Writing News!: Some Announcements, A Bit of Discussion, and One or Two Carefully Placed Primal Screams

Hello there! So, it took quite a lot of doing, but some author stuff has finally been accomplished, and now I have tangible details to share!

First: A few months ago, I started looking into alternatives to Amazon when it came to ebook distribution. The corporate giant has long forgotten its origins as one of the grassroots building blocks for the indie publishing field, and doing business with them as a self-pubbed author these days is literal hell. And since I no longer work in the local library system, I need sales and royalties and actual promotion for my bibliography. Luckily, I came across some real possibilities for not-Amazon; and finished paperwork and file transfers later, I can announce that my work will very soon be available on the digital bookstore, NE1 World!

Everyone there has been so welcoming, and I joined in their live anniversary con on YouTube last week to introduce myself and share a little about my series. The feeling of getting involved in a group that supports authors of all sorts of genres and styles is so rewarding. For any of you who have read my writing, you’ll know that I don’t stick to tropes, that I combine genres, that I like to shake up the norms (no love triangles or 40-page chapters here!), and that means finding a distributor who accepts all of that and figures out a way to market my work as it is has been tricky. So — as nervewracking as my first live appearance online was! — I’m excited for the chance to go in this direction.

Second: Editing on Volume 4 is almost complete! I fully intend to release a paperback, but I’m thinking that I might go with digital release first (now that I have the groundwork laid for easily-submitted ebooks!). Between needing to get ready for the start of the new school year and returning to the dance studio, I simply may not have the bandwidth to deal with all the formatting and configuring right away. I’ll be sure to keep everyone informed of the next steps as they’re taken!

Third: This will be a primal scream moment. Now that I do have an alternative in place to the ‘Zon, it is very important to not lose sight of the reasons why finding said alt was so necessary. I first uploaded my back-catalogue onto the website, for public sale, in mid-2021; in 2 years, I have yet to receive a single royalty payment, though the company’s own records show that in some months, I did earn “enough,” according to their own rules. What knocked me way down was their former policy on ebook returns — which removed a royalty credit from the author’s account if their ebook title was returned. In less than a 60-day period, I lost over $40 that I’d acquired in Kindle sales because of this, and have yet to get even close to reclaiming it. And because of “printing costs increasing” earlier this year and making authors set our prices higher, paperback sales are in a massive slump. While I, as a reader on a shoestring budget, understand that, as a financially-strapped writer, I’m also pretty upset about it.

So, although I’m going to leave my catalog on Amazon, I’m not going to add to it. This company has done absolutely nothing to make me feel valued as a creative or as a person with real world concerns, and while I will continue to remind folks my work exists there — so that hopefully one day I finally cross the mythological threshold of “earned enough” and actually get some royalties from these *insert bad words here* — I’ve decided striking out on new paths is the way forward.

Fourth (and last for now): The recent upheaval over at Twitter has also taken its toll on my marketing abilities. Since my account is not “premium” there, I am on the lowest rungs of the algorithm’s ladder, and my community engagement has dropped dramatically in the last several months. I still post there — aherm, TWEET — and am doing my best at yelling into the void and hoping my voice lands on at least some of my tribe. But, because I like having a safety net for all sorts of situations, I have created an account with Blue Sky social media, and hope to cultivate a presence there as well (just in case). My handle at Blue Sky is also invisiblemoth1, for anyone who’s headed there and would like to drop in on me!

All right, that brings you pretty well up to speed! Have a great week, everyone!