Publishing Stats--Three Weeks In

It has been a little more than three weeks since I published my first novel, and I thought it would be interesting to compare different sites to see how they have fared with sales. This assumes that all of these sites have properly updated the data as of yesterday. I figure this can give a rough idea of just how difficult it is for a new, unknown author to gain any attention. I believe the book is of high quality, and it has been drawing very good reviews so far.

Amazon trade paperback edition - 20 units sold

Amazon Kindle ebook edition - 69 sold

Kobo ebook - 1 sold

GooglePlay - No data (or it may mean nothing has been sold)

B&N Nook - 5 sold

Apple iTunes - 2 sold

Meet My Character Blog Hop

I joined this blog hop from a post on the KindleBoards that seemed interesting to me, since I had done a similar character post for my fantasy novel but have never done one for my published novel The Immortality Game. The hop goes to one site each week, so my post was preceded last week by Rachel Medhursts' post here.

Since there are two primary characters in the book, I figured I'd tell a little about each of them.

1) What is the name of your character? Is he or she fictional or a historic person?
Zoya Vladimirovna Drozdova is the first of the two main characters in the book. Her precise age is never determined in the story, but she's in her mid-twenties. She lives with her mother and brother in a poor part of Moscow in the year 2138, not far from the refugee park at Kolomenskoe. She works in a morgue preparing corpses for funerals before their cremation (burial is no longer legal). Life is hard, so she has only vague dreams of one day being able to have a child. Her brother has a good heart but has fallen in with a mafia gang.

Zoya, artwork by Stephan Martiniere

2) When and where is the story set?
The story takes place in 2138 Moscow, Russia in about a 24 hour period.
3) What should we know about him or her?
Her passion is for ancient rock music, such as Led Zeppelin, the Beatles, Pink Floyd, Simon and Garfunkel, Cat Stevens, and so many more great bands. It's her one true escape from the general misery of her life.
4) What is the main conflict? What messes up his or her life?
Her brother is tasked by his mob bosses with stealing some secret military tech from a compound on the outskirts of Moscow. He blackmails a guard who steals two data chips for him. However, he is upset at being passed over for promotion, so he decides he is going to take the chips, leave Moscow, and sell them himself. He can't have the chips on his person for some of his escape preparations, so he forces Zoya to hold on to the package for him and bring it to him at a safe house the next morning. When she goes to meet her brother, Zoya witnesses his murder and find herself being chased by the mobsters, who will do anything to get the package, including killing anyone she loves.
5) What is the personal goal of the character?
At first she just wants to survive and try to help her family and friends. Later, as things become more and more horrific, she decides she has no choice but to seek revenge on her pursuers.
6) What is the title of the book(s), and where can find out more?
The Immortality Game was published by Breakwater Harbor Books on November 24, 2014. I have lots of information here on my blog or on my Facebook page, and you can check out the book on Amazon, Goodreads, iTunes, Barnes&Noble, Kobo, and GooglePlay. Links to all of these and more are on the right-hand sidebar of my blog.


1) What is the name of your character? Is he or she fictional or a historic person?
Marcus is the second main character. He's 26 years old and earns his doctorate in nanotechnology on the very day his life changes. He is a former Mesh addict, which means he was addicted to 'living' within the virtual reality of the Web. His dead father got him out. Yes, his father is dead, but 'lives' on as the world's first true artificial intelligence.
2) When and where is the story set?
Marcus lives in Phoenix, Arizona in America West, the US having been divided during the Dark Times of the late 21st century. After the death of his father, Marcus's mother became a Mesh addict as well, so Marcus essentially lives alone with just his AI father for company.
3) What should we know about him or her?
He is depressed and aimless when the story starts, beat down by the extreme fame and genius of his father, who is known the world over for having made the Web safe by creating the sentry code that wiped out viruses. He has no plans except to follow what his father demands of him.
4) What is the main conflict? What messes up his or her life?
When Zoya's brother inserts one of the stolen chips into a Web port, Marcus's father is alerted to a fabulous new technology that could potentially help restore him to a human body cloned from his own DNA. Marcus's father sends Marcus to Moscow to track down the chip in order to learn who developed the technology.
5) What is the personal goal of the character?
At first it is simply to follow his father's orders, but once he meets Zoya he begins to have feelings for her. When she seems to become ever more intent on getting herself killed, Marcus becomes determined to save her from herself.

