Oh my gosh, it’s happening…Rise of the Ash Kingdom is OUT NOW. Officially. Available for purchase on Amazon and other major online retailers. For all to finally read (insert panic attack). This is truly wild.
If you’ve read Rise already, left a review, or have pre-ordered your copy and are expecting it to arrive any day now, THANK YOU. Thank you, thank you, thank you. I seriously cannot express that enough. Which leads me to follow up with an apology for asking for more. We’re not done just yet. I still need your help…
As an indie author, the downside of doing it yourself is that your reach doesn’t go as far. This is where you come in—the supportive reader. Things like reviews, social media follows, orders (obviously), and word-of-mouth recommendations really go the distance. There are so many ways you can help push Rise along in the sea of books out there. Here are just a few:
Calling your local bookstore, whichever it may be, and requesting the book. If a bookstore gets an order for a book they don’t already have in stock, that doesn’t mean they can’t get it. With enough calls, the retailer is likely to order the book (yay supply and demand). Now, it’s on their radar. They’ve seen it, they’ve held it. They know about it, which they wouldn’t have without your call. After a book gets enough attention and stores start to see a demand, they might just decide to stock the book on their own, not just when someone calls to special request it. This one step alone is enough to get Rise farther than just online retailers. But it’s going to take more than one.
Reviews! Reviews help other readers get an idea of if Rise of the Ash Kingdom might be a good fit for their reading tastes. That overall star rating average on Goodreads and Amazon holds weight to interested readers.
Speaking of reviews… Searching for Rise of the Ash Kingdom on Goodreads and marking it as either read, want to read, or currently reading will also help get the book seen.
Tell your friends! Some of us have found our favorite books by simple recommendation alone. If it’s your turn to suggest the monthly read for book club, here’s your sign to help a girl out :)
Share online. The easiest (and freest) way to support me is simply by hitting the share button on one of my posts. There. You didn’t even have to talk to anyone! Crisis averted.
So what’s next?
Don’t worry, I’m not going to blow your inbox up with these newsletters. I plan to only send them out when something is happening. So…here’s what’s happening:
Someone (and I won’t mention who) (narrows gaze) (it was my husband) asked me if this was it. If after this book I had any more plans or if this would just be it. I’ll spare you the speech I gave him and keep it short. I’ve been dreaming these dreams for the last 30 years, and I fully intend on spending the next 30 years writing story after story.
I’m currently focusing all my attention on The Sun and Moon Tales, which I plan on being a four-book series. I had four years, off and on, to make sure Rise was as perfect as it was going to get. I don’t have four years with the sequel, so it’s been a bit of a struggle to figure out a timeline that is going to work for both myself and the readers.
Typically, the publishing industry wants you to publish your series books within a year of each other. Which makes sense. I get it. You want your readers to actually be able to remember what they read in the last book by the time they start the next one. I’m going to do my absolute best to get you these books no later than a year apart from each other. But full disclosure, I don’t think I can make that a promise.
I am not a rapid release girlie. I know of authors who are full-on rockstars when it comes to this. Some are even capable of tackling homeschooling AND homemaking WHILE pumping out two to three books a year. And somehow even manage to look like a normal functioning human being while doing it?? I am not one of those full-on rockstars. I only get a few hours a day of free time, and those few hours just for me are spent pouring into manuscripts. While it’s a heartfelt process, it’s also a slow one.
With that being said, I’m attempting to be a rockstar…but if I find I have to choose quality over quantity, I’m going to pick quality every time. Maybe that won’t backfire on me later. Maybe it will. I really hope you all decide to stick through it with me anyway :)
Here’s how attempting to be a rockstar is going so far: I’m about 3/4 of the way finished with a second draft of book 2. When I finish, I plan to take a small break (ya know, to refill the creative well) and then do another round of edits to polish it before sending off to beta readers (another email will go out then if you’re interested in signing up). While they are reading, that will give me time to take a step back (we love creative refills) from this project and outline some other projects for the future. After ANOTHER round of edits based off the beta feedback, the publishing details are rapid-fire. Editors, the cover designer, formatting, and marketing. All the things. It’s a loose timeline for now, so bear with me.
