Ruth Ann Nordin's Blog, page 4

Writing Income Goes Up and Down (And That’s Okay)

Well, I had intended to make this a short post, and yet, I wrote an entire book on the topic. (You can’t get me to shut up sometimes.) At least I created a video to go with it so you can listen to it instead of reading it.

Years ago, I made a post on a different blog where I mentioned the fact that writing income doesn’t always remain steady, nor does it always go up. I don’t have this post on hand anymore. I don’t remember the year I made this post, but it was at the point when my income peaked. There was a tipping point for me. Do all authors have this? My bet is no. We are all going to have different experiences. But what stuck out to me was how quick a couple of authors were to blame me for the fact that I was seeing a decline in income.

One said that I should get on Kindle boards where other authors hang out and mention my books to them. Because writers are readers, too. Yes, I understand that writers are also readers, but you can’t just market your book to anyone and expect you book to please everyone. Your best bet is to reach people who read the kind of books you write. For example, a science fiction lover probably won’t enjoy a romance. I know I don’t enjoy reading science fiction. And besides, there are divisions within a genre that narrows down the specific type of book the person will want to read. For example, if you’re thinking of marketing your historical western romance book to a person who loves contemporary billionaire romances, that person probably won’t enjoy it. There are also other factors that play into a person’s enjoyment for a book. Some people want a literary style of writing. They want flowery, poetic words. Some people want a lot of description so they feel more immersed in the world these characters are moving around in. Then there are people like me who would rather get to the dialogue and action. That’s why some books resonate more with certain people instead of others. That doesn’t mean the book is bad. It just means the book targets a different audience. There are so many nuances within the fabric of storytelling that makes it challenging to find the right kind of reader for your books. However, I do stand by my point that other writers not buying your books is not the reason you’re not making the kind of money you want to make. So I would not suggest hitting up other writers to buy your books.

Another author said I wasn’t writing good books, and therefore, I wasn’t selling. That’s fair. My books are not good to everyone. I have enough 1 and 2-star reviews proving that. The reasons I mentioned above help to point out why. I do believe there is a book for everyone. I think that whatever an author writes has an audience waiting for it. I don’t think we should think of our books as something that will appeal to everyone. I like the idea of niche marketing. This is where you narrow your focus. But to do a general marketing approach where you figure “there is something in my book for everyone, and that means everyone will enjoy it if they just give it a chance” is flawed. My suggestion, for what it’s worth, is to not worry about the people who don’t like your books. Instead, connect with people who do like your books. Find out why those people like the books. Then you can better fine-tune your storytelling to pleasing them.

Now back to the income side of things…

A lot changes in the publishing industry, and these changes can impact your income. For example, back in 2009 when I started publishing books on Amazon and Smashwords, there were very few ebooks out there. Kindle had just come onto the scene. People were buying Kindles and needed content. I put up books that were $0.99, and I didn’t have to do anything else to get noticed. I mean, I had a website, a blog, and a social media presence. I uploaded some of my books available for free on some “free ebook” websites. I honestly didn’t think I’d ever make money but still wanted to share my work with the world. But the money came. And it didn’t just come for me. There were other authors I knew who made some pretty good money back then. Then word got out across the writing community that self-publishing wasn’t where books went to die, and even traditionally published authors jumped onto the self-publishing back wagon. That meant more books. That meant lower visibility. And that’s fine. I think the more books, the better because when I was a teenager, I got upset in bookstores and libraries for not having the specific book I wanted to read. I don’t have that problem today. You can find just about anything these days. Kindle Unlimited came along in 2014, and that is an industry change that did shift income around for a lot of authors. Some did very well with it. Some didn’t. Two of my friends who were making a living at it, no longer made a living with their writing. I still made a living, but in the subsequent years, my income did steadily decline. I had some years where it would go back up, but then it dropped again. So it’s been like a rollercoaster, but I will say it never has been what it used to be.

As the industry changes, the way we promote the books is also changing. There are a lot of places where authors can run ads. Then there are the one-and-done ads, which is where you pay for the ads to run on a certain day (or days) and that’s it. Then there are keyword ads that you have to constantly adjust and watch every day. There are videos you can make. There are graphics you can create. There are podcasts, blogs, etc, etc. Really, there is no end in sight to all the different marketing strategies available to authors these days, and it would be too exhausting to go through them. Quite frankly, my strength (and my interest) isn’t in this area. I am the wrong person to look to for this stuff. If I enjoy it, I do it. If I don’t, I avoid it. Life is too short for me to spend time doing stuff I dread. I get enough of that when I have to manage my bookkeeping for tax season.

And now we are being told that no matter how much we do, it’s not enough. I’ll tackle this in other posts (and I already have tackled it before, really), but I’ll say something about it here since it does coincide with the topic. Rapid release of books used to mean getting something out once a month. Then it became twice a month. Last I heard, some author was putting out a book every week. Then I listened to an audiobook last month where the man said to make social media posts and videos all the time. Like several times a day every single day. And another author was saying if you want to make money on YouTube, you should upload one audiobook a week. Let that sink one. One complete audiobook. Every single week. I mean, all of this is crazy. When are authors supposed to have time to relax?

But I guess we aren’t supposed to relax. We’re supposed to put out more and more content because the income has to either be steady all the time or the income has to go up.

That’s a lot of pressure to put on someone. Maybe you can get by with hiring help, but the moment you hire help, you have to make more money so you can pay them and make a profit. To me, that ends up spinning the hamster wheel as much as doing everything yourself. Because when you have help, you’ll probably want to do more. And the more we do, the more we feel like we have to do. More means money. And when we’re in the mindset that we need to make money in order to be successful, we can’t afford to stop.

I hit burnout back in 2018-2019 or so because of this “more and more” mentality. I wrote through some of that burnout, but the day came when I couldn’t write anything else. My entire creative well had dried up. I had no choice but to stop. I didn’t get the ability to write with enthusiasm again until Spring 2024. I am still recovering from burnout. My income has significantly dropped, and I have had to let it drop. I don’t have it in me to fight this slide down. I’m doing good just to write again.

If you haven’t ever hit burnout, I hope you never do. It’s the worst. Seriously, nothing is worse for a writer to hate the one thing they used to be most passionate about. You feel like you lose a part of yourself when that happens. My advice is to let go of this belief that you always have to make more money in order to be worth something as a writer. Once you do that, you’re able to relax and enjoy the process of creating stories.

Updates on What I’m Working On (March 10, 2025)

Video to go with the blog post so you can listen to it. (I will condense the information in the video since I did ramble like a crazy person in the blog.)

The Hero Least Likely (and the story of writer’s block that goes with it)

So I sent out emails to my email list on MailChimp, and I made a blog post in my monthly newsletter blog where I said I had finished the first draft of The Hero Least Likely.

