BasedCon

And the Based Book Sale

I’m going to my first-ever con the day after this article is scheduled to post.

Actually, I don’t expect any cosplay at this con.

Well, I did attend a libertarian conference many moons ago, but it was a bust. As much as I embrace many of the libertarian ideals, most folks who identify themselves that way are just pacifists and cultural Marxists who, for whatever reason, can’t get laid at their own conventions.

Also, Libertarians and the Bowtie Brigade aren’t interested in buying fiction, outside of Rand and Tolkien.

Those are the impressions I left there with, and why I never attended another one. BasedCon, however, will be different.

I hope.

It’s not just a conference for right-leaning (or at least non-leftist) folks; but for folks who are interested in fiction, too.

I hope.

I also hope it won’t just be writers pimping their own books with nary a reader to be found. I don’t have to go through all this trouble to experience that—I already have that for free with, essentially, the entire World Wide Web.

I arranged the travel, the lodging, rented a merch table, shipped a boatload of paperbacks to the venue (not cheap, BTW), got a Square POS scanner, had a banner and bookmarks printed.

I hope I sell all the books, but am mentally prepared for this to all be a financial liability. At the least, I hope to get some networking done and just enjoy a long weekend interacting with other literate people.

Got an email from Rob Kroese (organizer of BasedCon) about authors doing public readings. Sign up and you’ll get two minutes to read from one of your books. The jury’s out for me on this. I mean, it could cause people to later visit my merch table.

I’m a good writer, but not such a good orator. We’ll see.

Meanwhile, the quarterly Based Book Sale will be underway. All kinds of ebooks (with an emphasis on sci-fi and fantasy) will be free or on sale for 99 cents. I have loaded up with a ton of discounted ebooks at previous sales, including the Hidden Truth trilogy by Hans G. Schantz (organizer of the Based Book Sale), which I recommend, and will probably be represented again in the sale.

My entire Paradox Series will be discounted to 99 cents.

Originally, I had hoped to be crowdfunding my epic superhero graphic novel by the time of the convention, but I am only about 2/3rds finished with the coloring and lettering, despite spending every spare moment doing that for over a year. And building an audience has proven equally difficult and time-consuming.

You need a crowd before you can fund, and as a comic creator I’m just not there yet.

I shifted my effort to getting a 48-page preview comic ready for the con. Long story short: that fell through as well.

If this turns out to be a positive experience, I may do it again. And if you’re going, let me know and maybe we can kick it for lunch or something.