I'd been playing with the idea for a while, and even went as far as to make my page last April to avoid Patreon's percentage hike if I ever decided to go through with it. And, a few weeks ago,
I finally did.
Writing is a huge passion of mine - you probably noticed - but it takes such a very large amount of time, passion and energy to produce anything I can sell, and I need to live in the mean time. So I decided Patreon might be a good way of both financially supporting my writing a little more, and bringing readers in on the process.
I want to keep my tiers simple and affordable, so I only plan on having 2 true tiers at this point - $1 and $3 - and a couple of higher-priced tiers later on for one-off rewards that patrons aren't expected to keep supporting (ie pledge once, get the custom reward, then drop back to a lower tier or leave entirely). I'm still working on those higher tiers, but my lower tiers are more important to me anyway.
Along with the below rewards that distinguish one tier from another, all patrons will get early access to news, cover reveals, and an inside look at the writing/creating process. They may also be subjected to my more personal writing woes. Sometimes a character winds me up, and I just have to vent. I will also need beta-readers from time to time, and patrons will absolutely be my first port of call.
Library Moth - $1 a month
As of right now, there is only one tier available -
Library Moth, $1 a month. This tier gives you monthly access to
1-4 raw snippets from my current work, usually something I wrote that very week, but that are chosen deliberately to avoid any spoilers (and will therefore impact whether I can share them weekly or not). These snippets won't be shared anywhere else, they're exclusive to patrons; no one else will see them until they find them in the books themselves, once released.
There will also be a desktop wallpaper featuring a quote from my books - meaningful, or funny. These will be emailed out every month.
This $1 tier is, ultimately, just a way for able supporters to contribute, and can join, cancel, and re-join at any time. There are no hard feelings at all. Money shifts; circumstances change.
Archivist - $3 a month (coming June)
There will, around June, be a second tier available -
Archivist, $3 a month. This tier will give the same rewards as the $1 tier, and will also provide
2-week early access to a monthly short story, which means that the story will be made available to everyone else 2 weeks later, so non-patrons won't miss out on those. These short stories may be book-related (but
always written as a stand-alone, so no one will feel like they're missing crucial information), or they may be completely random.
But - and I'm excited about this - it will also include exclusive access to my research every other month. This can generally be anything. I love to learn, I love making notes, and my research always gets out of control, so I definitely have some things to share. I research for my books, as well as for short stories, and can be about things like the moon, folklore, isolated cultures, crocodiles, wind, warfare, survival, tracking - the list is endless. Anything I need to research, I can share - and, like I said, I always go too far.
The research won't include notes on how I've used it, it will just be fact, and that can be put to use by other writers, aspiring writers, or even artists creating OCs and cultures. You can read it and learn, or you can apply it to your own creative channels. That's what's so great about learning.
Future Tiers
Future tiers will be more expensive because they will require a significant chunk of time for each individual, but they will result in one-off rewards such as a critique on a few pages of your own writing, or perhaps a custom short story (with full creative license).
Because these will be one-off rewards, the patron isn't expected (and is in fact advised not) to keep pledging after that initial month.