Well, here’s the thing: I wrote those in mid-February and scheduled them to go out around March 1. At the time I wrote those, I only had 2-3 chapters left to write in that book. In the past, I haven’t had issues with getting 2-3 chapters done in two weeks. (I mean, you think after writing 101 romances, you’d get the hang of what you can and can’t do, right?)

However, there is a first time for everything, and I hit a major writer block. It wasn’t that I didn’t know what I needed to do. It’s that I didn’t want to write the climax of the story. This is a historical western romance. The romance part was easy. The action western scene I have to come up with to wrap the story up is not the least bit interesting to me. I have watched action western films, and it is painful (to me) when the gunfights come up. But I have to include the gunfight scene in this particular story because I have built up my character’s journey for it. The hero of this book can’t be the “hero” without it.

So after twiddling my thumbs with a mind that went completely blank on how I was going to come up with this scene, I went to others for advice. Some people were authors. Some were my readers. In the end, I came across a game plan that led me to do something I have never done before:

I plotted!

I think now I get how authors plot. I have never been able to grasp how authors ever successfully plotted before because all of my past attempts to plot have failed. Once I start writing, the characters have always gone off course. But in this particular instance where we are talking about a scene that I don’t want to write, the plotting method has helped. At least now I know where I am going with this.

The first thing I did was consult my husband and sons who love the western action stuff. I asked them what makes for an exciting scene. Then I took notes on stuff they liked. Then I came up with a map of the town this scene is set in. My son helped with this. I spent some time figuring out where the key characters need to be for this scene to work. After that, I listed out the stuff that needed to happen and the order it needed to happen in. One author I talked to said when she’s stuck, she will do a basic sentence for each paragraph, and then she’ll go back to flesh things out. This is what I’m doing. I have five pages worth of notes that dictate what needs to happen and who needs to do it. Today I fleshed out half a page, and it took about 1,000 words to do it. Quite frankly, I’m surprised that much got fleshed out from the notes, but at least I’m finally getting words on the paper.

I don’t know when I’ll finish this book, but at least I have a roadmap to go by. It’s a lot better than the blank screen that was in my brain for the past month. I still prefer to go by the seat of my pants while writing, and I’m hoping I never have to plot again, but in case I have to plot, I have the tools to do it.

The Earl’s Bluestocking Bride (so far, flowing smoothly–let’s hope it stays that way)

I’m at the 40,000 word mark. The big reveal about these characters’ aliases is about to come onto the page. I’m looking forward to that. It’ll be fun to watch the sparks fly.

The Preacher’s Wife (might not come out until 2026 and why I can’t set deadlines anymore, except for the holiday books)

I’m pushing this one back. All of my books are turning out to be longer than I originally plan, and this has made it harder to get a firm schedule in place on when you can expect my books to be published.

Having gone through burnout for so long (I think it was like 3-4 years total of going back and forth in burnout before I finally came out of it), I am surprised that I am so excited about writing. Happy, but surprised, too. You know?

One thing I promised myself was that I would not rush anything, and I would also focus on stuff I enjoy, whether that be writing or marketing. (I get the irony in that statement in light of how much I don’t want to write the action western scene, but that is only one scene in the entire book. I have enjoyed writing the book. I just can’t skip out on the one scene because that scene is crucial.) I would never write an entire book that I dread. That will kill all of my enjoyment for writing.

So anyway, since I have this renewed enthusiasm for writing, I’m finding that my books are longer than they have been. Typically, my books have finished at about 60,000 words. These last couple of books that I’ve been working on have been between 70,000-80,000 words. The Hero Least Likely is already at 70,000 words, and I’m not finished with it yet. The Earl’s Bluestocking Bride might finish up around 60,000, but I am at 40,000 words right now, and the big reveal hasn’t come yet. I am already 15,500 into The Preacher’s Wife, and I don’t know if I even got 1/4 of the way into this one yet. I feel like I’m still building the foundation for this story. The Wilderness Bride turned out to be about 74,000 words (when you tack on the front and back matter). These stories just seem to want to go on and on. I don’t want to rush them just to get more books out a year.

So this is what I’m going to do. I’m going to let them play out as they want to play out. If I have to go longer between book releases, I’ll go longer. When I say I don’t know when a book will be out, I’m not trying to be difficult. I really don’t know. Even when I finish the first draft, I have other people I work with, and it’s hard to say what their schedules are like. I guess I’ll know for sure when a new book will be out when the final draft is up on pre-order.

Okay, so why might I push The Preacher’s Wife to 2026? Because I am working on a holiday series this year.

The holiday series covers Halloween, Christmas, and Valentine’s. Halloween book Christmas book Valentine book

Given how long it’s now taking me to finish a book, I am starting on the Halloween story right now. I need to start the Christmas one next month. I have no idea how long each book will take to write. It could be on the shorter side (40,000 words) or it could very well be over the 70,000-word mark. Until I’m hitting the halfway point and know what is going on with these characters, I don’t know. So I am getting a head start on this stuff before these deadlines force me to rush the books.

Masquerade Bride is a spin-off of the idea of “living a different life”. Kind of a “what would your life be like if you were someone else” situation.

A Wedding Carol is a spin-off of A Christmas Carol where the heroine (our “Scrooge”) will get to do the whole Christmas past, present, and future thing.

It’s a Wonderful Marriage is a spin-off of It’s a Wonderful Life where Mr. Christopher Robinson (remember him?) will get to see what life would have been like if he’d never been born. I’m really looking forward to writing about him and Agatha again. Those two were so much fun together.

I don’t expect most people to be interested in this Marriage by Holiday Series, but I’m excited about it. I kind of like doing things that are different from time to time than the standard romance. It keeps my creativity fresh.

Traditional vs Indie/Self-Publishing and Author Income Surveys 2023 and 2024

Today, I thought I’d take a moment to look at the realistic vision of what it means to be an author. This is based off of my conversations with a brand new author I met early last year.

Like last time, I also made videos so if you would rather listen to my (beautiful) voice instead of read the text, you can. But I’ll keep the information less of a ramble in the text.

Pros and Cons of Traditional and Indie Publishing

Basically, the best route depends on your goals and comfort levels.

Pros of Going with a Publisher

1. If you want someone else to handle the cover, the bulk of the edits, the description, the formatting, and getting them on retailers for you, then going with a publisher might be your best option. When you indie publish, you have to either do all of these tasks yourself, or you will have to hire people to do this stuff for you.

2. It is also nice to have a publisher take on your work because it validates that your work in good in someone else’s eyes.

Cons of Going with a Publisher

1. You have to make sure your book fits what the publisher wants. The publisher has to stay in business, so they will think of your book’s marketability.

2. The book will probably take longer to get out there into the world because you have to wait on their timeline to get things done.

