Friday morning here and I’ve got shovelin’ to do. Low pressure system dumped about 10 cm of wet snow on the back deck, around the car, and the driveway. “What’s that got to do with anything,” you might be asking. Well, I tell ya, it’s hard writing about zombies or gladiators or anything when you’re recovering from a hour of shoveling wet snow. That shit’s heavy, man! It’s a great workout but I’m pooped for almost the rest of the day, and in January, every snow day we’ve had essentially stopped me from writing.
Mountain Man continues to rise and sell, which is great. I’ve also had email exchanges with few folks who have read the book and took the time to write some really flattering reviews. Noble Savage, in particular, helped out my sales by mentioning the book to a number of friends which caused a very much appreciated sales spike over two days (thank you again, man). As of today, it’s sold 72 copies in February, and it easy should beat January’s total, if not triple it. I’m working on the second part–I don’t really want to call it a sequel as it picks up right where MM stops, with one exception–can’t tell what that is, but some of you know. 🙂
I’ve been talking about March and how it’s the end of my full time writing career (if you don’t know what I’m talking about, it’s waaaay back in my earlier posts). As of now, if sales do not overall improve, I’ll have to go back to the day job… at the end of March. Mountain Man has given me some hope, as it’s following the same rise as “The Bear That Fell From The Stars” when it was selling between 70 and 150 copies a day at its height. If that happens to MM, my day job fate will be delayed at least a month, and if I’m lucky, maybe two or three. Plenty of time to get the next book out which will hopefully produce another spurt of sales which will cover me until I get the NEXT book out, and so on and so forth.
The result of this is the fantasy line will probably lag a bit until things start to stabilize. I want to get back to writing the next 131 Days book, but I have to concentrate on what’s selling for me now, before going back to a series that, while I believe is solid, isn’t selling.
The good thing is, I’m really hitting my stride with typing. I’m having more 4000+word days and less 1500. Production is way up… on the days when I don’t have to shovel snow or do research for books (which takes time).
One last thing, some good news for the heroic fantasy readers. “White Sands, Red Steel” is now at the proofreaders to catch any last minute bugs. That should be ready by the end of the month, if not sooner. The cover is below.
Have a good weekend all.
