Category Archives: Esposito County Shifters
Consider This a Twofer
High Tide Episode 13: Going For a Ride and Episode 14: Pouring Oil On Troubled Waters are now live on Kindle Vella. Friday’s episode didn’t upload until late so I didn’t post about it last week, sorry about that.
Speaking of contacting people, I sent out a newsletter yesterday thanking folks for buying Crystal Blade and talking about some other projects, and woke up to four people having unsubscribed. Which, believe it or not, is fine—I would much prefer people who actually read my stories and enjoy hearing from me to get my newsletter. Having a huge newsletter audience is pointless if half of them only signed up to get a free book and plan on unsubscribing at some point. I’d much rather build a solid group of readers who actively enjoy my books and want to hear about what’s coming up next, read teasers, get entered into giveaways, etc.
And even though I lost four subscribers yesterday, today more than made up for it with four book purchases, including a print version of Esposito County Shifters: Omnibus Edition. Apparently Mercury is no longer in retrograde and everyone is rejoicing by buying books, hurrah!
Wide Versus KU
I am pondering moving more of my titles from KU only to wide. My KU reads have been steadily going downhill since September 2022 and absolutely nothing I’ve done has helped with that. I’ve tried new Amazon and FB ads, new releases, working social media, using my newsletter, and none of it has helped. I don’t know how much of this has to do with Amazon pushing its Vella platform, but I suspect that, plus the KU strike promoted by Booktok and the fact that Amazon is letting some major writers put their books in KU without being exclusive to Amazon, is having some impact on KU reach and reads.
Problem is, going from KU to wide will result in a temporary shortfall in income until the books start picking up steam, and this can take up to two years (the more backlist you have, the shorter that time period is). I did move the Esposito County Shifters series wide back in March; so far those titles have made more from non-‘Zon platforms than they have from being a non-KU title on Amazon, which gives me some data. I’m still reluctantly to move the series that are still bringing in some KU reads, but I could move the rest of my standalones. Behind the Iron Cross, Degree of Resistance, Stealing Dmitri, and Trickster might do better wide, especially now that Smashwords has combined with Draft2Digital.
Something to think about over a weekend, I guess.
On Monday We Write
And other writing-related chores, which for me means refreshing Amazon ads for Shadow of the Swan and Storm Season (I freely admit that I’ve been using ChatGPT to give me ideas for ad blurbs, which I then heavily tweak to get the result I want) and checking on the FB ad I started on Saturday for Esposito County Shifters: OE. Clicks on that are pretty good and I’m waiting for updates on Smashword’s Daily Sales report to see if there’s any happiness on the sales front.
Some nice people in England also bought a copy of ECS:OE and three of the novellas this morning, so whoever you are thank you for that.
In Crystal Blade news I’ve reached the midpoint of the book where Crystal makes a moderately shocking discovery about her parentage after being banished t0 the hunting lodge where she was born. Needless to say, the Buff Lords are not happy about this and Fallon has been dispatched to keep an eye on her and rescue her if necessday. More importantly, Crystal’s also been set a rather tasty task by the empress to prove her heritage, and it’ll be interesting to see how many people figure out the answer before I reveal it in the book.
I will give one hint here: 3-D printing. Heh, heh…
Relieved That It’s April
That is a March that I am particularly glad to see the back of, if I’m being honest. This month will be filled with getting my car’s registration renewed, continuing my plan to get this house deep cleaned bit by bit, finish Crystal Blade and get that published, and start on To Love a Wild Swan and the Hidden Empire novella (after a nice chat with Ramón I now have a plot).
Yeah, I know, I promised that I would finish the Olympic Cove series this year, and I will. But Hidden Empire is currently my bestselling series so I have to go with the money and add a book to it. I’ll keep picking at High Tide while I’m working on TLaWS and pivot to that once I’m done.
In the meantime I need to update my ads on Amazon because my KU reads are slowing down painfully and launch an FB ad for Esposito County Shifters: OE in the hopes that more people will buy it on non-Zon platforms. I’ve already sold a copy on Apple Books as well as copies of all the novellas and I would very much like to transfer that kind of selling action to B&N/Kobo/Google Play/et al.
Back In the Saddle
Did a respectable chunk of work on Crystal Blade today, which felt good. I’m re-reading the existing chapters to remember where I was going with the story and how the different romances were progressing (juggling one woman and five men is … a challenge. Yes, let’s call it a challenge), and I rediscovered that I’d already fixed a problem with the middle of the book that had been nagging at me. So hey, got that going for me. I’m hoping to have this done by the middle of April and published two weeks after that. Seeing as I released three titles in March, I figure I’ve earned the editing and polishing time.
In other publishing news I’m still noodling over that Hidden Empire novella and I need to set up a Facebook ad for ECS:OE. Since both the omnibus edition and the individual titles are wide I want people to be able to see them outside of Amazon ads, and an FB ad is one of the more affordable ways of doing that. One of these days I will be able to afford a BookBub Featured Title promotion, but that day is not today.
Running the Numbers
Considering that I released two brand new titles this month and an omnibus collection I’m a wee bit disappointed with my sales so far. They’re not horrible, but they’re not as good as I would have expected.
Then again I haven’t really been pounding the promo like I normally do, and for perfectly understandable reasons. I think I need to refresh some of the Shifter Woods: Howl ads in AMS and bump up my posting about Claw and A Theory of Crystal on social media, and I definitely need to add the last two titles to my books on BookBub and get some attention that way.
