To not write

I’m back from vacation and for the first time that I can remember I got absolutely no writing done. I always vacation in the Florida Keys and I always spend many hours sitting by the water creating, but this time I didn’t. Why?

I used to be obsessed with hitting the big-time with my books. I dreamed that I’d be that one percent of one percent of writers who actually earn a living from their craft. I spent years sitting inside writing when the weather was beautiful outside. I’ve sacrificed and sacrificed to achieve my dream… but at what cost?

Now that I am older and far wiser than my younger days, I’m beginning to believe that enjoying our limited time on this celestial realm may be more important that the sacrifice needed to achieve fame. I explore this concept deeply in my best-selling book DROP OUT, but hadn’t applied my own ideals to my real life until this vacation. Did I feel guilty not writing? Yes, but that guilt was assuaged by the happiness I felt walking along the beach among dunes and palm trees. Happiness that no amount of money can buy.

Of course, now that I’m back the writing will commence at a feverish pace. I’m hoping to finish my dystopian novel before the long lazy days of summer tempt and drag me away from my craft. I’d also like to report my results with BookGorilla. The promotion did make a profit and did give me good exposure, however, I heard they recently raised the price and may not be as selective with the titles as before. I have another promotion with them for SILENT INVASION on April 22. We’ll see how that goes.

I’m also experimenting with the sales power of Twitter and signed up for a promotion from Booksandauthors.com. They Tweet DROP OUT’s blurb three times a day on their account. They have over 170,000 followers. After two weeks, I’ve seen no real results from this promotion as sales of DROP OUT remained steady until the BookGorilla promotion gave sales a boost and got the book down into the 4,000 range on Amazon’s best seller list. It has since returned to @ the 150,000 range even though the Twitter promotion is still running. I’ll post my final analysis of these promotions soon.

Great day!

Great day of sales. Almost got below 5,000 ranking.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B005FX0K7U

20 books an hour!

Great promotion is Bookgorilla.com from Kindle Nation Daily. Selling 20 books an hour right now. Hope it keeps up.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B005FX0K7U

Book Gorilla is working

Right now my novel DROP OUT is being sponsored on Bookgorilla.com, a subscription only newsletter newly developed by Kindle Nation Daily specifically designed for readers looking for quality books… and it is working. The book is selling! 

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B005FX0K7U

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B005FX0K7U

Promotions

Been working hard on my latest manuscript (still untitled) though the Easter weekend did muff up my writing schedule a bit. I also have a big promotion coming up for DROP OUT on April 4^th with KND’s new Book Gorilla newsletter. I paid extra to be on the premier front page and be exposed to @ 20,000 opt-in readers. Will it be profitable? I guess we’ll see. I need to sell 150 books to recoup the cost.

I’m also trying a new promotion with a site called BooksandAuthors.net. I paid to have DROP OUT ( http://www.amazon.com/dp/B005FX0K7U ) its description and Amazon link tweeted on their Twitter site three times a day for one month. They have 180,000 followers, so I only need a small percentage to purchase the book to earn out. I also think the exposure from both promotions is going to be huge. The tweeting promotion started four days ago and I have already noticed a slight increase in sales.

It’s the beginning of the month again and authors who sell through Amazon know what that means, the dreaded brown bar of zero sales as the book stats reset. With the impending nice weather, I anticipate a new batch of readers aching to grab their Kindles, find a quiet, comfortable spot under a shady tree, and get lost in one of my books. Let’s hope so.

Sleep well manuscript

It finally happened. I reached the end of my creative juices on my latest novel. At 25,000 words in, I’ve had enough. The book started well enough. I had a great idea and I feverishly wrote the first draft in under three weeks. I let it sit for a few days while I visited the Jersey Shore and then pulled it back onto the screen anxious and excited to begin the revision process. And then thunk!

Plagued by writer’s block for the last two weeks, I’ve been spending my morning writing time agonizing over the draft. The story is strong, the characters lively, and the setting fantastic… so what’s my problem?

Perhaps, it’s the oncoming nice weather, or the fact that I’ve come up with another new, fresh idea for a book (a philosophical thriller). I don’t know. But what I do know after writing twelve novels, nine of which are published, is that when I lose interest in a project it only results in flat writing and a boring story if I continue. I learned this lesson the hard way after writing three novels that I struggled to finish over a span of years only to realize that they weren’t very good. A combine twenty-seven months of work shoved into a closet drawer for eternity.

There’s nothing worse than realizing the drive to continue this book is dwindling and the joy of writing this book is waning away. It’s a good book by all standards (great plot, action, and suspense) except my own. As the itch to start a new project tickles in my mind, I feel both sad and relived (because I’m only three months into this project and haven’t wasted too much time) that this latest novel needs an incubation period before I continue with the revisions. I think that’s what separates the consummate writer from the wannabe; knowing when to move on.

So, as I put my latest manuscript to rest in the drawer with the others for who knows how long, I’m feeling the excitement, anxiousness, and commitment of starting yet another project. Writers get better with time and experience, and although my latest novel may never be finished or may become a bestseller in the future, I realized for my own sanity that for now, I need a new world to live in and new characters to meet.

Sleep well my unfinished manuscript, may you someday see the light of day again and come fully to fruition. For now, it’s time to start another new novel. I can feel my fingertips tingling already.