What Sword and Sorcery Magazines Look For — A Talk with Goblins & Galaxies Editor Charles Tyra

Added: 2026-05-08

[00:00:00]One of my favorite things about what I do here at the Arkinist is that I get to talk with a bunch of cool people who actually do things in the industry. A couple weeks ago, I got to talk with Charles Tyra, editor and chief of Goblins and Galaxies and Cosmic Horror Monthly. Hi everyone, I'm James, an author, editor, and the owner of The Archinist, an independent publisher dedicated to sharing excellent fantasy fiction. Goblins and Galaxies is genuinely one of my favorite Sword and Sorcery magazines out on the market today. They're rather new to the community, but they just funded on Kickstarter their second year of magazines. They're quarterly magazines, so one is coming out every 3 months, and the next four are ready to go with submissions opening up in May. So, if you are a sword and sorcery writer and you're hoping to learn how to get a leg up while submitting to magazines like Goblins and Galaxies and similar pulp magazines, I highly recommend you stick around and hear what Charles has to say about what he looks for in the submissions. But before we begin, I wanted to let you know that Goblins and Galaxies is still running on Kickstarter and they've just entered their final days. This is but another example of excellent Sword and Sorcery publications just killing it in the indie market.

[00:01:22]Readers want this. They want action and adventure. They want Sword and Sorcery to come back. So, let's help them finish strong. While you're taking a look at crowdfunding campaigns, go ahead and follow the literary fantasy magazine on Backer Kit. We're going to be launching in the summer and there's going to be plenty of options for people who have subscribed in the past and people who are new to the publication as a whole.

[00:01:46]All right, that's enough of all that.

[00:01:48]Let's get to the talk. Hey everybody, I'm here with Charles Tyra, editor of Goblins and Galaxies. And uh I'm not going to take up too much of more of your time. I'm just going to let him describe who he is to you.

[00:02:01]>> Hey, thanks for inviting me. I'm the editor and publisher of Goblins and Galaxies magazine. It's still pretty new. It launched last year through Kickstarter and did fairly well. And so this is kind of like the renewal where um with the campaign running right now is for the second year. It's a quarterly magazine, so it's going to be the second year is issues five through eight. But before that, I edited and published Cosmicor Monthly for about five or six years. And so that's really where where I started out. And this is the second branching off of that. So, Goblins and Galaxies is science fiction, sword and sorcery.

[00:02:40]Uh, is there like a special brand of sci-fi? I'm pretty familiar with the sword and sorcery end, but you know, what's your guys' specialty? What are what are you doing a little different than everyone else?

[00:02:50]>> Yeah, I do feel like everyone kind of has their own flavor for this kind of thing. My idea for what we're putting together is to have traditional sword and sorcery and then try to have dark fantasy and science fiction that incorporates some of the elements of sword and sorcery primarily like having lots of action and um a sense of adventure if we're going to pick up a dark fantasy or a science fiction story.

[00:03:18]So, a big part of my audience are Sword and Sorcery authors trying to find their start. They're they're seeing all these cool magazines coming up this and they're they're looking to to break in.

[00:03:31]What advice would you have for an author who wants to submit to Goblins and Galaxies or another similar magazine?

[00:03:38]What are what are you looking for? Even though we like to kind of like pay homage to the classics and I'm a like huge fan of the stuff that was going on like 100 to 80 years ago. We like to kind of have stuff that is in a similar vein but is utilizes modern storytelling. And then like beyond that, it really is about like for Gobbles and Galaxies, capturing that sense of an of adventure within the story. Um, regardless of the subject matter that they choose and having having it be very actionoriented, you know, even though we are like, you know, calling out sword and sorcery, things like that, you know, avoiding cliches and like tropes is definitely helpful, too.

[00:04:23]when you say modern storytelling, what are you what do you mean by that?

[00:04:28]>> So, like I said, even though I'm a fan of it, you know, a lot of the um old, you know, pulp stories, you know, I would say that it's kind of like not necessarily purple, but like the l the pros and the language would be real elaborate and kind of flowery. Um, and I typically look for saying the saying as much as you can and as few words as you can.

[00:04:53]>> What do you want from the sci-fi end of things? Uh, what what is compelling to you as far as like subject matter or I'm assuming you also want that clean, concise pros on that end of things as well?

