Author Earnings 1st Quarter 2015

Huge Howey is not only a best-selling author, he is also a prominent figure in the Great Publishing Market Disruption. He came to prominence via the Author Earnings Report published quarterly.

I've been silent on this subject for several reasons, most of them are family issues. But also because others have said it better. I enjoy blogging, and I enjoy charts, so I'm going to say a few words about the chart at the top of the page.

There is a trend, a very interesting trend, as shown in this chart. The purple line is the money earned by authors published by the Trade Publishing Industry, or the Big Five. The blue line under it is the earnings of Indie Authors. Notice where the two lines cross? That shows the extent of the (continuing) loss of earnings for authors who are Trade Published.

The marketing techniques that worked in 2010 with little effort are now an 80 hour a week, soul-sucking black hole. I gave it up and refuse to go back to it. But that doesn't mean I don't care what happens to others.

In brief: The Big Five fought with Amazon last year in order to stop Amazon from discounting the prices on their e-books. Amazon wants e-book prices to hover in the $2.99 to $9.99 sweet spot, so they discounted e-book prices at their own expense. The Big Five want to raise prices on e-books to discourage sales, with the idea that it's better to sell paper at brick-and-mortar stores, like they always have. This is known as 'the agency pricing model.'

As the Big Five raise prices under the "agency model" they have suppressed sales, their sales. So they trumpet that e-book sales (as a whole) have fallen by 8% and it's no longer The Growing Market.

Which is true, they've lost 8% of their market $ share to Indie Authors, plus their gross unit sales have slid a whopping 17%. I think a some of this is the fact that everyone who wants a copy of '50 Shades of Twilight' has one.

Now, if the gold diggers continue to drop out of the Indie Book Biz, micro-selling authors like myself might see a few more dollars come our way. We aren't going to see  big bucks, because the Tsunami of Mommy Porn isn't going away any time soon.

Mommy Porn sells. '50 Shades of Twilight' made enough money to give the janitors of the Randy Penguin a $5k Christmas Bonus. But the Next Hot Book (of any genre) has yet to be found.

If there is to be any hope for micro-sellers, this is it. We need to get our Works In Progress finished and ready to go by fall. January is peak of the Reading Season, if your e-book is to have more than a snow-flake's chance in Hell, get it published in the fall of 2015.

I'm going to spend this summer selling paperbacks at every book-signing I can get to. My personal best month is August, which is the best time for me to launch a new book. This year, I hope to have 'The Emissary' trilogy finished and in paperback by October's Zombie Walk, here in E'town.

Wish me luck!

Banner Day!

This fantastic banner came from Vista Print. They spam me like crazy since I bought cards from them, but they do FAST work.

Spotlight on Local Authors

Had a lovely day in Radcliff during the Spotlight on Local Authors. It was warm and very breezy.

Learned something I want to share.

My friend had just purchased two signs on foamboard. She set them up on easels.

The wind had it's way with them. We tried securing them with tape, which only worked for a short time. Then we switched to string, which worked to keep them on the easels, but the easels blew over.

I keep an assortment of small bungy cords. We used the bungies to secure the easel legs to the tent poles, then used the twine to secure the foam board to the tent pole. This worked, only had to adjust the signs after big gusts.

However, the canvas banner I bought via Vistaprint moved with the wind. I merely secured the top grommets to the frame of the tent. Once it was up, I only noticed it when it hit the back of my chair.

My suggestion is to spend a bit more for the canvas banners and signage. When I purchased my banner, I was a bit worried that I'd spent too much. However, after chasing the foamboard signs all afternoon, I think the extra money was well spent. You can see the two different signs above.

Notice the curtains in the background. They provide shade, make the booth more visible and cut the breeze back. When the sun comes around the booth, I move the curtains to block it. That way I stay cooler and my sunblock works better. I still wear a hat to keep the sun off my face. They just don't make a sunblock that will keep my face from swelling up after a day in the sun.

Guess I'm half vampire.

The white curtains in the background are shower curtains, so they are waterproof. If we get a light shower, they block the rain from sneaking in. I put grommets in the corners so I can tie them down. I need to get a set of weights to hold the center down. My book bag wasn't heavy enough.

I want to buy a four-sided tent. When I do, I'll put the shower curtains on the inside, to jazz it up. My sister has a large tent, and she decorates hers extensively.

I also have a stand to bring my books up off the table.

It's all about being visible, and being different, to attract attention.

I'll post more as I learn more.

Covers, Covers and More Covers

 

 

Here are six of the new covers.

I've found a photo site I can afford, so I've redone all the old covers and am uploading them to Amazon, Draft2Digital and Smashwords.

I have to say, this is the first time that Smashwords has allowed me to upload new covers without having to upload the entire work.

I'm very pleased with the new covers.

I should thank Bradley Wind for chiding me about the old covers. (He's a cover artist and author I met during my days at Authonomy.)

Daniel Roberts for posting a website with photos that I can afford.

And Andre Jute for his lesson's in cover creation that I was finally able to put to use.

Shouting In A Crowd II

Yesterday there was a post "Please Shut Up" by Delilah S. Dawson on The Passive Voice.

There was this rebuttal from S. J. Pajonas Stop Being A Robot and Start Being You she makes good points. She stresses that using time-saving short-cuts turns out white noise and 'buy my book' tweets and posts. Her solution is 'be yourself' which means interacting with friends and tweet-followers.