So, for this story I really wanted to take two fairly average people and throw them into the fires of hell to see if they could find a way to survive. I hope you might check out the book to see if I succeeded!

Now, since this is a blog hop, I'm supposed to tell you a bit about the next blogger in line for the hop, which appears to be one post per week. That would be Amelia Smith!

Amelia Smith takes an odd-jobs-and-adventures approach to writing. She is currently working on a multi-volume epic fantasy about four friends making their way in a land animated by dragon gods. She has also written a stand-alone Regency romance, a historical fantasy novella, and a screenplay, along with dozens of magazine and newspaper articles. She lives in a small house on Martha's Vineyard with her husband, two children, and an overweight cat. 

Link to website:  www.ameliasmith.net 
Link to blog: http://ameliasmith.net/blog/

Getting Reviews for Novels

Getting people to read a book isn't so hard once they know a book exists (getting them to notice the book exists is a whole other story!), but my experiences so far match up with what other authors have written, which is that the vast majority of readers simply won't post reviews. My debut novel has been 'live' for about two weeks now, and it's sold around 100 copies (thank you to everyone who has bought it!). I know some people buy books and don't read them for quite some time. I certainly do that, buying books often several years before I get time to read them. There are probably three hundred books on my shelves that I still need to get to! But reviews are like gold for new, unknown authors, because buyers often won't spend their money if they don't see enough reviews. So it is awesome to find someone who not only posted a review, but even blogged it!

And now on the same day there is another post, which includes a short excerpt.

It's been a good day today! Another writer mentioned my book here.

Best Christmas Songs - Part 3

To wrap up my three part series of best Christmas music, I'm going to show you my favorite individual songs (the first two parts talked about the best albums). Songs like these are all about individual taste, of course, but are also often about nostalgia over what music we grew up with. Association is a powerful thing, so having heard certain music during our childhood Christmases creates a strong power of association.
Now this following one isn't a song I listen to generally when I'm in a Christmas mood, but I do appreciate it for being different from the run of the mill Xmas music. Well, that was odd. I actually couldn't find any more of my favorite songs on YouTube. I have a couple from the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, though none of these really great versions are on YouTube, along with some others. Sad not to be able to present them to you.

Best Christmas Songs - Part 2

Following up from yesterday's post, today I'll give you some of my favorite Christmas songs from the other of the two albums I consider to be the best two Christmas albums of all time. Yesterday I told you about the brilliant John Denver and the Muppets album. Today the album is the Carpenter's A Christmas Portrait. Honestly, I'm not a Carpenters fan, but their sound works brilliantly for Christmas music. This is another wonderful album to put on in December and listen to all the way through, though naturally I have my favorites, shown below.





When I next post in this series, it won't be about albums but about individual great Christmas songs. Please chime in with your favorites!

Best Christmas Songs - Part 1

In the past I have often put up some of my favorite music, but I have never done so for the holidays, so I figured it might be a good time to do so. I'll start with what I consider to be one of the two very best Christmas albums ever made--A Christmas Together, performed by John Denver and the Muppets. It may sound silly, but this is a fantastic album of Christmas music. Every song on it is great, but I'll post my favorites here. Denver's voice is perfect for Christmas music, and he does some unusual songs, which I think is great.



I'll put up some more next time, including letting you know what the second greatest Christmas album is! What are your favorite Christmas albums?

Author Interview -- Lela Markham

 Joining the small publisher Breakwater Harbor Books has allowed me to get to know some really awesome writers. I'm happy today to get to interview one of those writers, Lela Markham. I haven't yet finished reading the entire book, but her Celtic high fantasy novel The Willow Branch is truly fascinating so far. Since reading Lloyd Alexander's Chronicles of Prydain as a child I have loved Celtic tales, and The Willow Branch is a story all lovers of Celtic myth will enjoy.

