Hi, this is Danielle Ackley-McPhail of eSpec Books, the publisher of the Systema Paradoxa cryptid novellas. I have worked in publishing for a really long time, but am relatively new as a publisher. eSpec has just wrapped up its seventh year as a company. So hard to believe. We love creating books, writing them, designing them, exploring unique ideas and seeing what we can do with them. If you have seen the Systema Paradoxa books, you know we have a lot of fun with this. We would have to to stick with it for seven years. In publishing, you make books... not money.
Publishing is a passion for us, and we didn’t break down and become publishers easily. We were quite happy for years doing the work for other publishers... until those publishers became unreliable. Fortunately, at the same time that started happening way too often, we discovered crowdfunding and settled on a business model that we could commit to. See, until the Systema Paradoxa series, every new book we published had been funded through Kickstarter. We have run nineteen successful campaigns just for our own titles (funding 38 books), as well as successfully managing a handful of campaigns for
outside projects.
Why crowdfunding? No messing with credit, no depleting personal resources you don’t have enough of to begin with. You connect with the very target audience for your product. Either a project finds support and
a following, or it doesn’t get done. Systema Paradoxa is a special case. Thanks to our collaboration with Cryptid Crate, we don’t have to go through the stress and effort of running a campaign, particularly in these trying times when the signal for something as non-essential as a publishing project is drowned out
by so many other RL concerns.
Unfortunately, we have other projects in the works that don’t benefit from such a collaboration, and our business model works for us, so it holds even in this less-than-optimal climate. For example, our current project. DAIRE’S DEVILS: Give the Enemy Hell has funded, but there are so many goals we hope to unlock that it isn’t looking too good for at the moment. Nothing wrong with the project, there just isn’t a lot of activity out there. Cryptid Crate has been nice enough to hand us the mic for a moment in the hopes of getting the word out.
To give you an idea what the book is a about:
Give ’em Hell!
At the ass-end of the galaxy, Allied Forces—including the 142nd Mobile Special Ops Team, better known as Daire’s Devils—stand ready to defend the contested colony planet Demeter from military invasion and corporate exploitation.
But when the Allied Forces are infiltrated by those determined to secure the secret designs of AeroCom’s new prototype flagship, the Galloway, the newest member of the Devils, Corporal Katrion Alexander, finds herself facing off against an unexpected menace, synthetic operatives indistinguishable from living beings.
She and the Devils must neutralize this new threat, but how when the enemy wears a trusted face?
Does that sound of interest to you? I know... that sells the book, but it doesn’t really tell you what it’s like, does it? Well, this one happens to be my novel, and this is how I describe it: an action-packed, character-driven military science fiction, with enough humor to take off the edge, and just a hint of
romance to keep it real.
I like to think it has something for everyone. The campaign we are running does as well. Military science fiction not your thing? Well, I write just about everything under the sun and all of my books, plus the entire eSpec library are all available through the campaign.
We also have a number of bonuses still to achieve, and stretch goal rewards that score backers free fiction, not all of it military or science fiction. Also among the stretch goals are production targets. In fact, right now we are just $125 away from our next stretch goal, a custom embroidered squad patch based on the novel:
Other production targets are two science fiction collections by Systema Paradoxa author James Chambers, a very limited-edition hardcover edition of Daire’s Devils, and production of the Alliance Archives Martial Roleplaying Manual (the universe upon which Daire’s Devils is bases.)
If any of that sounds good to you, would you consider checking out the project? And heck, if it doesn’t could you maybe share it with someone it may sound good to?
DAIRE’S DEVILS: Give the Enemy Hell - http://kck.st/3AWD0rP
eSpec Books - https://www.especbooks.com/
eSpec Store – https://especbooks.square.site