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Milestones

August turned into a busy and exciting time for me. Early in the month, my eldest daughter married her long-time beau. They both appeared thrilled. Both had previous marriages that didn’t work out contributing to the long pre-marriage relationship. Then at the end of the month, my wife and I celebrated our fifty-fourth wedding anniversary. I am still amazed that God could take two selfish and naïve hippies and join them together in a lasting, loving, and mutually beneficial relationship.

Lightning’s Edge

In the middle of the month, I received the final cover design for my second novel. Though I thought of waiting until after the first of the year to release it, I set the tentative release date to mid-November. I uploaded the manuscript to Kindle Direct Publishing and ordered a proof copy of the paperback. My wife will read through it, acting as a final proofread before publishing. Next month, I will reveal the cover and hopefully have a video or pictures showing the proof copy.

Between now and November advanced reader copies (ARC’s) will go out so that on the release date the readers can post reviews on Amazon. Getting reviews on Amazon is very important to sales for the book. My first novel has only five reviews. The minimum requirement for Amazon to take the reviews seriously is 20, and if a book gets 100 five-star reviews, Amazon will put it in front of more people, increasing sales. So, if you have read Salvation and Doom, write a review.

Salvation and Doom Sequel

I have started writing the sequel to Salvation and Doom. The plan is to publish it late next year if I complete it in time. The sequel seems to be harder to write than the original even though it revolves around many of the same characters. But, thinking about it, Salvation and Doom took seven years to write. Long Journey’s End – Moving from Writer to Author

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First Book

This is an exciting time for me as a writer. My second novel is ready to format and upload for publishing as soon as I get my final cover design. Thinking about my second novel reminds me of when we had our second child. Our first child came into this world fourteen months after our wedding. I felt excited but also fearful that something would go wrong, and it was a difficult delivery. When I first saw my son, he hadn’t been completely cleaned up and his head was misshapen from the forceps. When my wife asked me if I had seen him and how beautiful and perfect he was, I hesitated.

My first novel came into the world with high expectations, but it didn’t sell despite the rave reviews from the initial readers. (Long Journey’s End – Moving from Writer to Author) Eight months later, I still receive compliments on my cover whenever I post it on social media. Miblart, MIBLART | Book cover design services, the company that designed the cover for my first book, is designing the second cover as well. The initial design looked great but needed some minor changes. I should receive the updated design in the next week or two. With the cover, I can upload everything to Amazon and Ingram Sparks, for their review. If there are no errors, the book will be ready to publish, and I can set a release date for later this year.

Second Book

When we decided to have a second child seven years after the first, there was the same excitement but less fear. We knew what to expect and had more confidence in ourselves as parents. One difference though between releasing the books and having children is not knowing the exact date of the birth, especially since my wife didn’t require a c-section. With the book, I set the date. If I establish a late November or December publishing date, I will have four or five months to do the prepublication tasks that I left only six weeks to accomplish for my first book.

After acceptance by Amazon and Ingram Sparks, advanced reader copies (ARCs) need to go out to reviewers to read and prepare Amazon reviews for posting on the release date. I didn’t do a good job of getting ARCs out on the first book. As a result, I only have 6 reviews on Amazon. Amazon’s algorithm and readers like to have a minimum of twenty reviews. My goal is to reach or exceed that benchmark. The plan is to provide the ARC readers two to three months before the release date so they can comfortably finish the book.

 If you would be interested in participating as an ARC reader, use the contact form on my website, Contact – C Buck Jones, or if you read this on Facebook, let me know through a comment. I will provide you with either an ePub or a pdf file to read.

Proof

Also, before the release date, I will have proof copies of the paperback sent to me from Amazon’s and Ingram Sparks’ print-on-demand services. These will undergo a final proofreading.  Whether it is your first child or sixth, the joy of seeing the newborn baby brings hope and happiness into your life. When the proof copies arrive, I get similar feelings of hope and happiness. Hope that the beautiful new baby will sell and be enjoyed by others. Happiness in holding the physical evidence of a book that I wrote.

