Well, my experiment with amazon's new KDP Select program is going gangbusters. At this writing, it's been a little over 24 hours since I put The Marriage Pact on free promotion. There have been 15,279 downloads so far, and TMP is at the top of the Kindle Contemporary Fiction List. It's Number 6 on the Free Kindle list overall.
Amazon updates those rankings hourly, so by the time I finish this blog (especially with my sweet little interruptions), it may have changed. Still, as a first-time author, it is an absolute thrill to know that something I've written is in the hands of more than fifteen thousand people. And to be at the top of any best"seller" category is something I wouldn't have dreamed of a few months ago.
Please pardon the Oscar speech. I'm humbled by the experience and grateful to everyone who has participated so far. My friends and family, as well as loads of Twitter followers, have been downloading and spreading the word with enthusiasm. I also want to send a particular shout of gratitude to my amazing mother-in-law. Neither of my parents is alive to share these little moments of triumph with me anymore, but she took the ball and ran with it last night. We were on the phone half the evening, and it was like watching election returns come in. There's a reason Hubs is such an amazing man. End of Oscar speech.
Not only have I been promoting my own book lately, I've been taking advantage of the opportunities these free promotions are offering. I have seen some really interesting books come across the Twitterverse for free -- independent authors promoting horror, mystery, suspense, sci-fi, fantasty, etc. And of course, contemporary fiction like mine. I love taking advantage of the opportunity to download some of these for lots of reasons.
For starters, it's a chance to support other authors, which is a no-brainer. My kindle is getting fat and happy and I will soon have enough free reading material to get me all the way through the summer. And maybe next summer, too. :)
But it also allows me the opportunity to download, risk-free, books from a variety of authors and genres -- maybe even those I wouldn't normally explore. I'm not a huge fantasy person, for example, but I do love a good story and I respect that sci-fi and fantasy authors have the enormous task of creating whole new worlds - with rules and places and languages - in addition to the usual writing tasks of plot, character and conflict.
I think it's good for writers to read lots in their own genre, to understand what works and what doesn't. Obviously, you probably aren't writing in a particular genre if you don't already like to read it. But other genres can teach us a good bit about the craft of writing: details, suspense, language, emotions... the list goes on. Good writing is good writing. I'm happy to find it and learn from it wherever I can. And if I get hooked on a suspense or fantasy series in the process, so much the better for me and my writing.
It's not clear what kind of impact the KDP Select program will have on reading and writing, but it certainly will be a venue for many independent authors to go from unknown to less unknown. The strength of our stories and honing of craft will have to carry us from there.
Again, thank you to everyone who has downloaded, forwarded, tweeted, and taken a chance on my little book. I hope you enjoy Marci's adventures and will be awaiting the sequel featuring Suzanne this summer. Feel free to join the email list if you want to be notified when it comes out.
PS - For those who are curious, the number of downloads is now up to 15939. Incredible.
3 comments:
You do realize it's because people are mistaking it for the Eugenides book, right?
Hi Manda,
Just downloaded the Marriage Pact today and am enjoying it immensely. Big congratulations on the No.1. As a fellow self-pubber I can only dream about this kind of success!
http://francenecarroll13.blogspot.com.au/
Thanks, Francene. Glad you're enjoying it!
Anon, I don't think so, at least not on a large scale. My book had been out since several months before Eugenides published The Marriage Plot, and I didn't see any uptick in sales from people buying it by mistake when his came out. There have also been very few returns as a percentage of sales since the promotion began, which tells me that the majority of the volume is coming from people who at least intended to buy this book.
It could be that some people thought Eugenides's book was suddenly free and downloaded it for that reason, but that would be weird because legacy publishers don't generally give anything away, particularly a novel that was lauded with Pulitzer buzz the way The Marriage Plot was. I admit I have no idea if amazon has had any complaints about the similarity of the titles, because I don't think I would hear about it if they did, but the covers are decidedly different and I think most people can easily tell the difference between them, especially with a glance at the price.
If you have any actual information to the contrary, though, I'd be interested. I'd hate to think I got excited about my success without considering all the potential negative, crappy angles brought up by anonymous commentators.
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