In Cleanup Mode

Well, my Amazon ad is done running (thank God). It wasn't completely worthless, just mostly. I did make one sale--in a week. I've come to the conclusion that nothing will work for this novel, so I'm throwing in the towel. I've tried every tool within (and sometimes without) my budget. 

I'm still proud of Running From Herself. I think it's simply a matter of the theme not clicking with potential buyers. An author can't force people to be interested. I have my own paperback copy of the book on my shelf, and that's just going to have to be enough--my first and only hard copy book out of eleven. Having it in my possession reminds me that, yes, I am an author. Ebooks are like ether; they only exist in digital land. A bound book is concrete. Maybe I should autograph it to myself! 😋 (and thank myself for buying it)

In other publishing and non-publishing news, I published a book of music essays a year or so ago under a different pen name, and it did sell three copies, but now it's time for it to say goodnight. So I've unpublished it. Since I'd been reliably informed that even a writer with one book should have a website, I created one to accompany it, but I've deleted that now as well. My domain expires in about a month, so that'll be one less expense.

It's not as if I haven't tried other ventures that didn't work out. I'm still a big believer in trying things. I had a digital music magazine that I've now discontinued (subtract one more domain expense!), and I diligently deleted that "brag" from my official author bio. As far as I can tell, not one person ever visited it, but the creation of it was fun, at least. 

Shoot, I even had a podcast once. Granted, I didn't possess the right equipment to produce it, but somebody's podcast I used to listen to regularly advertised a service for creating one's own audio program, and all that was needed was a phone! So, I commenced writing out my scripts and finding the appropriate music. (The subject was music, and this service whose name escapes me allowed insertion of musical tracks into the episodes--all licensing covered.) I read my scripts into my phone, careful to make it sound as if I was talking off the top of my head and not reading--just threw in some "ums" or a short silence, as if I was thinking of the next thing I wanted to say. The playback sounded like a person talking into a tin can and there were no audio enhancement tools. So, it was no wonder no one listened to it. I recall I had one listener on one episode, but naturally, he or she never returned. Thus, I finally deleted all those episodes, too. 

I don't regret trying and failing, because how else does anyone learn? My delusion, though, is that I can compete with professionals, when obviously, I can't. Maybe that's the deal with my fiction writing, too. I'm told that I'm a good writer, but that certainly hasn't converted to anything worthwhile. To be clear, I have not failed at writing. I've failed at selling.

I sure don't regret writing the novel. I loved (almost) the entire process. Creating Leah's world was fun, inventing all the supporting players was fun. Throwing Leah into absurd situations was a blast. They're like those humiliating experiences in your past that you look back on and laugh about. Or at least appreciate surviving. When she was stranded in a snowstorm with three people, two of whom she hated, with one disaster piled atop the next, I sat back and smiled with satisfaction. Or when she and her band showed up at a bar the record label had supposedly booked and they sat and waited and waited for the opening act to finish, except it never did. And when she asked the bartender what time her band was to go on, he looked at her like she was nuts. "This is the band," he pointed toward the stage. I loved those situations. As my only fan wrote in her review, "This book had me laughing and crying in equal measures." That's what I was going for.

So, maybe only she and I know how good this novel is. Shouldn't that be enough? It'll have to be.

I'll think of something to do next. I always do. I can't write anymore, because I have neither the time nor the inclination.

But something always comes up.