Filed under: Amazon, Feedback, Kindle, Marketing, Promotion, Publishing, Science Fiction | Tags: Amazon, direct publishing, free, jim downey, Kindle, literature, Science Fiction
So, had this little promotion yesterday. Since the last one only generated about 1,800 downloads, I didn’t have really high expectations. Which was probably a good thing, in light of how yesterday went.
Good, because what actually happened just blew me out of the water: almost 6,000 downloads. 5,831 to be specific. That includes 42 in the UK and 4 in Germany.
That beats the previous high tally of 5,277. When combined with the other sales and whatnot this month, that makes a total of about 5,950 copies of Communion of Dreams distributed since April 1, and something in excess of 14,000 since the launch of the new edition. Not bad.
So, as I’ve said before, thanks everyone. Really – it makes a huge difference. Your downloads. Your purchases. Your reviews. Your ‘likes’. Your telling friends and forums about the book. Your helping push it to #1 in the Science Fiction category of the free Kindle store for most of yesterday, and something like #53 overall. It all has an impact.
And it is all very much appreciated.
Stay tuned for further developments.
Jim Downey
Filed under: Amazon, Feedback, Kindle, Marketing, Promotion, Publishing, Science Fiction | Tags: Amazon, direct publishing, jim downey, Kindle, literature, Science Fiction, writing
… feet, er rank.
That’s where Communion of Dreams has been hovering most of this week: #30,000 or so in the “Amazon Best Sellers Rank.” Sometimes it’s a little better, sometimes a little worse. Just now it was #28,088. Yesterday afternoon it was 34,000-something.
You might think that this would be somewhat disappointing to me. Actually, I’m pretty happy with it.
That happiness comes because it does seem that people are actually enjoying the book. Yeah, sure, I would love for it to suddenly skyrocket to the top of the best-seller list. I could certainly use the financial boost which would come with that. Just as I would love it if everyone raved in their reviews about the book. But being realistic, the book has only been available for about 10 weeks now, I haven’t spent any money on advertising, and the response keeps growing. Over 8,000 people have downloaded the book in the Kindle edition, and so far this month over 100 people have actually paid good money to do so. That tells me that enough people who have read the book are telling others about it, recommending it.
And when you think about that, it’s really one hell of a compliment. Because the amount of time taken from other things people can do with their life to read a book is pretty substantial, and represents a significant investment which makes the $4.95 price fairly insignificant by comparison. So, thanks, everyone. Keep it up!
My participation in the KDP Select program comes up for renewal next week, and I’ll be able to schedule another promotional day shortly thereafter. Stay tuned for an announcement about when that will be.
Jim Downey
Filed under: Amazon, Failure, Feedback, Kindle, Marketing, Promotion, Publishing, Science Fiction | Tags: Amazon, direct publishing, jim downey, Kindle, literature, Science Fiction, writing
So, as mentioned early last week, I planned on doing a “make-up” free-Kindle-edition promotion on April 12, in recognition of this first paragraph of Communion of Dreams:
He could see four or five thousand buffalo, one of the small herds. They stretched out in a long line below him, wide enough to fill the shallow valley along this side of the river, coming partway up the sides of the hill, not fifty meters from where he stood. The sky was its perpetual blue-grey, as clear as it ever got at this latitude, though the sun was almost bright. Late winter snow, churned into a dull brown mass by the buffalo where they trekked along the valley floor, nonetheless glinted along the tops of the hills. Weather forecasts said more snow was coming. It was Friday, April 12.
Well, as of noon today, it doesn’t look like it’s going to happen. But this time, it’s not my fault – I did the requisite hoop-jumping to get Amazon to provide my promised “make-up” day. But you know how it is with corporate bureaucracies – my submission seems to have been lost somewhere in the dreaded depths of customer service. I even sent a follow up two days ago, asking about the status of the submission, and was promised a response within 48 hours. You can quess how that turned out.
So, from what I can tell, tomorrow will not be a “free-Kindle-edition promotion”. Sorry about that. Here in a couple of weeks the calender will start anew for my participation in the KDP Select program, and I’ll have more promotional days available. And I’ll schedule one right away.