[00:05:05]>> Yeah, I would I would say that that typically is something I look for across the board. It's hard to say like looking for specific types of stories. I would lean more towards speculative than like hard science fiction um for what we're going for and stories that manage to like combine the subg genres. What like I'm really looking like really interested to read stories that do that like well that do it creatively. Um, I mean I I do kind of feel like the most obvious combination of the two is steampunk and I haven't published too much of that, but I mean you can take like, you know, lots of like, you know, the the basics of sword and sorcery, you know, like combat, magic, weaponry, heroes, and I think I feel like you can put that into a futuristic setting as well, and it still works.

[00:05:57]>> You have experience, you said about six years doing cosmic horror monthly.

[00:06:02]Yep.

[00:06:02]>> Tell me tell me about that. What what was that like? Was that your venture or did you get hired on by someone else to do that?

[00:06:12]>> Yeah, that was my first venture that I took on by myself initially. Um, it evolved over the course of a couple of years. um starting as you know blogging about Cosmic Core in some way to producing a print magazine when I felt that there weren't too many options for that available and kind it really came down to Cosmoore being like my first love in the uh like fiction world. I grew up reading that kind of stuff like HP Lovecraft plus a handful of other writers that did it well at the time and so that's really where it started. So, are you still editing Cosmic Horror Monthly or have you passed it on to focus on Goblins and Galaxies?

[00:06:54]>> I edited that one for the first couple of years and then it started to grow and I brought on some more people to help out with that including uh Jolie Tumigin who's a really good editor. She started out, we did an anthology and that went super well and so I invited her to be the editor of that magazine uh roughly a year before I decided to kind of branch off and do Goblins and Galaxies. What are what are your goals for for Goblins and Galaxies? Are you are you just wanting to maintain the quarterly thing or do you have your your eyes set on some bigger prize down the line?

[00:07:26]>> Yeah, I think about this from time to time and you know what I would like this magazine and both magazines to look like five or 10 years down the road. I mean, I'd love for them to still be going.

[00:07:37]Obviously, it there kind of are a split of what I feel like weird tales did really well, which was a combination of fantasy and horror and weird fiction.

[00:07:47]Um, but I don't have any plans to like converge them. I would like to keep them both going separately. In terms of having more frequency, it kind of just depends on bandwidth. If the magazine stays alive and does well for a while, I would love to do more more often than uh quarterly, but I do foresee sticking to quarterly for at least a couple more years.

[00:08:11]>> Yeah, the quarterly model is already pretty tough. I mean, most magazines aren't doing that. Every now and then I see a monthly magazine like like Cosmicor Monthly is doing it and then there's there's a few others in the pulp realm of things. I'm I can't even imagine trying to keep my head on straight w with all of that. Um h how how do you how do you keep your head on straight doing a quarterly magazine or I'm I'm assuming you're doing some level of submission reading. Um if not at like the end of the train then somewhere further down the line. Walk me through your process.

[00:08:46]>> Yeah, it might be a little different than some others because submission reading is one of my favorite things.

[00:08:51]It's like I didn't really realize that when I started, but reading slush is something I love doing even still. So, I try to help out with that as much as possible. We usually split that into two rounds and then the second round is more heavily um myself and in the case of CHM Jolie. And then for gobbled and galaxies, we do have some slush readers helping us out. And then um like for a second round of final decisions that's all me.

[00:09:21]>> Do you work like do you have a day job on top of the publishing that you have to balance?

[00:09:26]>> I do. Um like fortunately I'm in software. So that's a I have a work from home situation. So I'm able to save at least the time that I would be commuting to an office where I can kind of just like switch between things and get some things done in the morning and in the evening. Um, I mean it helps to have some systems in place. Like definitely wouldn't have been able to start out with two magazines, but I learned a lot um for the first couple years of doing CHM and was able to slowly streamline some things and get kind of like a system going that I can rely on. And so that helps to not get burned out.

[00:10:07]>> Right. Right. Yeah. So with the magazines, so I'm assuming the the whole publishing practice that's your baby and then you have the magazines that are their own imprints. So is it something that you'd want to do full-time if you had the opportunity? Um or are you pretty happy, you know, splitting your time between your your day job and and publishing on the side?

