I wrote up my year in review, and thought “Huh I didn’t address the future” so here we are, a post about that.

Honestly, I’m not feeling super optimistic about 2026. I mean after 2025 how could anyone be optimistic? Our President undid so much in his second first year with complete impunity, why would he stop or slow down?

Maybe the mid-terms will help? But Who knows. It’s not like Democrats are worth much unless you’re a big corporation. This also assumes we have mid-terms, that the results are honored. Something I’d have laughed off even during Trump’s first term, but now…

Politics aside (As if that’s possible), as of right now Denver has had 2 snows. Neither of which amounted to much or stuck around beyond a day or two. In-between we set/broke heat records. The mountains aren’t doing much better which doesn’t bode well for ski season, and bodes worse for next spring/summer water levels. 2026 isn’t going to be good for weather/climate.

Add to that capitalism capitalism’ing. A few years ago we moved to a Heat Pump from our gas furnace/swamp cooler. We’ve just installed a Heat Pump Hot Water Heater. Like so many Americans, moving from gas to electric. Wouldn’t you know it, our local electric monopoly is raising rates. They’ve shifted time of use to be useless unless you do your laundry and wash dishes at midnight, and now that more and more people are using more electricity boom: Higher rates. So the savings we all that we’d get are up in smoke, but I guess we’re at least risk of cancer thanks to natural gas…

And of course, fewer and fewer people are reading and those that are are feeding Amazon’s coffers with Kindle Unlimited memberships where they consume books like Whale consume krill.

So yeah. Not feeling particularly cheery or optimistic about 2026 but at the end of the day, all that any of us can do is keep going. The only way out is through and all that. I hope my pessimism is misplaced, even a little. I want 2026 to be awesome for us all, except Donald Trump, Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos and Sam Altman.

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As I type this (The week of Dec 16), I’ve sent Rogue Enterprises 3 off to beta readers! I had hoped it’d be a late 2025 release, but that’s not gonna work out. It’ll be an early 2026 release. A few things caused that.

1. Invasive Species took longer to write than most of my books. I started a rewrite before I was even finished with the first draft. Starting a new series is always a slow process. New characters, new settings and such. Lots of stuff to build from the ground up. When you’ve got 12 books in the series already, you don’t have to do that, LOL. So much went into Invasive Species that it’s my only 2025 release.
2. Writing Rogue Enterprises 3 was a bit slower going than originally planned, and it came out longer than normal. Around 95,000 words! That’s more or less 20,000 more words than my usual books.

That means 2025 only saw one release from me. I usually get 2 books out, sometimes 3. So that’s not great.

Upside, 2026 is already set with a release, and the writing on my next WIP, Grand Human Empire 6 is going well, so I expect it to be done around early spring for a summer release. Maybe I’ll get a third thing through the door. We’ll see.

Speaking of Words

I wrote a lot of words this year. I set the goal at 102,000, and right now with 1 week left in the year, I’ve written 113,176 words. Not mad about that! Those words got out despite everything going on in the world around us, Day Job ebbing and flowing, losing Muppet, traveling, adding Wallace to the Wilker Pack.

As I said above, most of those words were Rogue Enterprises 3. The rest were finishing ‘Invasive Species’ and the last 2 weeks, the first words of Grand Human Empire 6.

Who’s Buying?

If you’ve read previous years, or just know me. You’ll know I’m not down with Amazon in most scenarios, certainly not with giving them exclusive rights to my work. So I’m “Wide,” meaning I sell everywhere. If you’re a Nook person, I got you. If, like me, you’re a Kobo person, let’s do it! You get my point.

Escaping Amazon is of course impossible. I don’t want to make no money on that platform, they’re huge, by far the biggest in the US and much of the rest of the world (but not all, don’t fall for the propaganda!). I just don’t want them to be more then 50% of my income. You never know when an Amazon bot will decide you’ve broken a rule and bans your account. Maybe you’ll get it back maybe not, but you won’t get back lost sales.

So I’m pretty happy with this chart. I’d love the ‘direct’ slice to grow. That’s people who buy from my site, right here. Not only do I get more of the money, but I get their information so I can engage with readers. It’s a big deal and I put a lot of time/energy into pushing that option.

What’re They Buying?

Mostly ebooks. This chart isn’t 100% accurate since I don’t capture in-person sales at a granular level in this spreadsheet.

For example I sold 20 odd books at MileHiCon, all paperback of course.

This also doesn’t capture audio because I sell very little audio as audiobooks, but move a fair amount on Youtube. Go figure. 2 ads per chapter, plus full novel releases once all chapters are released. But that’s hard to break into unit sales, so I don’t.

With genre books (that aren’t Romance) ebook is king. There are outliers of course, but most of us move far and away more bits than dead trees.

Money?

Always the elephant in the room. Which I get but also prefer transparency. Especially if it can help others. Most authors, myself included imagine making a living writing. In 2021 I though that was right around the corner for myself. Womp Womp.

Coming out of 2021, things looked downright rosy! Then reality set in. 2022 saw an immediate reversal that has continued into 2025.

A lot has been written about this issue. (NPR, Gallop, Purdue) People are reading less. I’m certain 2020-21 was an aberration. We had little else to do but bake bread and watch Tiger King, so reading spiked. Once the world opened back up, reading slid back into its place. You can see below how things have gone / are going.

