Friday, November 29, 2013

leslie okane: Overnight Success After Twenty Years!

On Tuesday before Thanksgiving, I had my wildest-dream success from a promotion I ran on Bookbub for my mystery PLAY DEAD.  I watched my author ranking on Amazon rise from 20,000 to number 67.  On all of Amazon, there were only 66 authors who outsold me on 11/26/2014.  It is now Friday, August 29th, and there are now 225, but I'm not complaining.  I've sold several thousand books, and it has been an exhilarating and magical ride that I never truly believed would happen to me.  The promotion expires on Sunday, and my ratings will drop, but I'll remember how much fun this was for a long time.

I'll also remember, though, that my daughter came home for Thanksgiving still suffering with the after-effects of a terrible case of food poisoning.  She can still barely force herself to eat more than a couple of bites at any one sitting. 

I'll remember that I didn't manage to write the chapter in my next book that--no pun intended--I'm dying to finish.  I awoke this morning with my thoughts in their usual whirl as I tried to think of how I can get my book in front of my intended audience for THE BODY SHIFTERS.  I miss my son who's stationed in S. Korea.  I'm feeling guilty about some friends that I still haven't managed to have over for dinner.  My husband and I still have financial concerns as he retires from IBM in two weeks.  There's no way to know if all of these new-to-my-work readers will buy another book from me, or if by Tuesday, I'll be back in the 20,000th position.

This was probably my fifteen minutes of fame.  If so, I'm so happy and grateful that I got to experience it!  I've loved every one of those minutes; I've smiled for every second of them.  I'm also happy and grateful to have learned from this experience that life isn't very different for the 67th and the 20,000th sales-ranked author.  Either way, I still need to finish my next book to the best of my ability and then try to market that book to the best of my ability.  It's the nature of the beast to come up short, but also to keep trying.  How frustratingly wonderful is that?!

Warmest wishes for the holiday season!
Leslie "Caine" O'Kane

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