How An Ice Pick Doubled My Sales

So, the craziest thing has happened to me. It took me a while to sort out all the pieces, but in a nutshell, on my birthday some person (whom I will not name, but I do know who it was) did her best to sabotage my books. She found my birthday on facebook, wrote two rather hateful reviews, found a friend to post them for her so I wouldn't know who had done it, and then waited till my birthday to have her friend buy and return each of my books (no doubt so she would register as a 'verified purchaser'), and post both scathing 1 star reviews. Did I mention they waited till my birthday to post them? That was a nice touch, don't you think? It's kind of like the difference between shooting someone and stabbing them 53 times with an ice pick.

(Insert creepy sound effect from Psycho...)

It was pretty obvious right off the bat that the reviewer hadn't actually read the books, because they cited some pretty major inaccuracies (like calling the second book religious propaganda when religion isn't actually mentioned in the book), but it took me a while to sort the whole thing out. Even despite the clues and one kind-of-obvious link, the list of people who might hate me this much is pretty short - like one-person short. And to think I'd felt guilty for wondering if she was the type to go on and leave me a bad review...

(In case you're wondering, I edited her book for her, and she wasn't really ready to hear what needed to be said. She told me a million times how awesome, amazing, and thick-skinned she was, so I was pretty worried about it from the get-go. The sad thing is, I didn't think her manuscript was bad at all for a second draft, but I could tell she wasn't getting that from me. Second drafts from a first-time author are always rough, but the makings of a solid, original story were there, and I'm actually pretty confident that she has what it takes to work it into a good book - which can't  be said for the majority of first-manuscript writers and their second drafts, which is why so many first novels are never salvaged. Unfortunately, I think I offended her when I suggested that her rewrite might be more time-consuming and extensive than she thought it would  be, and when I told her it wasn't ready for a professional edit. And who knows what else I may have done to offend her. Too bad she didn't just tell me. Then I could have apologized and all this retributive hate wouldn't be necessary. What a thought, eh?)

But 1 star reviews happen to pretty much everyone (although one generally hopes they're of the sincere, honest variety), and I'm certainly not going to go on the attack in the comment box (although I did have to hold back a few of my friends, who were chomping at the bit to go leave her a piece of their minds). There's really no point in trying to combat reviews that you can't get rid of, and in the end it just generates bad press. Instead, I resigned myself to the harsh reality of the situation and hoped people would notice how generic and overly-spiteful the reviews sound.

Then my sales doubled.

Seriously. In the two days since she posted those reviews, my sales have doubled. They've been pretty consistent for about the last three weeks, and were actually starting to taper off a bit, but on the day after my birthday they totally took off. I don't know if it's because her reviews have made people curious about the book, or because I'm being blessed with good karma for trying not to let her personal problems get to me, but whatever is going on, I'm tempted to send her a thank you note!

And so, today's message is that if you get a 1 star review, let it pass. Don't worry about it, don't go on the attack, and don't feel like the future of your book is doomed (and watch for an uptick in your sales, apparently). Do read it carefully and look for elements of truth, however, because ideally the person who wrote it actually read your book and may have something valuable to say. 

I'm certain that if my detractor had read mine she would have been able to come up with substantive critique, and who knows? Maybe she would have pointed out something that I could have changed or learned from? After all, there will be people who find the inherent faults in my books, or who simply don't care for them. It's a given. Someone will read Laryn's story and find it a complete waste of their time, because no book appeals to everyone. Heck, for all the great feedback I've received, my own mother thought the third quarter of Laryn Rising was a snooze fest, and continually tells people, "Oh, the second book is much better. I loved the second book." Thanks, Mom.

The thing is, I knew Laryn Rising wouldn't appeal to her. It's a story about personal, internal struggle, and that sort of thing bores my mom. She reads mysteries and historical fiction, and prefers the plot-driven story over the character-driven one, and that's okay. If there's one thing I've learned through all the editing I've done, it's that there is value in all honest critique, and we should embrace it. I've also learned that not everyone is ready to do this. I can say that I care a lot about the clients I take on, and whether she (my 'reviewer') realized it or not, I did not spend hours and hours agonizing over her story without becoming invested in it. I think about it all the time, and wonder how she's doing with it and what her rewrites look like. I admit that I was blind-sided by her actions, but I do still want her to succeed, and I honestly hope the best for her book - I just wish she realized that, and it makes me sad to know that I failed to convey my sincere interest in her project. The fault there had to be mine, and that's something I think I'll always regret.

