Marketing The Book of Answers

a progress report

(The image above is clipped from the most recent newsletter of Crime Writers of Canada. It’s an organization for professional authors that is very encouraging of new writers. They are quite happy to share the news of recent successes of their members!)

I started this Substack as an experiment with this “newish” model. I’ve had a blog for years, and it has a bit of a following, but I wanted to see what could happen if I created something new, that focussed on my interest in mystery fiction. I also wanted to see if there might be people who wanted to read my novel, outside the circle of family and friends.

The response to this Substack encouraged me to create a publishing imprint and prepare the manuscript to be distributed as an e-book, and then as an actual, hold it in your hands “real book”.

I was surprised to discover a strong majority of people who want to read my book would rather have the paperback than the virtual version.

When a colleague recommended my mystery to the book club at his church, and suggested a local bookstore that might be willing to distribute it, that set me down the path of dropping in to local bookshops with my book in hand. I now have consignment deals with 4 independent stores.

The book club idea has also grown. I’ve been invited to sit in with two different online groups to talk about The Book of Answers, and that has led to a bump in international sales.

I’ve been contacted by ministers who want to host me for a reading event, or have me Zoom in on a book club discussion of my novel.

My approach with churches who invite me for an event is to give them 25% of the proceeds from all sales.

Perhaps the best thing I’ve learned to do, is to share the “wealth”. Each month I choose a church, or a ministry that I value, and donate half the royalties to support their good work. From June to August I was able to donate over $600.00.

There are benefits beyond the obvious one of supporting a good cause.

I find it easier to “self-promote” when I am also helping others.

I’ve also found that those connected to the cause are happy to share my posts, and tell people about the book.

It also gives me more of a “story” to tell when I get interviewed:

https://www.essexfreepress.com/post/harrow-pastor-pens-mystery-novel-that-is-getting-some-recognition

Yes, I know the photo makes it look like a cloud of crosses is billowing out of my head. Even so, I am grateful for the opportunities I’ve had to talk about the book.

As of this afternoon, I can report having sold a total of 344 copies of my first novel. I find this significant. According to a 2018 article in the Winnipeg Free Press:

“For books published by Canadian-owned publishers, the average Canadian-written trade book sold 343 copies in its first year of publication in 2017.”

That’s an old article, but I’ve also heard anecdotally that self-published authors (like me) can expect to sell an average of 50 copies of a single title.

I feel pretty good about how the book is doing.

It’s available on Amazon at:

https://a.co/d/bocRLjc

It’s also now on KOBO:

https://www.kobo.com/ca/en/ebook/the-book-of-answers-11