But how many hours are there in a day? Hundreds of tweets cross my twitter feed every day. Someone with thousands of followers...reply to them all? Be 'yourself' to them all? Seriously?

Face Book -- imagine trying to read and reply to every post that crosses your feed. All the time spent 'connecting' to hundreds or thousands of followers.

The only way to do that is to be glued to your phone, one of those dazed and disconnected souls who never look up from their phones to see the world. I've seen them at author fairs...glued to their phones or tablets, never looking up from the device to connect to the living humans around them.

They never sell any books. They never speak to readers. They spent good money and time to be at a fair, but stay online selling books to people selling books. They missed the opportunity to connect with real readers.

Isn't connecting with readers the whole point?

I spend enough time at my laptop already. Blogging and reading...I'm already getting frustrated with Real Life left un-lived. I've done this since 2009, during that time, my mother passed and my step-father broke his hip and his leg. Each time I turned from my laptop to 'Real Life' I felt guilty because I was neglecting my 'marketing on social media.'

Then the question arises: If I'm not living life on life's terms, how will I write about other people living life? Won't I be stuck in my office, typing away and leaving my own life un-lived, except through the glowing screen in front of me?

Haven't I done enough of that, working in Tech Support for the last 30 years?

I'm not buying the Kool-Aid. I'm getting more frustrated every day because Real Life is calling and I've put my life on hold to "market my books on social media."

Shouting In A Crowd

I'm a great fan of The Passive Voice.

This post "Please Shut Up: Why Self-promotion on social media doesn't work." is not the first time that someone has made this point. But Delilah S. Dawson said it this way:

“How do I build a platform and make money with my blog?” a woman asks.

“Build a time machine and go back to 2005 and start your blog then,” I say. 

This is it -- the time when the internet was SHORT on content is over. The time when there were only a few thousand kindle books on Amazon is over. The day when you could tweet "Just released a new book." and get thousands of sales is over.

This is NOT A BAD THING!

Should I repeat that in larger, darker letters?

Maybe not. I think you get the point.

We can stop spending all our time trying to sell our books on Twitter and Face Book, Tumbler and whatever else is out there. It just keeps us from having 'Real Life' time with family and friends.

I, for one, have spent every waking moment either writing, or marketing or planning the next book or next marketing move. For the most part, it's been wasted time and effort.

I like going to fairs and festivals. I like talking face-to-face with people who like to read. I'll talk to them all day and go home feeling refreshed. Unlike most days when I feel obligated to compose tweets, messages, like and friend and follow from dawn to dusk.

My books have always sold more in the summer -- because I'm out and about, handing out cards and enjoying being an author.

Guess what I'm going to do more of -- social media or socializing?

I like Kentuckiana Authors, I'm going to continue going to their book fairs.

I'm going to be at the Spotlight on Local Authors on Saturday.

I haven't stopped upgrading covers, blurbs and uploading ebooks. I'm not going to take my books down and slink off into the sunset. To prove that I'm not giving up, here's the cover I created today for my first collection of I. C. Talbot short stories.

But I think my twitter days are over.

Marketing At Fairs and Festivals - Summer Time

Authors must do their own marketing. The easiest way is to sell books at fairs and festivals. If you are about to go to a festival, or a big flea market, what are you going to want to have with you? This is a fairly comprehensive list of the things I have packed in my truck.

1. A banner (or sign) - I bought a vinyl banner at Vista Print for less than $10 with shipping. It has enough information on it to catch the eye. Put in at people's eye level, make it colorful.
2. A table, with a tablecloth - It makes a big impact to have the table covered. Also in the fall and winter, you can put a tea-light heater under the table to keep your feet from freezing. 
3. Display items – business card holder, book display, signage. Up off the table is better than flat.
4. Business cards - book marks, post cards something with your name and website or Face Book page on it. Sites where your books can be purchased.
5. A comfortable chair or two – folding sling chairs may not work if you have a bad back. I've got a very old folding wooden chair that weighs more, but it supports my back, which means less pain.
6. Canopy with sides and weights - Yes, invest in sides and weights. The canopy makes you MUCH more visible. The sides will protect you (and your books!) from the sun, the wind and the rain. The weights can be made for the tent, or cement blocks, or bags filled with sand.
7. Hand-washing supplies. Wet wipes work great and can be bought in small quantities. I use one of those laundry soap containers with the spout, filled with water, a dash of soap and an old towel. For all day events this is perfect.
8. Water – thirst becomes a problem when you’re talking all day. Soda is great, but there’s as much sugar in the average soda as there is in a candy bar.
9. Sunscreen – a full day the sun and wind will leave your skin sun and wind burnt.
10. Hat & Sunglasses – The hat protects your face and shades your eyes. Sunglasses prevent headaches.
11. Little stuff in baggies - Twine, tape and scissors. Trash bags, Kleenex, wet-wipes, index cards, magic marker to sign books. Aspirin, band-aids,
12. Shower curtains rings and clips. If your tent didn't come with sides, a shower curtain will work to shade you from the sun or the rain.
13. Money supplies - Apron, money clip, cash box with lock and receipt book. I keep my cash in a money clip so the wind doesn't blow it away. I have the cash box for change, the receipt book, the magic marker and extra business cards.
14. Food supplies - Napkins, plastic silverware, coffee cups, and drink cups.
15. Credit Card reader - I use Square on my phone. It works either with, or without phone reception. There are other companies, find what you like. They work on phones, laptops and tablets.
16. Heater - The 3 tea-light terracotta pot heaters are good enough for the average spring/fall day. Make sure it's sturdy enough to take a nudge from your feet if you forget it's there. I don't recommend the ones that use metal to hold two or more pots together. The metal gets too hot for a busy place.
17. Small cooler – cold drinks taste better. And it can be used as a side table or just a place to stash things so you aren’t tripping over clutter. Snacks help to keep fatigue at bay.
18. Comfort items - chap stick, bathroom tissue, sun screen(!) sun hats or extra shoes. Temperatures vary over the course of a day. An extra shirt or sweater, a pair of sandals for a day that starts chilly and heats up. Or if the day cools down, or it rains.