[00:10:32]>> Yeah, I'm lucky to have a day job that I don't hate. Um, and so it it works well splitting it right now, but it is kind of like the dream. I would love to do publishing full-time.

[00:10:44]And I don't know. I guess the second magazine in some way is kind of a way to try to expand and maybe um get closer to that goal, but it could take a while.

[00:10:54]>> Yeah, I I have a lot of mixed feelings on that because uh I like my day job, too. It's not easy all the time to balance everything, but I I have a pretty good regiment of of waking up early and taking care of things and uh also I have a lot of free time at work often. I have my computer with me all the time which helps. So >> nice.

[00:11:15]Yeah, always have my head in in two places. And I would like to, you know, I I feel like I would like being full-time as a publisher or, you know, focusing on on doing stuff like that, but then I really admire the variety I get, you know, going into the office doing something that isn't writing related for a while and then uh and then I can come back and I don't know, it generates longing, right? It it makes me miss the fun part of what I do on the daily. The work life balance like how are you do you wake up early? Do you do you have time because you're in software you're able to to kind of pop on and look at things. How do you split up those two roles?

[00:11:57]>> Yeah, that's another good question. Um, kind of like you were saying, I amum, it's fortunately I'm a morning person.

[00:12:04]So, I get up pretty early, um, just kind of naturally and I'll get some coffee and just like sit at my desk right away and try to knock out two or three hours of publishing stuff before I start doing software.

[00:12:19]>> Nice. Yeah, you you're probably the first person I've met that has agreed with me on the morning person thing.

[00:12:25]>> Most I don't know very many others. It's an unpopular stance, but it's so liberating, right? You waking up I I wake up around between 3:30 and 4:30, which the last few weeks, I don't know.

[00:12:37]My body's just been telling me no. I' I've been sleeping in almost every day.

[00:12:43]I'm chronically behind six. So, >> Oh, hey. Hey, still um I I'm just I tell people all the time I'm crazy. I just >> teach each teach their own. Yeah, but I like the the before sunrise hours because I used to be when I was in high school and my early 20s, I was a huge um you know allnighter person. I just never went to sleep as a kid. You know, staying up late was kind of my only time I had to myself was the only freedom I had. So, I find that waking up that early is has the same appeal as staying up late, but except I get to drink coffee guilt-free and and then I feel good when I go to work uh most of the time.

[00:13:27]>> It's a great way to look at it.

[00:13:29]>> Yeah.

[00:13:31]Uh so, is there any writing of your own on top of publishing other people's writing?

[00:13:38]Yeah, that's one of those things where when I started out, it was kind of a side by side with my own writing goals and interests. And it kind of turned out that I enjoyed the process of running the first magazine, doing the editing, doing all the things that are needed for publishing that I kind of put writing aside and I haven't really done too much of that. I plan to get back to it though.

[00:14:03]>> Right. So your your enjoyment is coming more from working with other people and and getting these these products out.

[00:14:11]>> For sure. Yeah.

[00:14:13]>> Yeah. What what's your favorite part of that? Is it, you know, um when I when I'm working with I really love finding new talent, you know, people who didn't have a whole lot of confidence um or like it might be one of their first publications. And then uh I'll often something that the archinist does I feel like a lot of publishers don't is that personal touch that hey I'm the actual person who does this and I'm going to edit your story. I'm going to explain to you why I'm making the suggestions that I am. And I and I often get really positive feedback from that because the writers that really care will actually pay attention and they'll they'll learn something and then they come back and I can tell that they've gotten better. So that's always just such a vindicating moment. I do you have anything like that when you're when you're working with authors where it just warms your heart to to see them come back or see them improve? You don't really think, especially starting out, that, you know, you're going to be working with some of these writers a lot, like, you know, they you get a lot of the same people submitting. Um, because a lot of writers, they'll stick to one as a subgenre or a genre. Um, so you get to read a lot of their stuff and it's it's fun to see someone's writing evolve. And so I would say my favorite is especially if I've published a few short stories and like you see someone's kind of career coming along and they're coming out with an anthology. That's always really cool.

[00:15:48]Um I can think of a a couple where their this a person's first short story was with me and that's kind of a proud moment um to see them come that far.

