than War and Peace, and that I’m still eager for more! I often wish you had this story in book form. I’d love to be able to read it during my lunch breaks at work and during sims load screens at home. I read during a comment a long time ago how you have great doubts you could publish this in book form since it’s been on the internet. Also something about the pictures. I too think that the pictures help to make the story. I think a publisher might only be interested if you had a large number of people who said they would buy it even if they already read it on the net. If you ever get that far, I think you could get quite a list going. As for the pictures…graphic novel? It would be the only graphic novel I’d be willing to read. At last a graphic novel that’s a real story, not a comic book posing as a book for grown ups!

@Chicklet.

You could play your game in “window mode”. If you right-​click on the game shortcut on your desktop, a box will open. Click on Properties. The tab that says “Shortcut” should be open, if not click on that tab. In the area that says “Target” will be the location of the game expansion you use to open the game. At the end of that sentence, type a space then “-w” (without the “‘s). This will open your game in a window allowing you access to your taskbar and you can toggle between your internet browser and the game. So, now you can continue reading the story while your game is loading. (I hope that’ll make sense). That’s how I read the story while waiting for my game to load with all the CC I have. It does take a little getting use to playing the game in window mode though. Make sure you have a good camera mode too.