The Hot Mic - Mur Lafferty's Weekly Newsletter - Issue #2

Welcome to The Hot Mic, Issue 2! I appreciate all the folks who have signed up so far, and if you like it, please feel free to forward this on to people you think might be interested. I have good writing advice, bad writing advice, and information about my upcoming books, appearances, and schedule!

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This week had only new Ditch Diggers landing, with lots of ISBW content coming over this weekend! Catch them as they come out at murverse.com (or your favorite podcatcher) or subscribe to this list!

Twitch Schedule for week of July 12-24

I have been struggling for years to name my current book. I’m bad with titles and Ace wasn’t excited about anything I did come up with. But now I have a solid draft turned in, my editor has met with marketing, and a decision has been made! I can announce! UNTITLED SPACE MURDER BOOK will become

I’m very happy about this! Even better, my editor showed me the direction they were thinking of going with the cover design, and it’s amazing! I’m keeping that part a secret, because I have to keep you coming back, right?

Hey all you baby writers out there! And I could be referring to any of you; cause if you feel like a newbie, you probably are. If someone is a pro, they know it. You don’t know it, do you? Yeah, thought not.

This week’s advice is: you need to chronicle every mistake you make. Keep a journal of every rejection you get, every comment from an editor that guts you. Write it all down, carefully. Learn bullet journaling for the SOLE PURPOSE to write down your failures.

Because that’s what they are. Failures. And you’d better not forget it. Because the editors surely will not forget it. You’ll be on their wall as “forever blacklisted” because you’re terrible.

Facing the dark abyss of just how horrible we are is the only way to succeed in this business.

Might as well quit now. Why Bother, right?

Want a peek at the archives? Here’s an older episode, Season 5, Episode 18. It’s the Four Year anniversary of ISBW, and Neil Gaiman joins us!

I’ve been podcasting since 2004, with my second show, ISBW, starting in 2007. I have many, many episodes of this show. One of my supporter* perks has been access to the archives, but let’s face it; I haven’t kept good or consistent identifiers in the ID3 tags, album art, and more. The archives are a mess.

Well. They were a mess.

I took many, many hours this past weekend and cleaned up the archives, renumbered all of the episodes to follow Apple’s preferred season formatting, and made all of the album art consistent. This was a HUGE undertaking, but I am mostly done. Podcasts from Season 1 to Season 15 are cleaned up and uploaded for your perusal!

(Please note, I have NOT edited the sound files themselves, so they will still have the old Farpoint Media tag, the old numbering system, etc.)

I’m very proud of this, and also ashamed that I have kept such inconsistent files over the years. At least 2021, Season 17, is solid. But I am almost at episode 50 here, and it will be the longest season ever. (Before last year I could get barely one episode a week uploaded, and since livestreaming I’ve been consistently doing two a week.)

The Ditch Diggers Archive is also coming along, if slowly. Much fewer episodes there, though!

How can you get the archives? Support on Patreon, Ko-fi, or Jemi!

You can support me on Patreon, Jemi, or just buy me a Ko-fi. That helps support my many creative projects, keeps the lights on, and keeps Matt’s rum allowance comfortably full.

(I don’t supply Matt’s booze, but I did paypal his wife some money once and told her to buy him a bottle of rum, because buying liquor in some states is impossible or at least a PITA. Still, your support helps me in so many ways.)

If you can’t support via financial ways, totally understand, it’s been a painful few years. You can still help by telling a friend about my work, or leaving a review of the podcasts or books.

Just want to catch the podcasts? Here’s how to do it: for I Should Be Writing, you can subscribe on iTune or take this RSS feed and plug it into your preferred player. For Ditch Diggers, use these links: iTunes, RSS, and Spreaker.

Or just search I Should Be Writing, Ditch Diggers, or Mur Lafferty on any podcast site.

Podcast credits: ISBW production by Summer Brooks, ISBW theme song byJohn Anealio, DD theme song by Devo Spice, art by Numbers Ninja, site design by Clockpunk Studio and hosted by Libsyn.

This newsletter is BY-NC-ND 3.5 Creative Commons licensed.

See you next week!