[00:15:58]When I first started, I had a writer write me back it because when you when you just open your doors, nobody knows your name. Nobody you're you're wondering what what all the other publishers are doing to where they have way too much because I get 10 submissions a month. And I I remember so I would be quick to jump on things that I really liked in those first, you know, six months or so that I was open. And I remember somebody saying to me, "This is the quickest acceptance I've ever got."

[00:16:34]And I'm this has made my day. And I'm like, you know, that's really cool because that's not how it is anymore.

[00:16:42]>> Yeah. Yep. It's It was exactly the same that first open call. I don't remember exactly how many, but it was kind of going through reading them and then if I left something, it was like, "Okay, I got to get this before somebody else gets it."

[00:16:56]>> Um, it's just trying to get the best stories that you can. Um, and so yeah, like a couple more submission periods later and then it's, you know, hundreds of submissions. You got to read all of them. so you don't miss out on something. Um, and then it becomes a balancing act.

[00:17:10]>> Yeah. I find that when I'm submission reading, so I you like submission reading. I I like it sometimes. I like it when it's good.

[00:17:20]So often um we'll have our we have a whole volunteer team of submission readers. They do all the slush and then they pass it up to my managing editor who does the second stage. He's a lot pickier than I am. So then he will curate among those acceptances and then I get a much reduced list and I I sometimes will go and do the lower level like the lower tier readings as well and then I pass it up like anyone else would because I my emotions drive me when I really enjoy something because sometimes you really enjoy a story but then it's just not really like the the technical aspect of the writing is pretty lackluster and that could lead to a lot of labor for an editorial.

[00:18:04]That's all to say. I So, I pass it up the line just like anyone else. But when I when I get something, I find I've started really paying attention to my moods because if I'm reading something that nobody else has touched, I find that if I'm in a bad mood or I'm tired, I'm going to be a lot rder about it. So, I I try to recognize that and I will, you know, put it aside and say, I need to just come back to this because I'm I'm being kind of unfair in this moment. Do do you ever have situations like that where you can kind of feel like whatever is going on in your life is is maybe affecting your judgment as far as it being an editor um or the other way around like you're in a really good mood and maybe you're you're you say you yes preemptively to a bunch of things and and have to pair it back.

[00:18:51]>> Sometimes it's hard to tell because you like will read four good stories in a row and it's like oh my god do I have any idea what I'm doing?

[00:19:00]>> Yeah. they just they just happen to be there, however you're whatever order you're going through them. Um, but I have come across that where I have noticed, oh, like my I'm not in the right mindset for this. And so I typically I've come to the point where I have to like really schedule my time and decide when to do certain tasks. And so I try to do slush reading early in the morning where I'm kind of fresh for the day. Um, also I just I even though it's like it's early, it's pretty it's easier for me to focus rather than like in the afternoon or the evening.

[00:19:36]>> So that's kind of how it works for me.

[00:19:38]>> Yeah, reading in the morning I think is typically a good decision. Your your brain is more primed to accept new information and for focus. And I know if I'm going to be in a bad mood, it'll be after 3 p.m. typically.

[00:19:53]>> I mean, exactly.

[00:19:55]>> Okay. So, in submissions, what are your pet peeves? What are the things that people just keep doing and and you're like, why why I put it in the guidelines? Why do you keep doing this?

[00:20:06]Do you have any of those that keep coming up?

[00:20:09]>> Yeah, it's really one whenever someone whenever the manuscript starts with the first word of the story, no title, no by line, that bothers me.

[00:20:20]>> Like, it doesn't mean the story's going to be bad. I just really would like to read the title and the by line before I start reading the story.

[00:20:27]>> We we work from a a Google sheet that auto automatically populates with the form and uh I just put like a long paragraph answer for cover letter and I have since turned that into short paragraph.

[00:20:42]>> Yeah. because uh it was fine for a while with like our normal rotation, the people who submit to us all the time, but then we got featured on a on a blog.

[00:20:52]I I've never heard of it before, but apparently a lot of people read it cuz suddenly there was like, you know, 300 submissions out of nowhere. And uh and I couldn't a nonzero amount more than one just copied their entire CV from like 1975 onward. Oh my gosh.

[00:21:13]>> I'm just like, "Dude, I'm not going to read that. I got to read your story. You want me to read your CV instead?"