And of course, this is all “Unless you write romance” Because that genre is crushing it, and what little reading is happening, is happening there. No shade on those folks or that genre, I just wish it bled over into the rest, but it doesn’t. The hardest thing when looking at that graph is that while units/revenue/profit are falling, back catalog is growing.

This feels like a first world thing for sure. Boo Hoo, I might make $10,000 above my Day Job income. But when you look at the world. why are authors expected to have day jobs when instagram/TikTok/Youtubers are making millions? Sure not all of us can make a living. But the number of us doing that is falling, while the number of books released to have a shot at it, is growing. This survey, which is a sort of industry standard paints a bleak picture. Especially when you look at the previous year’s data around “Books released to income earned.” If you’re curious, the blip in 2024 was peak AI Slop get rich quick scheme. Of course I know most “influencers” aren’t making millions. I don’t even want millions. I’d be happy with, well, significantly less.

So, yeah. On the money side, writing is getting harder and harder make make sense. I don’t know the solution. Many think “Throw money at ads” is the answer. I know a lot of authors who say things like “I spend $75,000 a year on Facebook/Amazon ads, and make $140,000” which good on them, but I don’t have that seed money laying around to spend to really master ads like that. Not to mention Facebook especially isn’t my target audience.

I enjoy telling the stories and meeting readers, so don’t worry, I’ve no plans to stop writing. But have come to terms with it being a side hustle, which disgusts me. We expect artists to die poor. Fuck that.

Family.

In February we lost Muppet. It was, is still, hard. He was such an adorable agent of chaos who was full of life right up until the end. I miss him terribly.

In happier news :) We welcomed Wallace underfoot to the Wilker pack in October. He’s a 3ish year old long haired Chihuahua. He’s latched on to me like nobody’s business, which is fine. I’ve been “Dog-less” for a while. Muppet was supposed to be my guy, but he had little interest in people. Paco is very much a mama’s boy. So it’s nice to have someone hanging with me everywhere I go. We’re still working on house rules and behaviour but he’s getting there. And in the meantime being unbearably cute.

Generally, 2025 has been a good year for us. Muppet’s loss in February really hurt. I still struggle to think about him without getting teary eyed.

We traveled a bit; Utah (family trip with mom, sister’s family), Costa Rica (celebrating friends’ anniversary), Japan (our anniversary and time with friends). As much as we like our home and our things, time with friends and family was awesome and recharging. We’re thankful overall that things have been pretty ok here. Looking around the world, “OK” is a big deal and not enough can even get that.

Between when I started this post and now, a major wind event ripped through the Denver metro area and downed part of a neighbor’s tree. Thankfully power to the house wasn’t affected, but power to the garage was (both lines in the same place, one survived, one snapped). Our “doggy fence” took a beating but was easily replaceable. Over all nothing too catastrophic repair-wise. Fun times though.

Day Job.

Day Job is fine. It’s a day job. I love what I do and who I do it with. I love my boss, she’s an old friend from way back and working for her is a joy. I thought I was relatively free of silly politics, but learned that wasn’t the case. One of my biggest clients hired a new person who doesn’t know how budgets work, who has no idea how events work or are organized. That person took their non-understanding out on me, undermining me at every turn and blaming me for their failures. Good times for sure.

I’ve been moved from that client, which is A-OK with me, though I’ll miss those hours.

Beyond that, I’m glad to be employed. Especially when you consider the above. Writing isn’t gonna do it any time soon. I still hope that changes, but assume it won’t anytime soon.

Reading. Because writers read, and I read a lot.

This year I read 54 books this year; 44 Fiction, 10 Non-Fiction. I read non-fiction very slowly. But Enjoy it, so it’s worthwhile. Fiction reading keeps my creative well topped up. Seeing what others do, being inspired by it and just enjoying the escape of other worlds. It really boggles my mind that more people don’t read, such an amazing escape. But I guess they get that from tiktok or something. And yes, that’s shade.

I thought this graphic from Goodreads was neat. I still track there, but mostly use Hardcover. You should check it out. The less we give to amazon; money and attention, the better.

So anyhow, that’s my year. I’ve had better and worse years.

The post 2025 in Review appeared first on John Wilker SciFi Author.

• It lets lazy people who aren’t creatives cosplay as such. They’re not my peers.
• It lets disinterested and un-discerning people consume (even more) mass produced pulp (Hello Kindle unlimited whales). They’re not my readers.
• I’m a writer because I like to write. I don’t know how fun asking a computer to write is, but it doesn’t seem fun.

But. As a consumer, and person who’s existed in the tech space since before Twitter was a gleam in Jack’s eye, I think about AI a lot.

Mainly I think about the thing I don’t see the media, Silicon Valley or our government, talking about. Or when they do, not giving it enough attention.

What’s next, after AI?

The valley is hell bent on destroying as many industries as it can, with little thought given to what happens after. AI is only accelerating that trend.

Taxi’s. All but gone thanks to Uber and Lyft. But hey we have Uber and Lyft. But what happens when we actually get non-pedestrian killing self driving cars? Where do those people go? Where do the Doordashers and GrubHub’ers go? They’ll likely be out of work at the same time because the woman at Burger King can run the bag out to a self driving car, and the person too lazy to drive through can walk out to the sidewalk and get their food.