3. Issues with intellectual property rights may arise. What happens if the publisher goes out of business? How will you get your rights back? Can you take a secondary character in this book and use it in another one to self-publish? Can you go with another publisher? What formats will they publish for you? Can you share anything from your story online and share excerpts from it? Etc, etc

Pros of Indie Publishing

You control everything. You pick the cover, the title, the content of the book, description, timing of publication, where you publish, what format your book is in, etc. (I went into a tangent about Draft2Digital being a distributor.)

Cons of Indie Publishing

You control everything, and that can be overwhelming.

Regardless of how you publish, keep in mind that:

1. You will have to promote yourself because visibility is a pain in the rear to get.

2. Keep your expectations for money realistic. (This is where I give outdated information from a Wide for the Win YouTube video that is no longer available. It is now marked private. I have made another post which I am linking to below with more current information.) However, the fact does still remain that this is not a “get rich quick” endeavor.

3. Someone will hate your book. You can’t avoid it. Whatever you do, keep yourself professional when in the public arena. Any crying, yelling, etc should be reserved for private.

4. Some people will only want free books. Don’t expect that everyone will want to buy your books. And that is okay.

5. Focus on the people who enjoy your work and connect with them. Those relationships are the best kind in the world. Don’t underestimate the value in personal connections.

Author Income Surveys 2023 and 2024

A note before we get into the numbers:

Be mindful of how much authors are really earning. These results cover gross income, not net. This is an important distinction because net is what matters. If an author makes $100,000 gross a year but spends $80,000 on ads, virtual assistants, editors, taxes, and other things, that author is really only making $20,000 profit. On the other hand, you might have an author who makes $30,000 gross a year but only spends $10,000 on expenses. So that author also profits $20,000. Profits matter more than gross. Profits allow you to pay the bills and invest.

I didn’t ramble about that on the video, but I did mention how income isn’t always just from selling books on retailers like we assume. A lot of authors making good money are selling courses, doing Kickstarter campaigns, selling directly from their website, etc. So take the “book selling” portion of their business with a grain of salt. Some really are just making money selling their books, but some are adding other things into the “six-figure income” basket.

Here is the breakdown from the Draft2Digital Blog Post Episode 128, June 15, 2023 (https://www.draft2digital.com/blog/?s=EP128)

Just over 2,000 authors participated in this survey, and these authors spent at least 50% of their time with author-related duties.

The median revenue for 2022 was $12,749.

1/4 of these authors made $0-$1,000 a year.

43.8% of these authors made over $20,000 a year.

28% of these authors made $50,000+ a year with 1/5 of that number earning “six figures”)

Now for the survey Written Word Media conducted. This post was published on Oct. 24, 2024. (https://www.writtenwordmedia.com/2024-indie-author-survey-results-insights-into-self-publishing-for-authors/)

This was a wider group of authors. I’m not sure of the exact amount. I might have missed that information in the post. I did participate in this survey. I am wide. I am not in KU at all. KU, for those who don’t know, is an exclusive program that Amazon set up for authors to make their ebooks only available on Amazon.

87.5% of authors in this survey have at least one book in KU.

Over 75% of the income reported in this survey were from authors who made their money on KU. I feel this skews the results a bit on how much authors are selling because KU is a library platform. Readers aren’t buying those books. Readers are borrowing them. KU pays authors based on pages read. Readers pay Amazon KU a subscription service and can access as many KU books as they want.

Here are the stats:

46% of authors make $100 or less a month.

17% of authors make $251-$1,000 a month

17% of authors make $2,501-$20,000 a month

It’s interesting that there’s a gap between some of those numbers, but I take it to mean they were statistically insignificant. Therefore, they weren’t worth mentioning. (Who knew that one day the three statistics classes I was forced to take in college would one day pay off because I actually understand this stuff.)

Authors whose goal is to make money, made more money. Authors whose goal is to write for enjoyment, made less money. I’m sure that shocked everyone. (I’m joking, of course.) It’s natural that authors who treat this more as a business have a better chance of making money at this thing.

The Frustrating Side of Writing

For the past week, I have been having such a difficult time writing. As some of you know, I write three books at a time. I do this in hopes of being able to work on at least one book if I get stuck in one or two of them. Working on more than one book doesn’t always work, though.

Over the past couple of weeks, I have been trying to strategize how I’m going to get the main characters in The Hero Least Likely to apprehend the outlaws who are terrorizing Arizona. I realize I’m stuck on this point because I don’t plot. But I can’t plot like some authors can. Every time I have sat down to plot out a book, the story goes off the rails within a chapter or two. It’s as if the characters are saying, “We will not follow your orders, Ms. Author.” My characters are a lot like my kids. They have minds of their own and will do whatever they want. I know that sounds crazy to some people out there. I’ve heard the videos and have read the posts where other authors say, “Authors who claim that characters have a mind of their own are crazy because that mind belongs to the author.” Well, yes, it is my mind, but I swear, these characters feel like they really are separate people who will do whatever they want.

When I write, the story plays out like a movie in my head. As long as I write what is happening on the “screen”, things flow smoothly. I never know how a scene is going to play out until I’m writing it. I can guess. Sometimes I have a better idea of what I’m getting myself into when I sit at the computer, but I really never know how things will go. And this is why I’m surprised when people tell me something in my book was “predictable”. Except for the characters falling in love and ending up together, it wasn’t predictable to me. I wish I had seen this stuff coming because it would have saved me a lot of time while I waited for the characters to clue me into what they were planning.

Like this book I’m trying to finish up, The Hero Least Likely.

Not only was the cover a pain in the butt to finally get right, but now I’m at a standstill in the final two chapters. I think I only have two more chapters to go. Three at the most. I should have known when I had to go back and rewrite part of the beginning that this was going to be one of those books that is painful to write. I know where I need to end up, but I don’t know how to get there. I’ve been creating a map in my head of this town and laying out where the key characters need to be. I know there is one character who will be tied up. Another is going to need help with the rescue. Then there’s one who has to end up saving them all–not outright saving the day but doing enough so that these outlaws will finally be arrested.

I think a lot of my frustration comes from the fact that I am not an “action” kind of writer. These scenes are not that interesting to me. This is like a western movie. While the grasp of the time period is good to see, I honestly am not a big fan of western action-packed films unless it’s heavily laced with romance. Which most are not. But the plot demands I do this. And the characters are not helping me figure out what to do in order to get past this block.

The worst part is that since I’m stuck here, my creativity took a huge nosedive. It’s impacting my ability to write the other two books I’m working on.

Ironically, I’m not stuck in these other two books. I know what the characters want, though I am hitting a crucial element in The Earl’s Bluestocking Bride. I have to get the right balance between teasing the reader about the “big reveal” while satisfying the romantic requirements that come before “the big reveal”. In The Preacher’s Wife, I have figured out the hero–his motivation for what he does and what he most wants. But now I have to start layering the foundation for the romance between him and the heroine so that they fall in love before I disrupt their world. I don’t know why, but because I can’t finish The Hero Least Likely, I am unable to proceed with the other two books.