This sounds like a lot of stuff. But the devil is in the details - as my grandmother used to say. Kleenx and napkins can double as toilet paper. Twine, well, 'a world without string is chaos.' I use twine every time I go out for something.

Everyone has different requirements. But after 4 years of weekly markets and festivals this is what I carry.

Care to add anything?

Changes In The Background

I am changing distributors. I've gone through several. When I was direct to Kobo, B&N and Sony my sales started good, but soon I had outstanding balances that I had no hope of collecting.

By using Smashwords, instead of going direct, I thought it would make everything easier. But, alas, The Meatgrinder kept chucking my files back at me, and I was unable to find the errors in their FAQ database. Any changes to the files, new covers, new back matter, new ebooks, anything at all and it became a Help Desk issue to get my files approved. Even switching to epub files didn't stop the errors and the delays.

Meatgrinder has become rightfully infamous, once you've run an ebook through it, there isn't any way around it. Anything once run through the Meatgrinder lives forever, untouchable, in formats that can't be updated, corrected or deleted. Worst of all, all potential customers will see the dozens of corrupt files, and could down load any of them at any time.

Then there was the lag on getting these changes published; on getting new ebooks approved; the lag in price changes. Testing and tweaking becomes agony when there are logistical problems. Yet, with falling sales, testing and tweaking is necessary, even critical, for any writer.

Then there was the reporting oddities - a week long 'glitch' that showed I had another $50 in sales last year. Sales and money that mysteriously vanished one day. I got frustrated.

I have nothing personal against Smashwords. Marc's made a huge contribution to Indie Publishing. It's just the software glitches in the site drive me nuts.

So I went back to testing and tweaking once again. First I opted out of Kobo and Scribd in mid-February, and didn't check on the status of the files until this week. They are down, they are all down.

I started tweaking covers in mid March, and updated quite a few of them. But I have yet to fight with the Smashwords site. Instead, I switched some ebooks over to D2D. Every one of the files I loaded went through without a hitch, the same day.

That's right, they shipped the same day.

Now we'll see what will happen with the new ebooks. I will, of course, have to take them down at Apple, via Smashwords. It will take a very long time.

Eventually I'll get my mother's ebooks switched over. Eventually, I'll get all the Smashwords ebook covers updated. Hopefully, there will be improved sales because of the new covers.

New Release 'Girls Who Wear Glasses'

This blog is officially www.kajordan.net

I'm not sure what to do with it, today. I've got some long-term plans, and a some research to do, but for now...

This is where I am.

Confession - I haven't done much with this blog since my parents came to live with us, several years ago. There were so many details of my life that I didn't want to blog about, so I let this blog, which once had a couple thousand hits per month, lapse into obscurity.

Now I'm wondering what to do next.

My e-books have suffered from the same dysfunction. But I think it is perfectly understandable when end-of-life issues come to play. Some people can roll with these enormous disruptions. I'm not one of them.

Losing my mother, and my step-father's health issues flattened me. The stress of that put stress on my mental and physical health. I was still working my way out of my own mess, which came to a head on March 9th, when I had my gallbladder out.

I am still working on my parent's property and the barn full of things they left behind when they moved to my home.

I'm still publishing my mother's short stories. One went out last night and went on sale this morning.

"Girls Who Wear Glasses" can be found world wide on Amazon, but alas, only on Amazon for 90 days. The Amazon US link is here. The Amazon UK link is here. The Amazon CA link is here.

The e-book is part of "Tales From The Leeward Lounge II" which has yet to be published. The story is set in the 1970's. I've edited it to enhance the flavor of the times. I think it came out quite well.

The e-book will go free on the 9th of April 2015 and will run free for 5 days. After 90 days it will come off Kindle Select and I will publish it to other vendors.

I'm working on my mailing list. The goal is to publish once a month, and have the titles of the new releases and the free dates in the newsletter.

We'll see if I can stay focused, I'm not promising anything.

Enjoy the new story.

Spring!

March, in like a lion, has not been a roaring success. However, spring is here!

Against all odds, I'm making bits of headway. A few more things out of my way, a few more papers thrown away. The weather is better, which always helps my mood.

I had minor surgery, so I'm laid up. But that gives me time to work on Mom's collection of short stories. I've got to get an announcement post written, to promote the links to the new stories.

Paring Down Moves to Cyber Space

A few weeks ago I was ranting about the way things had taken over my life. (See Things That Take Over Our Lives) I was very frustrated because there was so much stuff - mine, my parents and my husbands - that I wasn't enjoying my life at all.

That put me in the mood to purge, and man, I purged the entire house. There are just two closets to go, the rest of the stuff is gone. Furniture, electronics, books, clothing, things small and large were taken out of my house. Last to go was the fish tank I've had for almost 30 years.

Yeah, it was a huge undertaking.