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Books and Authors I like

As a young man, I enjoyed reading science fiction and fantasy. Books like Dune, Dune Novels – The Official Dune Website, and The Lord of the Rings trilogy, The Lord of the Rings – Tolkien Gateway, are favorites I have read multiple times. But not all the books I enjoyed were long massive tomes. I enjoy shorter, less literary works like those by Edgar Rice Burroughs, H. G. Wells, Author Conan Doyle, and C. S. Lewis.

So, during the editing of my first book, Salvation and Doom, I started writing my second book. (My Manuscript is finished. Time to prepare for publishing.) I thought of writing a fun science fiction book like A Princess of Mars, John Carter of Mars® Series < Edgar Rice Burroughs, The Lost World, The Lost World – The Arthur Conan Doyle Encyclopedia (arthur-conan-doyle.com), or Out of the Silent Planet, Series: The Space Trilogy Archives – C.S. Lewis Institute (cslewisinstitute.org).

New Book In Process

It only took a few months to have the first draft of the book complete, compared to the years for my first book. The proofreader will finish with the final draft of the book next week. I can format the manuscript and order a cover design. I sent out social media posts asking for help with the book title and received several responses but tried a different approach using A.I. to generate a title and book blurb based on the summary I provided.

The title of it is Lightning’s Edge: Lost World Odyssey. And the blurb is below:

When a bolt of lightning from a clear sky propels middle-aged Ryan and his loyal dog, Toby, into a perilous and primitive world, putting their survival skills to the ultimate test. From enduring capture by ruthless slavers and battling fierce pirates to navigating the treetop villages of a mythical winged race, Ryan’s odyssey is a heart-pounding adventure through a land filled with danger and mystery. As he seeks the secrets held by a tribal medicine man, Ryan’s determination to return home conflicts with the relationships he develops and the uncertainty of his future there.

In “Lightning’s Edge: Lost World Odyssey,” embark on a journey where every step is a battle for survival, every encounter a test of trust, and every moment a fight against the odds. Will Ryan unlock the path back to his world, or will he remain forever lost in this strange and wondrous land?

I submitted the summary to the company that designed my last cover for a free design concept and their idea fit the new title without knowing the book’s title. The excitement is building as publishing nears and I prepare to send out advanced reader copies for review. I had fun writing it and I hope you have fun reading it.

The Money Pit

Last weekend, I had lunch with my son-in-law, one of my grandsons, and my daughter’s fiancee. During the meal, part of the conversation revolved around the fiancee’s progress on restoring an old pickup truck. Whenever he thought the end was near, something else would come up. For example, he changed from drum brakes to disc brakes. As a result, he had to change out the rims, and the new rims required new tires.

It reminded me of the old movie The Money Pit (The Money Pit (1986) – IMDb) with Tom Hanks and Shelley Long renovating an old house. The renovations went on and on with no end in sight. The truck renovation is not nearly as involved as the house in the movie, but it made me think about my experience as a self-published author.

Marketing and Sales

Over the last several months, I have written about the trials and tribulations of a self-published author struggling with book sales,(Book Sales and Marketing Is Work), not knowing how to market, and the ongoing expenses. Lately, I have explored different marketing avenues. I had an Instagram book blogger review my book. (Buck Jones (@buck.jones.507) • Instagram photos and videos) This resulted in a lot of interest with nearly 700 likes and comments on the post, and it nearly doubled my Instagram following. However, the bottom line is it resulted in zero sales and a deluge of other bloggers wanting to post about my book for a fee.

I contacted book marketing companies that promised a minimum 200% return on investment. But the packages they offered ran from $1500 to $6000 with a significant payment upfront. This was over my current budget. I will continue to struggle through various free and lower-cost options, especially since I have already contracted with an editor on my second book, which I hope to publish later this year.

