Signal Boost: "The Pulp Mindset"

Friend of the Retreat J.D. Cowen has a new release out today, The Pulp Mindset.

To quote his description:

Out with the Old, in with the NewPub

Nobody reads anymore. In an age where audiences consume more art than ever before, books have remained irrelevant to the ever-changing West. Nothing seems to change this unavoidable reality. The industry is over.

Or is it?

A new frontier has opened where anything goes! We live in a pulp landscape now, a place where the past and present comes together to create a better future. In this book you will learn just what this NewPub world is, how to adapt to it, and change the way you think about everything.

The Rules Have Changed!

You can do anything! The Pulp Mindset will help you adapt to this crazy climate and become the best artist you can be. Read on and join the revolution!

It's not so much a change as a return. The days of the Pulps were a time of fast writing, fast publication--even with the lag-time that magazine production then entailed, we are still light-speed fast--and that meant a laser-like focus on craftsmanship, acumen, and satisfying what the audience demands of a given magazine. This was a day of widespread social acceptance via a diverse marketplace of pulps, from stories on sports heroes to salacious takes of rakish air aces flying mercenary missions between the World Wars while avoiding the dangers found in the fast femme fatales such locales attracted and so much more. Then John Campbell came along and wrecked it for Muh Literary Respectabilitiy (and more) because Reasons.

That time's returned thanks to Amazon breaking OldPub's hold, a hold it first got thanks to Campbell, on genre fiction in particular and especially the fantastic adventures of science fiction and the cautionary morality plays of horror. Now the enterprising author needs no agent or editor playing Commissar to get on the shelves. He can go directly to his audience and satisfy their wants, and the result is a new explosion of entertainment-focused fiction that OldPub increasingly abandoned in favor of gaslighting propaganda pushes. The ongoing collapse tells the tale, as does the continued campaign to corrupt Amazon as OldPub was generations ago.

This is a fantastic time to be a writer if you're not one of those feted by OldPub, which is almost all authors wanting to actually entertain an audience instead of grind Good Boy points with people who hate them. JD's new book is all about how to get into the mindset needed to not just survive in this wild and energetic frontier, but to thrive within it and make it work for you. After that, there's some very practical things to do--starting with writing the books--but being in the right headspace makes all of this easier to make real. JD's not going to steer you wrong. His post on this is quite the read; if you're still on the fence, read his post and then decide to buy his book or not. Even if you decide not to join the party, you can still enjoy the wealth of new entertainment available and support those of us making it. Speaking of which...

Campaign Update: We're now at 70% to goal. Another Build-a-Mech Perk got claimed, so only three remain. Five Character Illustration slots and the Back Cover option also remain, with a new Perk coming when we meet the goal. Come over here to back "Hounds of Nimrod" and make it happen.