Now I'm struggling with the hoarding gene again. It wants me to fill my house back up. My husband isn't helping - he's gone on a buying binge that's filled his office with enough rockets to have his own Star Fleet. But I degress - this blog isn't about him and his stuff.

The next step was to pare down my social media sites. Three blogs, five Facebook pages, three twitter accounts and a half-dozen email addresses. I've deleted and unpublished and abandoned nearly all of them.

This is the only blog - there is the Icy Road Publishing Facebook page, twitter account @IcyRoadPubs, and it's email list. All the rest is gone.

Oddly enough, that's made it easier to start posting again because my energy is now focused on a smaller number of projects.

Who'd have thunk it?

So, the mailing list is going to become the next priority. I'm going to need to tweak it, because I've got Mom's short stories and my books all lumped together. But that is still easier than scattering my energy all over the internet.

Yahoo! Let's see if we get anywhere with a better focus.

You can sign up for our Newsletter here.

Advertising In The Age of Social Media - 10 Tips

This is not really a timely post. Facebook is about to change their rules for business pages, and I'm not sure what that means yet.

However, I want to go on the record for saying that my social media skills up until now, sucked. I found it tedious and not at all effective. But now that I've got at least a vague notion about how it should work, the rules are going to change.

Drat that!

However, I've managed to put together 10 tips for Facebook usage.

1) If you don’t have a Facebook for specifically for your author page – I recommend that you create a page. I’ll explain more as we go along.

You don’t need to open a new account. You can go over to the right and under ‘pages’ you can ‘create a page.’ There are a few things you need to tell Facebook about your business. What this does for you is simple, and powerful.

When you have an author page, you can like the pages of businesses and they can like your page back. Right now, Facebook allows the Icy Road Publishing page to ‘like’ a personal page. This might change on the first of year.

2) Visibility is the key to Facebook advertising. We ALL need people to find us, and the way to do that, without spending any money, is to network with local businesses. Yes, local to you, dear writer. Because local authors and their books are interesting to the people who live near us. I've seen this every time we do a local festival or on Second Saturday.

The more local Facebook pages I connect with, the more people see my posts. The people who ‘like’ our posts show our posts and pages on their newsfeeds. So their friends see us, our page, and you, and your page. We're looking for READERS, after all, so start with the library closest to you and branch out from there.

3) Taking advantage of extended “reach” by posting or commenting on that page’s posts. This will make your author page show up on the timeline of that page. “Likes” on posts don’t have the same impact, but they get counted in the overall statistics for your page.

4) Cooperation is the key to success. Once you "like" a local business, comment and "like" their posts. Your activity will show up on the business pages, making it likely they comment and like the posts you publish.

5) Measuring progress. When you have an author page, you also have access to a page called “Insights” that will show you how your page is doing over time. This will also give you an idea of which posts and photos are working the best for you. 

6) What to post? This can take some thought and planning. At work we get the most activity on photos of merchandise. This generated more page “likes” which extended the reach of our page a little bit more.

7) How does this help everyone? Facebook is a powerful tool for promoting your business. The more networked you are to your community, the more people will be aware of your work. We’ve all heard that word-of-mouth is the best advertising. Currently Facebook is one way to get people aware of your existence, and ours, without paying thousands of dollars for advertising. Hopefully this won't change.

8) Facebook ads. For those who do have even a modest budget for advertising, Facebook can promote individual posts or ads. You can spend as little as $5 to promote one of your posts for up to 3 days. However, the number of people who will see the ad is limited by the number of people you can “reach.” So unless you can “reach” several thousand people, it is not in your best interest to pay to promote your posts. You will be better served by ‘liking,’ ‘commenting’ and ‘sharing’ the posts of other people as your author page for free.

9) Keep pages active with posts and ‘Likes’ for best results. This doesn’t mean you have to spend all your time on Facebook. I know you have better things to do, so I recommend scheduling posts. This is a function Facebook provides on all pages.

Take a few minutes to scan your author page newsfeed every other day if possible.  Share anything that catches your eye. Like posts or comments that amuse you. Comment or reply to any posts that interest you.

Once a week, sit down to write a few brief posts concerning your business. Is there a new project you can photograph? Did something great happen that you want your business to share? Do you have a pet that likes to watch you work? Don’t stress out if you can only think of one or two posts for the week. Type them up, upload any photos and schedule the post for later in the week.

Check the Insights tab on your page to see what activity your page has generated. Which posts generated the most activity? How many overall ‘likes’ has your page generated? How many people follow your page? Can you tell where  the most activity came from?

10) Don’t stress over the daily numbers. Activity will rise and fall during the day, and over the course of the month. You are looking for TRENDS over a MONTH of activity. Modest changes of less than 1% are common on a weekly basis, which is what Facebook looks at. A 0.1% rise in a week is a 0.5% rise over the course of a month. This is a respectable increase in the world of Facebook.

I'm sure there are plenty of authors who do this already. However, are they targeting other authors, or targeting your local community?

I've spent four years targeting other authors. The results have been...zero. It wasn't until I started doing this for a local business that I got it. One of the first pages I had my work page "Like" was my author page as an experiment. The numbers didn't rise by much, but my author page got a few more hits the first week and every week thereafter. Just a couple, but a couple more than before.

Meanwhile, the reach of my work page nearly exploded.

That's when the light dawned. I can do the same thing.

Stay tuned, we'll see how well it works.

A Lifetime of Paperwork

A lifetime of paperwork is my current source of frustration with my Mother's estate.