Of course, once AI can better recognize objects, it can flip a shitty burger. So now the fast food workers are out a job.

When AI is able to create an even slightly passable novel or movie, what do the creatives do?

AI is already destroying junior developer and designer roles. That pipeline is going to go away soon. What do those people do?

If you’re sensing the theme, good. You’re ahead of a lot folks.

Our society is built around spending money. Making it, and turning around and spending it. It’ literally how we decide if our society is strong or faltering; how much money we’re spending.

What’s our society look like when 18 men own the planet and employ only 100 people who manage various AIs? What should the rest of us do?

I’m certain the valley thinks AI will come up with an answer. I’m also certain it’ll be as dystopian as the creatives warned. “Have less humans. Problem solved”

Epilogue:

You might think, “duh, Universal Basic Income is the solution” You’re right it is.

BUT. Do some searches. Our elected’s are against it (or made to be afraid of it). Tech bros are against it. Tech bros just want us all to find new gig work, but how many of us can serve as living chess pieces during tech oligarch yard parties?

UBI is our only realistic solution, but out society hasn’t come to terms with it. I mean, our entire history has been around capitalism, and UBI isn’t that.

That’s the part of AI I think about a lot, and I wish more people were, and were talking about it. The proverbial shit is only a few inches from the fan and the government and Silicon valley are ignoring it.

The post AI… And Then What? appeared first on John Wilker SciFi Author.

We only knew him a little under two years. We’d been trying to foster and had a few dogs slip by us, not working out. Then we got a call. “We have this 15 year old shih tzu that can’t stay in the shelter”

We met him and brought him home. Turns out he couldn’t stay there because he screamed all night. Understandable. As our groomer said. “Very human like screams.” She’s not wrong. He’d had one owner his whole life (15 years) and had been surrendered because she was too told to keep him any longer. BY the time we met him he’d already lost most of his teeth, one eye and his back legs were super thin and weak. I can’t imagine how terrified he was the day we met him. Likely his second day at the shelter.

We called him a lot of things. Muppet, agent of chaos, Fuckee the Muppet. He came to us called Princeton, because Prince (The name he came into the shelter with) was taken. His one big loving eye and toothless mouth made me think of muppets and that’s what stuck.

He didn’t like to cuddle and if you tried it too long he’d head butt you. Other than the screams (which stopped after the first two weeks living with us) he was silent. The headbutt would come out of nowhere.

He liked to explore. Instead of cuddling, he wandered the house looking in every corner. In the summer months he’d go outside (he mastered the doggy door pretty quickly. Including the steps) and just sit and look at the sky. It was the most magical thing to just see him sitting there looking up. I don’t know what his previous home was like, but assume the sky wasn’t part of it.

In the time we got to be his parents; he went camping, went on a boat, went on several road trips and other adventures. He got to wear all sorts of little outfits, most of which he seemed to at least not hate.

As indomitable as his spirit was, his body wasn’t up to the challenge. Six or eight months ago our vet said he had a tumor on his anal gland that she feared was impossible to remove given his size and age, its size and location. We did what we could to manage his comfort as it grew.

Then doggy dementia started to take his mind. Going potty became difficult. He’d “Glitch” as we called it, and struggled to remember things about the house. He forgot to go outside for potty 9/10 times. Eating became more of a bribe. His weight dropped a pound in a month. He’s wake up in the mornings trembling until the various meds and CBD oil kicked in.

The night before we said goodbye he took himself out to potty. A number two for those who care. Those were tough for him and we often had to hold him up as his back legs had started to weaken. He came in so proud of himself. He was spinning in circles (that was his happy dance. He’d do 2-10 revolutions in a go) and jumping up and down as we cheered for him. Which only made what came next so much harder. Those little glimpses of him as we wanted him to remain were fewer and further between. Besides, even if we could fix his brain, his tumor wasn’t stopping and certainly wasn’t getting smaller.

We said goodbye last night with our vet who’s helped us say goodbye to several doggos over the years. It hurt so much. He was running around the comfort room sniffing corners and eating treats and then …. he wasn’t.

Bye my little friend.

The post Goodbye Sweet Muppet appeared first on John Wilker SciFi Author.

Outside of writing, I’m not really looking foward to 2025. I’m sure you can imagine why. I spend more time that I’d like thinking about what the next four years are likely to be like. As a white dude, my life won’t be as impacted as many, which is horrible. But I don’t imagine even white dudes will get a complete buy on this. Whether taxes, inflation, general degrading of society and the environment, I think we’re all going to suffer and that sucks. I try to be optimistic, but it’s trying.

Anyhow. Onward to what 2024 looked like.

Life

Life was good in 2024. Work is rewarding and challenging. It’s just enough of both that I love what I do and who I do it for and with. I honestly am very thankful where I landed post 360.

Dogs

This was our first and sadly, likely only full year with Muppet. We met him last August and Adopted him around October. He’s slipping into Doggy Dementia so it’s a race to see which thing gets him; The dementia or the tumor on one of his anal glands. All we can do with both is manage any discomfort.