In the meantime, do feel free to continue to tell others about the book, or to get your own copy. I’ve sold almost 100 so far this month – YAY! And the feedback has continued to be very positive, though some more positive reviews would be very welcome so the most recent thing isn’t the fellow who found it “A bit too Insubstantial for me.”
Stay tuned!
Jim Downey
Filed under: Amazon, Astronomy, Book Conservation, Connections, Feedback, Kindle, Marketing, NASA, Promotion, Publishing, Science, Science Fiction, Space | Tags: Amazon, direct publishing, jim downey, Kindle, NASA, science, Science Fiction, space, technology, writing
Two items.
One: Yesterday’s post was the most popular thing I’ve written here in years. Actually, I think it might be the second-best ever. Go figure.
(Well, three. I should mention this other item.)
Two: Possibly related, though things were doing quite well even before yesterday’s post – so far this month we’ve sold almost 50 copies (mostly Kindle) of Communion of Dreams. Thanks, everyone!
(No, make that four. Damn, forgot about this one.)
Three: Got another review. And it serves as a nice counterpoint to all those who enjoyed the book.
(Finally.)
And lastly, which I intended to be my second point all along: this very cool site showing relative scale of our solar system. I’ve seen this attempted a number of times and different ways online, but this is the best I’ve come across yet:
OMG SPACE is the thesis project of Margot Trudell, an OCAD student studying graphic design in Toronto, Canada. This website aims to illustrate the scale and the grandeur of our solar system, as well as illustrate through the use of infographics our work in the exploration of our solar system with various spacecraft.
And now I need to turn my attention to some book conservation work I want to wrap up. Cheers!
Jim Downey
Filed under: Amazon, Connections, Feedback, Kindle, Marketing, Promotion, Publishing, tech | Tags: Amazon, direct publishing, Kindle, literature, Science Fiction, technology, travel, TV Tropes, writing
Some miscellaneous bits this morning…
Since the close of the Kindle edition promotion on Saturday, about two dozen people have actually purchased a copy of Communion of Dreams in one form or another. Yay! Keep it up, people!
Oh, no! – TV Tropes Warning – while doing some ego-surfing this morning (actually, I’m still trying to get a handle on what promotional efforts work, what don’t) I found that CoD is the first listing under the ‘Literature’ sub-heading of the TV Tropes entry on First Contact Team. I always get sucked into TV Tropes, because it is such a good tool for exploring modern literature in all its various and sundry forms, and it is cool to be included in it. Thanks to whomever added Communion of Dreams to the entry! (Any chance of getting a direct link to the CoD homepage?)
As you all know, I screwed up and wasn’t able to extend the promotion to yesterday. However, there’s another day coming soon which is also important in the novel: April 12. From the very first paragraph of the book:
He could see four or five thousand buffalo, one of the small herds. They stretched out in a long line below him, wide enough to fill the shallow valley along this side of the river, coming partway up the sides of the hill, not fifty meters from where he stood. The sky was its perpetual blue-grey, as clear as it ever got at this latitude, though the sun was almost bright. Late winter snow, churned into a dull brown mass by the buffalo where they trekked along the valley floor, nonetheless glinted along the tops of the hills. Weather forecasts said more snow was coming. It was Friday, April 12.
Hmm…let’s see if I can get my act together for that date. Stay tuned.
Lastly, there are some new reviews up on the Amazon page for Communion, and I’d invite you to check them out, rate them if you find them useful. As I said yesterday, reviews seem to really make a difference – if you’ve read the book, please consider writing your own review. Thanks!
Jim Downey
Filed under: Amazon, Feedback, Science Fiction, Space, Writing stuff | Tags: gratuitous sex, literature, suspenseful novel, writing
One of the more enjoyable aspects of having Communion of Dreams out there is the consistently positive response it is generating. Reading reviews, seeing what others post about it in comments & blog posts, getting messages – all of these help affirm that the work which went into writing the book was worthwhile.