We are talking about critically important papers filed right next to 30 year old utility bills. My mind is boggled when I think of wading through 6 huge file drawers of papers. It's worse when I have to sit down with the moldy, dusty, yucky stuff. It's crawling with dust mites that irritate my asthma.

And handling some of it makes me cry.

I'm grateful that we worked on publishing Mom's stories while she was still able to enjoy putting them into notebooks and making lists. I've got a pretty good index of titles and the notebooks.

It's hard to read them.

I don't want to edit them. Her grasp of grammar and other mechanics is above and beyond mine. I'm afraid her unique voice would be lost.

I look for software translation errors, and spacing errors and take care of those. Otherwise, I let Mom tell her stories her way.

That makes me smile.

Another Rant About Things

Original Paperback Cover

Today is just one of those days, I really want to chuck it all and go hide somewhere. Or at least I want to chuck all the THINGS that are bugging me.

Lawnmowers that have been fixed three and four times, and still the batteries are dead. I can't mow the lawn without the damn things. I can't clean my stalls without at least one of them to pull the damn manure spreader.

Other objects that have way too much value, and power, over me. Just handling some of them leaves me in tears. I can't open my mouth to talk about them without choking up.

When did a stupid object gain so much power? And what does it mean to have to give up something like that? Not that I want to keep it, it shouldn't mean anything to me. But it has all this power over my emotions.

Stupid THING.

Maybe it's the hoarding gene. (There is one, and I've got it.) Where we put so much stock into things that they take over our lives and families. Is this how objects become haunted? They somehow gather energy from the people around them?

I've written about the haunted motorcycle - an object modified by one person to change her life - and coveted by two others because of what she made it. Cora Cobra had the mad artist Van Man Go paint her Hyabusa to look like an albino python so she could use it in her stripper act. She was choked to death by her albino python after she cracked up the bike. All her energy went into her motorcycle when she died, it was the object that defined her.

But I can't see my mother, or my father being defined by any object. No matter what it was. My father's ghost was seen in my childhood home many, many times, which makes sense because that house defined our family at the time he passed.

This farm, Jordan's Croft, has been shaped by me. My energy and effort has gone into this place to shape it more than any other person. The floors, the barn, the porches, the fencing, and the garden have all been shaped by my will. But when I'm here by myself, all I feel is the frustration and stress that I've been under for the last 5 years.

Today, this is just a place that contains too many 'things' all of which are on my last nerve. I'm going to purge these objects out of my life. Maybe they can take some of this negative energy with them.

The Things That Own Us

I've been struggling with other people's things lately, and I'm emotionally exhausted from taking care of...you know...stuff.

Things my mother owned. Things my father owned. Things my husband owns.

Even my own stuff has started to run my life. Or maybe ruin my life is a better term. All of it requires maintenance, in some form or fashion.

First off, my mother was a hoarder. A very neat and tidy one, but a hoarder none the less. There are items in her hoard that were made by my grandfather. Tool boxes, wooden stools, tools, what-nots and thing-a-ma-bobs.

There aren't as many things from my grandmother, my aunts divided those items and passed them to their daughters. Which, since I have no human children, and my sister's children were far away at the time, wasn't such a bad idea.

My biological father passed back in 1966 or 1967, but there are items of his in the hoard. One of them is particularly troublesome. It is subject to regulations and tracking down these regulations and figuring out how to comply with them took up my whole weekend.

The damn THING is a pain-in-the-ass!

There is so much bad information on the internet. Even on websites that are supposedly accurate, you never know if you are getting B.S. or the real deal. Inaccurate information from online sources isn't much of a defense when dealing with government regulations.

I decided to contact a supposed expert on this subject, and got harranged by some ignorant twit who didn't understand what I was talking about.

"Ain't no such thang!" The redneck then tried to brow-beat me into bringing this troublesome 'thang' to them. "You's just brang that thang here and I'll show you what you read on that-there website just ain't so!"

My frustration with things in general, estates in particular and MY MOTHER is, on a scale of 1 to 10, somewhere off the chart.

The pressure to get rid of all this stuff, and raise enough money to keep my Dad in the nursing home until Medicaid kicks in, which is AFTER all these things have been sold, combined with my frustration, has done nothing for my piece of mind.

These "thangs" are making me crazy.

Festival Selling - A Checklist For Fall and Winter

Selling books at festivals is fun. I've never made any money at one, but my sales always get a spike over the next two weeks. This is going to be a way of life for me until my name gets out. Everybody has to have a hobby, this is the one I've picked,

So, if you are about to go to a festival, or a big flea market, what are you going to want to have with you?

