News: Don't Do Creepy Stuff Simon & Schuster 100 years Spotify Audiobooks blowing up! Storyfair Partnering with Blackstone Tools: Health Creatives on F.I.R.E.: Savings Rate Realistic Expectations

Author, poet, and actor, Chris M. Arnone joins the pod this week to celebrate the release of the latest book in Cyberpunk series, Necopolis Alpha. News: What up with all the World Con Hugo Drama? Penguin Random House to sell and distribute Wattpad WEBTOON Libro.fm & best selling authors donate profits to support independent booksellers Publishers fire metaphorical cannons at pirates New scam! Yay! Writing Tools: Chris shares his love of whiteboards and laser printers Creatives on F.I.R.E.: The least you need to know about traditional publishing Recap of the Trinity Study and a personal example from Phill on how it might not be as daunting as it seems

Author, poet, and spooky stuff podcaster Becca Harris joined the pod this week to talk all things writing! And to help J.H. pick on Phill. News: SFWA has announced dates for the Nebulas Holiday book sales soar The Los Angeles Public Library becomes a publisher Blackstone Unlimited AI News: Fairly Trained Insight Book Mimics Tools: Scrivener - but this time we air our dirty laundry Creatives on F.I.R.E.: The Trinity Study The indie path - the least you need to know

Award winning author and writing coach Sherry Peters joined us this week to fire off the first pod of the year! She tells us all about her Mabel the Lovelorn Dwarf series, winning a Writers Digest award, what it was like living in Northern Ireland, what being a writing coach is all about, and more! News: Tor.com is changing its name to Reactor Barnes & Noble to open more stores! Library Audiobook lends up 23% last year! January 1st was Public Domain day What can authors learn from Wattpad's reader research? A.I. News: An A.I. novel won 2nd place in a competition in China The New York Times has raised a suit agains OpenAI & Microsoft Writer Tools: ReMarkable Creatives on Fire: A 2nd path to achieving my dreams The 2 paths - Trad or Indie

Pod favorite authors Julie Jones & Shayne Easson return this week for a deep conversation about setting goals, achieving goals, failing goals, and getting real with ourselves. And from the Future Best Seller crew to you, we wish everyone Happy Holidays and the best of luck in the new year! News: Review Bomb Fail Penguin Random House Acquires Hay House

Nebula winning author William Ledbetter joins us this week to celebrate the release of his latest novel, Level Seven in his Killday series. But that's not all he's celebrating. Bill also joins us to celebrate retiring early to write full-time! A big congratulations to Bill from the Future Best Seller crew! News: How many people read books on their smart phones? Oddest book title of the year? Barnes & Nobles sunsets Nook Reading app for Windows Bookwire's audiobook service, WAY, or We Audiobook You, goes to English, Brazilian, & Spanish Markets Amazon sunsets Comixology app AI News: The Authors Guild's survey on generative A.I. **LINK** How to identify A.I. books on Amazon Kindle Unlimited The Association of American Authors submitted a 2nd round of comments to the U.S. Copyright office regarding A.I. Tools: Portable Monitors >> Link to the portable monitor Phill has and mentioned on the episode Creatives on F.I.R.E.: We celebrate Bill's retirement from the day job! Bill gives us a bit of his villain origin story and some advice about not giving up

He's the nicest person we know! Shayne Easson joined the pod this week to share some wisdom and hard lessons learned with his first novel. News: Writer Beware has some new solicitors they want us to beware of. See what we did there? A Christmas tree made out of... Books? Another Witcher book! AI News: Sports Illustrated and our robot overlords Tools: Critique Groups. - Shayne shares the value he's found in his group and how they've all grown as authors Atlantis - Shayne shares how he uses a different word processor for editing Creatives on F.I.R.E.: Shayne tells us about owning his own business and how the lessons learned there translate to his author business

Author Louisa Morgan joins us this week to talk about all things writing, as well as her career as an opera singer, telling ghost stories on TikTok, and of course, her latest novel - The Ghosts of Beatrice Bird. News: Kobo turned in the their Book Report. Spoiler alert - Canadians read a lot Airport Libraries? Amazon Author Pages get their groove back Draft2Digital celebrates releasing 1 Milly books AI News: Amazon using AI to spot fake reviews Spotify to utlize Google's AI to make recommendations Tools: Keeping it simple Writing Sprints

Updates on NaNoWriMo and our thoughts on series fatigue. News: Spotify launches 'free' audiobooks for Premium subscribers Amazon KDP puts out an update on the recent category changes The book club that spent 28 years reading one title Like Smokey the Bear said, only you can prevent review bombing! Tools: Dictation. Shuddup and listen, and then... Don't shuddup. Creatives on F.I.R.E.: Buckets for bucketing and some thoughts on checking & savings accounts

NaNoWriMo makes Phill a NaNoWhiNo. Never call real-life Axel in a crisis. News: Gen Z & Millenials & Libraries A friendly holiday reminder from the Zon The Zon goes after scammers Simon & Schuster is single AI News: SFWA sends a letter to the U.S. Copyright Office A message for the Prime Minister The Zon does a beta for A.I. audiobook narration Tools: The majestical Con Box & Book Box Creatives on F.I.R.E. NaNoWriMo - What are you trying to achieve? Annual enrollment & insurance things Phill plays with a YoYo ***No YoYo's were harmed in the making of this episode