Playing it Cool . . . Yeah, Right!
So, The Shattered Prism has been out officially for one week tomorrow and I've been promoting the heck out of it. I had the very first virtual release party I've ever had, screwed my courage to the sticking place and called a couple of newspapers, and have been a self-promoting pill on every FB page I'm affiliated with. I have to say that it seems to have paid off. Starting Friday and still going today, as of an hour or so ago, I am still on Amazon.com's Best Selling Coming of Age Fantasy list. I have to say, I'm still geeking out over it more than a little bit.
I've been going to science fiction conventions since my sophomore year in high school. I remember finding the advertisement for WindyCon in the back of my dad's Analog and begging him to take me. Don't ask me who the author guest of honor was at that time, I just remember the individual in a nine foot Masque of the Red Death costume and the feeling that I'd found someplace very magical. However, no matter how many times I go to the cons I've always felt a little bit on the outside. I wasn't an author, no matter how many writing panels I went to or how many rejection letters I collected. I wasn't an artist. I am incapable of drawing my way out of a paper bag. My husband tried to teach me to draw when we were in college. It wasn't the bonding experience he'd hoped for, let's just say. I wasn't a masquerade geek who could sew. When my grandmother gave me a sewing machine, I asked her if it were supposed to be a door stop. She told me not to be an ass.
Even after getting Ribbons of Moonlight published, a feat that had me dancing around the living room for days, I still didn't feel quite part of the con family. I was a watcher--not a participator. They put me on a few panels. I got to talk about YA literature, a topic near and dear to my teacher heart, but as a writer, I still didn't feel as though I belonged. With Prism, I feel more confident. I have DuckCon this weekend and I have to admit that it's a heady feeling to be able to go into a Con, sit on a panel and tell people that my book was on a best seller list its first weekend out. I'm secretly hoping to keep it up until Saturday so I can have those bragging rights too. Particularly, since it seems that at every Con there's someone out there who's willing and ready to rain on your parade. I was so happy at WindyCon. I'd just gotten my cover art for Prism and was on a couple of panels. I was talking to Bill Faecett, Jody Lynn Nye's husband and a writer and editor in his own right. Pretty cool, right? He looked at my cover and told me that putting Book One of The Star Circle Trilogy was going to kill my sales. Unless book 2 was going to be out a matter or weeks or months after book 1. What a downer! Seriously? I was doing my happy dance and here's someone who has throw ice water in my face. Ah well.
It's rather nice to have seen Prism up on the Best Seller List, number 12,000 or so out of all paid Kindle books (considering how many of them that have to be out there.) So, I'm looking forward to DuckCon. I'm also promising to myself and to everyone who ever shows me their happy dance to never rain on their parade!
I've been going to science fiction conventions since my sophomore year in high school. I remember finding the advertisement for WindyCon in the back of my dad's Analog and begging him to take me. Don't ask me who the author guest of honor was at that time, I just remember the individual in a nine foot Masque of the Red Death costume and the feeling that I'd found someplace very magical. However, no matter how many times I go to the cons I've always felt a little bit on the outside. I wasn't an author, no matter how many writing panels I went to or how many rejection letters I collected. I wasn't an artist. I am incapable of drawing my way out of a paper bag. My husband tried to teach me to draw when we were in college. It wasn't the bonding experience he'd hoped for, let's just say. I wasn't a masquerade geek who could sew. When my grandmother gave me a sewing machine, I asked her if it were supposed to be a door stop. She told me not to be an ass.
Even after getting Ribbons of Moonlight published, a feat that had me dancing around the living room for days, I still didn't feel quite part of the con family. I was a watcher--not a participator. They put me on a few panels. I got to talk about YA literature, a topic near and dear to my teacher heart, but as a writer, I still didn't feel as though I belonged. With Prism, I feel more confident. I have DuckCon this weekend and I have to admit that it's a heady feeling to be able to go into a Con, sit on a panel and tell people that my book was on a best seller list its first weekend out. I'm secretly hoping to keep it up until Saturday so I can have those bragging rights too. Particularly, since it seems that at every Con there's someone out there who's willing and ready to rain on your parade. I was so happy at WindyCon. I'd just gotten my cover art for Prism and was on a couple of panels. I was talking to Bill Faecett, Jody Lynn Nye's husband and a writer and editor in his own right. Pretty cool, right? He looked at my cover and told me that putting Book One of The Star Circle Trilogy was going to kill my sales. Unless book 2 was going to be out a matter or weeks or months after book 1. What a downer! Seriously? I was doing my happy dance and here's someone who has throw ice water in my face. Ah well.
It's rather nice to have seen Prism up on the Best Seller List, number 12,000 or so out of all paid Kindle books (considering how many of them that have to be out there.) So, I'm looking forward to DuckCon. I'm also promising to myself and to everyone who ever shows me their happy dance to never rain on their parade!
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