I’m Not a Great Conversationalist…

It’s been a long time, like a really long time. Turns out, helping someone get started is a full-time job.

That’s believable, right?

Trying to do the re-write just hasn’t moved, so whenever I’ve had the urge to write, I’ve gone to Aya and helped her a bit with her stuff. She’s finally getting ready to launch her first book, has three more written, has four more planned, and is currently ripping her hair out over a couple of characters who won’t listen to her.

Aya likes to repay help whenever she can, she doesn’t like being in debt to people. At least, not to people she physically knows.

So she’s helped me set up an office, is trying to coach me on social media, and kindly only asks after the next book every couple of months.

A few days ago, I received a message from a new reader. Said something like, “found you on iTunes because your books were on the front page.”

… I… may have called Aya and yelled at her.

I don’t have iTunes, all I can do is find the page for Trouble and see that there are links to other books, and no reviews yet. I went through quite a bit of my contact list to find an Apple user. Kind of surprised how few people have Apple that I know, I figured it’d be like one in three, but apparently, it’s more like one in ten.

That’s not to say it’s not as popular as you might think, so much as I have an odd collection of contacts.

They told me it was still on the front page. Number nine, I think it was when they found it.

Now the call to Aya does take a little more explanation.

I haven’t been doing social media. I haven’t set up advertisement. I’m not actually certain I’ve put a link to iTunes anywhere in any of the previous advertisements.

Basically: I didn’t do it.

Whenever there’s something unpredictable and untraceable, I panic. Blame my parents or years or predictable living, or even genetics, but my first instinct when I see a surge I can’t explain is widespread panic.

So I talked to Aya and she said she hadn’t done it. Then she said.

“Well, that’s a shame.”

“Because you wanted to claim it?”

“No, it’s a shame that you haven’t been working on the fifth book like you’ve been telling me you have. You can’t just start a pre-order for it on top of this wave.”

I would have made a strangling motion, but we were texting.

Have you ever texted an author? Just blocks of conversation bubbles, miles long.

Anyhow, this is probably the universe telling me that I need to get back to work. I can’t quite afford an editor yet, but I should do the re-write and have it ready to go for when I do. Then I should write the sixth so that it’s ready, and so on and so forth.

I wish I could write at Aya’s pace. A book that would have taken me three months, she does in a month, sometimes a week if she’s having a good time of it.