On $20

The following post was doing better than normal on its own, so I decided to pay $20 to "boost" it on Facebook. It went like this: “John Prine and Bill Murray both figure heavily in my novel THE GREAT AMERICAN SCRAPBOOK. My main character snaps out of a breakdown by wandering around playing Prine songs on his girlfriend's guitar. Later Murray, as part-owner of the St. Paul Saints, invites him to sing on Opening Day 2004.” I paired that with a video of an interview and a picture (below) of the two—not sure who the third guy is.

Final return on my investment: 'Reached' 1,928 people, got 98 'clicks', 8 'engagements', 6 'likes' from strangers, 2 new 'friends' on FB, 1 Goodreads 'follower' and sold zero 'books'.

That's what we call marketing.

On ebooks

Over the last three years I've published my ebooks exclusively through Amazon Kindle in order to take advantage of their 70% royalty rate for doing so. Problem is I ain't sellin' any through them lately and have decided to expand to multiple vendors such as B&N, iBooks and others displayed in this post.

Today No Happier State is no longer under any exclusive contractual obligation with Kindle and will soon be available through these other outlets (as well as Amazon). The same will happen with The Cary Grant Sanatorium and Playhouse and The Adventures of Hank Fenn later this month, and the other three at the end of January.

Time will tell if this jump-starts my sales. One thing is for sure, your Facebook feeds will be deluged with links to these new outlets and for that I apologize.

Right...