David Witteveen

SYNOPSIS

THE STRAY SWANS is a grunge-rock ghost novel set in 1990s Melbourne.

Melbourne, 1991: Cat and Vee are two lonely teenagers who start a grunge band called the Stray Swans. But Cat is haunted by the shadow, a demonic presence that threatens to devour everything--and everyone--that she loves.

Can Cat keep Vee safe from the shadow?

Is friendship stronger than death?

ABOUT ME

I'm a writer and zine-maker based in Melbourne, Australia. I won the inaugural Australian Horror Writers Association's award for Best Flash Fiction. I've had stories published in Macabre, Geek Mook and Hardboiled Cthulhu. And I ran the flash fiction blog Melbourne by Dusk for the Emerging Writers' Festival in 2011.

The Stray Swans is my first novel. And I'm self-publishing it.

WHY SELF-PUBLISH?

I love DIY. I love zines and Bandcamp and Patreon. I love that people can make art without having to wait for some big company's permission.

The Stray Swans is weird book. Publishers have told me they really liked it, but it didn't quite fit into any of their marketing categories. I've been self-publishing minocomics and zines since 2000, so self-publishing this novel just makes sense.

I'm very excited to be bringing this novel to the world in exactly the way it should be.

HOW CLOSE ARE YOU TO FINISHING THE BOOK?

The text is written. I'm currently finishing up the final edits with my editor Scott Vandervalk. A Sneak Preview edition was on sale at the Festival of the Photocopier 2017 Zine Fair. 

Everything is on track to launch the final edition in April 2017.

For news, check thestrayswans.tumblr.com or @davidwitteveen on Twitter

The funds I raise for through this Pozible campaign will be used to pay:

• The printing and postage costs from Blurb 
• My editor's fee
• My personal profit

These are the main challenges we will need to overcome to publish this book:

PREPARATION

The book is written, is being edited, and we have the layout and design. There is a risk that the preparation might be delayed because Scott and I both have day jobs. We have allowed some padding in our production timeline.

PRINTING

Blurb have proved a prompt and efficient printer for the Sneak Preview edition. We have allowed two weeks for printing into our production schedule.

FAILURE TO MEET GOAL

I've deliberately set the goal for this project very low. My intention is to print at lest 50 copies of the book using my own savings, so there will be regardless of whether or not this project reaches the goal. If it doesn't, I will contact backers directly with other ways to purchase the book.

RUNAWAY SUCCESS

It's highly unlikely, but if more than 100 people pre-order the printed book, then we can have a special discussion with Blurb about bulk printing (as per their website.)

DISTRIBUTION

Distributing copies of the book to backers will be a manual process. This may cause delays, and there's a chance that books may get damaged in the mail. 

I plan to cut down on some of the postage risks and delays by offering Melbourne backers the option to collect the books in person at the book launch (details coming). And to avoid damage in the post, I'll purchase some bubblewrap. ;)