Right now he seems happy and healthy and every day is a bonus. I don’t love it’s likely going to be up to us when the end is, vs. him. I’ve become quite attached to my little rambunctious teddy bear of chaos.

Paco is doing great. His vet always comments on how good he looks and how spry he is for his age. He’s as happy as ever and seems to like Muppet. He’s still my Saturday morning navigator for our burrito runs and loves coming home with the window down, even in the winter.

Travel

It was a year of travel for Nicole and I. We had Glasgow on the books so I could attend my first (and likely last) WorldCon, but then she got accepted to speak at a RedHat event in Brno (Czech Republic). So twice in one summer we jetted off to Europe. Both trips were excellent. Both made significant dents in our finances LOL. Travel ain’t cheap, yo!

WorldCon was fun enough, but not for me. It was lots of cool kids clubs and friends groups that existed already. I made myself be open to any invite or activity that came my way, which was HELLA UNCOMFORTABLE.

I did a morning walk and was able to say hi to Tao Wong whom I know online from a few discords. That was nice.

I did a lunch outing with some really nice folks. As the self-pub’ed author I was the oddity of the group. The rest did shorts and/or were chasing the trad pub dragon. I didn’t know any of the people they talked about or even most of the small zines and such that they were published in. The food was good and the company was great, but not my people.

I did a dinner outing with a group of Codexians, which was super fun and tasty. It was nice to meet people I’d been speaking with online for so long.

Beyond that however the content was really sort of middling. Like a ComicCon almost. While I enjoyed the hell out of the `80s Fantasy movie discussion panel, it wasn’t really useful as a writer. I think partly I was wrong in assuming it was an industry event. It is for networking, but not for content. Which for a not super outgoing person means I spent a lot of the event in a corner writing (OK not a corner) or in a session that was mildly interesting, but not adding to my craft.

That plus my above mentioned introversion meant the social gatherings without a wing-person meant I didn’t loiter long at any of them.

Nothing against WorldCon, or those that go every year, but I’ll save the money and the time to use on other things. At least I did it once and know what it’s about.

We also did a last minute road trip to Washington state to see my mom, sister (and her kids/husband) for Christmas. Was fun to have Muppet along on his first roadtrip. Was great seeing them and seeing Washington, a state I love.

We got in a little camping, learned that raccoons are indeed freakishly clever at opening things (and hulk strong when the food they want is in a metal lunchbox. RIP Yelp lunchbox). Muppet seemed to like camping. Paco loves laying in dirt.

Other

Beyond that we enjoyed many beers at our local brewery. I did a lot of writing there as usual. We went to Park City UT so Nicole could Ski. We’ve been a few times and it’s always fun. It’s a fun road trip. Friends popped in and out of our AirBNB.

Reading

I mentioned reading (a little) here. I read in all, 62 books this year. A fair number were re-reads of my favorite series, but many were new. I try to have 1 fiction and 1 non-fiction read in process, doing the reading of the latter during the day, and the former in the evening and on weekends.

Writing

It was a good year for further reducing my dependence on Amazon.

I spent a lot of effort making my store as friendly and easy to use as possible. I cribbed from other authors and tweaked constantly.

That said, my direct sales (Dark Purple) are still a fraction of my income. However, Amazon (Orange) is far less than half my income this year. That’s awesome! Kobo is my second strongest outlet. As a Kobo user, I put a lot of energy into them as well.

Obviously there is still plenty of room for improvement. I really want my direct sales to become not just a larger slice of the pie, but for the pie to become much larger.

I’m still very happy with my choice to remain outside of Amazon’s “All you can read buffet” that is Kindle Unlimited. It’s not a healthy place for authors and encourages readers to value books only as long as they’re holding it, moving on to the next thing as soon as their done. Forming next to zero relationship with the author.

In addition to direct sales, I was in 1 StoryBundle and did a few in-person events, which while not out of this world, are a pretty solid number. That’s the burnt orange color. It’s actually higher than direct sales.

Audio continues to be a loser for me. Though this year I added my books to youtube, releasing a chapter a week before the full audiobook release. That brings in more monthly revenue than Audible. So that’s nice. Keep it up youtube!

Marketing

Marketing is still hard as fuck. One thing that used to work really well was ‘free first in series’ but as you can imagine that has limited utility unless you’re churning out new series.

One thing I’ve noticed this year is that the promo newsletter providers are adding “value adds” to their offerings. I suspect this is in large part due to the actual newsletter lists not growing any/much. Once someone sees your book in a promo they’re unlikely to download it again after all. Maybe seeing it jogs their memory that they already have it, who knows. It feels like a diminishing return sort of thing.

I played with FB ads again this year and again walked away with less money, and no firm idea how to improve. While I’m sure that’s still a viable option (plenty of folks are still doing it, who knows how successfully), I also don’t hear about user growth at FB. Younger folks aren’t creating accounts. Existing users are, frankly, dying off, ever so slowly. It’s more Boomerbook than anything else. Which is great if that demographic is your target audience. Not so great otherwise.

The Numbers

Overall this year was another low year. It seems, at least for me, readers peaked in 2021. That was the year I was rubbing my hands together Mr. Burns style thinking that maybe writing would be close to full time income sooner than I hoped. Since then it’s been a slide back toward not bad money, but not job replacement money.