This morning I opened my CoD inbox to find a very nice message from someone who had just read the book. After favorably commenting on my book, and then relating some other books by VERY big-name authors he had read recently, he said this:
The [other author’s] novel mentioned was, I think, his best to date, and while it ended beautifully, there was a darkness behind it that left a tragic feeling when I was done. The other two are very, very grim indeed. I mention all of these because in the absence of the awe and sense of newness of the pioneers of science fiction, most authors take the route of being deliberately cynical–often bolster their flagging motivation with plenty of sex.
I am greatly impressed that you have created a suspenseful novel without gratuitous sex or violence, and paint a hopeful human picture in what could easily have been the run-of-the-mill depressing post-apocalyptic world.
I have to chuckle – it seems almost like a back-handed compliment, though I know it wasn’t intended that way. And in truth, he’s quite right. In fact, this is what I said in regards to that in my return note:
Thanks – both the core story and the decision to leave out the gratuitous sex & violence was very deliberate (as you know) because I wanted the book to be akin to the SF I enjoyed in my own youth. I wanted not just my contemporaries to enjoy the book, but for it to be enjoyable by their kids and grandkids. I agree that it is impossible at this point to recapture the innocent optimism of Clarke and others, but there’s nothing wrong with trying to again find optimism in understanding the limitations of the world – I think we’ve lost that in the last couple of decades.
Anyway – yeah, I’m guilty of being a cynical old bastard. But my book isn’t.
And on that note, a reminder that today is a promotional day: you can get the Kindle edition for free, all day. Help me get the word out, if you would be so kind.
Thanks!
Jim Downey
Filed under: Amazon, Artificial Intelligence, Augmented Reality, Expert systems, Feedback, Kindle, Marketing, Predictions, Promotion, Publishing, Science, Science Fiction, Society, tech, Writing stuff
Via my Her Final Year co-author, this fairly light but interesting look at the current tech which is very much the precursors of what I envision in Communion of Dreams:
5 Exciting Innovations That Will Change Computing in 2012
Technical innovations are incoming in the next year or so that promise to bridge the gap between the physical and digital worlds like never before, whether that’s controlling your computer with gestures, opening programs with your eyes or extending the menu options for touchscreens with wearable devices.
There are a number of things they feature in the slideshow which gave me a chuckle, they’re so clearly direct ancestors of what is in Communion. Such as the Keyglove:
The Keyglove is a wearable, wireless, open source input device that boasts unprecedented flexibility and convenience for all kinds of computer applications.
With exciting potential for gaming, design, art, music, device control and even data entry, the glove-based system’s multi-sensor combinations mean it could be programmed to offer one-handed operation of many systems and software.
But this had me laughing right out loud, from the last of the five entries:
We predict that the press-a-button-and-speak method will become outdated as smart virtual assistants — which offer an AI-powered, conversational style solution — emerge.
Gee . . . a smart virtual assistant. Now, *there’s* an idea I never considered for the future. Well, maybe this passage from page 6 does sort of hint at that:
“Hi Seth.” Jon just talked to the not-quite thin air next to him. It was common enough to see people walking through the halls, or sitting at their desks, chatting with someone invisible. He could have Seth give him the feed for the images of the other experts, and see their ghostly manifestations, if he wanted.
His expert was one of best, one of only a few hundred based on the new semifluid CPU technology that surpassed the best thin-film computers made by the Israelis. But it was a quirky technology, just a few years old, subject to problems that conventional computers didn’t have, and still not entirely understood. Even less settled was whether the experts based on this technology could finally be considered to be true AI. The superconducting gel that was the basis of the semifluid CPU was more alive than not, and the computer was largely self-determining once the projected energy matrix surrounding the gel was initiated by another computer. Building on the initial subsistence program, the computer would learn how to refine and control the matrix to improve its own ‘thinking’. The thin-film computers had long since passed the Turing test, and these semifluid systems seemed to be almost human. But did that constitute sentience? Jon considered it to be a moot point, of interest only to philosophers and ethicists.