 Lela, tell us a bit about yourself:

Thanks for having me, Ted. I grew up and still live in Alaska, where my family has lived off-and-on since the 1930s. I've traveled, but this is home and an adventure like none other. I live in a small city with all the modern conveniences, but I'm half-an-hour from real wilderness where the wildlife is in charge. And since my husband insists upon going out into that wilderness, I've had plenty of adventures and raised two fearless offspring.

 I envy you, as I've always wanted to visit Alaska. Hopefully I can someday. When did you begin writing?

My mother claims I told stories as soon as I could talk, but a teacher in the 5th grade made me write one of them down. I hated the assignment – it was planned and felt really stilted – but I got the highest grade in the class and the teacher said I had talent. Talent will only get you so far, so I decided to rewrite the story for my own pleasure. I think it was still horrible, but the exercise ignited something in me – a passion for writing that has never gone out. I've kept working at it, trying to hone my skills (which is shaped talent) for four decades now. I trained as a journalist, worked as a small-town reporter and then decided I'd rather work for a living wage and write fiction for my own pleasure. I try to learn from others, but also recognize that my voice is unique and sometimes I have to with what it says.

 What's your favorite thing about writing?

That I can choose or create where I want to go in my head and populate it with people and settings that I want to explore and that I can take other people with me.

 What inspires you to write?

 The world provides plenty of inspiration – news, movies, conversations you overhear in the grocery store, my pastor's sermons, the anarcho-capitalists of Fairbanks …. I used to work in the mental health field and a psychiatrist told me once that the only difference between writers and schizophrenics is that writers (usually) know there's a difference between what's going on in their head and actual reality and I think I represent that. Writing flows out of me and demands that I create. Wherever I go and whatever I'm doing, I get inspiration and that translates into stories and I jot them down in a stenographer's pad for later use in whatever story I end up developing.

 What is your writing process?

When stories first start to develop, there's no plan or even a plot. Usually, a character will start to form in my head while I'm doing something mundane – washing dishes or filing at work. That character will start to tell me his/her story. If that character hangs around for a while (and they don't all do that), then I'll write something about them to see what follows. If a world starts to develop around that character, then I will start to outline and bring in other pieces of writing from the “notebook cache.” Eventually, I'll decide that this story needs a direction and an ending and I'll begin to fashion the story to flow that way and step up key milestones and determine which characters are willing to do what at any given point. Since my characters really write themselves, often my writing process is about figuring out what they will and will not do, because they have their own personalities and limitations and it is up to me as the writer to find out what those are.

Where do you like to write?

 I don't have a favorite place to write. For many years, we lived in a tiny cabin where my computer was in the main living room, so I grew used to writing with people around and televisions blaring in the background. Now that I have a laptop, I write during my breaks at work, on planes, in the bedroom, by the wood stove, in the kitchen, in coffee shops, on the deck in the sun, sometimes during water breaks on hikes (I use a paper notebook for those last two). I'll jot down ideas that come to me when I'm watching movies with the family. Some places tend to lend themselves to certain stories and others don't, but I will literally write anywhere and anytime. Generally, I drink coffee or tea while I'm writing and I don't usually eat because I hate crumbs in the keyboard. When I'm getting down to the serious parts of writing, it's usually just me, my laptop, music in the background, a cup of coffee, and the continuity notebook for whatever book I'm working on.

 I admire that tenacity. I'm so picky about writing that I have to have silence and I only work in my office at home! What is something you've written that will never see the light of day?

In high school, I wrote a lot of fan fictions for my friends based on TV shows we all liked, but were ultimately awful or maybe great because they got canceled. I think maybe I improved on them. My husband found a box of it and stuck it in a binder, but it will never be published because of copyright concerns. It was actually a great exercise, taking so-so episodic writing and making it better, giving minor characters fuller attention, finishing stories that were canceled mid-season. Call it weight-lifting for writers.

What's the hardest thing about writing for you?