In Conclusion

I’ve got one book 95% written that will be releasing early in 2025. I’ve plotted out the next Rogue Enterprises story so will be getting to work on that in the next few weeks.

While generally speak, I’m not at all optimistic about 2025, in terms of writing and selling books, I’m looking forward to a year of new releases and learning (or trying and failing) to improve my selling.

The post 2024 appeared first on John Wilker SciFi Author.

I figured, I’d roll up any and all top 10 kind of things I might do in one mega listicle. You’re welcome.

Obviously we’ll start with my top 10 books of 2024. I read a lot, a LOT, of fiction so much of this list will be non-fiction that stood out to me. I try to read one non-fiction book alongside however many fiction books it takes to read the non-fic (I consume non-fiction at a very slow rate). If it made this list, I wholeheartedly endorse you picking up a copy. You can see my full year’s read on my Hardcover profile.

1. Digital Minimalism: Cal Newport

2. The Adventures of Amina Al-Sirafi

3. Chaotic Neutral: Ed Burmila

4. Filterworld: How Algorithms Flattened Culture: Kyle Chayka

5. I Swear: Politics Is Messier Than My Minivan: Katie Porter

6. I’m re-reading and re-enjoying the Frontiers Saga by Ryk Brown.

7. Artemis City Shuffle: Jessie Kwak

8. Lady Eve’s Last Con: Rebecca Fraimow

9. Tyche’s Deceit: Richard Parry

 10. On Basilisk Station: David Weber

I watch a lot of TV and Movies while I right. Usually at the end of the workday I’ll put something on top up the creative well. Almost always something I’ve seen before, but not always.

These are the top 10 movies or TV shows I enjoyed this year. Whether they came out this year or not. I discovered a pair of apps (Tautulli & Wrapperr) for Plex, so next year I’ll have better details on what I watched in the year, and maybe even some cool graphics.

1. Blue Beetle (Movie)

2. Alien Romulus (Movie)

3. Pacific Rim (Movie)

4. Warrior (TV)

5. Dark Matter (TV. The original of the name)

6. The Wonder Years 2021 (TV)

7. The Marvels (Movie)

8. Transformers: One (Movie)

9. Star Trek: TNG (TV)

10. Star Trek: DS9 (TV)

It’s been a slow year writing wise. I started ‘Invasive Species’ sometime in the spring I think. I’m still working on it. Which means I only released one book this year; ‘Rising Resistance‘.

‘Invasive Species’ is a challenge. A good one, but still a challenge. It’s a new story idea. I’m trying to improve my world building and character depth. Two things that are no small feat, and that have thrown many a wrench into the process.

I’m closing in on the last few chapters, and really aiming to have the book out to beta readers before the end of the year. We’ll see. Revisions are always a slow part for me.

Anyhow. That’s my end of year listicle and wrap up. Hope your 2024 was great/excellent/fantastic/profitable/etc. Pick the one that most resonates.

The post Wilker’s Year in Review appeared first on John Wilker SciFi Author.

We almost had it. A corner of the internet not run by Silicon Valley. A corner where you connected with people not because an algorithm thought you should, but because you stumbled on them, and found them interesting. A place where people talk to each other unconcerned “with getting those RTs.” A corner where news outlets, city and state governments could stand up their own instance and be known as a source of truth. A corner where trolls are dealt with rapidly. Because in this corner trolls aren’t profitable of worth the trouble because they drive engagement.

As Twitter implodes (again), and people flee to elsewhere, by and large they’re fleeing to BlueSky. Because “It feels like old twitter.” Of course it does. As someone who was there, one of the earliest users of Twitter, I know what old twitter feels like, and still miss it. 

Except to me, Mastodon feels like actual old twitter. People share ideas and knowledge for the sake of it. Where going viral isn’t a driver (It wasn’t in old twitter either). Where many are paying (with money, not attention) to support the server they’re on because a web not run by bots and investors is worth a few bucks a month.

But here’s the thing. Of course BlueSky feels like Old Twitter. Old Twitter is the only play in Silicon Valley’s playbook. Maybe it’s because (shakes fist at cloud) I remember foursquare, gowalla, Glue, and dozens more. They all start the same way. A (free of course) service that sucks as much oxygen out of the space as it can pulling in users as fast as possible, revenue be damned, because of course, it’s funded by VCs. The valley is about “Get users now, figure out money later.” Spoiler. Later always means; ads, paid accounts that you see regardless, and algorithms that promote the most engaged posts over everything else.

VCs aren’t philanthropists. They want a return and because the valley only understands one path to revenue. BlueSky 3.0 (or so) will introduce ads. “Don’t worry they won’t be annoying. They’ll blend in and be from brand you want to hear from” This is what Twitter said too.

Then because engagement is key, they’ll slide an algorithm in (They’re using them now but you (for now) have a choice) to make sure the posts getting engagement are seen be more people. I know this because this is what Twitter did. 

Maybe they’ll jump to paid “verified accounts” faster because that worked a little for twitter. “Hey influencers and think piece writers. Pay us, and more people will see your stuff. Bonus, the more people who see it, we’ll PAY YOU!” Twitter did it.