[00:21:22]>> Yeah. And I So, how do you feel about cover letters? Just out of curiosity, like I I get a little um a mixed feelings on them. I feel like they can make me a little biased. Like I almost want to root for somebody when I read something in their cover letter. I mean, how what do you think about that?

[00:21:40]>> Yeah. Uh actually what I typically do is read the cover letter after I read the story.

[00:21:46]>> Um because I have found some similar things with myself. I don't want to like prejudge. I also don't I used to ask for hey send me a like a a quick summary of what your story is about. But like we're not since I'm not publishing novels, it doesn't really do me as much good. Um, I'd rather just read the short story because it might turn out that the person's not good at writing a query or summary, but the short story is great.

[00:22:13]So, especially, you know, it's only up to 6,000 words. So, I typically try to just read that first and then I'll go back and see what they happen to put there if it any information is interesting or relevant.

[00:22:28]>> Yeah. And a lot of writers are unfortunately pretty bad with, you know, concise summary writing. Uh, you know, you ask somebody, "Hey, what? Pitch me your novel in one sentence." That's the perfect way to get someone to free up.

[00:22:42]>> Yeah, I' I've been that guy before. I my first time at a like a conference my first year of college and uh there was this I can't remember what his name was but he was like this surfer bro guy from a professor from Arizona State and uh I swear I don't know if he was but I swear he was wearing swim trunks. It was in Florida so he might have been.

[00:23:08]He's like yeah so what's your book about? And I just remember I can't tell you what I said, but I remember his eyes glazing over and just like his face falling and he's not listening.

[00:23:25]>> Yeah.

[00:23:26]>> Too many too many sentences. Also, that book wasn't very good. And I think this experienced individual was able to see that just from listening to me talk about it.

[00:23:36]>> I have been there. Um, before I was doing this, I wrote a novel and I had no idea how to write a pitch or a query and so it wasn't traditionally published.

[00:23:46]But it's just it's a different skill and it kind of makes sense with you know reading 80,000 words is a risk and a time investment. So you want to have an idea of what you're going to get versus you know a short story I can get through that in probably the average short story in about 10 or 15 minutes.

[00:24:05]>> 6,000 words. four to 6,000 words, correct? Or is it a little bit less?

[00:24:11]>> Uh, open to a little less. Try not to go over 6,000, though.

[00:24:15]>> Okay. Um, so what's your methodology there? Because I see word counts all over the place. And um, I've always been pretty lenient about it. And then I'm planning an anthology next year with with my managing editor. And usually we're 10,000 for the general submissions. And he tells me 4 to 8,000.

[00:24:37]I'm not budging.

[00:24:40]And I'm like, okay. All right. Uh, so what what's your what's your thought there? Four to or, you know, up to 6,000. Why that number specifically?

[00:24:51]>> Yeah, that's a good question. Um, it's kind of just over the past several years of doing this of reading and getting a grasp of what the pace is like at each kind of each thousand. There's no hard rule for that. Of course, you can have an 8,000word story that is super fast-paced, but that's I wouldn't say that's typical. And so I kind of have found that stories over 6,000 don't move at the pace that I would like for what I'm trying to do with Gobles and Galaxies.

[00:25:25]And so um have stuck to just sticking below that and it's worked out so far.

[00:25:30]>> Nice. And I imagine it makes your job a little easier with the reading. You know, you know that you always going to be within a pretty consistent range.

[00:25:39]>> Yeah. And then it helps to be able to plan. And I like to have a certain number or at least be able to plan how I'm going to, you know, like um where I'm going to put each story, how many stories for each magazine. It's easier to plan that way when I I know I don't have to work with, you know, an 11,000word story somewhere.

[00:25:59]>> Yeah, I I've run into that in planning my in 20 2026 issues. They're the December issue is the longest one, but it has the least amount of stuff in it.

[00:26:11]I almost like I want to put more in there, but every page is money. So, >> yeah.

[00:26:17]>> Uh, so, okay, tell me how you're distributing. Are you doing print on demand? Are you doing traditional printing?

[00:26:24]>> That's something that's kind of evolved over time, but like for this for this project, it's traditional printing. I have a a printer I work with locally in in the city where I live that does a good job. And so, I'll try to have an idea of how many issues I need. Going through Kickstarter makes that pretty easy.

[00:26:41]>> Yeah.

[00:26:42]>> And I can order the exact number and then I um ship those out.