Ending a story. Even when I've decided how it will end, I often do not want to say goodbye to the surviving characters. I think I write series for that reason. I know how the Daermad Cycle is going to end, but I have a nice long while before I get there.

How many books have you written and which is your favorite?

I've written dozens over the decades, but I've officially finished only four and those are in various stages of revision or restructuring, except The Willow Branch. The door is shut on that. Onward to Mirklin Wood. My favorite is probably my dystopian A Well in Emmaus, which will be a series. I get to bring in a lot of threads from political philosophy, history, anarchism, faith, psychology, even economics and I really love that. I think the Daermad Cycle is my second, and again, because it is so intricate.

 What are some of your favorite books?

Zenna Henderson's People collection were my first introduction to fantasy (they called it sci-fi back then, but it isn't really). I have a soft spot for it still. Madelein L'Engle's books remain favorites, especially The Young Unicorns. I have a library full of classics – Austen, Dickens, Hemingway. I love the letters of the American Founders. My favorite fantasy authors are Katharine Kerr and Kate Elliott. My favorite sci-fi authors are still Bradbury, Heinlein and Asimov. I re-read Fahrenheit 451 last year and was surprised at how prescient Bradbury was – he described ear buds and wide-screen media rooms 50 years before they existed and his take on the alienation of modern America is stunning.

Since we're both new to Breakwater Harbor Books imprint, tell me about your experience with them.

I've known Scott Toney and Cara Goldthorpe from Authonomy for a long time. I think Scott's Ark of Humanity might have been the first or second book I read on the site and I backed it to the ED for a year. Scott gave me lots of feedback on The Willow Branch right after I came out with a major rewrite. Then we sort of lost contact until he found me or I found him on Facebook a few months ago. I checked out the BHB website and complimented him and then he asked me if I was interested in joining the imprint. I had already done most of the work on The Willow Branch. Scott Butcher, who is not part of BHB, acted as my editor for it -- it was a read-swap that went above and beyond. I literally agreed to join BHB three days before the ebook launch. Since then, it's been a warm and welcoming atmosphere and I've picked up a few author interviews from the relationship (both interviewing me and then my interviewing others, which drives traffic to my blog). Scott was moving houses, so things were quiet for a while, but now I see how being a member of a group of writers will allow me access to alpha and beta readers, critique on cover art, and help with promotion. Ivan appears to be a Twitter warrior, which I am ambivalent about, but I enjoy blogging, so I could support him there. That sort of thing. It's tough being an indie author, but if we can find ways to work together, to play off of each other's strengths, then we become better publishers as a group.  

Promo Blurb from my press kit --

Lela Markham is the pen name of an Alaskan novelist who was raised in a home built of books. Alaska is a grand adventure like none other with a culture that embraces summer adventure and winter artist pursuits.

Lela has been a journalist, worked in the mental health field and is currently works for the State of Alaska, but her avocation has always been storyteller.

Her first published book The Willow Branch begins an exploration of the world of Daermad where a fractured kingdom leaves two races vulnerable to destruction by a third and opens the opportunity to mend old wounds. Lela drew inspiration from Celtic mythology, Alaskan raven legends and the Bible to craft a tale of war, faith and reconciliation. And, don’t forget … Celtic goddesses, sentient animals and dragons.

Lela shares her life with her adventuresome husband and two fearless offspring and a sentient husky who keeps a yellow Lab as a pet.

aurorawatcherak@wordpress.com

thewillowbranch@wordpress.com

Lela in the lovely Alaskan wilderness

Back Cover Pitch:

A healer must mend a fractured kingdom and bring two enemy races together before a greater enemy destroys them both.

Fate took Prince Maryn by surprise, leaving Celdrya to tear itself apart. A century later an army amasses against the warring remains of the kingdom as prophesy sends a half-elven healer on a journey to find the nameless True King. Padraig lacks the power to put the True King on the throne, yet compelled by forces greater than himself, Padraig contends with dark mages, Celtic goddesses, human factions and the ancient animosities of two peoples while seeking a myth. With all that distraction, a man might meet the True King and not recognize him.

 The Willow Branch is available on Amazon and Smashwords!