Singing in the rain

The week began for me really on Wednesday because of two events. Prior to that we took our friend Pauline back up to Baldock. It started raining as soon as we arrived, and eventually forced us all, including Pauline’s daughter and son-in-law, to abandon any hope of spending time chatting and we were forced to get back in the cars. We couldn’t use the restaurants because we had dogs with us.

But Wednesday — our No. 3 great grandson’s naming ceremony and my BookBub promotion. We turned up at the BBQ in the park in pouring rain. Set up a Wendy house (3x3 garden gazebo) alongside our son’s, pitched them both to the large, wooden, three sided lean to, and sheltered from the rain. The BBQ was alight and smoking at 11 am when we arrived and still smoking at 3.30 when we left. It poured with rain incessantly all day. We all got wet, the dogs got filthy and everyone’s clothes needed a wash by the end of the day. But being stoical, we all refused to let it dampen our spirits, and the ceremony went ahead as planned. It was good to mingle with the family and our grand-daughter’s friends. It was a real family bash and I know we all enjoyed it.

The other “emotional” event for me, the BookBub promo, was a little nerve wracking. I wasn’t convinced it would be a success, and a little concerned that I had maybe lost a lot on the deal. However, things brightened considerably overnight, and by Thursday evening I had just about broken even. Today (Saturday) I am still selling and consequently making a profit on my investment as well as adding a whole new tranche of readers. I expected sales to dwindle as the days went by, but my sales are still buoyant. I made the No. 1 spot in Canada, which included a “best seller” banner on the sales page. Can’t be bad.

I decided to try out Amazon Ads to coincide with my BookBub promotion. I elected to spend $5 a day for a week, just to see how effective it could be. Today I have spent nothing, had 99 impressions and no clicks. Obviously my advertising skills are not persuading anyone to click, so that’s something I need to bear in mind when I promote through Facebook — something I’m planning to do within the next few days.

Although I haven’t put pen to paper this week, my WIP hasn’t been far from my mind. I still struggle with the concept of a series character, preferring the idea of writing stand-alone books. But seeing the competition among indie writers favours the series novelists, I know I need to do something about it, although I feel as though I’m prostituting myself for the sake of sales. Goodness me, what we writers have to do to get recognition.

Looking ahead, our Chindi group will be supporting Cancer_UK at Arundel in a week’s time. I’ll be there hoping it doesn’t rain, but you can never tell with dear old England. Hopefully I’ll sell some books, but truthfully, it’s more about engaging with potential readers in the hope they will check out my website and buy my books.

Oh, I was more successful in North America with my BookBub deal than here in UK. Am I about to crack the American market? Wish me luck!

Getting some mileage in

My post is one day early this week because we are travelling back up to Baldock to return our friend and her little Chihuahua to her daughter tomorrow. It’s been an interesting week but with very little time to write. I’ve managed about 1000 words and a great deal of head scratching. Last Monday, my book group, Chindi (www.chindi-authors.co.uk) had an on-line meeting. We managed this through a company called Zoom. It’s strange to see your PC monitor filled with individual TV images of those who logged on. It can be a little hectic, but still possible to get a conversation going and come up with some sensible suggestions. We are already looking ahead to a November event, and hope to have something put together in time to publicise it.

I’m looking forward to the BookBub promotion of my thriller, A Dangerous Game. I dropped the price to £0.99 in readiness for the promotion. You can see the book at http://www.amazon.com/dp/B01AKCLP60/?tag I’ve also submitted it to ENT, but haven’t heard from them yet. If I can get some decent mileage out of this, then maybe I can keep those balls in the air and hold good rankings for some considerable time.

I also have a sponsorship with Kindle Book Review for The Eagle’s Covenant. This will be for August, but unlike other promotions, this has nothing to do with a price change or new launch, but simply having my book on the right hand side of their main web page. I won’t know how effective this is until later in the month when I can check my individual book sales. The link to their home page is https://www.thekindlebookreview.net

The newspapers over here in UK are talking about the latest development in DNA modification through genetic engineering. It’s made the TV news feeds as well. I’m pleased to say that genetic engineering was featured in my book, Where the Wicked Dwell. http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B06WD8988W/?tag. It doesn’t make me a clued up scientist, but at least I’m on the ball.

During the week we went to an open museum at Singleton, a few miles north from us here at Pagham. It’s known as the ‘Living Village’. The museum is dedicated to life throughout the Middle Ages and towards the 18th and 19th centuries. The houses on display have all been pulled down, removed from their locations and rebuilt on the site. It provides a fascinating look at how we used to live in those times. Good place for research too if you want to write a novel about those periods.

We also went to Queen Elizabeth Country Park up the A3 Portsmouth to London Road, The reason for that is because me and Pat are going to our No. 3 great-grandson’s naming ceremony there next week on Wednesday. Orin will be six months old. We’ve never been to anything like this before, although we’ve been to christenings. It’s a Vegan/Vegetarian affair, which leaves me wondering what we will be having on the BBQ. Flame grilled veggie burger anyone? It’s also the same day as my BookBub promotion. Wish me luck!

Looking at fact from fiction

I made another small step forward in my WIP: managed to write up a ‘mystery’ flight into the Negev desert. Now I don’t know what to do or where to go with this. It isn’t too bad a problem because although I now have to figure out how to resolve it; if I can do that, the reader will probably think I’m really clever. I know of one author, Helen Macinnes, when asked how she managed to get her characters out of the impossible situations they got themselves into, she said she put them there so had to figure a way out. She was a best-selling crime writer who died over thirty years ago.

I did some work on my website, trying to improve the way I present some of the pages. I’ve redesigned a couple that are hidden from the main menu, hopefully making it easier for those who visit my site. Although my rate of progress with this is quite slow, I do hope eventually to have something a little more professional looking.

I’ve been looking into Facebook advertising again. I have a promotion coming up during August and need to support it with other social media efforts. I will also look at EReaderNewsToday (ENT), plus others that have been recommended to defray the cost.

My book sales have just about flat-lined this month. I’m hoping it’s because readers are spending more time out of doors at BBQs, at the beach, on holiday and other such pursuits where there isn’t much time, or the desire, to be stuck in a book. I just hope August proves to be different, which means I’ll have to be a “glass half-full” optimist.

Earlier this week we went to see the film, Dunkirk. Enjoyed it immensely. Bit noisy though, and with hearing aids it practically blew my ears off. When I think of what those men and women had to put up with, it makes my problem with book sales and marketing pale into insignificance. I also watched the film, American Sniper, on Amazon last night. If you haven’t seen the film, and know nothing about the sniper Chris Kyle, I suggest you Google it first before you watch it. I thought it was fiction until I saw the caption as the credits rolled.

Yesterday we travelled up to Baldock, north of London to pick up a friend of ours. She will be staying with us for a week. The traffic was horrendous, and while I was crawling along the motorways etc., I thought about the government’s plan to ban all petrol and diesel cars from the roads by 2040. Something tells me that the government are talking themselves into an impossible position which they will have to sort out just like my fictionalised plane trip into the Negev desert. Wish them luck!