Coming, going and coping.

My week began slowly with regard to Pat’s situation. This was the beginning of what we call the ‘second week’ in the chemo process where the patient is most vulnerable. I had to pick up seven syringes from the hospital to begin the ‘protective’ phase for her, but by Wednesday she was showing signs of deterioration and Thursday morning was taken back into hospital. She is now on antibiotics and has had three scans. Outwardly, Pat is OK, and is showing signs of good recovery, but it’s unlikely she will be home for a couple of days yet. I’m getting used to living off ready meals by the way.

On the book front, I have joined a promotion for my latest book, No Time to Die. It began yesterday and this morning I’d sold five copies. The promotion will run for five days. The link for the books on offer, all free or $0.99 (Crime thrillers — 17 of them) is at https://storyoriginapp.com/to/5Jey3uT. At the moment mine is showing on the first page, but I think the organisers rotate the pages. Why not have a look?

All in all this month, my book sales have been sketchy, but I’ve managed to sell about 44 copies so far. That is good for me because it isn’t all promotion; a lot of that is organic. I’m hoping to remedy that by creating a campaign on Amazon Ads. Trouble is, I still haven’t got through the first Bryan Cohen video properly. I set the video going on my PC, sit back to absorb the information and wake up with out a clue of what’s been said. So I rewind and then give up. Back the next day, same thing. I will crack it though, after all, it cost a fair bit, but the idea is to have a forensic understanding of the way in which the ads work, and how to manage them. Time will tell just how successful I’ll be with them. Unfortunately my current situation doesn’t lend itself to serious study. I’m off to the hospital in ten minutes, couple of hours and home again. Snatch a meal, walk the dog and go back to the hospital. I’m spending more on car parking each day than I would on advertising. Frustrating, but that’s the way it is. When we lived in Spain, car parking at the hospitals was free (probably still the same).

I have changed my reading habits from typical A&A thrillers, most of which annoy me, to perhaps a more cerebral crime novel. I downloaded The Sound of Rain by Gregg Olsen. (No, me neither). Anyway, the guy’s a ‘best-selling author, so I thought I’d give it a go. So far it’s a little weird for me, but interesting. I think the story will become more edgy as it goes on. I’ll let you know if I get round to finishing it; something I seem to have trouble with these days — finishing what I started.

I can’t see much further ahead for my own book ambitions, simply because I have little time to myself now. If Pat recovers fully, I should be able to get back to some semblance of order. I can only squeeze this blog in because of separating my morning and afternoon visits, plus I think by keeping this ‘space’ open, it helps me to maintain links to my readers and zillions of fans. Meanwhile, I hope I sell a ton of books. Wish me luck!

Great minds think alike.

August 24^th. 2019

The week began with a visit to the haematologist for Pat’s blood test results and a resumé of where she is with the chemo. It turned out that one of the chemicals, etoposide, was too toxic for her; no doubt it would have killed her had they persisted with it. That was the reason she ended up in hospital for a week. That has been resolved now, thankfully, and Pat is on her third chemo session. We had to go to the hospital three days running, which cuts into our free time, but it is what it is and we have to put up with it. Pat is a little wearier now, but so long as I keep an eye on her, we should be OK. CT scan next.

On the book front I’ve had an interesting week. Haven’t sold any books, but I have dived into a couple of courses on email marketing and Amazon ads. The former is with Adam Croft, the latter with Bryan Cohen. If I can master their advice, I should be able to look forward to a better understanding of how to use the kind of tools that an indie writer needs these days to make sense of the whole business. I have already decided to change my tactics with regard to marketing and will be adopting a new approach to my 1200 or so subscribers. I still have a way to go, but I will try to stay with it. The Amazon ads course is a little different in that there is a lot of study, about nine hours in total, and that’s without running a campaign. I will be testing the water later with my latest book, No Time to Die with an Ads campaign. You can find the book here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B07WFQMQV4. That will be followed up with The Boy from Berlin.

When I circulated the jacket for No Time to Die, one observation from somebody was to ask what kind if title that was. Someone said it didn’t mean anything with regard to the genre etc. But I liked the title and decided to stay with it. Then a week after I’d published the book, I find that the latest James Bond film is to be called: No Time to Die. What a coincidence! See, great minds think alike. I might be able to make some capital out of the common link, but I have to wait until next April when the film will be released.

I had a couple of problems getting my jacket changed with KDP. I couldn’t publish the book because there was an error with the meta data, highlighted in red. I couldn’t see it. I checked all the KDP data pages for the book, but there was no red highlight. I contacted Amazon and was told that the pricing for Japan was incorrect. This is set automatically when you choose a price for USA; all the other areas have their price boxes filled in. Seems that I was charging 1215 Japanese yen for the paperback instead of 1218. Three yen? Anyway, we got it sorted. The updated book arrived today. Looks fine now.