[00:26:47]>> Is there like a minimum that you have to work with with that printer?

[00:26:52]>> Um I haven't really had to mess with that since I found them when CHM was pretty far along. And with the last Kickstarter, you know, we launched at I can't remember the exact number, but it was more than or around 150 print subscribers. And so the higher the number, the lower the cost per book, of course, but like there wasn't any issues with the initial print run there.

[00:27:19]>> Okay. 150. I've always heard around 250 is a a benchmark. So it's interesting that you're able to to do 150. I'll have to look into some local printers then.

[00:27:29]See if I can get that to fly.

[00:27:31]>> It makes a huge difference. Like as a publisher, I have used some of the like I don't know how what you would call it like a nation national printer. Um like it was in another state. Um like the cost kept going up every month and like the quality was decent but it was like every month significant hikes in the price and papers would become unavailable. Of course, I mean, some of that is launching a magazine, you know, in the years postcoid is how do you plan for that anyway? Um, but like the switch to the local printer is one of those things I wish I had known about and done sooner.

[00:28:11]>> I work with a company called Book Vault for most of my print on demand. And I'm getting to this point now where it's not making much more sense in the next year.

[00:28:23]We just did a a backer kit campaign a couple months ago. Yeah, last month.

[00:28:28]Yeah, last month. And I'm just at that threshold where I'm like, I really should be getting this offset printed cuz it's it would be a lot more affordable. And I I always get a little bit concerned about space cuz I I just actually last month went to like a 5x10 climate controlled storage unit. Before that, it was on the my basement landing.

[00:28:49]It just stacked up in boxes.

[00:28:52]>> Yeah. Um, but yeah, that Book Vault is great. I highly recommend them to anybody watching who's looking into print on demand. What I like is that it's it's no nonsense. You put in your ISBN number, if you um if you are a patron of one of their partners or whatever, they have promo codes where you don't pay anything for a listing fee and then you just order your book. You don't have to actually publish it. Heck, you don't even really need the ISBN. I I had a friend who just put together an anthology of short stories his D and D group made and he made six copies and sent them to his friends in hardcover with all their fancy things that they do and their their hard covers look amazing. I mean they do a really excellent job for print on demand. But yeah, I'll have to look into local printers because it's uh it's still expensive per on a per copy basis to do that do it that way.

[00:29:46]It is. That's kind of the issue with print on demand. I I do have some experience with book vault. I feel like they're great, especially for shipping internationally.

[00:29:55]>> Oh, yeah.

[00:29:56]>> Because if you're going to print, you know, if you're in the States and you're trying to ship AC overseas, that's it's hellaciously expensive. Um, and then Bookfall really helps with that.

[00:30:07]>> Yeah, Bookfall. I love they're just you just put in the address and they tell you what it'll cost. I I'm still trying to decode the whole, you know, Eldrich language of shipping across overseas and and giving people estimates on that. Um I on my direct sales website, I'm always having to update the shipping because I'm like, "Oh, I got an order in this country.

[00:30:32]Okay, let's see how that worked out. Oh, I'm barely breaking even. We got to raise that."

[00:30:37]>> Yeah.

[00:30:39]>> Yeah. That's that's pretty much been the the driving force for all of the price increases I've had to do over the past six years.

[00:30:46]>> Yeah. And magazines now, they are not they're not a cheap thing the way they might have been, you know, 50 years ago, >> right?

[00:30:54]>> They're almost like a luxury item. I mean, would you agree with that?

[00:30:58]>> I definitely would. Um although it's it's an interesting point because I do feel like there's at least you know a section of you know the reading population that has like going back the other way you know first everything was digital and digital was the coolest thing but I kind of feel like there are there's this a section of people that are kind of rebelling against the digital age going against social media and going against you know, everything being on a screen. Um, and so it's kind of nice to see. I'm one of those people. I like to hold a book in my hand. Um, that's part of why I have insisted on offering print the whole time.

[00:31:42]>> There there really is something special about a print copy in your book. I'm split between the two. I mean, I'm I'm definitely with you ide ideologically on um on deteathering from screens and uh and going back to a print medium, but then I'm also always thinking about like uh like with the archinist, I'm never I'm always trying to do things in an environmentally friendly way, >> right?

