Mama Mia

August 4^th. 2018

My week began with a picnic in the park. Our Chindi group like to meet up about once every three months for a chat and talk about books etc. We used to meet monthly in a pub, but it got too noisy, so we reverted to meeting on-line with a programme called ‘ZOOM’. It worked after a fashion, but in the end we settled for a regular, three-monthly face to face. The beauty of these meetings is that you get to see people who have joined the group through Facebook, but who you have never met. It was a pleasant evening, the sun was shining, a little breeze to cool us off, and words of wisdom were bandied about like confetti. Well, not really, but there was a lot of good stuff there. Not all the members came of course: there were about eleven of us; a third of the Chindi group.

I also began the week with new ads on Amazon and BookBub. So far there is little to show for my efforts. I’ve sold one book on D2D, which is usually the result of my ads with BookBub, and two books with AMS. I’ve also seen a lift in the page reads for my book, Shadow of the Wolf. I didn’t even realise I had that in KU. I have my box set there, which attracted some page reads about five weeks ago. I’m using Brian Meek’s book on AMS ads, and have to keep going back to it to figure out if I’m looking at the stats correctly. My ROI would be a nightmare for someone of Meek’s ability, but for me it’s all about learning something, trying to understand the mechanics of AMS, and hoping some good will come of it. I have been tempted to go back to Facebook, but I can see something positive with BB, and I’m hoping I’ll crack AMS. The downside to Amazon is that there’s no point in raising your bid price to sell more books; it doesn’t work like that, otherwise we’d all be pouring money into advertising on-line. I’ve spent $11 so far, earned $4.99 and had 1800 impressions with two of the four ads. The other two are virtually lifeless.

I got stuck into some writing, thankfully. I was getting to the stage where I thought I had subconsciously given up. But the dying flame flickered into life and I am putting pen to paper again. The problem is though; I now have three books on the go. Apparently, this isn’t unusual with many writers according to one of my FB forums.

I watched the SPF podcast yesterday. The star of the podcast was Lynda le Plante, writer of the TV series Widows and Prime Suspect. She came over as someone who has no illusions about herself, and gave some good insights on how it all began for her, particularly when having to talk to some unsavoury people in the sex worker business. Some of the hookers she spoke to wouldn’t say a word until they’d been paid. Others just told her to bugger off with stronger words than that. But it all paid off for her in the end.

And during the week, me and Pat went to see Mama Mia! Here we go again. Loved the film; it put a big smile on my face. I could have watched Lily James all night I think, but what man wouldn’t? Such a talented actress. And being a fan of Cher, I enjoyed her performance of Fernando. So perhaps I should take a leaf out of Bjorn and Benny’s book and use that as my by-line when it comes to deciding which book to get back to. Mama Mia, here I go again! Wish me luck!