Something to look forward to next year for members of Mark Dawson’s SPF group: a meet-up at Amazon’s HQ in London early March. I know the SPF group has a huge following, and I’m sure the meet-up will be buzzing. And from what I’ve learned about Mark and his partner in the business, James Blatch, it will be a pretty good turn-out. Hopefully I’ll be able to go and, hopefully, I’ll be able to tell people how successful I’ve been with email marketing and Amazon ads. Am I dreaming? Wish me luck!

On yer bike, son

August 17^th. 2019

Pat came out of hospital last Monday after spending six days in isolation. We were happy to have her home (me and Tuppence). Although Pat has recovered from the infection, she is still quite frail. I’m keeping an eye on her temperature and BP, but there is precious little I can do about her general weakness. She had a blood test yesterday in preparation for the appointment with her haematologist on Monday, which will be followed by her third chemo session the following day. All the jobs around the house are slipping behind again because of the amount of time I’ve had to spend on visits etc., but I’m hoping to catch up as we get through next week. This afternoon I’ll be doing the ironing and watching the football on TV (on the big tellie! Yeah!)

I published my latest crime thriller (No Time to Die) during the week, but not without a couple of tweaks that were necessary. When I checked the ‘Look inside’ facility on the Amazon product page, I could see the text was ‘left justified’; something I dislike intensely, but in the downloaded eBook the text if justified. It makes me happier but I did wonder how many potential readers would be put off by the book because of the way the text appears on the product page. I’ve bought a print version, which arrived today. There are a couple of changes I’ve already noticed that I’ll deal with, but I will go through the book with a red pen and then update the cover and Word doc before sending it up to Amazon. You can find it at https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B07WFQMQV4

Back on the health front for the moment. I have had a chest infection (something historical) since Pat went into hospital and ended up seeing the doc. Meanwhile, Pat was talking to our eldest son on the phone while I was watching the football on my laptop. She told me our son, who is a personal trainer, said I should be on an electrolyte to compensate for my mood-swings (really?) and to ensure I don’t get dehydrated. She said I had to buy an electrolyte from the Wiggle bicycle company. Now I know I was watching football and not listening, but honestly, who buys electrolyte from a bike shop? But sure enough I ended up buying it from the Wiggle bicycle company. Could have gone to Boots of course. Perhaps Wiggle could start selling my books?

I’ve signed up for an email marketing course with Adam Croft. It’s a cheapy and he will tell me where I’m going wrong with my email marketing etc. Well, all the experts will insist you need a big bunch of subscribers because they are your most important marketing tool EVER! I’ve done Nick Stephenson’s excellent course, I’m a member of Mark Dawson’s SPF group and have followed his advice, and have seen it trumpeted far and wide by all those who know how to sell books through their subscribers. When I launched my eBook, I notified my subscribers of it’s release at 0.99 and it’s inclusion in KDP Select (which means it’s free for members), and sat back waiting for the sales figures to rocket. I have 1220 subscribers and in two days I have sold 2 paperbacks (I bought one), eighteen eBooks (yes, I bought one), and have seen 8 pages read on KU. Fantastic. So I’m wondering where I went wrong after spending so much time and money on Mark Dawson and Nick Stephenson. No doubt Adam Croft will reveal all. I think I will be told that it’s “Engagement” that counts. But how can I engage when my open rate is about 0.1%?

So, more effort from me, more effort from my readers and more pedal power if I’m to get anywhere. Wish me luck!

Great Expectations

August 10^th. 2019

We are now at the end of what Pat and I refer to as the “middle week” of the chemotherapy. This is the low and risky point where the immune system is at its weakest. Sure enough, Pat’s blood pressure started going down and her temperature went up to over 38 C. I had no option but to phone the emergency number we’d been given. I was told to take her in, and now she’s in hospital for six days while they treat her for the infection. She’s in a sterile room under ‘protective isolation’. A similar thing happened to me when I was having chemo: three times during those middle weeks. On the last one I was put in hospital for six days; three in isolation. Pat’s in good spirits though but wants to come home — natch!

I’m now looking forward to publishing my latest Marcus Blake thriller, No Time to Die. The jacket is ready and I’m doing a final read through before putting it up on Amazon as part of their competition. It would be nice to win, but it’s unlikely. Amazon will give the winner £20,000 and a lot of promotion. That would be nice. I also paid Stuart Bache a kings’ ransom for the new jacket for my book, The Boy from Berlin. This provoked a discussion with some of the Chindi authors in our private FB group. This year I have spent just under £1000 for four jacket designs. Two were with professional designers, one was with a writer who offered to design a jacket at a low price, and the cheapest, £50, was with Fiverr.com; it was for my pulp fiction thriller, Hunted. Setting promotion attempts aside, Hunted sells regularly, not much I have to say, but it sells. The first professionally designed jacket has sold three copies this year with some promotion. In June/July I promoted The Boy from Berlin with the author designed jacket, new blurb, rewritten prologue, and sold 100 copies. Facebook relieved me of about £275 for the promotion. It will be interesting to see what kind of difference the next campaign I run with Stuart Bache’s new jacket will achieve. When it comes to ROI, I’m losing out big time. But — there’s always a ‘but’ — without advertising, not many people will know about me and my books. It’s a Catch 22 situation, but that’s life for most indie authors.