[00:32:10]>> So, eventually I want to move I I have to do bubble mailers right now because I'm just on such a tight budget. And then I just I'm looking at all this plastic in there. I'm like, "Oh god, I want to move over to more like recycled, you know, environmentally friendly packaging materials that will safely send books hopefully." That's another thing I'm worried about is bubble mailers. At least I know the stuff will get there, right? But so I think about like the the paper, you know, the clippings and and the things like that.

[00:32:39]And uh and the way I distribute ebooks is I always give people DRM free. you know, they can download the files. You know, I I still need to kind of strengthen my um internal infrastructure on my website so that this stuff gets automatically delivered. But ideally, I want if you buy a paper book, you also get the EPUB and the PDF because like why not? Why do you have to buy those things three separate times? It's ridiculous. Um I just heard some a podcast somebody said you could buy the EPUB, the print, or the PDF. I'm like, you have to choose between the two different digital files. What? That's insane.

[00:33:20]>> I've always offered those together.

[00:33:21]That's kind of been just like a basic thing for us.

[00:33:27]>> Um, I do agree with you. I think that, you know, like the the print typically is the flagship. I mean, if I feel like if you go if you chip in for a print, you should get digital. So, we've started doing that as well because I haven't always done that. Not necessarily on purpose.

[00:33:42]>> Yeah. And and it helps massage the way that like books are priced now because books are more expensive. Making books is more expensive. Just shipping things is more expensive. And and I don't really see this getting better as far as like when as time goes on. So like what I've seen around like with the death of the mass market paperback, it's being replaced by ebooks. So you know, I like offering the digital option for people who really need it financially. you know, uh, as far as I'm concerned, if anybody asks me, I will just give them whatever they're hoping to read because I mean, I just want them to read it. I I don't really care. Uh, other people might feel differently, but, you know, so that digital only is the the budget option. It takes the place of the of what paperbacks used to be, and now paperbacks are kind of more the the standard. And in the case of magazines, they are kind of premium. They have art.

[00:34:39]They're they tend to be bigger or smaller. U something something that sets my magazines apart is that they're pocket- sized because I spent a lot of time on the bus last year and I'm just lugging around these big books and I'm wishing like, man, I I wish I had something that I could fit in my pocket.

[00:34:58]Um >> doing a little bit different that is bringing the magazine into our current year because it's a different landscape than it ever used to be. we have to approach these things differently. So the point I was just making is, you know, my my feelings towards print. Uh I'm a big advocate and while also trying to stay conscious of, you know, um taking care of the environment, but we do prioritize our digital publications as well. And I'm working on reworking our mobile app, which is supposed to make reading the magazines digitally extremely easy. And this year the uh the mobile app will include Goblins of Galaxies.

[00:35:45]>> Oh, I really >> it was dedicated to Cosmic Horror Monthly. Um and it's an application once it's on your phone. Um you just you get instant access to all of the back issues that have been published. And so couple months from now, rough timeline, um, when we're able to re-release the mobile app, um, fixing a lot of issues it used to have, it's also going to include Goblins and Galaxies for reading.

[00:36:12]>> Oh, that's awesome. So, okay, tell me more about this mobile app. I didn't know that was a thing. Is that available for anybody to download or you said relaunch, so is it gone for right now?

[00:36:22]>> It's gone for right now. We had some some issues with there's a rule with Android apps that you have to, you know, push updates to them every so often or it looks like you're not doing anything even if your app is fully functional and it shuts down. Um, so we have had to like uh kind of start from scratch there. The original app um had some issues anyway and so went ahead and rebuilt the whole thing. the e-pug reader works a lot better than it used to. And yeah, so in addition to reading CHM, um we're gonna have a section for reading Gobles and Galaxies and then also old um public domain pulp magazines.

[00:37:02]>> Okay. Oh man, this keeps getting better.

[00:37:05]Uh okay, so is this like for subscribers or or like you download it and then you kind of get access to it in some other way? How do you plan on people using it?

[00:37:15]>> That's a good question. So, both magazines have a free version. Um, I've always called it the the light version of each magazine. Um, because each issue has roughly seven to nine stories. And so, the light version will have like four. Um, so that's what you can get as a sample each month or each quarter to read. And so by default, once the app is available, um it's not quite ready yet, but once it's available, you'd install it and you'd have access to all of those half-sized magazines. And then there's the option to subscribe or if you're already subscribed, you'd have the premium access.

