Fools Err and False Profits

Two for the money, none for the show

Hey! Where do you find the strength to rise?

Some mornings can be rough. Some years can drag on for decades. Holding the faith to walk forward when everything is pulling you back—often a difficult path filled with despair.

Fear not for the sadness of that phrase, but let the honest emotion linger while it can. I’ll be sharing some of my thoughts on writing in general and showing some data that highlights the lack of interest around my books—at least in terms of sales.

But I will rise.

Immersed Confidence

The slower pace of writing Rhean has me thinking a lot about how to make a story worth reading. There are obvious answers in tropes and clichés, but I suppose what I’m asking is how to achieve that success while leveraging my own unique style and structure.

There’s a balance to be found, and I don’t think completely free-form is the right way to capture a crowd, but I also don’t want to rely on cheap tricks that manipulate basic instincts.

One way I’ve come to think of my goal is to find a way to bring my strange conversations and my sense of wonder into imagined worlds. A place where my intention is less intrusive and less important than the invitation to open discussion.

I like to believe the result is captivating or at the very least entertaining. Whether it’s a reflection of winter holidays in Besnowed, an exploration of generational regret in Maneus, or diving into forgotten nightmares in Revification, I want to guide readers on a journey somewhere new.

I do also understand that the unfortunate result is that my stories sometimes simply are not for everyone. That’s okay. However, I am curious what you think of my thoughts on my own writing.

Have you gotten anything from my books?

Would you tell others to read them?

Long Zeros

The measure of my monetary success is worse than bad. Granted, I’ve shifted focus to drafting and editing, but even when I was pumping out marketing content, it had zero impact on my sales.

Zero.

That single sale in February is also a bit of false advertising since I needed to order a copy of Besnowed for myself—and that’s the bump we see on the graph.

So, I’m going to make all my books free on Kindle in a few days. Amazon has a kind of promotion system and I’m curious to see if that will affect anything.

Besnowed and Revification should be available tomorrow, and Maneus should come later in the week.

If you know anyone looking to check out something new, this would be a good time to get the kindle version for free.

Other than that, I’d like to ask you to help me promote my books.

Leave a review, comment somewhere, or just mention them in a conversation. Having more activity around what I wrote—both online and in real life—is the best way to get new people discovering me and my writing.

Drawing Board

And it’s back to drafting for me.

The constant onslaught of failures and rejections can erode motivation, but it certainly helps ease the pain to share the burden in a few confessional words—either written to the priest or my limited audience here on Substack.

Most important of all, I hope you enjoy Rhean when it’s done.

I know I’m proud of what the story has become.

Until next time.

Cheers,

JMB