Praise Report

A Year of Milestones

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Since I first published The Spirit of Resistance in July of 2010, I’ve been marking my writing year from July to June. Thus, now that we’ve crossed the threshold into July, it’s time for a recap.

An especially helpful recap, frankly, because for the past week or so I’ve been feeling rather discouraged. No worries, though. It’s just part of being a writer, I’ve learned. There’s good days and bad days, up and down like  everyone else has.

At any rate, this year has been a  year of milestones.What are they? I’m glad you asked.

#1 –  TEN NOVELS WRITTEN

I’ve written and either published or had accepted for publication (Which is practically the same thing in my book) now ten novels. Yes. I’m officially into double digits. The Elixir of Life is due to come out in November, which puts me over the top. I don’t know if I’ll have another completed before then, given my current attempt at writing six novels contemporaneously, but it’s possible.

#2 – SOLD OVER 1,500 BOOKS

As of this writing, it’s more like 1,600, though I don’t have final numbers in yet from Ellechor (due Friday, and probably worth an update when they arrive).

When you combine these numbers with the freebies I’ve given away, I have almost 32,000 copies of some of my books floating out there somewhere.

Kboards (formerly Kindleboards) has just put up an author milestone page where my tally shows up (I have to update it. It’s on the honor system), and it’s kinda cool to see where I stand in relation to other authors. I’m definitely on the right target. It’s also highly motivational. I really want to get to that next threshold, now.

#3 – SOLD OVER 1,000 COPIES OF A SINGLE WORK

The Coppersmith crossed that threshold this past month, and I now have sold 1,003 copies of that particular story. That’s more than all my other books combined, which is kinda cool given that it’s my first born novel. Way to go, kid (hey, it’s a metaphor. Trust me: writers get it).

And while not exactly a milestone, I’m happy to report that I have now written over 100,000 words since mid February (or since the start of the year. If you remember, I took six weeks off at the beginning of 2013). While I’m convinced I can do better, it’s still something to be proud of. I’m averaging about 725 words per day at the moment. Now that I’ve got my groove back, I should be able to push the last two of my six current WIPs over the 20K threshold.

Of course, if I expect to maintain the growth of my book sales, I’m going to have to do some kind of promotion again this fall. I don’t know if I can duplicate the results of last year’s efforts, but I hope to pull something together that will at least get me close.

Some day, probably not next year or even the year after that, but someday fairly soon, I should reach the magic threshold of 1,000 books per month. That’s the magic line where a writer can earn a respectable living from his words alone. That’s the real short term goal. I guess I’m getting closer and more confident now that it’s achievable–and that is a milestone.

Turning Is Now Available

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Or will be shortly, as soon as Amazon finishes reviewing the file. That being said, you can order a print version from Createspace here. And for a limited time, I am offering five signed paperback copies of the book (I’ll have them shipped to me soon) for you to read, provided that (Big Caveat!) you promise to leave me a review. I’m totally serious about this. Reviews are the lifeblood of book sales. Without them, our books just sit there in digital anonymity. I’m not asking for five stars or unrealistic praise. I’m asking for an honest “This is what I thought of the book” type review (although, I suppose if you absolutely hate the book, we can just quietly give that copy away to someone who might appreciate it more, ya know?).

Just, somewhere toward the bottom, write something along the lines of, “I received a free copy of this book to review and was in no way otherwise financially compensated. All comments are my own.”

If you want the book digitally, I can make arrangements for that as well. Just let me know your kindle email address so I can send it to you.  Sorry, can’t sign the digital ones.

Happy Reading! 🙂

 

QUICK UPDATE: Amazon has now given me an ASIN, so you will be able to access the Kindle book here as soon as they finish publishing it.

Almost Famous…

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Who knew?

So I took my kids to the 8th Annual Teen Book Festival at Nazareth College here in Rochester this past weekend. They volunteer to support the authors as they interact with the kids and readers throughout the day. My wife was out of town, and I planted myself on my butt in a WiFi alcove near the café and proceeded to write. All told, I churned out over 7,000 words that day – which may be a personal best (it’s at least in the top five).

And I probably would’ve done more, except that something sort of unusual and kinda cool happened.

I was typing away, when a lady I’d never met before sat down beside me, reading her Kindle. There were also some teens sitting across the alcove that I spent a little time chatting with–enough to distract me from my keyboard. At any rate, as I typed, I happened to glance at the woman’s Kindle (idle, purely nosy curiosity), and I noticed a symbol on the top of the page she was reading – a kind of swirly-gig that looked exactly like the scene break swirly-gig used in The Lost Scrolls. I thought, “Now that’s odd…” So I looked a little closer and read, “Dr. Jonathan Munro…”

Stunned. Absolutely stunned.

I said, “You’re reading my book!”

She said, “I know. That’s why I sat down beside you. I didn’t want to interrupt your writing, though.” Then she told me that she’d even facebooked the fact that she was sitting down beside me as I wrote while she read my book.

Wow.