Final Words

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You can buy my book Salvation and Doom directly by using this link: Buy Salvation and Doom:The Cathardi Prophecy (ingramspark.com)

Last year, before publishing my book, I decided to start my own publishing company, Wolfstar Publishing. Listing a publisher on the Amazon product page, (https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CKM1CCFL), appears more professional. (At least that is what I read.) I registered the company, Wolfstar Publishing, with the state of Colorado as a sole proprietorship since I didn’t anticipate a lot of income. It would also allow me to evaluate the income and expenses using a separate business account, while the taxes would fold into my individual income tax.

Wolfstar Publishing is a registered for-profit business. However, over the last six months, it didn’t earn any profit. I have heard it said a business without profit is just a hobby. So, my business turned out to be an expensive hobby and will soon get more expensive, since I am preparing to publish another book.

My new novel, tentatively titled Portal to Almirosia, is ready to go to an editor. The book is just over 80,000 words and editing costs run at a minimum of $0.008 to $0.01 per word. Once editing is complete, I will need to pay someone to proofread the manuscript with an estimated cost similar to the editing. Then, a cover must be designed before publishing.

With no significant sales from the first book to provide income, this money comes from my limited retirement income or savings. All in hopes that the books will eventually begin to sell. Like any small business, developing a customer base is crucial to success. The more books I have for sale the better the chances of increasing my income. I presume this is the hope of all authors, especially independently published authors.

As mentioned above, my new novel is ready for the editor. It is not a sequel to the first book, but a different type of story. In it, the protagonist is transported to a new world full of primitive people, megafauna, and other strange creatures. He initially thinks he is dreaming, but soon learns he is not and must learn to survive. He must figure out how to return to the world and life he had. He fights wild animals, is sold into slavery, taken by pirates, and followed by ‘dragons’. Will he make it home? If he does, will his wife still be there after all the time that has passed?

It’s an action-packed fun story similar to Edgar Rice Burroughs’ John Carter or Tarzan books. If interested, sign up for my newsletter and blog to stay updated.

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 Naive about writing

When I decided to write my book, I thought it would be easy. I know I have talked about it here in the past. When I started, I was naïve about the difficulty involved in writing a book. (https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CKM1CCFL) The first two years of my retirement involved learning how to write understandably and how to develop a plot suitable for a full-length novel. Then learning about editing, proofreading, and all the technical work required to make the writing worth reading. The Only Kind of Writing Is Rewriting

Naive about the time required

During this process, I assumed that once I wrote the book, the rest would be easy. However, during my research, I discovered it could take a year or more to find a literary agent, and then another two years to complete the publishing process. Since I am over 70 years old, I decided self-publishing was the best route. There was a lot of information about marketing your book and using your author platform. But I have a tiny platform and marketing is difficult. Long Journey’s End – Moving from Writer to Author

Naive about book sales

I was naïve about how everything worked. I thought if my book was good, my friends and family would read it, other people would find it on Amazon, and I would sell books. The initial feedback I received from my editors, beta readers, and the reviews of the early readers encouraged me. To date, only 40 people have purchased the book and during the free-book promotion I ran on Amazon at the end of February, only 14 more people downloaded the e-book. Pretty underwhelming sales, though I didn’t expect to be an N. Y. Times best-selling author, but I hoped to recover the costs involved in producing the book. Buy Now – Authors Need Encouragement

Naive about marketing

Again, I was naïve. Since the end of last year, I have tried various approaches to marketing the book. I did a price promotion on Amazon (https://www.amazon.com/) in December which resulted in zero sales. In January, I paid someone on Fiverr (https://www.fiverr.com/) to post my book on various book blog sites. I can only attribute one sale to the effort. I am currently using eBook Fairs (Online Book Fairs Hosted By Authors | eBookFairs) to expand my audience, but it is too early to tell if it has had any effect on sales. Then there was the free book promotion which ran for two days on Feb.28 & 29. The 14 books downloaded make it the most effective marketing effort to date, but giving away books for free doesn’t cover any costs.

 The lesson from all of this is that even if I have a well-written and interesting book, an attractive cover, and a reasonable blurb people will not buy the book if they don’t know it exists. It is naïve of me to think by some sort of osmosis people will find it and buy it. I must be patient and satisfied with the major accomplishment of completing and publishing my first novel.

