Inn Dreams is Live Today

That's right; Inn Dreams is live on Amazon as I type this. Don't ask me why, but pre-orders have grown on me. It's not that they make any difference except for securing advance readers who most likely won't remember to leave a review, but it somehow feels more "special". Slapping a book up on Amazon with no fanfare (if just fanfare for me) is anticlimactic. "Well, I wrote this. Here it is." (Hello? Echo, echo, echo...)

Plus, there are advantages to not pulling the trigger right away. I've found typos in the past, long after publishing, which required me to pull a book down and fix it. With Inn Dreams, I did upload a new manuscript, but only because I wanted to add a review link at the end, and the only way to obtain that link was to first publish the book. I'm constantly amazed by folks, including David Gaughram, who tout the review link premise without mentioning that you've first gotta have a link. I could well be missing something, but I don't know what that could be.

Overall, based on the number of ARCs I've distributed, this book should garner the most reviews I've ever received. That's a scary thought. If they're all like my one Goodreads review, everyone will bemoan the fact that I "gave the villain away too soon". It's galling. It's not as if I didn't throw in not one, but two red herrings. Sure, if I was a reader I would have guessed it, too, but not every novel has a GASP! moment. What's wrong with just enjoying the ride?

I will NOT check for reviews. Well, maybe the one from my newsletter subscriber who wrote and told me she LOVED it. Those kinds of reviews I like. I will be very curious, though, to find out how many reviews I get. Too bad it's almost impossible to scan the number without my eye drifting to the written text. Maybe I just won't search out the number, either.

Soon this chapter will be in the past. Marketing is a soul-crushing beast, but it's the game we're all forced to play. Fortunately, my attention span is short and I quickly move on. I have zero personal connection anymore to my last novella, and this one, too, shall soon slip into the ether.

That's how I prefer it.