DarkSider News: December 2024 - Events!

  

“I think books are like people, in the sense that they’ll turn up 

in your life when you most need them.” 

– Emma Thompson

Love on the Beach Central Coast 2024

Central Coast, NSW

7 December

will feature DarkSiders:

Keri Arthur

Lilliana Rose

Mila Young

Tickets 

Facebook group 

A Romantic Affair Book Signing Convention

Adelaide Entertainment Centre, Adelaide

18 January 2025

will feature DarkSiders:

Helen Walton - pre-order form

Leisl Leighton - pre-order form

Lilliana Rose

Tickets

Facebook group

Books In-Sight Melbourne

Q Events Melbourne

15 February 2025

will feature DarkSiders:

Khloe Wren

Lilliana Rose

M.J. Scott

Maggie Mundy / Maggie Rose

Tickets

Motorcycles, Mobsters and Mayhem Author Event

Dallas Texas, USA

15 March 2025

will feature DarkSider:

Khloe Wren

Tickets

Website

Facebook page

A Romantic Rendezvous

Australian Romance Readers Association (ARRA)

Multi city event

March 2025

will feature DarkSiders:

Brisbane

Bernadette Rowley

Donna Maree Hanson / Dani Kristoff

HM Hodgson

Melanie Pickering

Panel sessions

Our book boyfriends - includes Donna Maree Hanson

Behind the Story - includes - HM Hodgson

Sydney

Donna Maree Hanson / Dani Kristoff

Efthalia

Keri Arthur

Leisl Leighton

Panel sessions

Our favourite tropes - includes Donna Maree Hanson

When romance and danger collide - includes - Leisl Leighton

Melbourne

Cathleen Ross

Donna Maree Hanson / Dani Kristoff

HM Hodgson

Hellucy Howe

M.J. Scott / Melanie Scott

M.L. Tompsett

Michelle Somers / M.L. Winters

Nicole Hurley-Moore

Samantha Marshall

Panel sessions

Rural stories - includes Cathleen Ross and Nicole Hurley-Moore

Paranormal vs fantasy - includes Donna Maree Hanson, HM Hodgson & M.J. Scott

Real life in romance - includes M.L. Tompsett

Perth

Juanita Kees

L.A. Monteiro

Tickets now on sale

Facebook group

List of signing authors

Apollycon 2025

Gaylord National Resort & Convention Center, Maryland USA

10-13 April 2025

will feature DarkSider:

Mila Young

Tickets

Facebook group 

Website

RARE (Romance Author & Reader Event) 2025

London, UK

5 July 2025

will feature DarkSiders:

Keri Arthur

Khloe Wren

Tickets SOLD OUT

Facebook page (RARE)

Facebook attendee group

Dark Delights Book Signing Event

Brisbane

20 September 2025

will feature DarkSiders:

HM Hodgson 

Melanie Pickering

Mila Young

Tickets

Facebook page

RARE (Romance Author & Reader Event) 2025

Melbourne, VIC

4 October 2025

will feature DarkSiders:

Claire Boston

Keri Arthur

Lana Pecherczyk

LJ Swallow

M.J. Scott / Melanie Scott

Mila Young

TJ Nichols

Tickets 

Facebook page (RARE)

Facebook attendee group

Meet Your Next Book Boyfriend

Hunter Valley, NSW

22 November 2025

will feature DarkSiders:

Bernadette Rowley

Efthalia

Keri Arthur

Leisl Leighton

Lilliana Rose

Mila Young

Tickets - not yet available

Facebook group

Once Upon a Fairytale

NSW

10 October 2026

will feature DarkSiders:

Efthalia

Mila Young

Tickets not on sale yet

~~

Congratulations to our DarkSiders!

Happy Reading everyone. Be safe & well.

Next on the DarkSider News: New Releases & Sales

Magic Thursday: Subscriptions, sustainability and sausages... with TJ Nichols!