I think I have to step away from all writing in order to see things more clearly. So I’m going to do that. I was originally hoping to have The Hero Least Likely out in May, but that might not even happen at the rate things are going. This will push back the other books as well. I really need to get started on the Marriage by Holiday Series because those books need to come out for Halloween, Christmas, and Valentine. I don’t have the luxury on delaying those. I’m thinking The Preacher’s Wife will have to take a bit of a backseat.

One of the myths about storytelling is that it’s easy. Don’t get me wrong. Sometimes it is. Sometimes the words just flow. But there are other times when it’s like pulling teeth every single step of the way to get something out, and when that happens, it can block all other creative efforts.

I’m not going to force this. I would have forced it in the past, and that helped lead to burnout. One thing I promised myself when I got back into writing was that I would never do things that lead to burnout ever again. I’m slowly learning what things trigger burnout. Forcing one’s way into finishing a story that isn’t ready to be done is one of them. Doing things you hate for a long period of time is another one. Rapid releasing is another way to burnout. This isn’t just rapid releasing for books. It is rapid releasing for anything–like blog posts, social media posts, ads, and videos.

If you’re going to survive this writing thing for the long run, you have to do stuff you love and you have to spend time doing stuff you enjoy. I am tired of chasing the latest marketing trends. I am tired of trying to sell books. All I want to do is write them. I want to have fun with this. I love blogging. I love being on Facebook with people who have become my friends over there, though I do get drained when I put myself out there too much on social media. It takes a lot of me to be socially “on” with others. The truth is, I’m an introvert who is pretty awkward in social situations. I feel like what I say is stupid, but I realize I have to put myself out there anyway, so I do. I do it because I want people who enjoy the kind of books I write to find them. There’s magic when someone comes across an author who writes stories that speak to them. Case in point, I recently discovered a fan fiction series by someone who gets the mindset of the characters in a popular series. It’s been so rewarding for me to read these stories. I read the published series, and I have seen the movies. But this fan fiction work has added more layers to the whole scope of the characters, the world, and events that take place. And that has created a kind of magic that reminds me of how important stories can be. It reminds me of why I fell in love with reading when I was 12. If you can get someone excited about reading, you’ve done your job as an author.

So anyway, to wrap this up, we’ll get there with The Hero Least Likely. One way or another, it does always work out in the end. I have 101 romances under my belt. This isn’t the first time I’ve run into this kind of frustration. I’m tempted to bring the characters in on the blog and ask them what they are thinking by holding things up. We’ll see if that will help things come along, but I’m not ready to make such a post today.

Finally Getting Use Out of YouTube and Rumble

It’s been forever (two years really) since I last did anything with these channels. I ended up dropping Bitchute because it was too difficult to upload things over there. YouTube and Rumble, however, are simple enough to use.

The plan that failed

My original plan was to have my oldest son read my books and upload them for me. He read the entire book for Nobody’s Fool, and at chapter 15 in edits, something happened to the file, and he was unable to open it anymore. He does not have a Mac. I think I will die on the “Apple makes a better computer” hill because I haven’t had the issues other people have had with losing files on other computers. I know Apple is pricey, but in my humble opinion, the cost is worth it.

I was depressed when my son’s attempt at making audiobooks didn’t work out. I still wanted to get these books into audio form. The main way I have to consume books is to listen to them these days. My eyes are much better, but I want to save them for writing new books and working on blog posts, updating my website, etc. I can’t overdo it.

What I am doing about it

I have decided that I will narrate my own books, and I will upload them using my computer. I found a program called “Voices” in my Application folder, and I downloaded the iMovie app to my computer. I use BookBrush to make the graphic to go with the video. It’s a simple graphic. Here is the one I made for Tagalong Bride.

I am not going to worry about using a microphone or trying to do anything fancy. I am not making money with this, so I am not going to spend any money making these videos. I am also not going to worry about how “professional” these will be. Recently, I have been listening to audiobooks on YouTube from people just sitting down and reading the book, and I figure if I can be happy listening to books “unprofessionally” done, then there will be people out there who won’t mind my approach.

Essentially, imagine I am sitting in the room with you and reading the book. That’s how I imagine it as I record the files. I am doing a light edit to remove glaring errors, but I have decided to let a couple of stumbles as I’m reading pass through. I don’t want to spend more than 30 minutes on each chapter. When I did Meant To Be, it took me about 2-3 hours to edit each chapter. I’m not putting myself through that aggravation again. I want this to be a fun project.

I am currently uploading Tagalong Bride

My plan is to keep reading and uploading chapters of all of my books. After Tagalong Bride is done, I am going to put up Eye of the Beholder. If anyone has a request, I will happily work on that book after I’m done with Eye of the Beholder.

I am removing all spicy content in order to keep my videos on YouTube and Rumble. They have this policy where spicy content can get books (or the author’s channel) banned. Even if authors put, “Not meant for kids”, they risk video removal. So I’m going to play it safe and make these all PG. I want the books to be available for many years to come.

I will be posting the book chapter by chapter

I made a post not too long ago about how crazy I felt that authors are pushing to get a complete full-length book out every single week on YouTube. I won’t rehash that. I’m just going to say that I will be uploading one chapter at a time, and I am going to do this on a consistent schedule. Right now, I have picked Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. I need to give myself time to record the chapter, turn it into a video, and upload it to YouTube and Rumble.

Now, I am able to put each chapter into a Playlist on YouTube. That way you can go to the Playlist, and after one chapter is done, the next will automatically play if you have your settings set to “autoplay”. I am not sure I can do the same thing in Rumble. I have done a lot more on YouTube than I’ve done on Rumble. I will see if I can get the chapters together.

I will try to make a file with the entire book on it after I finish uploading all of the chapters in case people prefer that way to listen to a book

I am going to see if I can merge all of the chapters into one file (in case someone does want the entire book in one video), but I will try that after I get all these chapters uploaded separately. I am also going to keep all the separate chapters on YouTube and Rumble. That way if people prefer the chapters to be separated out, they can have that. Personally, I prefer to listen to books chapter by chapter. I don’t like having to go back into a file to find where I left off, even if there is a way to mark it. YouTube does not always give me the video I had to pause and come back to later.

It really isn’t difficult to combing audio files in iMovie. It just takes time to do it.

My goal is to have fun and enjoy this

My goal is not to make money with this. To make money, I would have to rush these out. My goal is to have fun. I do want to make money with my writing, but I don’t want to kill myself while doing it. I need to have some things that are fun to me. I love reading my books. I would hope that any author would love their own content. I find that when I spend time doing fun things, I am a lot more creative, and it’s easier to write new books. The business angle plays a part at times, but I think there’s something to be said for not worrying about money if you can. Fortunately, my husband is the main breadwinner, so I do have the luxury of making this choice. I realize some authors don’t.