Talking about my new jacket; I put it up on KDP and, sure enough, it appeared on the Amazon eBook product page, but not the paperback page. This has happened to me before, and when I’ve queried it with the great Zon, I am usually told it will be OK when a copy is ordered. They do change it though. I can’t order a paperback until I know the jacket has been changed. It’s annoying, but I do want to think about another promotion. Just got to save some money!

Now that I can look ahead to a period without writing, I can catch up with the jobs that get neglected because I’m looking after Pat. And what with hospital visits there’s little I can plan. I can think a lot, but it isn’t getting words on paper. Thinking about Hunted, I can see that the way to go has to be pulp fiction. I have a sequel in my head, but not too much detail. It will need research, but for me, the whole point of writing pulp fiction is to knock something out in a couple of months, bugger the research and just get some excitement between the pages; this is what the reader of these kind of thrillers want. And they sell. But do I really want to go down that route? It usually takes me about a year to write a novel. My latest took eighteen months, but there were good reasons for the unusual length of time. To turn out pulp fiction stuff means one every three months or so, and I’m not really that kind of writer. But hey, what the heck? I’m not getting any younger, so I might just knuckle down and turn out a pulsating, pulp fiction thriller. Wish me luck.

Staying the course

August 3^rd. 2019

The week got off to a good start with Pat’s second chemo session and no real dramas. We are both surprised and happy with the way she is coping, and this week Pat seems to have got stronger. She made a decision about her hair, and asked me to cut it off before it all fell out. We were due to go to the wig shop anyway, but didn’t cut her hair until after Pat had chosen her wig. I can’t get used to seeing her with a full head of hair, but now I also have to get used to seeing her with no hair! I felt awful taking the clippers to her head: like Sweeney Todd, the demon barber. But it’s another hurdle crossed and that’s a plus point.

On the book front, I have now received the final jacket for my book, The Boy from Berlin. I’m well pleased with it. Haven’t had the bill yet but it will hurt. For some reason, maybe because of my age, I can’t understand why a lot of indie authors spend hundreds of dollars on their books without knowing what kind of success they are likely to have. I’ve spent money on three jackets this year (four when I get Stuart’s bill), and I’m well out of pocket. So, what’s the answer? Spend money on advertising of course, but even then that’s no guarantee. When Jennie Nash critiqued the prologue of my political thriller, she mentioned the fact that I only had 23 reviews; it meant I had no traction. Since spending the best part of £300 (damn VAT) on Facebook, I’ve sold 100 copies of The Boy from Berlin, and still only have 23 reviews. As the Americans would say: “Go figure”. A couple of weeks ago I asked my sister-in-law if she would read the draft copy of my latest, yet to be published, crime novel, No Time to Die. She reads all the time, particularly when she’s travelling up to London as part of her work with IBM. She said some lovely things about the story and promised me it wasn’t because she was related; but she did wonder why writers with my ability (her words) didn’t get the wide readership their books deserved. I had to tell her that many indie authors will spend up to $100 a day on advertising; it’s the only way, so that kind of explains why my work disappears into the literary wilderness. I plan to set up another campaign on Facebook once I have the new jacket, but I will marshal this one very carefully.

I mentioned last week about the reaction to the book jacket I designed for my latest WIP and the reaction from the SPF group, but one response was from a USA Today best selling author, Ditter Kellen, who offered to design a jacket for nothing. Looking on Ditter’s website, I could see she was a prolific writer and had a great deal of success, but nowhere did it say she was a designer. Anyway, she offered to do a freebie so I agreed. She knocked out a very good jacket which demonstrated her skill, but it was a world away from how I visualised mine. I thanked her and said I couldn’t use it. I have also had some advice from members of the CHINDI group, all helpful of course, but in the end I will be biting the bullet and completing the design myself. The book will be available on-line before the end of the month, but I’m not sure yet how I’ll promote it. I have 1400 ‘contacts’ (MailChimp’s new euphemism for subscribers and unsubs), so I’ll let them know it’s coming and will probably start the ball rolling with a price of £0.99.

Next on the agenda is to catch up with work around the garden and in the house during the summer and try — TRY — not to think about my next book, but I do have to figure out how to get Martin Quil into Russia and out again……. Ho hum. Wish me luck!