Thank you all so much

I'm almost overwhelmed at the number of responses my question received.

I want to quickly say couple of things. First: I didn't intend to criticize people for their expectations - I was worried that it was my understanding that was flawed. When I spent the weeks trying to decide what my path forward was or could be, I did look at various platforms and various different approaches. I looked at what people at various levels were doing, what they were offering, what I might expect given how various Patreons were run.

I looked at what was being offered, as well.

Some people write shorts or flash fiction or even novellas - but I couldn't promise that because, well, the last novella I tried to write as a charity prompt was a) 2.5 years late and b) a novel (The Emperor's Wolves for anyone who is curious).

My decision had to be built on the foundation of what I could actually do. If I over-promised the stress and guilt when I missed deadlines for those promises would eat me alive. I started this Patreon in minimal fashion because I wanted it to essentially support what I personally wanted to do anyway: write the books. If there's pressure, it's the pressure to ... write the books. Not to write shorter fiction (which would take me way longer than longer fiction), not to be entertaining outside of the books, just... to write the books.

I tried to lay that out as clearly as possible in this Patreon's mission statement, because actually, no one wants to be a disappointment. My uncertainty--and the reason I asked the question--was about my understanding of Patreon; maybe what I can offer isn't enough or isn't what is baseline expected.

So I'm going to lay that to rest, now.

The second thing I wanted to say: the posts I have been writing are not stressful to write. They don't feel like obligations. They don't distract me from writing, inasmuch as I write them down here--they're things that are going through my head. The over-focus--not the blogging of it--can be distracting to my writer-brain, but... that would be true even if I didn't share them here. Sharing here forces to me full consider the bits and pieces that are zipping around in my head, and that - strange though it may sound - is very helpful.

I'm grateful that some of you find them interesting, because I have continued to iterate on the inside of my head, but in a more general way. About which, more later.

***

This post is mirrored from https://michellewest.ca/

I find it hard to have a conversation on Patreon, and have created a WordPress Patreon only blog to make it easier for me to find new comments and respond to them, sometimes at length.

This post is https://michellewest.ca/2022/01/14/thank-you-all-so-much/; you should be able to hit Login with Patreon, and should be able to read posts there at the same levels you can read them here.

I'll answer comments here as well if this is your preferred format, but probably not as expansively (which might be a good thing!).