Well, I finally sold my first paperback copy of Tales of a Stranger Sister. It appears that my cunning and subtle sales strategy of standing in the middle of a busy intersection and screaming “Buy my book!” is finally working.

To the three people on Earth that appreciated that reference, I thank you.

But in all seriousness, thank you, physical book-buying stranger. The fact that you not only took a chance on my debut effort, but wanted a copy that will physically sit on your shelf somewhat blows my mind. It was a pleasant emotional boost on what has been a very trying week for me personally.

I promise you, I don’t plan to use this blog just to report every single sale I’ve made. Like I said above, it’s been an emotionally trying week in my personal life and simple things like that take up less mental energy than most other things right now.

That said, I do plan to use this site for some additional content beyond just promoting Tales of a Stranger Sister while I work on my next book. I have some additional material about my first novel in the pipeline both in the forms of bonus materials and in behind-the-scenes minutiae. I also want to talk more about the writing process, both what I’ve learned during creating Tales and what I’m applying from that experience toward my next novel. To summarize, I plan to detail the interesting mistakes I made, what I learned from them, and the amazing new mistakes I’m making now.

I also want to talk more about the things I love beyond writing. Other books I’ve read and loved (or loathed), media I’m enjoying be it TV, Film, Comic, or Game, and I might even share some snippets of what two writers sharing both a home and life together is like.

But that will have to wait until next time. I need to head back out into the intersection now.

So, I’ve been a published author for a little under a week now. I’ve been a writer for over 30 years, but this is my first honest attempt to create and sell something I could call entirely my own.

I didn’t get into this with any grandiose dreams of instant success or literary stardom, like so many who want to make their mark on the literary arts. Let’s be honest, if I wanted to be rich or famous, then writing a slice of life fantasy novel was probably the least efficient way to achieve either. No, as cliche as it may sound, I wrote a novel because I wanted to tell and share stories. I believed that I had something unique to share and that was worth asking for something in return.

When I decided to self-publish my first novel, it was not so much because it was the easiest way to get published, but because I wanted to create this story in the manner I felt best. I wanted it to have the cover I imagined in my head, be the length I thought it needed to be, and all the other creative and editorial decisions that I wouldn’t have been afforded if I had attempted the traditional publishing route. To paraphrase the old song, I wanted to do it my way and succeed or fail on my own terms.

So, using the metric of creative freedom, this project has been a resounding success. I am proud of what I have created and am eternally grateful for all the individuals who helped me reach this point.

And while I didn’t start this journey with expectations of sacks of fan mail and solid gold yachts (or solid gold fan mail and sacks of yachts), I did have hopes that someone, somewhere would see what I was offering and think that, yes, what I was asking for in compensation for my creative effort was fair and justified. For the five days since the book went live, I will admit that I watched my sales report page with some anxiety as four days passed without a single sale. Then, on day five, a most glorious number appeared:

1

One. Uno. Eins. Un. Ichi. Not Zero. I had made a sale. Someone – a total stranger – has bought my book. I say, with some confidence, that they are a total stranger because the sale came from Australia, and I seriously doubt anyone I know would bother to use a VPN just to boost my already prodigious ego. Not only did they buy my book, but the bought it at the price I asked for. That meant that they thought it was worth the cost because it could be something that they would enjoy. The royalty I’ll receive may only be a few dollars but knowing that someone felt my book was worth the cost is a genuinely priceless feeling.

So, to that stranger from the land down under, thank you. I sincerely hope you enjoy this story. I hope you will see the website address in the About the Author section at the end and visit this page. I hope you see that your simple purchase really meant something to me because you were the first person to give my book a chance without hesitation. More than anything, I hope when you finish, regardless of whether you liked the story or not, that you at least feel that you got your money’s worth.

And I hope you won’t be the last.