The people pining for “old twitter” seem to forget, old twitter died because it’s not a model that works. Those other social media platforms “lost” because the model doesn’t work. New twitter is what you get when the investors finally come around looking for their ROI.

So i find it really disheartening that so many are willfully going right back to what was comfortable, even if they know or are pretending to not know, that it will end the same way. 

I know Mastodon has issues, no platform is perfect. I just wish the people that are willing to put in the effort on BlueSky would’ve put that effort into a place that isn’t run by Silicon Valley.  I won’t be setting up an account on BlueSky. If that’s the platform that “wins” I guess I’ll survive without hot takes and think pieces. I did before after all. I’ll be on Mastodon, enjoying actual Old Twitter and happily paying $6/month for it.

I’m bummed we looked at an internet that we control, and said, “Nah, I need followers. I need engagement. I need my hot takes to be seen.” 

Repeat after me, Silicon Valley isn’t working for us, or solving problems we have. 

The post We Almost Had It. appeared first on John Wilker SciFi Author.

It’s just so pretty! I don’t need it. From what I’ve read, the color muddies the contrast for black & white a bit, which isn’t awesome, but COLOR!

Throw in bigger battery, faster refresh, and USB-C (I have exactly 2 Micro USB devices and my Libra H2O is one of them) and….. must… resist…

Anyhow. If you have one. Tell me what you think?

The post Color Kobos! appeared first on John Wilker SciFi Author.

Sometimes the initial heist is enough. Sometimes the team needs to get clapped back… clap backed? Anyway. They need to lose and regroup. I mean after all their opponent is way more resourceful than they are. 

The final scene of this chapter was a straight up hoot to write :)

-=-=-=-=-=-

“Who else is involved?” The stern-faced Harrith man asked, leaning on the table. 

Wil looked at Zee and Max then the man opposite them. “Actually that was my question.”

The team had been moved from the Dystum’s estate to a secure conference room a few floors below the admiral’s office in the Naval command tower in downtown Drotu.

“I can’t believe you convinced the Dystum we wanted to kill him.” Maxim said. 

The man in the vice admiral’s uniform smirked. “You didn’t give me much time to plan a better story. I had to improvise.” He cocked his head at the three of them, turning his focus on Zephyr. “You were supposed to be off-world. You two and your droid friend. He left you here?”

Both Palorians shrugged. The Vice-Admiral squinted. “If he’s here, we’ll find him.”

“Doubt it.” Zephyr said.

“So he’s still here?”

“I didn’t say that. I just don’t think you’re very competent.” She shrugged. “He could be down the street or back on Arcadia. Who knows?”

The Vice-Admiral shook his head. “He’s unimportant.” He turned to Wil. “Your life partner on the other hand. Congratulations by the way. She must be here somewhere?”

Wil shrugged. “Thanks. We like to vacation separately.”

The other man smirked. “I don’t believe that. Finding a Tygran shouldn’t be hard. I have people on it.”

Wil’s eyes narrowed. “If you hurt her…”

“You’re in no position to make threats Captain, Calder.”

Wil didn’t look away. “There’s a saying on my planet.” 

“Oh?”

Wil nodded. “Fuck around and find out.”

“Quaint.”

Breaking her silence Shre’T’An said. “Tra’V’Al, You know you can’t keep me here. For one thing I outrank you. For another I’ve done nothing wrong.” She looked at her fellow detainees. “Neither have they for that matter.”

The Harrith man shook his head. “Oh, Shre’T’An. You never were a political animal.” He waved both arms to encompass the room. “No one knows you’re here. I can do what I like.” He shrugged. “We’ll search of course, but you’ll have disappeared. Tragic really.”

Wil turned in his chair to face the admiral. “Who is this turd?”

“Tra’V’Al Wuan. Vice-admiral in charge of planetary intelligence.” She glared at the man opposite them. “And obviously a traitor to the Harrith collective.”

Wuan scoffed. “Traitor?“

“Is grolacking traitor, better?” 

Maxim cleared his throat. “You can’t exactly just march us out of here as terrorists. Three of us are well known heroes —“

“Heroes that the Circle explicitly asked to leave the planet after making your wild accusations to the security council.” The vice-admiral interrupted.

“Be that as it may, we’re still pretty well known here. Why would we intervene on Harrith’s behalf only to, cycles later, do …” She squinted. “What exactly?” Zephyr asked.

Wuan shrugged. “I’m actually not sure yet. Like I said, I wasn’t prepared for this. I planned for a lot of contingencies, you weren’t one of them.” 

Wil smiled. “We’re touched.”

The other man gave Wil a flat look, saying. “Don’t be. I didn’t think you were worth planning for.”

Maxim huffed a laugh. “That’ll teach you.”

Wuan waved a hand. “I’ve time though, no worries. Back to you all. Where’s your little Brailack? He here too somewhere?” The Rogue Enterprises team shrugged as one as if they practiced it. He stood. “Maybe after a tock or two you’ll feel like talking.” He left the room without another word or even backward glance at his captives.

As the door’s locks clicked, Wil looked at the others. “So this is going well.”

Zephyr nodded. “We’ve at least learned a few things.”

Shre’T’An looked at her. “What?”

“The Dystum isn’t involved.” Zephyr said, adding. “If he were, Wuan wouldn’t have to make up a story.”