Status of my new book

I have gotten about three-quarters of the way through the re-write of my new book, tentatively titled Portal to Almirosia. It is a portal fantasy where the protagonist is transported to a new world and must try to get back home. There is a lot of action and adventure and it deals with issues of fidelity, acceptance of new species, and slavery.

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Book Sales

As an author, I thought I could write and publish a book that everyone would like. What I found out is that even if you have a good book, if people don’t know about it, they can’t buy it. When I released Salvation and Doom, Amazon.com: Salvation and Doom: The Cathardi Prophecy eBook : Jones, C.Buck: Kindle Store, I figured people could search Amazon and find the book without any trouble. I learned that wasn’t the case and initially had a hard time finding it myself. Fortunately, my Kindle Direct Publishing page allowed me to go to the listing on Amazon.com where I could copy the link to my book’s listing which I could share.

The first page or perish, is a saying concerning sales on Amazon.com. In other words, if your item is not listed on the first page of the Amazon.com search, you sell anything. My understanding of books is, that Amazon uses recent sales and customer reviews to determine which books are listed first. The table below shows my sales for November 2023 – January 2024. From twenty-plus book sales, I have only four ratings with three of the four leaving reviews. Neither gets me on the first page. All the reviews, on both Amazon and Goodreads, are four and five stars.

Marketing Efforts

Somehow I need to let people know about my book, and the limited number of people within my Facebook and Instagram accounts are not sufficient to get any significant results. I am trying various methods to publicize my book to a broader, more targeted audience. I paid someone to post my book on several book blogs. The January posts resulted in one KU sale which won’t cover my costs. I have signed up for Online Book Fairs Hosted By Authors | eBookFairs which will show my book to a broad audience. The first fair is scheduled for February 9, 2024, and I will provide more details as the fair approaches. Next week I will visit our library, as well as the local Barnes and Noble bookstores, to see if they will carry my book as a local author.

Writing Update

In the meantime, I am continuing to edit my next book, a portal fantasy, that I hope to publish this year. I am also working on a sequel to Salvation and Doom. Word is that book sales increase if you have more than one book.

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Sound of Freedom

I recently streamed the Sound of Freedom on Prime Video, (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt7599146/). The movie from Angel Studios depicts the human trafficking of children and one man’s fight to rescue some of those children. Emotionally engaging without being too graphic, it is a reminder of how we rarely recognize the extent of the evil that exists in our backyard.

The movie achieved box office success and criticism from some of the Hollywood elite. The same group who may have been associated with or acquainted with Jeffery Epstein, (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeffrey_Epstein), the accused sex trafficker. The courts recently allowed the release of the list of his associates, which includes former U.S. Presidents and at least one member of the British royal family. It seems to me our leaders and cultural influencers don’t want us to know the extent of the problem.

Our current administration has disregarded the security of our southern border, allowing thousands of immigrants to enter the U.S. illegally. Many of them are minors without their parents. With the cartel’s influence and control of parts of Mexico, it provides an easy opportunity for them to increase the amount of trafficking from Central and South America into the U.S. It is a lucrative business accounting for over 150 billion dollars each year. (Cracking The $150 Billion Business Of Human Trafficking (forbes.com))

You can help in the fight to stop human trafficking. Many organizations are working to bring the problem out into the open and to fight against the traffickers. Search online and find one you can support. Remember, we are all created in the image of God.

New Book

In the book I am currently revising, the protagonist falls into the hands of raiders who take him and others from the village where he lives. The raiders take the captives to the coast and sell them as slaves. A significant part of the story involves his time in slavery. Because slavery is a sensitive issue for many people, some suggested I submit the manuscript to a sensitivity reader before publication.

