Honest Data: 4 February 2025

Come sit with me and have a drink while we go over the numbers together. Sure, it’s dawn but that’s always a great time for something nice, yeah?

First, the bad news. My momentum has slowed and I’m going backwards on every objective measure. Optimism may be unwarranted, especially if I can’t turn this around in a week or two.

The good news is that it’s not a single malt I’m drinking on the porch of my old Victorian cottage, but a fresh cup of coffee from my home espresso machine. This is the best time for writing and I’m wasting it on crunching numbers that don’t need it.

As an aside, I’ve been swapping out my usual Italian - and pricey - beans for some cheaper stuff from Aldi. No, I haven’t lost my mind. This is the Luxe blend in their Lazzio brand, the purple bag in this article. It’s a mellow, satisfying blend. Later on, I’ll have some cold brew from my Delter drip machine. Temperatures here in Melbourne have been above 30º recently, sometimes well above, and getting my caffeine with ice cubes in it is an attractive option to my usual.

I’ve been calling this series “Honest Data” and it’s not because I want to demonstrate an unstoppable upward curve but to show that I’m not fudging the figures. Maybe I’m making a virtue out of necessity but realistically if I’m wasting my time It’s best to not kid myself or anyone else.

Honestly, I won’t know for a while. I’ve suspended writing under my name for the time being in favour of building up a pen name for a more focused readership. I’ve got three stories out now, each within a loud shout of seven thousand words, and I need to build up a base, cross-promote them and crank out more of the same. That’s going to take time, and in the meantime I’m refining my promotion game, looking at ways to improve cover image, title, blurb, keywords and so on.

If anyone is keeping track, that’s only $4.66 over last week’s number. What is interesting is that the first books from my new pen name have moved up in the rankings, passing all of my old titles but not yet matching my Good Travel, Bad Sex collection. (That’s an affiliate link, by the way; you want the book alone, just search on Amazon for the title.)

I’ve dropped the price of my collection to $4.99, down from the $9.99 I started with. Yeah, big drop but if it’s not selling, it doesn’t matter what price it is, I’m not earning money from it. I’ll see how it goes at a lower price. Ten bucks is a bit of an ask for an unknown author.

I’ll drill down after the paywall. It’s not hugely exciting - we’re talking a few dollars max, remember! - but there are some interesting trends.

I’ve skimped a little on my writing this week. For one thing, I don’t have a huge amount of spare time, especially over the coming few days, and I’ve been researching writing and promotion topics.

I am making progress on the third story in my new series and that will be on the streets before the next update. It’s fun to write this stuff and it’s coming out regularly, a story a week.