I’m also musing about the idea of writing a Hidden Empire novella and posting chapters on Vella, since that seems to be a very effective way of getting readers to reliably read my stuff. From what I can see, chapters tend to be about 1500 words or so, which I can knock out and polish in two hours if I have a solid outline. Now I just have to come up with an appropriately novella-length romance story set in Cairo starring Henry and Louisa with guest appearances by Fyodora and Callum, and I should be ready to go.
Not a Lot of Writing Work Today
I’ve basically been focusing on cleaning (it’s how I grieve) and getting the new lantana in to replace the stuff that had been killed by the last freeze. Or at least I’d thought it had been killed until I laboriously levered up one big dry cut back mass and found little leaves growing on the underside as well as one massive tap root. If we have another freeze this winter I’ll cover them up as I usually do, but afterwards I’ll cut back EVERYTHING to the very base and let it stand until the end of March to see if it’s going to grown back. Seriously, those tap roots were humongous.
I’m still mourning J.J. and I probably will for a while, but I’m trying to get things done in the hopes that it will keep my mind off things. So I set up some promo for A Theory of Crystal (the Paladins of Crystal novella that I released yesterday) and did some TikTok videos for that and ECS:OE in the hopes that someone might be interested in reading those (and help me offset the vet bills).
And I didn’t talk about Theory here, did I? Yeah, sorry, brain is still not functioning all that well. It’s a Paladins of Crystal novella that I wrote for the charity antho F*ck the Patriarchy: Getting Smutty for a Cause (and got the rights back this month). It’s the story of smart, rebellious farmgirl Yelena Kozar who doesn’t want to marry the trio of carters picked out for her by her overbearing mama and decides to start a new life by disguising herself as a boy and running off to the capital city of Sideros. In the process she runs into three gorgeous scholars trying to solve one of the biggest mysteries of elemental magic, gets hired as their assistant “Yul,” falls in love with them (and they struggle with their attraction to “Yul”), and hijinks ensue. It’s currently at Amazon and on KU so if you like my Why Choose series and want to read a standalone story while I’m finishing up Crystal Blade, head on over to the ‘Zon and pick Theory up.
Looking Disconsolately at TikTok
I really shouldn’t be surprised. I’ve posted videos about ECS:OE and Shifter Woods: Claw, and they’ve gotten a handful of views. I posted a video of me reacting to the Gen X Flute Call (aka the opening to Peter Gabriel’s “Sledgehammer”) and I’m over a hundred views so far.
This is not unusual, nor is it isolated to me. A lot of romance writers I know have been complaining about how hard it is to get their book posts seen because—ta-da—the TikTok algorithm gives them a low weight. I understand that the clock app is heavily slanted towards content creators who post daily skits or duet with cooking/renovation/building videos, but writers used to get a fairly good slice of the pie. Not any more.
And now we have next week’s testimony of TikTok’s CEO to look forward to, then we find out whether or not TikTok will be banned in the US. That does have a lot of romance writers up in arms because low views or not they do make sales thanks to being on TT and this is going to hurt their bottom line. I know about the security threats associated with the app, but the fact that it allows writers to advertise to a wide audience of younger readers is incredibly valuable. I guess we’ll just have to wait and see.
Whoa
I’ve been under the gun all week what with getting Shifter Woods: Claw and the omnibus out (the cover at right, BTW, is the omnibus cover for Smashwords, Kobo, Apple, Scribd, et al since Smashwords won’t accept a 3D cover), and now that the pressure is off (well, the publishing pressure is off, but now I have to start the marketing push) I kinda want to curl up in a fetal ball and sleep for a couple of days.
Not that I can do that, of course, because Crystal Blade still needs to be finished, not to mention all of the house/bill/cats tasks still ahead of me. I swear to God, I would give my back teeth for a three day cruise. Just sit on a veranda, look at the water, and have someone bring me drinks. That would be heavenly.
But as that won’t be happening any time soon, I’ll accept a nap. Assuming that I can boot the J Crew out of the bedroom, of course.
In related publishing news all of the Shifter Woods titles except for Roar and the omnibus are now wide. I slipped up and used Nicola M. Cameron in Roar so that had to be removed, and as I already said Smashwords wanted a 2D cover for the omnibus. Luckily I already had the print cover ready to go so those titles should be wide soon.
Esposito County Shifters: Omnibus Edition is Live!
Phoo. After a lot of work last night, a lot of uploading today, and a buttload of updating on this here website, I can now announce that Esposito County Shifters: Omnibus Edition is available for sale at Amazon, Google Play, and Smashwords, and once SW gives approval it’ll be sent on to B&N, Apple, Kobo, et al. I’m setting the price for now at $9.99 due to Amazon’s insistence on paying a 35% royalty rate on anything over $9.99, and frankly I’m too damn tired to split it into two for Amazon so that I can price it at $14.99 elsewhere. Never mind—consider it my gift to you.
Of course I still need to make the cover for the print version—the image at right is the ebook mockup, not what it’s going to look like in print—but I think I can knock that out tonight. The print length will be around 564 pages so that’s a nice, hefty book that I feel justified at pricing at $21.99 (possibly more—I need to see what Amazon thinks about that price).
In the meantime, however, I have writing to do this afternoon so I’m going to focus on Crystal Blade and see about getting 3K knocked out on that. Assuming I don’t take a nap over my keyboard—it’s very wet here in the clavicle of Texas at the moment and we’re under a tornado watch with threat of thunderstorms and hail later this evening, and I kinda want to take a lot of painkillers and go back to bed for a couple of hours.
But I have a small business to run, so I shall simply take the painkillers and work on Crystal Blade, tra la.
Nicola Cameron Writes 