We had a marvelous conversation. Her name is Deb, and she works at the Phelps Community Library. Make a long story short, she suggested an invitation to come do an author reading at the library sometime in the near future, and we’ve begun connecting via email toward that end.

She totally made my day. To hear from someone I know that likes my books is pretty cool, but to hear it from a stranger who just happens to sit down beside me? Even more so.

Done!

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Last night I finally wrapped up Turning, the first installment of my teen dystopian New World Order series. I hope you’ll take a chance and read the book. You can find the main page here, and if you open all subsequent pages in a new window, you’ll be able to return to it to find the next chapters rather easily.

I’ll be releasing the book on Amazon and Createspace soon, and I hope that I can count on you to leave me honest reviews when I do.

The book will continue to be available for free here on the website through at least the month of May while I await your reactions, though you’ll be able to buy it for download on your Kindle or a paperback copy as soon as I have it up.

If I receive comments before releasing the book, I’ll be happy to include those in the front matter (hey! You’ll get your name in print!). If you’d rather I didn’t, just let me know and I’ll keep them out of the final copy.

Thanks for everyone for your patience as I composed this project. I know it took me a lot longer than I initially wanted it to, but writing is like that. Churning out a book in less than a year is very difficult, if only because sometimes it takes that long for the story and characters to mature. The process is very organic, and some things just cannot be rushed without getting poor results.

As soon as I’m able, I’ll get back to work on the other five projects (might be later today, though I might just take a break, too). I did crank out 6,383 words yesterday to pull this off. Getting to the finish line of a book is often like the final sprint in a marathon. Once you cross the line, you really don’t want to keep running, you know?

At any rate, there it is. Ten novels are now completed, and I hope to have two or three more done by the end of the year.

Nearly Done

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So I’ve made a slight adjustment in how I allocate my writing time. I had been dividing my attention equally between all six current WIP’s. But I’m nearly done with Turning, and so lately I’ve been pouring all my writing energies into wrapping this book up and getting it out to you all. Of course, most of the book is already available here on the website, and I’ll probably have it up for an indeterminate period after it’s finished, but at some point I’ll take it down so that I can start selling it.

The net result is that during the past week I’ve added almost 6K words, and the book has now crossed 80K words total. More to the point, I’m only three chapters and an epilogue away from being done. I hope to have a new chapter uploaded within the next day or so, and the book may well be finished by the end of the month at the latest.

This is my current word count as it stands today:

 

Turning 80001
God and Country 14185
The Blood-Eater Coven 12762
The Music of the Spheres 12471
A Glass Half-Empty 12018
Nicholas 9701

So there you have it. All told I’ve written over 46K words since the year began, and considering that I took all of January and half of February off, this averages out to about 21K or so per month (half of February, all of March, and only half of April). I’m hoping to keep upping the word count each month. I’ve increased my output by around 100 words a day from about 700 wpd in March to more than 800 wpd so far this month. God willing, soon I’ll be consistently breaking in excess of 1,500. That would net approximately six to seven titles per year, depending on length. At that pace, it would only take me about ten years to tell all the stories currently wandering around my head (with no accounting for any more I come up with between now and then).

And with that said, I’m getting back to work. SEE Yuh!

Jefferson’s Road: The Tree of Liberty AND the coolest thing…

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Two pretty cool things, actually. First is that the third mile (book) in the Jefferson’s Road series is now available in print and online. Jefferson’s Road: The Tree of Liberty is up at Amazon and Createspace. Like its predecessor, The Tree of Liberty takes up pretty much right where Patriots and Tyrants left off (so I do encourage you to read them in sequence!). I’ve asked a couple of you to be BETA readers for the book and write up reviews. If you have them ready, you can post them now or anytime (soon… please and thank you!) at your convenience. I hope you guys like the book and enjoy how the story is developing. God and Country is the fourth book. I haven’t quite started it yet, but I will begin it soon. I’m not making promises that it’ll be out this year, however. 2014 is more likely. Assuming the world hasn’t ended yet (we are in Mayan extra innings, after all).

Can you tell I’m jacked up on coffee right now?  All those parentheticals?

Okay, the second cool thing: I was at the library the other day with the guys I support, and while they were busily getting their movies and soda-pops from the machine, I was perusing the new fiction stacks at the front of the library. That’s when I saw it.

My book. The Lost Scrolls. Right there on the shelf at my own local library.

I didn’t donate the book myself, nor did anyone I know of. But there it was. That’s when it really hit home: I am a local author. I can actually say those words. Author. That’s me. Now, truth be told: I’ve been an author for some time, but I’ve been dreaming about it far longer, and just because you’ve got some books on the shelf with your name on them, or have sold some stuff online, it doesn’t quite compare to randomly stumbling across your own name on your own title in some place you didn’t expect to see it. It’s really an amazing feeling.

Now if I could just get them to start carrying the title at Wegman’s…

 

Ta-Daah!

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And now, ten days into December, Jefferson’s Road: The Tree of Liberty is finished! I wrote the final words around 6:00 this morning and typed “The End.” Final word count tally: 84,703 words. That means this book is about 10K words longer than the previous “mile” in the road.

