Good To Know
Apparently I either bored, grossed out, or offended four newsletter subscribers with my most recent newsletter because they unsubscribed. Which, as I said in my previous post, is fine—I want people who are reading the newsletter because they’re actually readers of mine who want to know what I’m doing, not folks who signed up just to get a free book. I really hate using terms like “organic” to describe the former people but you know what I mean.
That being said, I can also understand why some people might not want to hear about the cancer and how I was feeling at the time (namely, terrified and convinced I was going to die in ten months due to a reading on the PET scan that was, in fact, not osseous metastatic disease as suggested by the doc who wrote the report). I won’t really be discussing it again in future newsletters apart from brief reports on my six month checkups, just in case you’re on the fence about subscribing.
Still, I need to talk about more than just the latest release and whatever backlist book I’m promoting in a given newsletter. Courtney Milan does a beautiful job with that, talking about all the various teas she tries and throwing in little personal elements before she promotes her book. I tried talking about jewelry but that petered out quickly, Maybe I should talk about crafting in general? Crafting is part of my writing process, after all, and I usually have at least one project on the go at any time and I can show progress pics, or talk about why I picked that project, or mention the company that charged me for patterns I didn’t buy and never wanted, and that they stole from other creators. Ahem.
I’ll think about it this week. In the meantime, since I don’t have access to ABC or any of the streaming services hosting the Oscars I’m gonna catch up on the winners over at TikTok. While we still have it, anyway.
New Newsletter Subscribers
A newsletter is an important promotion tool for an author, especially indie authors, because it’s your direct pipeline to your readers that no middleman can touch. With a newsletter you don’t have to worry about the Book of Face throttling your posts, or some bozo billionaire tanking another social media platform (or the government trying to shut down a SM platform, grr). As long as you have a list of genuine fans and readers you can email them directly about upcoming publications and sales, give them pertinent buy links to your Shopify store, show them adorable pictures of your cats, etc.
The trick is to build your newsletter list in such a way that it contains only the people who actually read your stuff. Yeah, a huge NL list is great, and there are all kinds of ways to boost your NL numbers through things like swaps and paid promos. But if 80% of your NL members come from those mechanisms, they probably signed up for a free book and aren’t really going to bother opening your newsletter when it hits their inbox. The word here is “organic.” You want people to sign up because they found you, think you’re interesting and your writing is fabulous, and they want to hear more.
Why am I rattling on about newsletters? Well, I’ve had three people sign up to my newsletter in the last month or so through the signup form here on my website. This freaking delights me because it means (at least, I hope it means) that these three subscribers are organic—they like my work and they want to hear about new releases. When I send out a newsletter next week with a pre-order link for A Court of Green Clover, I can pretty much guarantee that they’ll want to buy it or read it on KU (as an aside I’ll be releasing ACoGC on Amazon and KU first, then after the KU period expires I’ll be releasing it wide, so if you prefer to buy your books on Apple or Kobo you will be able to pick it up in three months).
Right now, my newsletter list is only a skosh over 500 members. I prune out the hard bounces and the unsubscribes without rancor because those are the people who wouldn’t have opened the NL anyway. The important thing is that even with pruning the member list is growing, slowly but surely. Or to quote Sall Field as Norma Rae, “You LIKE me, you really, really LIKE me!”
Happy Anniversary to Myself
According to Facebook today is my eleventh anniversary as a published novelist. Eleven years ago today Evernight bought Storm Season, setting me off on this crazy adventure.
So much has changed since 2013. I lost one cat, gained two more, became an indie author and started writing MF romance as well as MM romance, went through financial tribulations, and had cancer last year. I also wrote a total of seventeen novels (sixteen as Nicola and my alternate history mystery as Melanie Fletcher).
Which is actually pretty good for someone of my generation. Yeah, I know Millennials and Gen Z can churn out tons of books a year because they have the energy and drive to do it. But for someone who is in menopause and is already missing a couple of body parts, seventeen books (eighteen if you count Shifter Woods: Claw since it’s 42K words which puts it into novel class) is something of an achievement. Of course that number would have been nineteen or twenty, but My Adventure With Cancer ate a good third of last year along with four teeth, five lymph nodes, and a strip of my jawbone.
So I’m busy playing catch-up this year and trying to finish those three books as well as the ones scheduled for this year, all while looking for contract tech writing or instructional design work because this house desperately needs a lot of repairs and I’ not making enough money from the books to pay for all of it. Oh, and I’m waving off my drunken slattern of a Muse who keeps popping up with new books ideas while I still have at least six to finish first. And yes, I’m completely aware these are First World problems and there’s a genocide going on and I’m incredibly lucky and should just shut up and be happy about my anniversary. I know this, truly.