[00:37:53]>> I try to kind of use like QR codes in the back of my magazines where where people can claim whatever digital reward comes with the book. Um, how are you planning on on dishing out that premium access? Like would it be a similar thing like you bought the the paper book so you have a code in the back or uh is it is it an email something simpler like that?

[00:38:17]>> Um, well this is one of those things because of my background in software and I've had to wire up a lot of stuff myself. So I track all of the subscribers and I they the mobile app is linked to a database. So if someone has subscribed through any of the channels that are available um the application will know about it.

[00:38:39]>> Nice. Yeah. So I'm not a software developer but I work in IT so I I think this is fascinating.

[00:38:47]>> Yeah. That's awesome.

[00:38:48]>> I'm very excited about it.

[00:38:51]>> So I assume that links up like with your website and everything. You you handcoded that and and have that all strung together.

[00:38:58]Now, unfortunately, I didn't like handcoding a website um was on the to-do list, but with what you can do with WordPress, it's almost like no need to reinvent the wheel. So, our website is a little more kind of traditional. It wasn't written from scratch, but a lot of our the processing, the distribution for digital magazines, it's all wired together with stuff that I've had to do because PayPal doesn't fit nicely with everything.

[00:39:25]>> Yeah. Okay. So, you didn't you didn't color in the site, but you put all the wires together underneath it.

[00:39:32]>> Yeah.

[00:39:33]>> That's neat.

[00:39:34]>> Yeah. I I learned how to do WordPress in a very weird way. I picked it up from a web designer who was working in my day job and uh kind of paired it with a I took one HTML, CSS, JavaScript class in college as an elective. And so, I don't know. I don't think this is how people are supposed to do it, but I I make everything from scratch and then I convert it to a PHP format and then I name it as a template and I just make my own theme on WordPress and I add the the template on there. It feels really messy, but then it just works so I just keep going with it. I I don't know. Does that sound like a like a totally crazy thing to do or >> It doesn't. Um, so I guess you reminded me the reason why I didn't write my website from scratch. Um, like when I was going to school, we I learned about PHP, which is what was used to develop WordPress, and I just don't like it very much. Um, I my day job is very different languages than that. And so there's not a lot of crossover. Um, but I know a handful of people that are able to do that and they're able to kind of do a lot of custom stuff within WordPress and they contribute plugins and I think that's really cool. But unfortunately, I've never delved into that myself.

[00:40:52]>> Yeah. Beyond that, WordPress is kind of an Eldrich language to me because it's just >> draconian.

[00:41:00]I I hate PHP too. I I mean I I understand the the HTML side of things. I I can do that by memory most most of the time. But then when it when I get to the WordPress integration, it's like all vibe coding. I just I'm just like I'm not a coder. I'm a writer. I'm just going to I need it to work >> right.

[00:41:22]>> And then it's like every other day I hear somebody I get a comment on YouTube, hey this thing on your website's broken. And I'm like how how is it where where are these things? But that's also a great thing that people will just let you know that because uh that's free QA right there.

[00:41:38]Yeah, and it certainly helps to know HTML when you're in publishing because for those that don't know, that's what an EPUB is. And so you have a little problem. It's a lot easier to look at and figure out what the problem is if you know what you're looking at.

[00:41:49]>> Hey, thanks Charles for taking the time to talk with me. I I forgot to mention it to you, but I I'm a happy backer of the campaign, so good luck. Uh >> I appreciate that very much.

[00:42:00]>> Have you funded yet?

[00:42:03]>> Actually, earlier today it crossed 100%.

[00:42:06]Um, so that was great. Um, hopefully it's just kind of coasting along and gets some of our stretch goals.

[00:42:13]>> Well, how can we find find you and Goblins and Galaxies? You know, what are the what are the plugs?

[00:42:19]>> Goblins & Galaxies.com.

[00:42:21]Um, we'll have all the links to everything we have going on, particularly the Kickstarter right on the front page. Um, that's where that's how I would find us.

[00:42:30]>> All right. Yeah, that's that's that's a good tip. So, go check it out, folks.

[00:42:34]Goblins and Galaxies on Kickstarter.

[00:42:36]They just funded, so you're getting your magazines. Uh, go for it.