Side note: If you’re an author reading this and want to make money by posting your books on YouTube, here is what I advise after listening to tips from authors who are making “three to four figures a month” off of YouTube. Get one new book out a week, put the entire book into one video, make sure to monetize the videos when going through the ad revenue portion while you’re uploading the video, remove any R-rated content (maybe even tame the book to a PG rating to be on the safe side), and engage with your audience. I can’t guarantee this will work for you, but it has worked for other authors who’ve done this. (If you would like to actually take the course that walks you through the steps, let me know in the comments, and I’ll link to it. I think the course was $199. I thought it was worth taking even though I decided not to do this path.) Rapid release works just as well on YouTube as it does on Amazon, which is why you see content creators posting new videos all the time.

Links to my YouTube and Rumble channels

I waited until now to make this announcement because I wanted to make sure that I was getting the videos uploaded correctly. Like I said in the beginning of the post, it’s been two years since I’ve done this. I was a bit rusty. But now that I have a few chapters up, I feel safe in pointing people to the channels in case anyone wants to listen to me read. By the way, I am not going to try to do different voices for the characters. My son has that gift, but I don’t. Plus, I have trouble remembering which voice to use for which character. It’s easier this way.

YouTube Channel

Rumble Channel

Quick note about YouTube ads

I have paid YouTube to remove ads, so I no longer get them when I am watching videos over there. Because of that, I have no way of knowing if these chapters will be having ads attached to them. (In the past, I noticed that some videos had ads, and some didn’t.) In the course I took about YouTube books, someone was saying that YouTube runs ads every three minutes on a video. This is even if the author isn’t paid. If you notice that happening on my videos, please let me know. I will sort through the settings in my videos and see if there’s a way to lengthen out the ad spacing. That is an option they discussed. I just haven’t thought to do anything about it since I’m not worried about making money. I think what I’ll do is look into my YouTube channel the next time I upload a video to see if I can find that spot and preemptively arrange for the ads not to come every three minutes. I’m not a fan of ads. Since I have so little followers and views, I am thinking that the ad thing isn’t an issue. But please let me know if you’re finding an ad coming up every three minutes, okay? You can leave the comment in any of my blog posts or contact me through my contact form.

***

I apologize that this turned into such a long post. I honestly thought it would be a lot shorter. I hope all of that was clear. I didn’t have time to go through here and edit. I had to run out to the accountant to turn in some tax information and then pick up my deaf son from work. (My deaf son was unable to get his driver’s license, so I’m his ride.)

The Wilderness Bride is Now Available (and Joel Larson is here to introduce it)

Here is The Wilderness Bride:

If you want to skip the long-winded post below, you can click directly here for the book info. (Description and links are included there as well as at the bottom of this post.)

***

Joel Larson (hero in Shotgun Groom) enters post: Hi, everyone! It’s been a long time since I’ve been on this blog.

ID 14776353 © Jason Stitt | Dreamstime.com

Some of you may not even know who I am, but at one time, I was pretty famous among the people who read Ruth’s books. In fact, some people preferred me to Dave Larson, if you can believe that. But for those who have no idea who I am, I am one of the Larson brothers in the Nebraska Series, and I was the hero in Shotgun Groom.

Anyway, since this is a historical western romance in a brand new series, Ruth thought it would be fitting that I introduce it. She would have done it herself, but let’s face it, the characters an author writes is far more interesting than the author herself. It’s no fault of Ruth. It’s just that she leads a very boring life. Who wants to hear about her day of cooking, doing laundry, picking up after the people in her house, grocery shopping–

Ruth enters post: I think they get the point, Joel. We’re here to introduce a new book, not to give details about my personal life, boring as it may be. So let’s return to the book, okay?

Joel: Okay, okay. So I’m here to announce a book set along the West Coast in a small Oregon town. You have a hero who’s pretty much a loner living in the hillside. I, myself, envisioned my life going that way before Ruth forced me to marry. Except, of course, I was going to be a doctor. Hunting animals for food and chopping wood was never my interest.

Ruth: This isn’t about you, Joel. It’s about Ashley and Lisa who are main characters in The Wilderness Bride. Now I have to work on the next book which is The Hero Least Likely. I’m close to the end and don’t need to lose momentum. I’ll trust you can handle it from here.

Joel: I can handle it from here. This isn’t the first time I’ve been involved in enough books to know how to introduce them.

*Ruth leaves*

Joel: Alright, alright. The hero is named Ashely. He’s a loner who lives in the hillside in a one-room cabin. He’s living a life to be envied by men everywhere when Ruth interrupts his life by throwing an unconscious woman in his path.

Tom Larson (hero in A Bride for Tom) enters the post:

ID 7420165 © Imagery Majestic | Dreamstime.com

Tom: I can’t read to this anymore. Joel doesn’t have a romantic bone in his body. It’s a good thing Joel’s wife isn’t here for this. She would string him up by the boots and let him hang upside down all night for this nonsense. Let me introduce this book. So there’s this guy named Ashley who is miserable because he’s all alone. He might not realize he’s miserable, but he is because I was single once, and I remember how lonely I was before Jessica came into my life. This poor man needs a good woman to come into his life and make that one-room cabin he lives in a home.

Joel: I’m not saying that Ashley won’t eventually be happy with the marriage a preacher is going to force him into. This is a romance, after all. But as things are at the beginning of the book, he is content with being alone. I think there’s nothing wrong with that.

Tom: You should just leave. You are offering nothing of substance to this post. All you’re going to do is dissuade people from reading the book.

Joel: How so?

Tom: Who’s going to read a book about a man who isn’t looking to get married so he has to be forced into it?

Joel: *points to himself* That’s what happened in my book, and people read that one.

Dave Larson (hero of Eye of the Beholder, To Have and To Hold, and Forever Yours) enters the post:

ID 43983249 © Wally Stemberger | Dreamstime.com

Dave: Why didn’t anyone ask me to come here to introduce this book? I can sum it up the best. This is a story where Lisa, the heroine, believes she has no reason to live until the hero shows her otherwise through his care and love for her. It’s the kind of story that I can give my seal of approval on.

Tom: Ruth asked Joel to introduce this book. No one knows why. He has no connection with it. If anyone has a connection to this book, it’s me. When my third daughter, Erin, got married in Suitable for Marriage, Ruth wrote into the story that there was a young woman who had been forced to give up her baby for adoption. We all wondered why that woman had been forced into that situation and what happened to her. Jessica speculated about that one for months. It’s about time Ruth satisfied our curiosity. Plus, we always thought it would be nice if the poor young woman could get a happy ending. I know I would want that if she was my daughter.

Dave: We all want this woman to have a happy ending. This woman has a name. It’s Lisa.

Tom: Did you get a chance to read this book?

Dave: I might have sorted through Ruth’s files and found it while I had some free time.

Tom: I can’t believe you did that. You aren’t supposed to go around snooping in her computer.