The other woman smiled. “I hadn’t thought of that. You’re right.” She pursed her lips, pressing her tongue against the inside of her cheek. “What does that get us?”

Zephyr offered a half smile. “Not sure. But the more we know, the better.”

“Talk. Now.” Cynthia leaned in so that her face was inches from Gul’P’Ulo’s wide flat nose. She bared her teeth.

Cynthia in one of the chairs from her bedroom. The young Harrith woman was in a similar chair from one of the other bedrooms. It wasn’t perfect, the chair was amply padded and its arms were one piece so they’d been forced to use bed sheets to tie her torso to the chair’s back while towels secured her feet to the bulbous feet of the chair.

“I can’t” the younger woman whimpered.

Cynthia shook her head. “Wrong answer.” She looked over her shoulder. “Do you know what being bit by a Brailack feels like?”

“What?” Bennie shouted, looking from the workstation he and Gabe were hunched over.

“No…” Gul’P’Ulo said through sobs.

Cynthia smiled wide. “Pain like you wouldn’t believe. Lesions, boils, skin sloughs off.” Seeing the look on the younger woman’s face, she added. “That’s just the first two tocks.”

Bennie looked at Gabe. “That’s not true at all.” 

“I do not care.” The droid said, not looking away from the data streaming across the display.

He looked over the display at Cynthia. “I resent being used as a threat.”

Nic, standing next to Cynthia said. “It’s true. I saw him bite a smuggler we apprehended on Thundera. By the time the authorities arrived he was screaming incoherently as his skin hung in melted strips.”

Gul’P’Ulo paled, tears running down her cheeks.

Gabe turned to Bennie. “You make an effective interrogation tool.”

Bennie turned and drawled “Yay.”

Across the room, Blu’T’Ohm looked at Bennie. He looked like he just ate a bug.

Bennie glanced at the man and bared his teeth. Blu’T’Ohm recoiled.

Cynthia stood. “Just tell us what you know. We’ll protect you.”

The other woman shook her head. “I really don’t know much. I was hired to keep an eye on Blu’T’Ohm and steer him where I was told.”

“Excuse me!” Blu’T’Ohm was on his feet. 

His probably now former aide shrank into the chair. “I was told where to book rallies and to make sure you went where you were supposed to. That’s it, I swear!”

Gabe turned to Bennie. “Look at this.” A window appeared on the display nearest Bennie.

“Well, dren.” The hacker nodded. “This is promising.”

“Indeed.” Gabe said, his attention back on whatever virtual workspace he was seeing.

“Bennie, come here. Need your teeth.” Cynthia called.

“Oh god!” Gul’P’Ulo exhaled.

Bennie stood. “This is degrading.”

Gabe turned to look at him. “It is, yes.”

Bennie hadn’t even made it around the makeshift shift workstation when the young Harrith woman shouted. “Ok! Ok! Vice-Admiral Wuan, he’s in charge. He’s the one who hired me.” She sniffled loudly. “Actually, it was someone that worked for him. I only met him, the admiral, I mean, once.” She glanced at Blu’T’Ohm. “Before we left Harrith. The rest of the time it was a… A lieutenant, I think.”

Blu’T’Ohm was still pacing. “I can’t believe this.”

Cynthia moved away from the chair with their Harrith captive in it. She looked over to Bennie and Gabe. “You two are certain the Dystum isn’t involved?”

Bennie looked up. “Yeah. he’s either clean or exceptionally good at covering his tracks.”

She nodded. “We can’t wait for the Dystum’s help. We need to find this Vice-Admiral Wuan and spring our friends.” Looking up at the ceiling she sighed. “I hate splitting us up more but,” she turned her gaze to Bennie, “little green I think you need to go to the Dystum’s estate and show him what you and Gabe have put together? At the end of the day we’re gonna need him on our side, but waiting for him or the Circle to act will almost certainly mean our friends vanish and we never see them again.”

Bennie extended his arms, palms out, cracking his knuckles. “I’ll find out when he’s due back at the estate.” Cynthia nodded.

Nic tore her eyes from her still quietly sobbing friend. “What… what about the rest of us?”

“We break into…” she turned to Gabe and Bennie.

Gabe said. “According the public net, the Vice-Admiral is in charge of planetary intelligence. His office is in the Naval Command building.” 

Bennie smiled to himself. “I’m downloading the schematics now.”

The Dystum returned to his estate. All traces of the Sovereignty Day party the day prior were gone, the work of hundreds of staff working through the morning. As his government issued ground car glided silently to the storage garage he walked through the two large doors. 

He was still shaken by the report from Planetary Intelligence. To think those people could be caught up in trying to now undermine the society they’d saved. He shook his head. “I’ve got a few things to do in my office before dinner.” He called out, seemingly to no one.

“Very good sir.” Came the reply as the Major Domo slid out of a corner to startle the Dystum. 

“I hate it when you do that.” He growled.

“Sorry, sir.”

The estate was a trapping of the office he didn’t mind. It was beautiful, massive and the pool in the west lawn was to die for. Stepping into his assistant’s office from the hallway he looked around. She rarely worked out of the estate unless he was planning to stay home for the day. 

