The tonsils are out, and while I’ve had my ups and downs this past week, it’s not the worst. Not particularly fun, but not the worst. So! Since I’m not completely miserable and I have passed off most of the care of my children to other adults, I’ve actually gotten quite a bit of writing done. Yay me.
When I last blogged, I predicted Hunting Astrid would go eight chapters (or so). I debated whether or not to split one chapter into two, and ultimately did so, so it does look like I’ll wind up with eight, plus a short epilogue. I finished Chapter Six today, but the next two will be long, so don’t expect a finished draft any time soon. For total word count, I’m predicting…let’s say around 22K. Definitely more than 20K, probably less than 25K. Either way, it’ll be a cute, fun little novella that didn’t take me a ton of time, assuming I don’t get struck by a meteor or something in the next few weeks. Another win.
I’m still patting myself on the back for deciding to work on this project and shelve Sonata for Springtime for the time being. 4th Quarter royalty statements just came out, and while I admit I still don’t know all the ins and outs of the Kindle Unlimited program, Fire Beyond the Frost did do well, I’m happy to report. At least better than a lot of my other books upon release. KU tracks pages read instead of books as a whole, and if I did my math right (which I TOTALLY might not have), it translates into a triple-digit number of readers. Or, for all I know, one or two people who liked it so much they read it a bunch of times. As someone who is far from a world-famous author with a huge following, I’ll take it.
I’d suspected for a while that the more specific your categories/genres/niches/whatever you want to call it, the more successful a book will be. (Unless you’re really savvy with your keywords and marketing, which I am not.) We’ll see if I can keep the momentum going with Hunting Astrid, and if lesbian sci-fi romance turns out to be my true, yet somewhat specific, calling, so be it. I’m not saying I’ll never write in another genre again, because I know that won’t be the case, but for now, we’ll see where this path takes me. Either way, I’m finally writing like crazy for the first time in years, and if I’m having fun, I’m hoping readers will, too.