It’s just that to me, money = time. I don’t want to be filthy rich—I do not have the temperament for it. I just want to have enough money where if the washing machine starts leaking or the refrigerator stops dispensing filtered water I can call a repairman instead of looking up ways to fix it myself, because that takes me away from writing. I want to have enough money so that I can pay for expensive CT scans and my medical insurance deductible for the year without fretting about how I’m actually going to cover that bill, because that takes me away from writing (as an aside, if anyone needs cover art done my schedule is open and I’m ready to make something amazing for you). I want to have enough money to put solar cells on the roof with a battery so that if this summer is as hot as last summer I won’t constantly be worrying about the grid going down, because that takes me away from writing.
The ironic thing is, if I cranked out a bunch more books I’d make more money and a number of these problems would be eased. So I probably should shut up and get back to work.
Busy, Busy, Busy
I have three new episodes of A Court of Green Clover up at Vella at the moment and I’ve been working on the next episode of High Tide this morning, with hopes of publishing it this evening. Can’t guarantee anything, but since I started drinking a cup of Flow State coffee in the morning (I started on Saturday) it’s done wonders for my ability to concentrate and get work done. I don’t know if it’s the caffeine or the lion’s mane and chaga mushroom powder in the coffee, but it does seem to work for me.
At least for now. My metabolism has a remarkable ability to adapt to practically anything I put in it and make it stop working. Frex, I can only take ibuprofen for a certain amount of time before I have to go off it and use other, less effective painkillers because at some point my metabolism says, “Nah” and I might as well be eating M&Ms.
What I might try with the Flow State brew is one week on, one week off. That should hold off the acclimatization process and I still get at least two weeks out of a month where I’m insanely productive. Because I have sooooo much to do—I need to finish ACoGC in the next week or so in order to publish it in March, I need to finish High Tide because that is painfully overdue, then I need to finish Hurricane Warning which will wrap up the Olympic Cove series, then write To Love a Wild Swan for Hidden Empire and Mage of Fire for Two Thrones. And that’s just the writing part of the biz; it doesn’t include setting up my Shopify store so that I can direct sell ebooks and signed print books, learning how to do sprayed edges so that I can offer those in the store as well, and cranking out content for my Patreon, newsletter, and social media.
And yet I still feel like a slacker. I don’t know why my brain dislikes me, I really don’t.
Well, This Is Just Inexcusable
Look, I don’t know what happened to this month. It seems like I was either prepping the house to get it ready for the deep freeze we enjoyed here in the clavicle of Texas, going to doctors’ appointments (my oncologist says my CT scan and labs are “boring” and he doesn’t need to see me again until July), working on cover projects for clients, crocheting lap blankets for a friend who is collecting them for elderly folks in sheltered accommodation, trying to keep the place clean, and churning out wordage on High Tide and A Court of Green Clover (aka the secret St. Patrick’s Day project that I’ll be releasing on Vella in January and February in preparation for publication in March along with the other books in the Lusty Charms collection).
Of course, I could have let you know about all of that, particularly the WIPs. My apologies. I think I’m just a little overwhelmed at all the things I need to do in the next few months. When that happens I tend to hunker down and hide while I try to get everything done. It didn’t help that I hit a bit of a wall on High Tide this month, not sure why (I mean, I was about to write a battle scene and you know how much I love those). But that seems to be broken now and I’ll be posting new episodes this week on Vella.
Oh, I also got everything I need to do sprayed edges on books, which is the new big thing on Booktok. I’m practicing on some old books I have on hand, and when I have the technique down pat I’ll order new print books and add sprayed edges to them. I’m still not sure if I’m going to sell them through Etsy or Shopify—Etsy’s fees are pricey but I already have the store set up, plus they track state taxes so I don’t have to worry about that—but they’ll be signed and come with some cute tchotchkes. So you have that to look forward to.
Back to Work
Got 1,068 words done on High Tide today in between spackling and painting my office window in preparation for the installation of cordless blinds, and that felt pretty damned good. Clichéd as it sounds, I really think I needed the break to let the creative well refill.
It also helps that I came to an important realization about one of the characters—I was writing him as kind of a himbo, and himbos bore me. So I changed his personality a bit, gave him a much more rounded background and intelligence, and suddenly my interest in the story surged. Of course I’ll have to go back and make sure I edit these changes into the earlier chapters (as well as an additional character), but hey, I already know that this book is going to need a buttload of editing so hey, what’s one more item for the punch list?
After I was done with that and the wondow, I got some work done on my January chapter for my Patreon (this is the contemporary paranormal romcom with a Regency MMC that I came up with last year). It’s so far outside of both Nicola M and Natasha’s wheelhouses that I can’t really publish it under either name (I learned my lesson with To My Muse and Grading the Curve about sticking to reader expectations), so it’s going to be exclusive for my Patreon members.