1. A banner (or sign) of some sort - I got a vinyl one at Vista Print for less than $10 with shipping. It has enough information on it to catch the eye. A hand printed sign will do, if it is large enough. (Standard paper is NOT large enough.) Put in at people's eye level, make it colorful.
2. A table, with a tablecloth - It makes a big impact to have the table covered. Also in the fall and winter, you can put a tea-light heater under the table to keep from freezing. 
3. Business cards - book marks, post cards something with your name and website or facebook page on it. Hand them out! They work better than anything to sell my books.
4. A comfortable chair or two - I don't like those sling chairs, they kill my back. I've got a very old folding wooden chair that weighs more, but it supports my back, which means less pain. Get a rug or horse blanket for the chair. It will hold the heat in so your butt doesn't freeze. Optional is a small dog - they bred lapdogs for a reason. If you've got one, the cute factor makes great advertising, and they're warm.
5. Canopy with sides and weights - Yes, invest in sides and weights. The canopy makes you MUCH more visible. The sides will protect you (and your books!) from the sun, the wind and the rain. The weights can be made for the tent, or cement blocks, or bags filled with sand. Gallon jugs of water will work in a pinch, but they aren't what you want for the long run. 
6. Handwashing supplies - I use one of those laundry soap containers with the spout, filled with water, soap and an old towel. Restrooms are always in short supply. Clean restrooms...never really seen one at a festival. Clean hands can keep you from getting sick, and maybe missing work on Monday.
7. Little stuff - Twine, tape and scissors. Kleenex, wet-wipes, index cards, magic marker. I use shower curtains for my tent sides, so I need shower curtain rings and clips. 
8. Money supplies - Apron, money clip, cash box with lock and receipt book. I keep my cash in a money clip because it stays together. I have the cash box for change, the receipt book, the magic marker and extra business cards.
9. Food supplies - Napkins, plastic silverware, coffee cups, and drink cups.
10. Credit Card reader - I use Square on my phone. It works either with, or without phone reception.
11. Heater - The 3 tea-light terracotta pot heaters are good enough for the average fall day. Make sure it's sturdy enough to take a nudge from your feet if you forget it's there. I don't recommend the ones that use metal to hold two or more pots together. The metal gets too hot for a busy place.
12. Drink Heater - I'm looking into metal cups and a small sterno-type stove I can use to keep my hot drinks hot. I've found that a wide-mouth jar lid is the same size as a sterno-can and will hold 3 tea-lights. If I find a metal candle holder the same size, I'll use that instead. It's all about keeping the flame from contact with the tent, table cloth, or your pant legs.
13. Comfort items - chap stick, sun screen(!) sun hats or beanies, extra socks, water, snack food, and if you bring the lapdog, water dish, food, long leash, dog bed and sweater.

This sounds like a lot of stuff. But the devil is in the details - as my grandmother used to say. Kleenx and napkins can double as toilet paper. Twine, well, 'a world without string is chaos.' Really. I use twine every time I go out for something.

I've only used my Square card reader a few times, yet each time it was the difference between making a sale and no sales. Sometimes just one is better than none.

I might tweak this list, but this is about what I'm carrying after 4 years of farmer's markets and festivals.

Terracotta Pot Heater

The E'town Zombie Walk was tonight. It was raining even this morning, and I didn't really want to freeze my butt off. So I brought along a terracotta pot, two saucers, a little metal grill and some tealights.

I didn't expect a whole lot, but I have to admit that my feet stayed pretty warm. There is only one pot, not a stack of them, and the heat leaked out from the hole on top, so I guess it could have been more efficient.

However, it was safe enough for the day and warm enough to keep us from feeling frozen.

I see where people want to use them inside the homes for supplemental heat. I don't know about that. But if you are at a craft fair or festival and you're feet are cold, this might help a bit.

Personally, I think it could heat a cup of coffee, or a small pot of tea as well as your feet. And putting a third saucer on top might make it heat faster.

Of all the things people used to prop up the pot, I think this makes the most sense. A loaf pan or bricks don't strike me as very stable. This was sturdy enough to not wobble.

I put another saucer inside. This was because the metal tealight cups get hot. I didn't want to melt my plastic table or burn my fingers if I had to handle it.

So I light the candles, making sure everything was as sturdy as I could make it.

Top it with the pot, an 8 inch pot that fit inside the big saucer. Again, I didn't want to risk getting burned, or have something blown into the flames, or the flames blowing out. They never appeared to waver, even when it rained. The bottom saucer wasn't hot, so it didn't crack when the bottom got wet.

We used it this way, with the hole open. It may have given out more heat if either the hole had been closed or there had been more pots. But I was looking for a SIMPLE heater. It heated up in about a half hour and the candles burned for about 3 hours. Our feet stayed warm. In fact, my friend's husband huddled close and seemed to stay fairly comfortable. I just wanted warm feet and a touch of heat to chase the raw chill from the air.

This didn't work. Not enough air for the tea-lights.

If I was going to use it with the idea of keeping a cup of coffee, or a pot of tea warm, I'd have used another saucer to close the hole, like this. (Nope, didn't work. There isn't enough ventilation this way.) 

The top was too hot to touch, but the rim at the bottom was merely warm. I could feel the heat on my legs, which was enough to keep my feet warm.

I lighted it at about 2 pm. The outside temps were in the low 50's. We were under a canopy tent, with shower curtains on three sides. The breeze was brisk at times. It did a good job of chasing the chill off, and giving us some heat for our feet and legs.

I bumped it once, it didn't tip over.

The candles never wavered, and burned about 3 hours. We noticed the difference between one candle and three in just a couple of minutes.

This isn't the answer for home heating by any stretch of the imagination. However, if you have a tent on the road, in the rain, with 3 sides, it will radiate a bit of heat to keep three people from being cold and miserable.

People radiate a lot of heat on our own. It may just be the fact that the tent had a windbreak that kept us from being chilled. Wind chill factor is a force to be reckoned with.

I want to continue experimenting with this simple heater. The winter I was a the farmer's market twice a week selling eggs, we had shelter, and a windbreak, but we really could have used a simple heat source like this.

I'll report back if I use this again at Steamboat Days.

October 20, 2014 

Two things, first the top saucer put out the candles. They went out as soon as the air was used up. 

So don't put the top on it.

