An Unexpected Gift

And to think I almost ignored it–the promotion, I mean. Amazon Kindle offers a program for authors in which one of the perks is up to five days of free downloads, to be taken all at once, one at a time, or not at all. I wasn’t particularly impressed by the idea. How were people supposed to know it was available, and since Angel is offered at a bargain price anyway, how much difference could it make? But the word on the Indie Author grapevine was that it had worked well for some, so I decided at the last minute to give it a try and set it up just before the opportunity expired. I announced it on Facebook, Twitter and my website, but after that, not really knowing what to expect, all I could do was hand it over to the vast and mysterious world of Amazon and see what happened.

It started after midnight on May 1st and I was quite pleased to see when I woke up that morning that there had been close to one hundred downloads already. But, as Angel might phrase it, my eyes about popped out of my head when I checked in around noon and saw that the number had reached over one thousand! I shouted the news, made calls, posted on FB, and generally made myself ridiculous, then proceeded to get myself hopelessly sucked into watching the number go up– at the rate of a thousand per hour at some points. It was addictive, like some sort of drug–or like giving a long drink of cool water to one who’s traveled across a wide desert. My book was being…well, noticed! Yes it was vain, self absorbed and pure ego-driven obsession, but I have to admit it was hard to pull myself away from the “Kindle: MY REPORTS” screen, me in my five day click-o-mania. Angel quickly climbed to the #1 position on the Top 100 Kindle Free list and stayed there for the duration, but at the height of this frenzy was my day-long seat as #1 in Literary Fiction AND Contemporary Fiction as well! Great FUN! I hope you don’t mind indulging me while I share with you a screen shot of this momentous occasion.

Anyway, it’s a good thing this lasted only five days, since my life was essentially put on hold until that final number was in, which was (drum roll)…69,138! Awesome! Whoever all of these people are, and however you discovered the promotion…I am humbled! And the best news is that in the aftermath, the book has continued to enjoy an exponential increase in actual sales, which means more sustained rankings, more visibility and more people discovering Angel! It is with much awe and gratitude that I can say, today Angel got up to the top 20 in Kindle Literary Fiction and to #28 on Amazon’s Bestselling Literature list-which includes hardbacks and paperbacks as well as ebooks. Who knows how long it will last, but for now, it is what it is. Sometimes a gift just comes out of nowhere, and there’s nothing else to do but just look up and all around you and take a big, deep breath and say THANK YOU!