Following the publication of
Spawn of Kongomato last week I had few days of good sales before inertia crept
in. (Can inertia creep anywhere?) I should have seized, struck and pounced. I should
have capitalised, advertised and continued, but for some inexplicable reason I
couldn’t. The writing was done and the excitement ended.
I suspect that’s what separates me from the real writers –
whatever that means. I do want sales, and indeed achieve a modest number, but
as soon as one novel is finished, it’s over and time to move on. There are
three more first drafts completed and waiting impatiently on my desktop, aided
by that irritating message from Windows incessantly flashing and announcing
that as I have never accessed these shortcuts then I should, for the sake of
humanity, delete them. Swearing at my computer merely produces “That look” from
my bionically endowed wife, the one promising myriad pain should I do it again
in her presence, even though I’m usually in another part of the house, behind
closed doors with Black Sabbath blaring from the speakers.
Incidentally, I also believe the same kind of torment might come
from the mother of the eighteen month old baby next door who always stops
crying every time “Evil Woman” comes
on.
For someone’s benefit, certainly not mine, Amazon have come
up with yet another scheme for ensuring us extra readers, and them extra revenue;
and there are any amount of other sites offering, promising the same thing for
just a little of our hard-earned. Smashwords
has afforded me over three hundred downloads of my novels in the last few weeks
of which seventeen were actually purchased. I try not to dwell on the thought
that my books are so rubbish, no one wants them, telling myself that lots of
people download free parts with the intention of reading them later, but never
do.
So in the spirit of being a “real writer” I’m going to remove
the shortcuts of the three finished and three unfinished novels from my desktop
and actually begin marketing my books. Except that I had a great idea for
another this morning. I’ll just sketch in a few details and then get onto it.
Mind you I’ve just had…
Sigh. Creative inertia. I think many of us suffer from that.
ReplyDeleteI'd be pessimistic if I could be bothered.
ReplyDelete