(Still, the doubling of my sales just might make up for it...)

Guess What?!?

Finding Shemballah, Book 2 in the Chronicles of Nequam, is now available on Amazon! And can I say that it feels soooo good to finally have it out there? Getting it to this point was a little easier than publishing Laryn Rising, mostly because I at least this time I kind of knew what I was doing. (Or, more precisely, I knew which things I couldn't do myself and who would do them for me...)

Now that the book is out and I can relax, I've been looking back over this journey with some bitter-sweet feelings. I admit it, I love Laryn. I wish I were more like her (and no, despite what my mother might say we are nothing alike). Regardless of how exciting it was to finally write 'The End' for book two, it's been hard to say goodbye to these characters. As I've mentioned before, my current project is juvenile fiction and although I'm having a blast writing it, I truly loved the emotional intensity of writing Laryn. With that said, I thought it would be fun to share some of the inside story behind the writing of these two books, so here we go...


Ten Random Facts About Finding Shemballah:
1. I never intended for Laryn's story to take two books.

2. You know the 'Big Decision' Laryn has to make in Laryn Rising? It was never part of the original storyline. When I realized there was no way Laryn and her sisters could assimilate fast enough to get them off the ship according to plan (i.e., without ending up with a giant, doorstop-sized tome), I had to scramble, rethink, and risk ruining everything in order to split the story into two books and make a complete story out of their journey to Nequam. In the end, I think it was the best decision I made.

3. Inventing a new planet is kind of hard. Don't believe me? Stop right now and see how long it takes you to design, AND NAME, three alien species. Go ahead and try it. If you have any success, leave your new creations (with full details) in the comment box because I'd love to see them. Let's just say I have a whole new respect for the writers of Star Wars, lol.

4. Plymouth was originally named Republic (hence the name for the colonial money being 'pubs', which is short for publicans), but then some astute readers pointed out that I had 'Republic' and 'The Federation', which was a bit too Star-Wars-ish. I still like Republic better, and I never did get used to calling the people of Plymouth 'Plymouthans', although that is the accepted name for 'People from Plymouth'. Who knew?

5. Alistair is my favorite character in Finding Shemballah. (Aside from Laryn, of course.)

6. When I realized I could no longer call book two Republic (see fun fact #4) I almost named it Promise Bound. But despite the great reviews I got on that option, it sounded too much like the title of a cheesy romance to me, and every time I considered it Fabio appeared in my head...

7. I have eleven full revisions of Finding Shemballah. Seriously.

8. The first draft was almost 250,000 words long. The final is around 170,000, which means I cut EIGHTY THOUSAND WORDS!!! out of this manuscript. (I hope all my editing clients read this. It might make them feel better, lol.)

9. There is a map for this book, but since I drew it myself it kind of looks like a 5th grader's geography project. Needless to say, it isn't currently included. Unfortunately, I have no idea where to go to find a map drawing person (cartographer?), so until I figure that out this book will remain mapless. This kind of makes me really sad because I LOVE maps! I even have a whole pinterest board dedicated solely to really cool book maps. (Does that make me weird?)

10. The inspiration for this entire series came from laziness. I love historical fiction. I love stories about American colonial life and all the challenges and adventures that went along with leaving the known for the unknown, and I always wanted to write historical fiction. Then I went to college, majored in History, realized how much research a person would have to do to write successful historical fiction, and promptly started trying to figure out a way to write history without all the research. Besides that, the idea of people from the future having to live in a pastoral world kind of captivated me. In the end, however, creating a whole world and all the creatures and places in it wasn't nearly as easy as I thought it would be, and there were days when I was absolutely positive that there wasn't another name, description, or 'fun fact' about Nequam in my head. Period. But in the end, I managed to come up with a story that, to me, illustrates that when push comes to shove human beings are amazingly strong and resilient, and as a society they will nearly always rise to the occasion.

Thank you to everyone who has shared Laryn's story with me, and to all the people who helped me along the way! I appreciate every time my books are reviewed, pinned, shared, tweeted, emailed, or talked about, because without all of that no one would even know they exist. Such is the world of the self-published, but I truly believe that if a book is good enough the world will find it.

Invisibility. It's Such a Drag.

Don't you think? Well, thanks to Amazon's free promotions, for the next 48 hours Laryn Rising will be blessedly visible as a free book on Amazon. I really don't know how readers find books on promotion. It's like this big, magical mystery that completely evades me. If I were to go on Amazon right now and try to find my book listed as free-for-today, I would be lucky to find it.