My son asks me, “Do you still feel as excited now when you finish a book as the first time?” The answer, of course, is “No.” Finishing a book now is more of a relief than an elation. I still enjoy doing it, but I think I enjoy the process more. Although at this point, the most satisfying part is knowing that I can move yet another project off my over-burdened plate and concentrate on the next project.

In The Widening Gyre is next on the list. There’s 57K words finished on that book, and if I keep to my current pace (50K per month), I’ll have it wrapped up before Christmas. This will give us three books to move forward into the new year. Total of nine books now written (wow!), shortly to become ten.

At this point, I still have some minor editing to do on Tree, as well as writing the first chapter of the fourth book so I can pull a teaser from it for the back of the book. As well as an Afterword, though that isn’t hardly as necessary. I’ve started a draft on Amazon for the book – have to do the same thing for the next two as well, of course. And I have to do the same over at Createspace.

The main thing, however, is getting the book into a suitable kindle format and securing BETA readers to give it a run through. Some of you will be getting an email from me shortly, asking to participate. If you don’t get one and would like to be a BETA reader, drop me a line or leave a comment on this post indicating your interest.

On a related note, I’m almost at six weeks of writing at this accelerated (for me) pace, and it looks like I’ll make it to the “I’ve formed a new habit!” level soon. Good news for my back list!

And Just Like That…

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Topheth is done. I wrapped up the final two chapters tonight (more accurately, this morning). The final tally for the book: 81,045 words. Not too shabby, frankly.

I’ll still be vetting it with my writer’s group on Wednesdays, letting them assist me in editing it and getting it ready for publication, which will happen sometime early next year. I still have to go back and be sure I incorporate all the previous edits I’ve already received on it. And I’m curious to see what they think of the ending, and the consistency of the characters, plot line, and so forth.

But since the overwhelming response has been positive so far, I’m not worried in the least.

This means that all I have left to wrap up this year is The Tree of Liberty and In the Widening Gyre. Yes, I’m finally getting back to that story. Probably not tonight, but this week for sure. I have to reread the whole thing to remember where I left off and recover the voice I was writing with. At present, I have a little better than 55K words written on it, so there’s no reason I can’t finish it sometime in the next twelve to fifteen days. And then I’ll be free to advance onto another project.

After the Storm…

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Well, we survived my sister’s wrath (inside joke. Gotta know my family), and the kids and I spent this morning cleaning up debris along our street – especially helping the neighbors who had some downed trees in their yard. Nothing too big to handle. It always kills me when people act shocked that neighbors help each other out. My God. What kind of society have we become that such is so unusual. Neighbors are supposed to help each other out. That’s why we live in communities.

Proverbs 27:10 says, “Do not forsake your friend or a friend of your family, and do not go to your relative’s house when disaster strikes you— better a neighbor nearby than a relative far away.”

At any rate, we’re fine and so is everyone else on our street, too. Power’s still out, though RG&E’s website says it was restored at 11 am. It’s a waiting game, I reckon. In the meantime, we’ve got propane to cook with, and a gas water heater for showers and such. Freezer on the back porch will keep the milk cold till things start working again.

Thanks to everyone for your prayers.

In the meantime, I’m still gearing up for NaNoWriMo, and I’ve picked up a new reader for In the Widening Gyre, so I really do need to wrap that book up in December. I’m at the library right now, using the local internet (wireless is out), just trying to wrap things up before the session times out. I’ll be going in to work an overtime shift tonight (called in “sick” last night ’cause we were under evacuation orders. Had go-bags packed and everything, but turns out we didn’t need to leave.). Hopefully, I’ll get some progress done.

I’ve gotten most of Tree of Liberty outlined now, and I think I see where the problem is. I’m gonna try to use the rest of today to finish outlining the story. Maybe then I can actually get this sucker done.

Enough to Quit

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As of this writing, I have now earned enough money from selling my books to quit my job. No, not my regular, 40 hour gig, but my part-time weekend job cleaning a hair salon (God bless you, Chad, for the opportunity!). I was earning right around $300 a month cleaning on the weekends for a couple hours each night, spending my time scrubbing toilets, mopping up hair clippings (they stick to everything!), and polishing mirrors.

No longer. Well, at least not for much longer. I’m giving my friend time to find a replacement. As much as he needs, of course, but the point is this: I’ve made enough money selling books in the past two weeks to pay for more than two months’ worth of cleaning.

Now I have the chance to actually go home at night and spend more time in the evenings with my family. This is the first step taken in a huge dream for me. Okay, technically, it’s not the first step. Writing the books and publishing them would come before that. Let’s call it a significant milestone, then.

The next mile marker is being able to walk away from overtime and taking my holidays when I have my holidays, instead of taking them on my regular days off. Just getting down to working only 40 hours a week would be huge, frankly. After that, the next mile marker is earning enough to quit my day job. I don’t mean to say that I’ll actually do it–at least not right away. But it’s still something I can see on the horizon. Except now it’s just a little bit closer than before.