His office was dark and when he walked in, the lights that should have turned on as he entered, didn’t. He turned to the wall mounted sensor switch next to the door frame and waved his hand in front of it. Nothing. He waved his hand more vigorously.

“I disabled it.” A voice said from deeper inside the office. 

The Dystum released a choked off scream as he spun. He couldn’t see who was sitting at his desk. “Who… Who are you?” Behind him the door clicked closed, the sound of the lock engaging made him jump once more. He spun, grabbing the handle. 

A snap-hiss sound preceded a magenta beam of light rising from behind the desk. The room was bathed in a deep purple light. A Brailack, sitting behind the Dystum’s desk said. “Hi. Have a seat.”

“Who are you?” The Dystum repeated squinting into the bright energy blade. He took a tentative step towards his desk. The purple beam of light pulsed faintly, a hum coming from it or something near it.

“I’m Ben-Ari Vulvo. Knight of Plentallus.” 

The Dystum shook his head. “I don’t know what that means. Is it a cult? I wasn’t aware we had Brailack cults operating on Harrith Prime.” He took a step back.

“What? No it’s not a cult!” He slapped his free hand palm down on the desktop. “It’s an ancient order… You know what, never mind. I said, have a seat.” His voice was deeper this time. “We need to talk.” The magenta beam of light winked off and the office lights came on. 

The Harrith man looked around the now brightly lit office. “How did you—“

“Would you just sit down, already!” The little Brailack demanded. He hopped off the chair, vanishing from sight. He came around the side of the desk. “I’ve got a lot to tell you.” He pointed at the seat he just vacated. “Sit.”

The Harrith man looked around the office. With a sigh he stepped closer to his desk. “You’re not going to kill me are you?”

The Brailack rubbed his face with both hands. “Knight. Of. Plentallus. No I’m not going to kill you.”

Falling into his well worn chair, he asked. “How did you get in here anyway? Security monitors every window and door. Especially after Planetary Intelligence apprehended those terrorists at the Sovereignty Day Celebration last night.” He gasped. “Wait, are you…?”

Bennie pointed to a corner of the room and the large sort of circular hole in the wall. Through the hole several trees were visible in the dim light of the evening.

The leader of the Harrith Collective’s eyes bulged. He turned to Bennie then the hole and back again. “You?” He pointed to the hole. “That wall. This building is a thousand years old!”

“Explains why it wasn’t easy to cut through.” Bennie waved a hand. “We’ve got more important things to discuss than architecture.”

“More important than…” The other man released an explosive sigh as he threw his hands in the air. “Unbelievable.” Running his hands across the surface of his desk he took a deep breath. He exhaled and looked the Brailack. “What is it that you need to talk to me about that couldn’t wait until the morning and an appointment?” One his hands eased from the desktop dropping to his lap before easing toward the silent alarm switch mounted under the desk.

Bennie cocked his head and clucked. “Come on. You think I didn’t disable that?” He pointed to a sensor panel in the corner by the ceiling. “Sensors are spoofed too. Your Major Domo, if he looks, will see that your office is occupied by one life sign. Yours.” He waited for the Dystum’s arm to return to the arm of the chair. “Can we get on with this?”

“Good afternoon. “I’m Klor’Tillan and this is GNO Newstime.” The pale green Brailack journalist inhaled. “We’ve just learned that Acrar Two has been attacked by its neighbor Bormean. At this time details are sparse, but what we’re hearing is that the Acrarians have been almost entirely wiped out.” He shifted in his seat. “It appears that the Bormeans, with assistance from an as yet unknown supplier, moved against their neighbors with the intent of cleansing the world ahead of future Bormean colonization.”

Klor’Tillan turned to another camera pickup. “Acrar had only recently voted to leave the Galactic Commonwealth which meant that when the attack came, no one was there to defend them. As far we know, the Acrar had little to no space defense force.”

After taking a calming breath, he continued. “We’ll do our best to keep you informed, but as of three tocks ago, the entire system was under siege and no one was being allowed in or out. Our hearts go out for the Acrar.”

The post Galactic Instability: Chapter 24 appeared first on John Wilker SciFi Author.

If you’ve read all of my series, you’ll know that they do exist (more or less) in a shared universe.

A  guy can dream, right? I figure, sooner or later, if I keep putting out  awesome books that folks like, it’ll happen… maybe… hopefully… ok,  probably not.

Anyhow!

Christina, my amazing editor and fellow Princess Bride stan is hard at work on ‘Galactic Instability‘  and we’re on track for a March release. The plan was for this month,  but life sometimes gets in the way. If you haven’t already pre-ordered,  please do!

I’m putting the final touches on ‘Empire’s Fall’ the 5th Grand Human Empire book! It’ll be off to Christina as soon as she’s done with ‘Galactic Instability!’

I’ve finally booked time with Adam Verner, the incredible narrator of ‘Any Job Will Do‘ to record ‘Side Hustle Tango.’ For you audio folks, that’ll be dropping in late summer of this year!

Speaking of audio! KC Johnston is also almost done narrating ‘So This is Earth!’
2024, gonna be the year of audio for me!!

And, last but not least! I just started outlining ‘Lonesome George Sends His Regards’ (A working title), the 3rd Expedition, Inc. book!

The post Status of the Wilker-Verse appeared first on John Wilker SciFi Author.