And finally, I need to schedule some time to go in and edit keywords for all of my books to add the term “romantasy,” blessings be on whatever group of readers made that a viable trend. The fun, it never stops around here.
2023 Was Not My Best Year
It didn’t help that I lost a good third of the year to cancer issues and associated stuff. I keep telling myself that when the obnoxious part of my brain tries to lash me for only putting out one book in 2023.
But after a week or so of relaxing, watching a lot of HGTV shows, knitting, and doing some small projects around the house, I will get back to work on High Tide. After that, I finish Hurricane Warning, then pivot to To Love a Wild Swan.
Just a warning, however. We have an absolute buttload of expensive repairs that need to be made to the house, and the only way we can afford to do them is if I pick up some contract technical writing/instructional designer work. Which means book production may slow down since I’ll have to spend eight hours of the work week selling my labor to other people so that we can fix our foundation and replace the dead air handler downstairs (those two issues alone will run us about $20-25K). It’s unfortunate, but it’s what I have to do until the books start selling better.
Is It Possible To Have Flashbacks Of Your Own Books?
As you know, Bob, when I wasn’t working on High Tide in November I was cleaning my house for a guest visit (which went very well, thank you). An interesting side effect has been that I’ve been spending an hour a day doing general cleaning (sweeping, emptying the litter boxes, feeding/watering the cats, wiping down counters, laundry, et al) and in-depth cleaning on a single room. I know from experience that this will last until I get sick, get a big project dumped in my lap, or some other time sink happens to swallow all available seconds, but for the moment it’s nice.
That being said, I keep having the weirdest experiences while cleaning, or cooking dinner to be honest. I keep getting what I can only call flashbacks of settings from my various books. I’ll be dusting a bookcase or vacuuming the living room, and suddenly I get hit with a memory of what the Hellene Royal Palace looks like, or Henry’s house from Shadow of the Swan, or the hunting lodge from Crystal Blade.
None of these places are real, mind you. They’re an amalgamation of places and buildings I’ve seen throughout my life, but for some reason they keep popping into my head in full 3-D color. And I suddenly really, really want to write another story set in that universe.
I think my creative brain is trying to tell me to get the lead out with High Tide, get it and Hurricane Warning finished, then get to work on either To Love a Wild Swan, Mage of Fire, or Crystal Reflection. The original plan was to take the last week of December off, but it now looks like I’ll be writing all the way through it. But hey, I love my job so that’s all right.
The Worst is Done
High Tide Episodes 29: A Little Flirting, 30: Leave It to Bever, and 31: I’ll Keep You My Dirty Little Secret are live on Kindle Vella. Go forth, read, enjoy.
Oh. My. God.
After a month of intensive work all of the public rooms are guest-quality clean (well, except where Jessie peed outside a litter box this morning, but that area is drying in preparation for sweeping and disinfecting). What’s guest-quality clean, you ask?
- All extraneous stuff is put away (frankly, this probably took the longest—Ramón and I have a bad habit of depositing stuff everywhere)
- All surfaces are dusted (including corners of walls and ceilings, undersides of counters, and window frames)
- All carpets are vacuumed/cleaned
- All hard surface floors are steam mopped/washed
- All curtains are washed
- All windows are washed
- All kitchen appliances are cleaned
- All furniture is dusted/cleaned/polished
And yes, this took a month to do because I’m 1) old and fat, 2) recovering from surgery, 3) trying to finish a book, 4) running a small business, and 5) cleaning up after an absent-minded engineer and four cats.
Mind you, I still have to fix the downstairs toilet’s intake valve, get the fridge water filter installed (considering that the last time I did this the intake didn’t shut off and flooded the kitchen floor so this will require Extra Steps), see if I can fix the springs in the living room chair so that humans can sit in it without losing circulation in their lower legs, clean my office, our bedroom and bathroom, then prep the guest room for Friday (aka kick out the cats, vacuum and dust, then make up the bed).
But the back of the really intensive cleaning has been broken. I may actually write today, then have a lovely dinner with my aunt and uncle who are unexpectedly in town. Whee!
NaNoWriMo, Day Seventeen
Today: 1,675 words
Total: 28,518 words
I’m sorry, but I think this is the last NaNoWriMo post for 2023. I am getting slammed with all the cleaning I need to do for the oncoming visitors, my right shoulder and left knee are screaming at me from all the activity, and I just don’t have the extra spoons to chunk out that much wordage every day. I already know I’m going to finish this book. I just may not do it by November 30th.
On the plus side, I discovered that there is a shoulder brace available on Amazon that should give the pranged shoulder a certain amount of relief. Truly, what I really need to do is stop cleaning but that’s just not an option at the moment so mechanical help it is.
Nicola Cameron Writes 