I've traveled to Central Florida for a health summit, to Oregon for a week, for my father's funeral, a sad time, then back to Central Florida for a camping trip (it rained the whole time, happy anniversary honey!) then north to Connecticut for a week to help my middle daughter with the kids while hubby went to a wedding. The baby got sick the day after I arrived and was miserable all week, poor little guy!
Well, I'm home now and it looks like August is free for me to get some things done that are long overdue. I'm working hard to put some new things in motion to help my book sales. Writing a book is less than half of the work that goes into its success. People can't purchase something they don't know exists!
Right now my subscribers are providing much needed financial help and I'm so thankful for that! (If you’d like to subscribe click here!)
This spring/summer I wrote a novella that ties into my series, a back story on one of my interesting ‘not so side’ side characters, Brian Solomon. This will be a free e-book/pdf for anyone who signs up for my newsletter on my website. I'll be asking three facebook friends per week this August to post a poster for the offer on their facebook page and other social media.
My target for completion was the end of May, but I’m still dinking with the web-site and it’s August 1st. So far I have the pdf download working. I may have to get a subscription (more money out!) to BookFunnel, which will allow me to give folks a choice of epub, mobi, kindle, or pdf.
Speaking of web-site, I’ve been giving my author website a complete overhaul this month. I've learned some things from more experienced authors and one of them is it's best to have a special page for each book, and I now have a page for The Dreamers. This way I can put a lot more information about each book and the first few chapters for them to read! What a concept! Now people can get a good taste of the story and be more motivated to buy.
Another project that’s running neck in neck with the novella, is the division of Book 1 The Dreamers into three smaller novels. Since the book is in three parts this isn't two difficult, however, I'm must add text to the beginning and endings of each part to make it work better as a stand alone novel. This will make each book less expensive, more friendly for new ‘Terra Colony’ readers!
I'm also doing a more thorough edit on each, and the results are taking the books from very good, to exceptional. Part one was titled Earth. It will now be The Dreamers. I’ve completed that! Part two, now called Earth Terra, will have a new title, The Training Ground, all about our intrepid colonists training in Oregon. I’m halfway finished with that. Then part three, Terra, will now be titled The New World.
The Dreamers as it stands now will be retitled as a trilogy, a compilation of the three smaller books. The title will be The Terra Colony Project: Books I, II, and III. The cover art will have artwork blended from each title cover, and it will be a revised version, with all the new editing and additions. I’m strongly considering releasing that as a hardcover also.
With all this work ongoing, book four, The Migration, is not getting as much time. That's hard for me because it's so exciting I really want to really dig in and finish it!
The novella was challenging for me as it has some political dirt, a little too much like what's going on today, but Senator Joseph Solomon's family's flight and his disappearance was exciting, and fun to write.
Thank you for reading! Adonai bless and keep you!