Joel: Yeah, I think there’s some sort of code we characters have to follow when it comes to books pre-publication.

Dave: But if we don’t read it, how can we tell people why they should read it?

*Joel and Tom grow silent for a long moment*

Tom: I suppose Dave has a point.

Dave: Of course, I have a point, and it’s a good one. If people liked our books, they’ll like this one, too. I think we’ve said enough about it. While I read it, I don’t want to spoil it.

Joel: At long last, we come to the cover and the links on where you can find the book:

Amazon

Barnes & Noble

Kobo

Apple

Google Play (ebook)

Google Play (audiobook)

Smashwords

Everand

Radish

Updates On What I’m Doing

The Wilderness Bride will be out February 7

This is Book 1 in the Oregon Series.

I will speak more about this later. In fact, Joel Larson will be making a guest appearance when this book comes out. Rumor has it a couple of other Larsons will be popping in as well. Kind of like old times. I’m looking forward to making that particular post.

Anyway, if you would like to reserve your copy now, I am going to post the links below:

Amazon US

Amazon UK

Barnes & Noble

Kobo (will also be in Kobo Plus)

Google Play as ebook

Apple

Smashwords

I have not posted episodes for this yet on Radish, nor is it on Everand until release day. But I have most places covered. If there’s a place you buy books that I haven’t linked to, please let me know. I’ll see if I can do that.

Well, I thought I had put The Wilderness Bride in pre-order under the audiobook, but I checked my dashboard just now and realized I haven’t done that yet. So I will be working on that soon.

***

I Updated My MailChimp List This Past Weekend

I am happy to say that I have figured out how to set tags and groups on MailChimp. I know that this probably makes some authors laugh since they’ve been doing this for years, but I just now finally figured it out. I also updated my signup form with options on what list people want to be on. I hope that signup form works the way I planned. I’ll be going in and manually checking things out for a few months just to make sure.

If anyone is reading this post who received an email from me on Friday via MailChimp, I want to thank you for responding to my email. So many of you were very kind and understanding. I appreciate that a lot, especially since I’m not the most tech savvy person around.

I Decided to Join Inkers Mastermind

I decided to join this group for a week-long sprint session, and I was surprised by how motivational it was to write when joining other authors who were also writing. We did this on Zoom, and we went in 25-minute sprints. They offered this three times a day, but I mostly could only get on twice on four days. Anyway, I had a lot of fun doing this, and since I did enjoy the conference this group put on last summer, I decided to join their Mastermind portion of things.

It does cost to join this, but sometimes I think spending money is worth it because of the value it provides. My main goal is to join their regular writing sprints. They do offer Q&A Sessions with other authors and classes, but what I want most after going through burnout is to simply have fun writing and learning new things. Even if I don’t use the stuff I learn for the writing side of business, I still enjoy learning it.

I Got Certified to be a Virtual Assistant for Other Authors

For about six months last year, I took a course by Grounded Chaos from veteran author assistants who taught me (and others in the course) the ropes of helping other authors with common tasks. Some I knew since I have been indie publishing since 2009, but other stuff was new. These two ladies were great. They have a site for additional support, and I’ll be joining it when it’s ready. If anyone out there is interested in being an author assistant and would like to take their course, let me know, and I’ll give you their information. (I am not affiliated with them in any way. I just thought they did a terrific job and would recommend them in a heartbeat.)

I Also Joined Joe Solari’s Treat Your Writing Like a Business Course

Months ago, I linked to his Capital Planner that went over expenses needed to run the business, along with figuring out how many words you need to write to reach a certain number of books you can publish in a year. I went on to listen to his Advantage audiobook that I got on Google Play. After some consideration, I decided to do the course. My primary goal is to simply learn new things. If anything I learn ends up being something that helps me, that’s a bonus.

I have not done anything yet in this course. In fact, I just created my password today. But I will work my way through it. I do a little at a time so as not to get overwhelmed. I still want to focus on writing new books.

Speaking of writing…

I am very excited about the stuff I am working on at the moment.

I am coming the last 1/4 part in The Hero Least Likely

This is Book 2 in the Love Under Desert Skies Series:

The hero will finally get a chance to prove himself to everyone. He’s already proven himself to the heroine. I am about to write their wedding scene. He was just collecting flowers for her wedding bouquet. I had to look up the kind of flowers that grow out there in the Arizona desert, and I was surprised to learn that there’s a batch that could be toxic to eat if it grows in the wrong soil. Who knew?

I’m coming to the halfway mark in The Earl’s Bluestocking Bride

This is Book 1 in the Marriage by Chemistry Series.

And the hero and heroine still do not know the aliases that they fall under. Which is good because the longer this goes on, the funnier it is, and the most exciting things will be when the “big reveal” happens. I’m looking forward to that moment. As an author, I can’t help but rub my hands together in fiendish glee of the chaos I’m about to throw on these two characters who are so very much in love. (A book isn’t interesting without some conflict.)

I have a good start on The Preacher’s Wife

This is Book 2 in the Oregon Series.

I admit that I wasn’t sure how things would go with the preacher when I started this book. I introduce him in The Wilderness Bride, and let’s just say that he is a very different person once you get into his point of view. Like, I had no idea that he’s not the jerk that he appears to be in The Wilderness Bride. I fully expected to start writing him as an egotistical jerk who thought he was better than everyone else. And that just didn’t happen. I could have gone that route, but I have learned to trust the writing process enough to let the characters tell me who they are. The only way I can really learn who the characters are is by writing their viewpoints. So when I wrote The Wilderness Bride, I could only see the preacher from the viewpoint of the hero and heroine in that particular book. It’s only when I dive into his viewpoint that I realized how wrong they were about him.

Well, if you read The Wilderness Bride, you’ll see how the preacher comes off. Then if you read The Preacher’s Wife, you’ll see how he seems like a totally different person, even though he isn’t. Quite frankly, these kinds of surprises is what makes writing so much fun.

***

Alright, I think I’ll stop there for now.

Trying to Segment My Email List, Facebook Updates, and the YouTube Dilemma

So I am trying out the segment feature of MailChimp. I use MailChimp to send out emails when I have a new book out or am participating in a BookFunnel Promo. If you are following this blog or on my monthly newsletter blog, you already get this information.

The reason I have an email list on MailChimp is that should WordPress ever cease to exist, I have another way to reach you. The reason I have this blog is that in case MailChimp should cease to exist, I have another way to reach you. It’s really about keeping in touch with you because you never know what the future will bring. I’m also on Facebook again. I made the announcement a few months ago, but it hasn’t been until this past month where I have figured out how to navigate my way over there enough to feel comfortable. They really changed things in the past few years.

After all the ranting I did the other day about being diversified, I figured I should take my own advice and spread my wings more in the social media area.

