jameslsutter

I'm with Ryan--a thousand duck-sized horses would make my wife squee with delight as they delicately trampled me to death, which I feel would help her cope with the loss.

About two feet long, kind of dry and scaly. Its been in the backpack for a couple of days, but every time I try to get it out, it latches on with this toothy little snout. I... I think it's a dwarf caiman? Or something?

At least for me, the MOD success was totally unexpected! In fact, for a long time, it seemed like it might not come out at all--I think it was something like three years between the time the story was submitted/accepted and when the book actually came out. As a contributor, that sort of lag time with an anthology usually means the project is dead. Thankfully, that wasn't true this time!

When David/Ryan/Matt announced their plan to make the book a #1 Amazon bestseller, I was excited, but when it worked... well, I was at a science fiction and fantasy publishing industry conference when it happened (I work as one of the main creators for the Pathfinder RPG), and it seemed like everybody around me was talking about it. Here was this totally independent anthology that had come out of nowhere and taken the #1 spot through grass-roots organization--people were fascinated! (And of course, having Glenn Beck go off on us publicly for knocking him out of the top slot was pretty awesome as well.)

In terms of the success spilling over into other projects... it's really hard to tell, especially because I had only published short stories up until that point. I know I've definitely heard from people who've bought my novel (Death's Heretic) because they liked my MOD story, and vice versa. And being able to put #1 Amazon Bestseller on your resume certainly makes people take notice when you're trying to get work for hire.

Really, though, I think the biggest ramification of MOD for me has been social! I've always been a webcomics fan, but even though I work in the gaming/publishing industry, I didn't really get to interact with the comics crowd much. Getting to know David, Matt, and Ryan has been really cool--they really are just as nice as they seem on the internet--and through them I've also made a bunch of other awesome comics friends that I never would have met otherwise!

I loved the book, and found the arguments for open borders really compelling! At the same time, it seems like various nations have been experiencing a lot of social unrest recently centered around refugees and immigration. ("What about all the refugee problems in France?" is the first objection I hear when explaining the book.)

Even if much of the unrest is a case of people latching onto foreigners as scapegoats for unrelated problems, how do we deal with the fact that irrational prejudice against immigrants *creates* culture clash, which then retroactively justifies the prejudice? How do we stop the cycle of exclusion and nativism?

Hey MOD authors! If folks liked your stories, where can they find more of your work? What else have you done?

(Cherie and Robert--I figure everyone probably knows how to find you two, but feel free to chime in!)