How important is praise?

Evening gang,

Been a hell of a week so far.

So, praise. Depends on the individual I suppose. Everyone likes to be told they've done well. Boosts morale, adds value etc, makes you less likely to snap and kill someone.

Today a colleague came into my office. I assumed he was there to talk about work stuff. But no. We went out at Christmas for lunch with a few others. We got talking about my books and he asked me to recommend one for him. He likes crime stuff, but mainly American authors. I suggested The 24 Hour Jazz Café. He bought the paperback.

He came to find me today to say that he's 50 pages from the end and he loves it. Told his wife about me apparently. Said I have an amazing talent and he can't believe I'm still working where I do. This chap has no reason to lie, we only met a few months ago and he's pretty direct as a rule. I write because I love it, because there are so very many stories to tell and because I want others to read those stories. So for someone to say such positive things about something I created means a lot.

In other news, The Trust continues to sell well on the back of the wildly successful free giveaway. It's hovering around the top 50 bestsellers on Amazon UK in proper sales which is superb.

But despite all this, my mind is consumed by the fact that I have one more day at work and then I'm off for a week. Plus Liverpool play Cardiff on Saturday which is a must win, and then it's Sunderland on Wednesday which I'm hoping I might get a ticket for.

Plans for the week off? Bit of work on the new book. Lots of bed, Lots of Tele and Xbox. Season 2 of House of Cards is top of the list on Netflix.

Right, quick gin then bed.

Are you big in Germany?

Evening,

Another quick phone based update. My free giveaway for The Trust is almost over. I'll post a final tally later but it looks like the book will have been downloaded close to 4000 times since Monday. Not bad.

It peaked at number 3 in America. It's been number 1 here in the UK since yesterday and, surprisingly, it is also number 1 in Germany!

Obviously I'm pleased. It has already led to a kick in sales but what I'm after is reviews. If just 1% make the effort that 40 reviews of the book. Fingers crossed and thanks to everyone who grabbed a copy.

Finally, the new paperback version of Ballroom, Bars and Seawater Baths is out now and looks superb. It's about 7 quid to buy in the UK but we'll worth it if you don't do digital.

Night.

Results of the Amazon KDP Free Giveaway

So there we have it. My 48 hour (nearly) free giveaway of my short story - The Storyteller - has ended and I have to say the results surprised me a bit. Based on what I'd read on various forums I expected to shift a few dozen, maybe a hundred. As of an hour ago I had "sold" 556 copies! The majority of these are in America (about 380) with the rest being from the UK apart from 3 in Germany (a real surprise).

It was very satisfying to see the bestseller charts during this period as I was number 1 in my category in the UK and number 2 in the US. Sadly, within an hour of the promo ending I fell back down to 70.

But it's largely positive. I've learned that clearly a lot of folk subscribe to the free Kindle books feed and that most of these people aren't going to risk 86p of their money on a book by an author they don't know. Also, I haven't had any reviews and the promo had zero impact on sales of my full length novel.

I have no clue how to address this for the future, other than to keep doing what I've been doing and hope it picks up. But 556 people now know who I am and own a copy of my work. Two days ago, that wasn't the case so, for that reason if no other, it's been well worth it.