About MailChimp:

Now, I am not too familiar with how setting up different email lists on MailChimp works. I would like to better fine-tune my emails so I don’t waste people’s time. I have created four lists that people can choose from: the Everything List, the Historical Western Romances Only List, The Regency Romances Only List, and the BookFunnel Promos Only List. I am hoping that I can tailor the email specifically to what people want. I don’t like emails cluttering my inbox, and I don’t wish to do that to other people.

I updated the signup form in hopes that it will work correctly, but it might be a bit rough while I tweak on things. If I run into problems, I’ll go to YouTube and see if I can find the correct way to do this.

Now, I just sent out an email today asking who wants to continue getting emails from MailChimp. I even asked which of the lists they want to be on. I will manually handle any of the replies I receive. If people would rather not stay on the list, they just don’t need to respond. I don’t know who reading this blog also get the MailChimp emails, but I’m letting you know about this here as well. It’s possible the email went to your spam folder or something, so you might not know I sent it. But it is important to me that you want to be on the list. There are no hard feelings if you don’t. I have had to unsubscribe from quite a few lists lately just because I’ve been overwhelmed with everything. So I get it if you are in the same boat.

Regarding Facebook:

I finally figured out how to get an actual profile url that isn’t jumbled up with a bunch of numbers. I struggled with this a few months ago, got frustrated, and haven’t tried until today. I don’t know why, but it was super easy to figure out this time. Maybe I’m in the right frame of mind for this stuff.

Here is my Facebook profile if anyone would like to “friend” me. https://www.facebook.com/ruthannnordin

If someone finds out that the link doesn’t work correctly, please let me know. I’m afraid that it was too easy to get that figured out and worry I somehow messed up without realizing it.

I also have a private group on there if interested: https://www.facebook.com/groups/946572040679293 This is just a cozy spot to chat.

I’m not on Facebook every day, but I try to hop in twice a week.

A final note about YouTube:

I am having the hardest time getting my kid to finish editing the book he narrated. He isn’t all that excited about romance books. (Hard to imagine, isn’t it? I joke because I understand why a 22 year old young man wouldn’t be all that excited about it.)

However, I did try narrating a chapter on my own in the closet (to better avoid the echo effect), and I kept stumbling over the words. Speaking isn’t my gift. I can write all day long, but it is painful to speak, apparently. I don’t know what to do with that channel. I’d like to do something. It would be nice. I was tampering with the idea of taking my blog posts and giving a speech form of it. That would be less intimidating than doing a whole book. But I am still thinking this over. Another part of me thinks it would be fun to just ramble on about different topics I’m interested in (money, relationships, health), but I’m not sure what kind of time commitment would go into those. I know it takes longer to make a video than it is to watch it.

Diversification is Necessary (A post for writers)

This morning, I happened to stumble across a TikTok influencer who said she might lose all of her income because she relied 100% on TikTok for her platform. I’m not here to argue whether a TikTok ban is good or bad. I prefer not to get into politics. I mention this because as soon as I saw that video, I thought, “It is dangerous for anyone to rely on one single platform for their business.” So that is what we’re going to discuss today: the importance of being diversified.

This rule of thumb works in any business, but since I’m an author, I’ll approach this from the author’s point of view.

The problem with being exclusive on one retailer

Your reader may not be exclusive to one retailer.

I buy ebooks off of Amazon because I’ve had a Kindle for years, and I don’t want to buy another eReader. To watch movies, I have my Roku set up with Amazon movies & subscriptions. Now, I have also purchased some movies from Apple and YouTube, but I prefer Amazon since they have most of what I want to watch. However, I buy audiobooks off of Apple and Google Play because I prefer to listen to audiobooks on my iPhone when I walk, do chores around the house, or drive around town. (I don’t want to lug a Kindle around to listen to an audiobook, nor do I want an Audible subscription.) Some authors have argued that if a person really wants to read their books, they can download the Kindle app onto their device that isn’t a Kindle, but some people don’t want to do that.

My point to all of that rambling is to give an example of how your reader might not be beholden to a single retailer. They might use different retailers for different reasons, and it’s best to meet them where they’re at. I have readers who buy my books on different retailers. For example, I’ve had one person tell me that they have some of my series on their Nook and my other series on their Kindle. Another person had some of my books on their iPad and other books on their Kindle. And another person listens to my audiobooks on Google Play and listens to other audiobooks on Apple. My point is that people may actually buy different books/series from the same author at different retailers. It is a good idea to be available where your readers want to be, at least as much as you possibly can. Some retailers still haven’t opened digital narration on audiobooks, and that limits authors like me who can’t afford a human narrator (nor do we want to do a royalty-split scenario that binds us to another person for a set amount of years). So as much as you can, I recommend being wide for the sake of your readers.

Multiple streams of income help you sleep better at night.

Another reason to diversify is to limit your risk for losing all of your income. If you are only on one retailer (whether it’s Amazon or elsewhere), you are much too vulnerable. What if your account gets banned, or what if the retailers unpublished some of your books for some reason? This stuff has happened. And it is terrifying when it does. It will stop any author in his/her tracks. Imagine if that one, single retailer was your only way of paying bills. What if you are the sole provider in your household? I mean, if you are at least investing and earning dividends to supplement your income, that is a decent buffer, but I don’t think most indie authors are looking to investments to make money. I think most indie authors are looking to their writing income for the means to pay their bills. In that scenario, it helps if you are getting paid from multiple retailers. That way if one retailer doesn’t work out for some reason, there are other retailers helping you get through the rough patch until you can work things out with the retailer that isn’t paying.

And over the years I’ve been doing this, I have come to appreciate how stable retailers like Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Google Play, and Apple are. Some authors like to bounce from being exclusive to Amazon (in KU) to being wide (available everywhere), but you lose momentum on the wide retailers that way. In my research last year, I learned that Amazon rewards “new” books. So new books get special treatment. Then after the newness wears off, Amazon props up what the newer thing is. I used to wonder why Amazon is such a rollercoaster compared to the other retailers. Authors assume they are doing something wrong in their marketing efforts when their Amazon sales take a hit, but in reality, it may just be Amazon shifting them down because there’s newer stuff to bring customers in. (Obviously, if you have a breakout hit, Amazon will keep you in a strong position. But most of us don’t have those breakout books.) That’s why things fluctuate so much over there. But wide is more stable. That’s not to say wide is always “up”. I’m just saying that wide is not the rollercoaster that Amazon is.

Be on multiple platforms so you can buffer yourself against anything like a ban happening to a single platform

This bounces back to the opening paragraph of this post. I am old enough to remember when MySpace was a thing. I was on it. Since then, there have been so many different ways to get the word out about you and your books.

Do the stuff that complements your personality.

