I received some bad news from the publisher of my BREAKSHIELD fantasy series yesterday: after five years in business The Zharmae Publishing Press is closing up shop. Disappointing, but not entirely unexpected, I'm afraid. Zharmae is a small publisher and the vast majority of them don't make it. Although they signed many authors and published many books (including three from me), Zharmae struggled to find their niche and grow as a company.

So, this leaves me in a bit of a pickle. I published the first two novels in the BREAKSHIELD series (BREAKSHIELD and SEIOKANA) through Zharmae, and had the final installment (REAPER) scheduled for release this October. Obviously that's not going to happen. At least not for while. I would like to get the last installment out there, though--I'm a bit of a completionist  and I know fans will want to know how it all ends--so I'm looking into my options. Self-publishing is the most likely route but I'm not ruling out another publisher. Assuming I can one who's interested in a partially previously published fantasy series.

That said, BREAKSHIELD and SEIOKANA are both available on Amazon for a little while longer--Zharmae doesn't officially pull the plug until 31 August 2016--so if you've been thinking about reading them, grab them now. Just a couple more weeks and it's all over.

To be continued...(I sincerely hope)

Okay, so some of you are thinking: What is a BookBub and why do I care? Well, if you’re an author, or a reader, BookBub is sort of the holy grail of book promotion. BookBub emails subscribers about discounts on titles they’ve accepted for promotion.

So, how does it work? Well, if you apply to BookBub and they accept you for a listing—yep, that’s right, you apply and then pay them to list your book if accepted—they give your book a prominent listing on their website and blast a blurb out on the selected day to their millions of subscribers. But first you’ve got to put it on sale—that’s the big hook, after all. So when Serengeti was accepted (after 4 tries), Severed Press dropped the price to $0.99 for a week) and then we all sat back and chewed our nails.

I honestly wasn’t quite sure what to expect going into BookBub day. BookBub’s pricing page (https://www.bookbub.com/partners/pricing) provides average sales for books by category, and Serengeti (a sci-fi novel on sale for $0.99 in coordination with the BookBub promo) was targeted for 2,200 sales.

But those were just estimates. Averages based on other promos. And this was my book, my promo—I had no idea how Serengeti would measure up.

The $0.99 sale started on Monday, 1 August—I saw a few extra sales right away but not much. And then Serengeti’s big day rolled around--4 August 2016, Serengeti BookBub day. After a slow start, things really got rolling, Serengeti’s Amazon ranking jumping by leaps and bounds. At its peak, Serengeti maxed out at #22 in Kindle ebooks and #1 in all its sci-fi categories. And that 2,200 sales expectation? Well, from everything I read I should hit that on BookBub day.
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Well, I didn’t. I didn’t even come close. Granted, I can only see Amazon sales data as reported by NovelRank (http://www.novelrank.com), not data from other sales outlets. And NovelRank only reports on some Amazon sites—Australia, critically, is missing from their data, which is potentially significant given my publisher, Severed Press, is an Australian company. Whatever the case, the data I did have access to told me that, on BookBub day, Serengeti sold just 159 ebook copies—a significant uptick from previous days, but nowhere near the 2,200 average advertised on the BookBub page.

Disappointing? A little. But ya know what? I sold more books the next day, and despite a dip over the next few days, sales stayed steady and relatively good over the next few days, even after the $0.99 promo (which ran 1-8 August) ended. 

That’s not what typically happens. From everything I’ve read, sales tend to peak on BookBub day, drop off precipitously and all but die once the sales promo is over. Oh! And as an added (and entirely unexpected) bonus? The ebook promo spilled over into audiobook sales. I don’t have access to audiobook sales data like I do for ebooks but at one point, Serengeti was ranked #6 in sci-fi audiobooks.

Interesting. Very interesting. Especially since I can only see a portion of the sales data. And it’ll be even more interesting to see if those sales stay.

Even if they don’t, BookBub helped me connect with a ton more readers and secure a few more fans. At the end of the day, that’s what it’s all about, right? I mean, yeah. Sales are nice and all but connecting with a reader, having them really, truly enjoy something you’ve written. Have them ask for a sequel because they really, really, really want more. Well, that’s it, isn’t it? Everything a writer could ever ask for. The whole reason I started writing in the first place.

So, three cheers for BookBub and a huge thanks to my publisher, Severed Press, for landing the promo for Serengeti. It was fun, it was exciting, and it helped me find all of you. 

Big news! SERENGETI got accepted for  BookBub promo! Whoo-hoo! So, go check out BookBub on 4 August 2016--SERENGETI will be on sale for just $0.99 for a limited time!