Storm building...

  I've finished the first installment of my serialized YA novel, and I'm anxious to see it go up, but first the hard task of editing, which always makes me grind my teeth and of course reach for the cheetos...

The monsoons have come to the edges of my world every day, rimming the sky and promising rain but never delivering.   

It's been frustrating, as waiting for anything good can be...but this strange weather-induced tension has added something to my work, a sense of suspense and anticipation.  

If you are open, motivation can come from the most unexpected places, the promise of a storm in the sky, or the sudden notice from a person you don't know that takes the time to do something, say something, that humbles and inspires you. 

One of the biggest things I've had to learn this summer was un-marketing.

After my initial blitz, where I sounded like a book selling parrot squawking about my latest release, I've discovered the joy of just meeting people online, fellow authors and bloggers who have more to share than the latest sales info.

When I sat back and just started listening, I really started to gain some lasting wealth.

This can be a hard life, a solo life, but the online community has reminded me that I'm not alone.  I want to thank every single one of you, people I have gotten to know from America, China, Belize...anywhere you can imagine.

It's like magic isn't? Being able to touch someone you would never have met, and having them become precious. Like rain on a hot dry day.

Keep your ears and heart and mind open my friends, listen for inner thunder.

At any given moment, anything is possible...

And now for something completely different...

Although Godhead is my first self published novel, it is not the first I've written.  I have one more finished and two more halfway or more done.  All of them are adult novels, most with historical or exotic locales.  But I have four children...and they have been asking me to write something for them for a long time now.  I tried children's books and wrote one really rousing story about a dog that outran a bee by crossing the entire world...I think the first line was Chester liked to lay in the yard...anyway, I don't think picture books are my calling.  Plus, I can barely draw stick figures.

My life is full of teenagers, rife with them, like a plague (but a good plague), and I remember my teen years so vividly that I felt fairly confident writing a young adult novel.  For years a book I wrote with two of my best friends gathered dust (literally) in a big plastic bin in the shed, but it was a story very close to my heart and I often thought about reworking it.
"Lux" is now taxiing down the runway of completion, to be released in installments of a hundred or so pages every three weeks on Amazon.  I am told this is a crazy feat, and that I will become a slave to these installments, but I really don't care.  Bring it on, I say.
So you might see a bit of hiatus while I finish the first installment for release.  But I'll keep you posted.

 It is a recipe free of vampires and zombies, but it does have a few cool and unusual supernatural elements, and bad guys, and teenage angst. I feel young again just writing it...and I hope when I let it fly that it finds its way to you Dear Reader.

Thank you, for everything,

Jordan

And in other news....

My rather smutty snippet is now featured on Indie Snippets.

http://indiesnippets.blogspot.com/

Upcoming Events

This week, look for my first ever author interview.
Monday on My Lady Web:
http://myladyweb.blogspot.com/

And coming soon, selections from my work showcased on  Indie Snippets:
http://indiesnippets.blogspot.com/

I'm almost famous.

Whew!

What a week!  I've been in a whirlwind, marketing, making trailers, and (theoretically) writing my next book.
My children have lived in their underwear eating Ramen noodles and watching the forbidden "Family Guy" unchecked.
In two weeks I may have ruined them.
This morning my refrigerator broke, and I sat around slurping melting ice cream and crying over all the lost groceries, and the expense of a new fridge, and generally just feeling tired and sorry for myself.  Then I opened my email and read the headlines.  Death in Norway, Amy Winehouse (supposedly) dead of an overdose at 27, economic dissapointment, kids with leukemia, and well...suddenly my refrigerator didn't seem like such a big deal.
So I spent the rest of the day cleaning house, and baking cookies, and kissing boo boos, and drinking unknown potions they concocted for me, and I felt really lucky.  I am doing what I wanted to do... writing, and even making some money for it, playing with my kids who are alive and healthy (Well, not as much as before the Ramen, but basically.)
And lo and behold my fridge started magically working again, and I'm not going to question it.

I'm back on air...feeling refreshed and generally under the grace of some pretty good karma. I'm back to the grind, but it's a good grind.

Now if only I had some ice cream left.

Baa Baa

So...marketing strategy.  I didn't want to put myself on blogs and websites where a zillion other writers were already hocking their wares.  To some extent you have to do that, but many of those same blogs are mostly haunted by other writers that are scoping the competition, and not actual buyers.  Authors can make good buyers, don't overlook that.  And if you don't mind the fact that they are comparison shopping if it lines your pockets, than by all means go for it.  And I don't man to slur other authors...they can be a wonderful source of both emotional and financial support.  I've logged enough hours on the Kindle forums to develop a very warm and fuzzy feeling for the authors that hang there.
All that being said...an author's goal is to build a readership, a base of consumers (Dare I say fans?) that will return to buy your next book and your next..and recommend you to their friends.  But doing that is no easy feat...you have to stand out from the crowd.  And for me standing out meant getting away from the crowd.
I was lucky enough to choose an unusual setting for my first published book, Godhead.  I set it in Belize in the 1960s. (At that time it was still known as British Honduras, back when the British Empire was gamely hanging onto as many outlying colonies as possible.)  I thought perhaps I'd have a market in Belize itself.
As it turns out there are few books set there, which astounds me, as it is lush and fertile with stories, and scenery, and memorable characters, but hey I'm not complaining...  So I started hunting for Belize forums and  there are plenty of those.  I posted my blurb, explained why I had chosen Belize and within days that post had been looked at over six hundred times.  Realizing I was on to something I posted in other forums, and at this time the majority of my sales have come from Belize itself, or at least from those with more than a passing interest in the country.
Now, I realize that since the rest of my books aren't set in Belize, I may have a hard time getting follow-up sales from the same people, but if they like my writing hopefully they will come back for more.
So my advice to marketing noobs with a zero budget, is to look for a niche market that your book belongs in and pitch it there.  If it's about detectives, pitch it on police forums. If it's about a particular locale, look for those web pages that may support you.  If it's about hacker,s pitch to techie groups...you see what I'm saying?
Think of your book as more than a book, think of it as a wealth of information on a particular subject that someone somewhere will appreciate beyond a good story.
Take your book and your brain out of the box.
Set it free and you may just be surprised where it takes you.

Here comes the sun...

Stayed up all night finishing my my next Lux trailer...now it's time for coffee and a nap.

Any reactions?