This is where you need to take your personality into account. Think about stuff you enjoy doing. Just because some authors flourish in one area, it doesn’t mean that is a good fit for you. Maybe you’ve already figured out your strengths and your interests. But in case you haven’t, then take inventory of things you enjoy doing already. I would make a list. What types of things get you excited? On the flip side, what do you hate? Knowing what you don’t like is just as important as knowing what you like. For example, I love writing blog posts. I find it enhances my creativity for when I write. On the flip side, I hate the thought of doing ads where I am having to put in keywords and tweak them all the time. I would rather go to the dentist for a root canal than deal with the click ads on Amazon. But some authors love working on those ads, and some authors hate blogging. I’ve had this blog for over a decade now, and I still post on it. It’s easy to stick with this blog because I enjoy it. That’s why your interests matter. You want something for the long term. When you hone in on your interests, you are more likely to stick with it, and you’re more likely to engage more positively with others.

Try to be on at least three places consistently to build a sustainable presence.

I don’t know what the magic number of platforms to promote is, so I chose three since it’s easier to stick with three main things. This will depend on your situation. If you have a day job in addition to writing, obviously, you will have less time to promote yourself than someone whose sole job is writing. Also, if you are single, you will have more time than someone who is married, and once you have kids, the amount of time you can devote to promotion goes down even more. I guess you could hire assistants for this work. I see nothing wrong with that. But I would advise that if you want to build a foundation where you can connect with your readers, you should invest time into communicating with your readers. For example, if you have emails coming in because of your email list, then you should be replying to the readers who email you. Don’t leave that to the assistant. (If the person emailing is rude, they deserve no reply from anyone.) Another example is if you have a group on a social media site. Take the time to get to know the people who are reading your books. Respond to their posts. Comment when they respond to yours. Make an effort to get to know something about them so that when you see their name, you’ll know who they are. This will mean honing in on a smaller group of people, but I think it’s better to develop connections in a small group than to not know anyone in a large group. That’s just my two cents. Will this mean mega money coming in? Probably not. But there’s something to be said for the human connection. Money is great. I love it as much as the next person. (Haven’t I whined enough on this blog about not making much money to wear you out?) However, I will say that when I look back on being an indie author since 2009, I barely remember how much money I made every month. There are two things that are easy to remember. I remember how much the books I wrote meant to me, and I remember the people I met along the way. There are some things in this world that money can’t replace, and in a world where we’re driven by technology to do everything for us, it is nice to have actual people who mean something to us.

As a general rule of thumb, I would recommend you pick at least three ways that you want to be visible as an author. And let people get to know you. Who you are is more important than what you write because part of being human is letting people know the person behind the books they’re reading. That helps to establish the bond between the author and the reader. Not every single marketing effort needs to be personal. There are times when you are giving the sales pitch. But everything can’t just be about selling the books. One of the ways you can divide things up for your promotional efforts could be buying ads, having a blog you maintain, and engaging with your readers on Facebook in an author group you run. Another way to divide things up is to have an active email list where you send something out once a week (and respond to readers if they email back), have a website that you regularly update, and engage with readers on Instagram. Those are just two examples, but there are so many ways to get out there on the internet. If you’re any good with video, you can add in something like YouTube. There’s also Substack and Patreon. Some authors do Kickstarter. There are so many ways you can be active online that I can’t even list them all. The more time you have, the easier it is to spread yourself out. Whatever you pick, make sure it’s something you like and something you can commit to for the long run because our books will outlive us. Once you write a book and publish it, you’re an author forever.

Updates on What I’m Working On

The Wilderness Bride will be out next month instead of this one.

This is Book 1 in the Oregon Series.

One of the people on my editing team came down the flu in December. I would rather wait and have the book be as good as it can be before publishing it. Plus, the people who help me with my books are friends. Yes, they started out as readers who contacted me, but we developed friendships over time, and their opinions are important to me. So I want to take their thoughts into consideration before uploading the book for publication.

When this is on pre-order, I’ll let everyone know.

The Hero Least Likely is coming along better than I expected.

This is Book 2 in the Love Under Desert Skies Series.

We are heading for the last 1/4 of the story now. I had to do some rewriting to the beginning to get on the right track with this one, and that set me back for a bit. But things are going smoothly now.

Today, I just wrote the scene where the hero of our story proposes to the heroine, and it turned out a lot better than I expected. There are characters an author writes who wonders if the characters will be able to successfully pull off a big moment when it arrives, and I’m both relieved and excited by the way the hero handled the proposal in this book. (Yes, I know it sounds weird for an author to speak as if the author had no control over a character, but the fun in writing is NOT feeling the control. I might be writing the story–and therefore, the character is really “me”–but I like viewing characters as if they are like my children–people I have no control over.)

And earlier in this book, I made a slight error that was a contradiction to Tagalong Bride (Book 1 in this series). At first, I was tempted to go in and change this error in this book since I did catch it while listening to Tagalong Bride. But then, I realized this error is the perfect segue into Book 3 of this series. I can’t say that is, unfortunately. It would spoil an important element in this story. Just suffice it to say that I was excited when I realized where I can go with this plot point.

Also, due to a concern someone has about the age of a certain character, I have decided to make the heroine in Book 3 of this series 35 instead of 39. I am trying to find ways to introduce older characters into books, but I have to make it work for the series.

That being said, I will be able to make the heroine in Book 3 of the Oregon Series 42 (I think I settled on 42), and the hero will be 50. Unfortunately, that book won’t be out until 2026.

I have slotted September 2025 through February 2026 for my holiday series since there is going to be a Halloween, Christmas, and Valentine theme to those books. I’ll speak more specifically to this series in a later post. I’d like to get the covers done before going into them. I’m putting this 3-book series into the Regency world so I can bring Mr. Christopher Robinson in as the hero in Book 3 (the Valentine one). Don’t worry. He is still married to Agatha. I’m not killing her off. I just have a special “holiday magic” twist I’m throwing into the story.

I think I’m halfway into The Earl’s Bluestocking Bride.

This is Book 1 in the Marriage by Chemistry Series.

This is one of my funnier romantic comedies. The comedy is more of the heroine not realizing she loves the hero while hating his alias. This is a situation I’ve never done before, and it’s turning out to be more fun than I expected it to be, so I’m dragging things on for a while. These two are soon to be married. It won’t be until after the marriage that the big reveal happens, and at that time, I anticipate having even more fun with these characters. To be fair to the hero, he doesn’t realize who her alias is, either. So he’ll be just as shocked in the big reveal as she’ll be. This book only goes to prove that sometimes authors enjoy messing with their characters.

I have started The Preacher’s Wife.

This is Book 2 in the Oregon Series.

You haven’t read The Wilderness Bride yet, so there’s no background to understand the preacher who is the hero of this story. But anyway, suffice it to say, he’s not exactly the most likable character in The Wilderness Bride. This setup is actually intriguing to me because we are taking a character who is unlikable in one book and then presenting his point of view in a way that makes him likable. The thing with points of view fascinates me. I love working at the same characters from different angles. It makes them more real. They are layered. Anyway, I really like this hero and am looking forward to seeing how he grows through the course of the story.