About six years ago I had a Patreon where at the end of each episode readers could vote on the direction the story took…I wrote one story that way (Hood and the Highwaymen) but by the end I realized that while it was fun it wasn’t sustainable for me. So I shut the whole thing down*. 

Last year I tried three new things, and they all ended up launching around the same time: Kickstarter, selling direct and re-starting a subscription. I considered going back to Patreon, but people have gotten their accounts shut down for posting NSFW content, so I went with Ream** as it was built for authors and handles the taxes. I also like the way that I can add to a story, and it is all in one place instead of spread across several posts. 

Why would an author want a subscription, after all it is another thing to do on top of writing books, marketing, writing newsletters, creating ads, cover art, audiobooks etc?

Subscriptions can provide a monthly income smoothing out new release bumps, as well as a place to interact with readers. However it’s important to think about how you approach it and what you are promising so that it is sustainable because I learned the first time, sustainable and fun are not the same thing. 

This time I did a stack of research before starting up my Ream account to see what other people were doing, and charging, while also working out what I wanted to do and was able to do. 

Depending on the tier subscribers get ficlets of existing characters, character art, plotting notes, WIP chapters as I write them (because some people like to see how the sausage…book…is made), and completed books before anyone else (either on Ream, or in ebook, or print). I’ve joined in group promos that had a story prompt and ended up writing two novellas that were not on my yearly plan (Werewolves and other Worries and Minotaurs and other Magic), but I had great fun doing them. 

For me having the subscription has been an incentive to create additional content that can then be repurposed at some point down the line. At first those two extra novellas could only be read on Ream, one I released in my store last month and the other is releasing next year. 

And the other two things I tried last year? I’m planning a third Kickstarter for January next year and my store is going great. Do I recommend doing everything at once, no. 

*In hindsight I probably should have changed what I was doing and let it continue to grow, but at the time I didn’t know what I was doing. Subscriptions are a slow growth thing, unless you are an author with a huge following. 

**Ream, as in a ream of paper. However since I write MM romance there is a delightful double entendre that I made full use of when naming my tiers…the first one being ‘show me the sausage’. 

Check out my experiments:
Ream | Kickstarter | Shop

Latest release

Phoenix Found

Book 5, Brothers of Fire

He wants to spread his wings...but can he trust them when he's never been allowed to fly?

Perrin Shade’s family has worked for the phoenix shifters for hundreds of years. It was always assumed he would do the same. But as his thirtieth birthday approaches, the restlessness he’s kept hidden grows. He only knows Mont de Leucoy. He’s never had a chance to explore the world. But there is a reason his family sought sanctuary in the kingdom…

He is the kind of paranormal being that many would like to forget exists. The kinds that even paranormals hunted.

A ghoul.

Oliver has spent the last ten years being told that he is a danger to others. That the Coven would hunt and kill him if they found him and that his parents abandoned him. Now, he is being told that is all a lie.

He is a phoenix shifter and his brothers have been searching for him. They claim to know him, but how can they when he doesn’t know himself?

They have their history, their duties, and their expectations. He should be embracing all of this, but instead, all he wants to do is leave before the weight of the past crushes him. The only person who treats him as if he isn’t broken is the castle handyman, Perrin.

Can a man who is really a monster help the man who is convinced he is a monster learn how to live and love?

This is the last book in the Brothers of Fire series.

Buy

Ebook - Amazon

Ebook - author store 

Paperback - author store

TJ Nichols

TJ Nichols is the author of the Studies in Demonology, Mytho and Familiar Mates series. They write gay fantasy and paranormal romance, but sometimes gay action/horror as Toby J. Nichols. With the Studies in Demonology and Mytho series translated into French, and Familiar Mates translations in the works in French, Italian, and German. TJ’s stories about love and acceptance have found an avid readership. After traveling all over the world, TJ now lives in Perth, Western Australia.

Visit TJ's website:  tjnichols-author.com

TJ also writes action/horror under the name Toby J Nichols.