I know I don’t update frequently because I suck. I spend most of my time “being” my other name. And so… I do most of my social media and interacting there. Anyway, the Preternaturals box set did way better than I expected. I was also fortunate enough to have a Bookbub with it, so that was awesome. And I got some nice sell through on my other titles which I think are overpriced given the rabid reading habits of romance readers so I’ve adjusted those prices downwards a bit just to see how that goes.

Sure, it isn’t “fair” other authors can sell books at a higher price, but romance is a tough market. (And who said life was fair? I don’t want to devalue the work, but I also don’t want it to sit there and do nothing. Keeping prices high when it’s not selling at that rate is just foolishness.) It’s a big market but it’s highly competitive and readers are so voracious that they want lower priced books so they can read more. I would have to be a BIG name in my genre to command $5.99 and $6.99 per title. I feel like that’s a more ‘respectable’ price that is more in line with mainstream traditionally published work. BUT… I would bet money that new authors with traditional contracts selling at that rate are having a MUCH harder time competing in the marketplace. Because it’s name recognition and big fanbases that command those sorts of prices now. So it’s not an indie vs. trad. It’s just that indie authors actually have the flexibility to lower their prices if something isn’t working.

And also, to be fair, this series is complete, and it’s been complete for a little over a year and every title runs it’s course. I know people say that you build this big backlist and things sell forever. But… that’s sort of true and untrue at the same time. A lot of backlist stuff WILL sell seemingly forever, but usually at a much lower rate than when it was a new release. That’s just the nature of the beast. It is beneficial to have a lot of titles out there, but you have to keep publishing new stuff or everything sort of just withers and dies on the vine. That’s not me bitching, just me actually having lived this publishing journey long enough to more or less know “what’s what” on subjects I couldn’t have known about when I started because everybody has a pie-in-the-sky vision and it’s hard to separate truth from bullshit.

I’ve been incredibly fortunate in this business to do as well as I’ve done. Part of that was jumping in back when everybody said you were a loser who’d never go anywhere if you self-published. (I honestly believe I’ve done much better than I would have done if I’d sought a traditional publishing contract.) I spent way too much time arguing with those people when I could have been building my brand stronger, but the fact that I jumped in and did it while everybody else was acting like this was something that even mattered in a world-ending way, was a smart move.

Also, new work IS coming. I have not abandoned this name. I’ve just been focusing more strongly on the erotica name because I get more ideas for that and more weird plot lines and my fan base on that name is a bit more “into me”. But with my other name, I got in there when my subgenre was just starting out, so there was some hope for name recognition at least within the genre. For paranormal romance it is SO competitive. I “might” have somewhat of a name if I’d actually been focused entirely on this name, but it’s hard to manage more than one name.

But anyway, the serial I was going to release last spring IS happening. It should start releasing in February. I’m already writing it. So stay tuned for that!

Thank you for reading and supporting my work!