Thursday, March 4, 2010

and now back to our regularly scheduled blog... sort of

With the blog tour over, I can get back to my regular posts on my blog. However, this is the time when things get tough. The semester is well underway, and no sooner do I finish grading one set of papers does another come in (66 in all, an average of 6-7 pages apiece), plus homeworks and conferences and keeping up with the course schedule, etc. Oy, I'm getting dizzy just writing about it.

In other words, my streak of posting every day has come to an end. I'm gonna try to keep up two to three per week, however.

The hardest part is not writing. Of course, the composing continues in my head, but I'm itching to get it down on the page. The problem with me is that I'm not a multi-tasker, never have been. I can only concentrate on one thing at a time. Unfortunately, teaching sucks a lot of energy out of me by the end of the day -- mental and physical -- so that I often wind up on my couch at dinnertime, in pajamas, planted in front of the TV where I watch Law & Order re-runs so that I don't have to think too hard. After that I just change screens and catch up on Facebook and Twitter.

I'm looking forward to Spring Break (a week from tomorrow, Hurrah!) so that I may turn my attention to my poor manuscript, neglected since Christmas. I'm hoping the same spark of energy that my writing partner in crime and I had three months ago will return with a vengeance, and I'll be productive as ever, enough so to start querying agents. After all, I want to capitalize on my Kindle success of the last two months.

And speaking of...
Faking It and Ordinary World sold a combined 21,000 Kindle downloads for the month of February, approximately 38,000 for the last two months combined. I still can't wrap my brain around the enormity of this accomplishment, and I can't seem to re-trace the steps to success in order to repeat it or pass it on to others. At any rate, I'm beyond thrilled; and even though both books are sliding in the rankings (although Faking It is still in the Top 100, been there for 40 days now), I can't complain. I somehow managed to achieve the thing I could only dream about eight months ago.

For now, I'll close with a heartfelt thanks to everyone who supported me on this blog tour. I loved reading and responding to your comments. Thank you to all of my hosts, readers, new followers, contest winners, and especially those who bought my books as a result. Most of all, a very special thank you to Jodi Webb and WOW (Women on Writing) for putting it all together, keeping in touch, and just being plain ol' fabulous. Can't wait for the next one.

6 comments:

Anne R. Allen said...

Blog tours work. I just found your guest post on The Writers Edge and I'm off to Amazon to buy your book. I love this kind of women's fiction, and I think the industry is nuts to turn its back on it in order to buy one zombie book after another. Grown-up women buy the most books. Why do they ignore/insult us?

Marvelous word verification: "indiest" You are way indie! Yay independent women!

Elisa said...

Wow -- Thank you, Anne!

And I agree with you. The romance genre sells the most books, and chick lit gets no respect. So where does women's fiction fit?

LOVE that word verification!

Thanks again-
:)

Brent said...

Yes, I'd concur that blog tours in the book industry work.

Congratulations on your success and best of luck going forward.

Thanks
Brent
thebookpatch.com

Venus de Hilo said...

Loved your guest post, jumped over to Amazon to one-click "Faking It" to my Kindle. Your success with blogging and social networking to build a book readership is very inspiring.

Debbi said...

Hi Elisa,

Your guest post confirmed everything I've thought about how indie authors can sell ebooks. Your success is a true inspiration. So glad you were featured on The Writers Edge, because all authors could learn from your experience. It all comes down to those 4 Ps you mentioned--just basic business sense.

BTW, I've included your Web site and blog in my links and blogroll.

Congratulations, and keep up the good work!!

Gotta start thinking about my own blog tour now . . . :)

Elisa said...

Brent (and Anne), I just got the numbers for my print distribution sales, and was pleasantly surprised at how high they were. I'm almost positive it was because of the blog tour. Thank you, Brent.

Venus, thank you! I hope you enjoy it! Spread the word, haha!!

Debbi, thank you so much! And when you're ready to book your tour, let me know. I always support indie authors when I can, including hosting them here.