I hope to have the manuscript ready to publish later this year, but that may depend on my ability to pay for the costs associated with editing, a cover design, and proofreading. I started a business to pay for my publishing costs, but book sales are almost nonexistent, so the business has made no money, making it an expensive hobby. Don’t forget to sign up for my monthly newsletter and buy my first book. Buy Now – Authors Need Encouragement

Published

Last month, on Nov. 15, 2023, my first book, Salvation and Doom: The Cathardi Prophecy, officially went on sale (Long Journey’s End – Moving from Writer to Author). It is currently available on both Amazon.com, https://www.amazon.com/, and BarnesandNoble.com, Online Bookstore: Books, NOOK ebooks, Music, Movies & Toys | Barnes & Noble® (barnesandnoble.com). I will include the links to the book pages below since I don’t have enough sales or reviews to rate very high on the Amazon algorithm. As of this morning, I have sold 15 copies of the book. As an unknown author who self-published, I assume it is to be expected that early sales will be limited to my friends and family. This does nothing to allay the fear that people won’t like my book. I am continuing to work on a new novel and have started the outline for a follow-up novel to Salvation and Doom, but I need the encouragement of book sales and positive reviews from readers.

With the book’s slow sales after release, I was struggling with the fear that I had spent a lot of money for no reason. I did not expect a profit from the book, but I hoped to at least come close to breaking even. That may be a pipe dream since most of what I have read says an author needs multiple books available before sales increase enough to be profitable. I guess there is still hope.

Reviews

On the positive side, I received my first review for the book on Goodreads, Salvation and Doom: The Cathardi Prophecy by C. Buck Jones | Goodreads, a five-star rating with some encouraging comments. Then I had lunch with a former coworker who asked me to sign the book he had bought. He said he really enjoyed it and took it to show to other people in the plant where I had worked and told them it was very good. Now I know there is an audience for the book if they can find it.

I have been working so hard on getting Salvation and Doom released, I haven’t spent much time working on either of my new books.  The last few days I have spent editing my portal fantasy book, tentatively titled Portal to Almirosia. I intend to have the book ready to be published next year, and I have received some encouraging feedback and specific areas for improvement from my beta readers. Wish me luck.

Book Links

https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/book/1144380920?ean=9798989049813

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National Author’s Day

Monday, November 1^st, was National Author’s Day. I won’t officially become an author for another two weeks, National Author’s Day had a real meaning this year. On Wednesday, November 15, 2023, I will release my debut novel on Amazon and Barnes and Noble. It has been almost ten years since I began this journey.

April 5, 2014

I printed a note to myself: I’m going to write a novel and get it published. I’m going to do it because writing a novel is worthwhile and because I have the talent to do it. I’m going to do it because I have something important to say to the world. I refuse to let anything get in my way.

I printed it out, signed it, and posted it on the bulletin board above my desk at home. Though I don’t know where I got the idea, it served as a reminder to me when I got stuck or didn’t know how to proceed. I would write every day during lunch at work. The first 40,000 words poured onto the page as I wrote long-hand in a spiral notebook. Then I got stuck. I knew how the story started and ended, but I didn’t know how to flesh out the story to make it a novel. But, the note reminded me of my goal.

Getting Unstuck

I bought a book, Writing Fiction for Dummies, (https://www.amazon.com/Writing-Fiction-Dummies-Randy-Ingermanson/dp/0470530707), which introduced me to Randy Ingermanson’s Snowflake Method. (https://www.ingermanson.com/) It helped me organize my thoughts and the plot into a story that could become a novel. During the downtime on writing, I copied the hand-written manuscript to the computer, though I still had difficulty finding the time to write. When I retired from my job, I still only had about 40,000 words, though I had developed a Character Bible and other background information for the story. Since my retirement nearly three years ago, the novel has expanded to over 80,000 words.

Finished Product

I have edited and rewritten it several times. Critique partners, beta readers, editors, and a proofreader have all read it and made suggestions. I have documented some of this journey in previous blogs (Book Update and Website Changes), and now I stand on the threshold of becoming a published author. I may not have taken on writing a novel if I had realized how much work learning how to write involved. But with the constant reminder of the note above my desk and the encouragement of my wife and others, my first novel is complete.

Now, I am both excited about the release and afraid that no one will buy it.

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