Yet there are all these Amazon wizards out there who will not only find it, but download it. And they'll do it at all hours of the day and night. It's crazy, they're crazy, and I love them.

I've had a lot of people ask me lately about marketing my book, and how my sales are going. When I tell them that I'm getting ready to run another free promotion on Laryn Rising they always look at me a little funny and say, "Free? Why would you want to give it away for free? What can you possibly get out of that?"

I can totally understand why someone would ask this question - especially when you tell them that you hope to give away not just a few books, or a few hundred books, but a few thousand books. Seriously, the more the merrier! And the reason? Because out of every 500 people who download my book for free, about 450 of them will put it in their kindle archives with all the other (hundreds) of books they regularly download for free (because remember, these people are the Free Book Wizards who do this all the time) and hopefully they'll get to my book someday. Statistically speaking, only about twenty of them will actually buy it and read it right away, and should all twenty of those wonderful people recommend it to five people (even if they tell them that it is the most amazing and life-changing book they have ever read), only a few will actually remember the name of the book once the conversation is over - and even fewer will take the time to find it and buy it while the recommendation is fresh in their head.

If you do the math you'll quickly realize that you have to give away a LOT of books to get any sort of immediate return in your sales. I think most of us know that generally we read a book because someone we know read it and recommended it to us. Even if you hear about a book that sounds interesting, aren't you way more likely to buy it if one of your friends says, "Yeah, I read that book and it was amazing!"? So if you consider the fact that virtually NO ONE will ever hear about my book unless they stumble onto it through a random amazon search or hear about it from a friend who read it, my future sales depend on these free promotions - and on the people who read my book and pass it on.

So yes, it is with great relish and anticipation that I offer my book - FOR FREE - to the world for the next 48 hours. So if you know anyone who got a new Kindle or Ipad for Christmas (I'm not on the Nook at the moment) then by all means tell them to get my book while it's free! Then tell them that if they're super awesome they'll read it (starting tomorrow), review it (probably the next day, because obviously they won't be able to put it down), and share it with everyone they see for the next week. (Or month.)

Oh, and if you want to read my first author interview, check it out here on my sister's hilarious blog (but be warned, it can be rather addicting once found - particularly if you enjoy comic realism) and find out all sorts of things you'll never learn about my book anywhere else (because only my sister would ask those questions).

Consider Me Reformed!

For pretty much my whole life (as in up to this minute) I have been a happy-go-lucky reader of books. I read a book, and if I love it I probably tell my friends to read it - if I remember - but other than that I simply move on and find another book. Happily. Completely oblivious to the plight of the poor author who is desperately hoping that I will do something to promote the book that I loved so much.

It's true. Until I became the desperate author, I never really thought about the fact that reviewing a book on amazon, pinning a book on pinterest, sharing it on facebook, emailing a link to my friends, or even simply being a member of goodreads might actually help promote a book that deserves promotion. Now, however, now I get it. Big time. Basically, because my book is not in bookstores (yet), not sitting around on someone's coffee table or even on their bookshelf (because there is no paperback available - yet), unless someone happens to put in one of the searches on amazon that brings my book up, they will never know it exists.

Therefore, they will never be able to buy it. Even if they would want to should they have come across it.

Isn't that tragic? And so incredibly fatalistic! Gah! It practically gives me hives just thinking about how hard it is to get my book out there. Seriously. And so, I am now going to make a public vow that from this moment forward I will pay more attention. If I read a book that I love, I will check the reviews - and if there aren't more than 200, I will write one. I will then check the publisher, and if it is an indie book I will pin it, share it (somewhere), and add it to my shelf on Goodreads.

And while I'm on the subject, I would like to thank all those (especially all those who don't know me personally) who have done any of these things for my book! It is so exciting to find it pinned, or shared, or to have someone tell me that they read it because a friend sent them an email with the link and a big fat recommendation. These things almost always lead to someone else somewhere finding my book, and that has to happen if it is ever going to get anywhere.

(Or if I'm ever going to be able to buy my husband the truck that I promised him. The same future/imaginary truck that made him suddenly much-more-supportive-of-his-author-wife's-authoring, if you get my drift.)

Basically, what I'm saying is that without awesome people willing to help promote my book, there may not be anymore of them. (Let's face it, my husband is an awesome guy, but he only has so much patience.) So thank you again to anyone who has done anything to spread the word about Laryn Rising. I will be forever indebted.