end of year

End of year - time for reflection. I got two books to read, right before my second son came, and, wanting to spend time with sons, fell behind a little. They are ok books, but I couldn't plow through them as usual because too much was going on around home.

By virtue of not being on it constantly, the reads slowed down. What's bothering me is, if I don't go out and get them, they don't come in. People aren't out there just picking up the books and reading more of them..

There is slow improvement; a sale here, a sale there, some reads that come out of thin air, that kind of thing. Whereas I had zero total at about this time last year, now I'm impatient if I go even a day without something. But yes, I go a day, occasionally, with nothing.

I can't expect instant success. One problem is that I'm starting with a very limited audience of indie authors who know who I am and know what I write. I have to expand this population basically so that a large population of readers know who I am and what I write. I have faith that when they find me they will partake of my books either in ku or by buying them, but until they know, it's going to be slow. The population has to grow organically. I have to find other ways to make myself known.

A few people have made it clear that they like just picking up what I write, and reading it; they like my style and I give them the impression of a traveler seeing a place for the first time. For now, I live with that satisfaction: that I've found a few readers, and made them happy. It'll have to do, for now.

Fortunately for me it is still not really about the money. The family budget runs without the benefit of my $30 or $40 a month that I make off of this; if I fail, the family budget will be ok. We spend $30 or $40 on a single door dash anyway, and support our kids on other sources which are more stable. But I take pride in the fact that i don't cost the family anything, and it's an uneasy truce that I spend hours doing the reading that allows for that income, getting a measly income, and building the income slowly. The one thing I can say is that if I backed off entirely (due to health or whatever other concerns) I would still have an income of about $20/mo. from people who already know I'm out there and aren't reciprocating in some form or another, the reading I'm doing. It's this income of course that I'm after. I'd like to have a set of books that simply generate some income because of what they are, not because of what I do. I've been encouraged in this regard: keep producing, you're doing fine, I like what you write. But obviously I'm not there yet. And ironically the more I market, the less I seem able to write.

A Happy New Year to all, and to all a prosperous future.