Heh. You know, reading that again, I’m pleased with just how much of the entire story of the book is foreshadowed in those couple of paragraphs. It’s almost like I planned it or something.
Anyway, another countdown of a sort: this coming Saturday and Sunday, all day both days, the Kindle edition of Communion of Dreams will be available for free to any and all who want to read it. And in preparation for that, I would ask that anyone who has had a chance to read the book to please go post a review on Amazon, or at least give the book a “Like” there. Building that sort of recommendation base will really help – thank you very much!
Jim Downey
Filed under: Amazon, Feedback, Kindle, Marketing, Promotion, Publishing, Science Fiction
One of those weird little quirks of mine: so far* this month I’ve given away some 5,277 copies of Communion of Dreams. Actually, that doesn’t include another half dozen or so hard copies sent to various reviewer and press outlets. This doesn’t bother me in the slightest – it’s all good promotion, and an investment in the eventual success of my novel.
And yet, the fact that 8 of the people who bought the Kindle edition of the book this month have “returned” the book and had their purchase price refunded, bugs me.
No, it doesn’t make any sense. There is no difference whatsoever between those people just getting a refund, and having not paid for it in the first place. I said it was a weird little quirk, didn’t I? I’m entitled to a few of those.
Jim Downey
*Yeah, so far. Watch this space for announcement of another free Kindle promotion day, coming soon!
Filed under: Alzheimer's, Amazon, Diane Rehm, Feedback, Kindle, Marketing, Press, Promotion, Publishing, Science Fiction, Society, Writing stuff
Marketing a self-published book is the single biggest hurdle any author faces. Well, perhaps other than all the other hurdles such as writing the book in the first place, competently editing it, getting it put into an attractive format with a nice cover, …
Anyway, marketing is a huge problem. That’s why I did the KDP Select program, with the ability to offer special promotions. It’s why I blog & tweet and generally blow my own horn. It’s why I bug my friends and fans and ask that they help to spread the word. It’s why I leverage any connections I might have into any press outlets. It’s marketing. And you’re never sure what works or what doesn’t.
And I thought I would share one more item I’m trying: direct communication with the Diane Rehm Show. Here’s the text from a letter I am sending them with copies of Communion of Dreams and Her Final Year:
Diane Rehm Show
WAMU 88.5 American University Radio
4400 Massachusetts Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20016-8082Greetings,
I’ve long been a listener of the Diane Rehm show, and know that Ms. Rehm is a fan of intelligent, thoughtful science/speculative fiction. My recently published novel is generally considered to fall into that genre, and has been generating considerable interest. I am enclosing an article from this past weekend’s local newspaper supporting this claim, and a check of the reviews on Amazon will do likewise.
I am also enclosing a memoir published last year, which deals with another issue I know Ms. Rehm has covered and seems to care about: care-giving for a loved one. In this case it was Alzheimer’s, and the memoir is a joint effort of myself and another man, along with our spouses. We were each care providers for our respective mothers-in-law, a relatively unusual role in our society, but one which is going to become increasingly common (and necessary) in the coming years. The book is based on each of our writings as we went through the multi-year experience, and includes blog posts and email communications.
I understand that Ms. Rehm, and likely the entire staff there, are probably overwhelmed with story suggestions and books to be considered. But I hope that you will find time to take a look at either or both of these books. The matter of care-giving for someone with dementia is extremely important to me, and I would like to see more people aware of the role that men play concerning this. And the novel which I wrote during my time as a care provider tells another story, one of how unexpected discoveries sometimes show us what really matters. I think it is easy to see how these two things may be connected.
Thank you for your time,
James Downey
Will it do *any* good? No idea. Maybe. If you would like to help get them to consider it, post a note on their Facebook page. Send ’em a tweet. Drop them an email through the ‘contact us’ form on their site. It might help.
It might not.
That’s marketing, at least as a small, self-published author.
If you have any other ideas or suggestions, or know other outlets/individuals which might be open to providing coverage, let me know.
Thanks.
Jim Downey
Communion Of Dreams 