Second, yes, I took the heater to steamboat days and slid it under the table to keep my legs warm. I lowered the table cloth in front so the heat didn't get blown away. It was enough to keep my feet from feeling frozen and miserable.

I really needed it on Saturday, it was chilly and windy, a bad combination.

It was so chilly that I didn't go back on Sunday, I was worn out from fighting the chill. I didn't want to get sick. 

Keep in mind that this is just a little bit of heat, 3 candlepower isn't that much. But since it radiates, you do get some relief from the chill. And as the tea-lights are small enough to fit completely under the dome of the pot, it is much safer than an open flame.

'Tales From The Leeward Lounge'

Irene at 77 years old

'Tales From The Leeward Lounge' (US) is the first collection of my mother's short stories. I've had a dozen titles over the last few years, but this one is the one that seems to define my mother's life the best.

There's many, many more short stories where these came from, hundreds in fact. I'm working on another collection, and I'm just debating how many of these I should publish as singles then collect into a single volume.

In 'Tales of the Leeward Lounge' (UK) Volume I:

• Digging Out (UK)
• Turned Out (UK)
• Death of a Family (UK)
• Trapped (UK)
• Turnabout
• Dumped 
• Beware Marjorie

Volume Two is in the works and these three are on deck.

• Character Flaw (Published)
• Kick in the Face
• The Courtship of Millie

A word of explanation is required as to why I've published the collection via Amazon. Especially as the Traditionally Published Villagers of Hachett are out with pitchforks and torches.

Since Sony closed down the doors to it's e-book store, my primary market is Amazon, as is true for hundreds of other Indie writers. The best way to get a book noticed, as I found out with 'The Emissary - Journey' and proved true again with 'The Emissary - Arrival' is to launch it with KDP Select, upfront.

That's right - I proved it again with 'Tales From The Leeward Lounge' the best way to launch a book is to let it 'simmer' a week in Select to make sure it gets to all the Amazon sites, then to burn those 5 free days.

The pre-order process didn't do a thing for 'The Emissary - Arrival' on Smashwords. The only pre-order was my own on Barnes and Nobel. On Amazon, there were three, none of them mine.

The pattern is clear:

1. Publish to Amazon first
2. Use KDP Select for the first 90 days.
3. Wait 5 days.
4. Blow all 5 free days, starting on a Tuesday or Wednesday.
5. Email newsletter to Mailing List for the first free day.
6. Spend up to $10 on Face book ad.
7. Breaking up days will yield less than 30 sales.

I'm going to check to see if I can use the Smashwords pre-order for something already on KDP. That way KDP can act like the advertising for the Smashwords edition.

I don't know what I did wrong, but I can't use KDP pre-orders for a year. I think I got confused about how to mark the 'hot' copy and missed the deadline. Frankly, I don't think it helped a bit.

So this is my new business plan for 'Tales From The Leeward Lounge, Volume 2."

Wish me luck. 

Horsewomen of the Zombie Apocalypse #2

The day has arrived!

The long-awaited release of the second book in the Horsewomen of the Zombie Apocalypse has been released!

The series begins with The Emissary - Journey an e-book. Also is just released is The Emissary - Journey in Paperback.

Not all women are helpless Zombie-bait. The daughters of Ken McLeod certainly aren't. Armed with bows and mounted on Spanish mustangs these girls ride like Huns, sweeping across the world in ruins. Bethany McLeod is the Emissary, bringing together the scattered remnants of humanity, in an alliance that might just save the human race. 

Three years after the Zombie Apocalypse, a handful of settlements communicate by ham radio. When the Davidson clan asked for help, clan McLeod answers. Bethany McLeod must take her sisters Alexis, Dani and Julie on the dangerous journey to Fort Chatten, Kentucky to form an alliance with the Davidson clan.  

Alexis McLeod is a healer, eager to prove herself. Led by Bethany, the four sisters risk their lives to help the struggling Davidson clan. Armed to the teeth, the sisters are light cavalry, quiet enough to avoid the walking dead and fast enough to outrun them. 

Militia, marauders and mad-men abound, the dead walk the land, eating everything in their path. Can four women and six horses make the hundred-mile journey to Fort Chatten?
This story is suitable for all ages.

September 15th was the release date for The Emissary - Arrival.

Bethany McLeod, with her sisters Alexis, Dani and Julie, make the dangerous journey to visit the Davidson clan at Fort Chatten, Kentucky to form an alliance. Armed to the teeth, the sisters are light cavalry, quiet enough to avoid the zombies, and fast enough to outrun them. 

They've arrived at Fort Chatten — to find just how dysfunctional the Davidson Clan really is: Livestock is running loose, there's no organization, no crops and no gardens. 

Beth must do what she can to help Alexis fix the problems, but there's only a few days before Beth, Dani and Julie have to return home. 

This story is suitable for all ages.

 The series is meant to be a celebration of the bond between women and horses, as well as a very 'Girl Power' series about the Zombie Apocalypse.

My primary motivation in writing this series is the scene from TV's "Walking Dead" where Rick rides a horse into Atlanta. Man and horse are attacked by Zombies and the horse pretty much just lays down and dies when bitten.

That scene really ticked me off.

I've got three horses, and not one of them would lay down and die if bitten by a Zombie. They would be alerted at the smell and I expect them to either flee or fight the first stinker that bites them.

I know my old mare would kick, scream, fight and strike until she fought her way free. I also know that she will protect me, her very own human, from dogs. So I felt I had to set the record straight.

