"Deadfall Ridge" BookBub long-tail.

I haven't wanted to jinx it, but "Deadfall Ridge" keeps selling at a very moderate rate. When I say moderate, it's like 20 times what I usually sell. This is after the first 5 days, which were way, way higher than normal. (That sounds impressive, but I'll reiterate--moderate.)

I'm sort of obsessive about checking my Amazon rankings, which probably doesn't help much. I wish I'd thought to write down the titles of other BookBub offerings in the weeks surrounding the release of my book so I could do some comparisons. The rankings don't always make sense to me. For instance, there are about a dozen books that I know came out in the same month as mine which are higher ranked but every time I check, my current ranking is higher. (There is a current moment ranking, and then a more long-term ranking that accounts for all sales up to the moment.) All I can think of is that these books had much higher sales upon release--which make sense if they already have followers or their book is part of a series.

Anyone still buying "Deadfall Ridge" now is probably discovering me for the first time. BookBub only keeps the listings up for a month, so I dropped off the list on Jan. 18. So I'm not sure how people are finding my book now. Possibly because enough copies sold to put me within hailing distance of discovery by being higher ranked.

The reviews of "Deadfall Ridge" are good overall, but not quite as good as usual--and I don't think it's because of the book but because of who is reviewing. For instance, my overall rankings are probably better than someone like Stephen King--not because I'm a better writer but because the better you do the more people knock you down a peg.

I'm now in my longest writing lull in 6 years. After my current WIP (work in progress) petered out, I decided to take a step back and figure out where I stand.

It feels very weird not to write every day. I mean, I feel like I'm being extraordinarily lazy. At the same time, I have over 20 books up for sale--so, you know, not too shabby.

I worked at Pegasus Books on Tuesday and sold a copy of "Deadfall Ridge" each of the first three hours I was there. Since I only had 4 copies on hand, I stopped pushing it (so that someone coming in actually looking for it could find it.) Then sold a copy of "Led to the Slaughter." Once again, I realize that I could easily sell at least a couple of copies of my books per day. If I worked 300 days a year, that would be 600 copies. My average profit on a paperback is about 8 bucks, so--that would be significant.

But I'd be done writing. The store wears me out. I was utterly exhausted on Tuesday night even though it was a relatively slow day. The business just takes up so much psychic space that writing becomes impossible. A real Catch-22.

I've been reading "Eden's Return" at writer's group. It looks like I'll be able to finish the entire book this time. Usually they only hear the first third of a book or so before I'm onto the next book. They seem to like it.

"Fateplay" is in the pipeline, so "Eden's Return" will probably be the next book after that. I'd like to get a book or novella released every 3 months or so, but that depends on the publisher doing the editing and covers in time. (3 months between releases is the sweet spot, apparently, for keeping a writer visible. I don't write at the pace currently, but I still have books saved up from when I was writing faster and books were being released slower.)

As I said,  I'm trying to figure out what to do next--but really, I know I need to do another Virginia Reed book. I owe Amber Cover Publishing that much. And really, I'm kind of excited by the prospect and somewhere intimidated.

And I'd still like to finish off the "Faerylander" series of books, as well as the 4 novellas of the "Tales of the Thirteen Principalities.) So that's a lot of work right there.

Sorry about the info dump, but I haven't written on this blog for five days so there is some pent up energy.

This month went by extraordinarily fast!