Throw in the 'Airs Above the Ground' - classical dressage movements invented by the Romans a couple thousand years ago, add a bow and arrow, and you have the equivalent of the Huns who sacked Rome and took over the known world.

The idea was too delicious to make into a short story or even a novel. I had to make it a series. Horsewomen of the Zombie Apocalypse was born.

I hope this series catches on, not just because of the time and effort I put into it, but also because it's about time somebody wrote the Zombie Apocalypse from a feminist point of view.

Recovering From Life and Change

From time to time I've been tempted to blog about my 'wasted youth' in more detail.

It's fun, really, to look back on that time in my life, the early 1980's as long as I don't get too close to the heart of the matter. I was broke, but I managed to look good. I had fun, and I managed to keep from being raped or killed, not all the women who partied at the time, or in the same places, can say the same.

I had a serious drug and alcohol problem then.

What I did about it was so mundane I hardly give it a thought any more - I joined a 12 Step program.

In some ways, that was the answer. However, for the first two years, just surviving the pitfalls of that particular 12 Step program was a bigger challenge than staying alive in the bars. Those Meetings were attended by a lot of old guys who didn't like young girls cluttering up their sobriety with questions. They didn't like drug addicts (some because they were doing drugs and didn't want to be challenged.)

When the Recovery Backlash surfaced with the rising of the Internet, I read a lot of the blogs and silently agreed with a great deal of what the 'AA Bashers' said. The number of sexual predators (of both genders) that I encountered, as still encounter when I'm around Those Meetings, is astounding. The way the program of recovery is used as a weapon against the newcomers is really distressing.

There are some things about Those Meetings that really suck.

But I stuck it out, because I wanted to stay sober. Still do, for that matter. There are some people who welcome me with open arms, others who really hate having me in a meeting with them.

Tough shit. I earned my seat.

But 27 years of Recovery has really changed my mind about the 12 Step fellowships. They are flawed, some of the people in them are really sick, some are dangerous. (Rumor has it that serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer was an AA member in good standing.) However, I've always been able to find people who would pull their heads out of their butts to help me.

There are some wonderful people hiding in Those Meetings. The problem is getting past the crazy and the predatory to find them. It's kinda like a video game, you gotta slay the monsters to get to the treasure.

Maybe everybody wasn't a Robin Williams, but I've found some angels whose wisdom I will cherish and spread every chance I get. There are people with whom I've butted heads in years gone by that I miss deeply. Some are still alive, some are dead.

It is the principles that remain, the 12 Steps are the most useful things I've ever learned. They are the building blocks of my sanity, especially at times like these when my life is chaos.

I'm writing this because I'm at one of those godawful crossroads. I hate them with a passion. But here I stand, with a road ahead, a road behind, one to my left and one to my right. For the life of me, I can't tell which one to take, except that going back looks pretty shitty.

One road down and three to go.

Acceptance may be the answer to all my problems today, but it's where my feet take me in the future that matters. I have goals today, I don't make plans, write plays and expect everyone to act their part. Clowns be clowns, some times the best thing to do is watch the show. But goals are things that keep us going forward in the midst of dark times.

These are dark times.

What I'm doing is taking inventory. Of myself, my books, my life as it stood two months ago when I left Jordan's Croft for Talbot Hill Croft. What I've found is that it's best if I take the inventory now, and allow my Higher Power to provide the guidance I need. That's come when I needed it the most. Though never in the shape I think it will take.

One of my 'paths' is to stop writing and marketing my books. I've spent every spare minute on that since I started down that path. The return on investment has been dismal. I get a lot of satisfaction from the process, and no cash to speak of. However, the process is time-consuming, energy-consuming and I have limited amounts of both right now. I have to make a choice.

I've decided to give it one last crack, but I've put a time limit on it.

My paperback books will become my focus for the next 90 days. At the end of the year, I'll look over the hard data and make some new choices. There will be four paperbacks by then, possibly two more if I finish another Emissary book and convert a collection of my mother's stories to print.

I've found that face-to-face market pays better, when you have paperbacks to sell. The Emissary #1 is on sale now in paperback and The Emissary #2 will be ready by the end of next week. 

I've got a box of each of the books coming this week. I've decided to throw my lot in with a large author's group in my area. I've hesitated to join this group because I'm afraid of the amount of alcohol and drugs that may come with the territory. It is always something I need to be careful of, other people's addictions can reek havoc on my recovery.

I have a plan to expand my publishing efforts, that could turn in to a wrap-up and shut down if need be. I have a plan to go back to work, using my writing and my fiber arts as hobbies. I have a plan that brings my wheelchair-bound father back to Jordan's Croft, but that plan is full of 'what if' and 'maybe if' to the point where I hate to put it forward.

There's another plan, the 'fall-back-and-punt' plan that I DON'T like one bit. It involves selling everything I own and going north again. Not to Ashtabula, but to Cleveland or it's suburbs, or to Louisville even. This could require the sale of my horses and my alpacas, not something I want to think about, but so be it.

Everyone needs a plan of last resort.

There are commonalities these paths. They start out looking the same. Going back to Jordan's Croft for a time. Cleaning out Talbot Hill Croft, no matter what happens with the books. Selling books in September and October, tweeting and marketing limited amounts. Purging my house, barn, shed and porch of everything I don't need.

The next four months will be busy ones. If I'm not blogging here, at Jordan's Fiber Arts or on
Facebook, you'll know why.

Stay well.