Saffron and Seaweed and other crazy ideas...really?

If writing quickly and getting another book out in a series in a couple of months is a good thing then I'm doing great! I just completed Saffron and Seaweed, book 2 in the Summer McCloud paranormal series. AND I've got the title and the first chapter of the next book at the end of this one. Marketing is like a bad word now, a bug in my ear that I can't ignore. I don't even want to think about it. When I ask questions in my author groups I hear answers that frazzle my brain cells and make me feel like I'm living on another planet. And then I become utterly discouraged, because, how is it that I'm so far behind?  I know I will never catch up. Is it my age, my idiocy or is everyone living in another reality?

These people use acronyms and other language that I don't know the meaning of, and ask what  I've done about this or that. What? What is it and how do I access it? Is it my imagination or is this too complicated for mere mortals to handle? And yet these people are selling hundreds if not thousands of books a month. I won't even mention the paltry number of book sales I had last month.  I have to admit I'm a failure.

But despite the knowledge that I'm an idiot I keep marching ahead, starting another book and feeling like this one may change everything. I've been doing this since I finished my first trilogy and now I'm working on book eleven. The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting another outcome. Hellooo... I would dearly love to sell hundreds of books, but right now I'm settling for what I can get and trying as hard as I can to find SIMPLE ways to raise sales. I appreciate so much all the help I've been given--if only I understood what they were talking about!! Maybe one of these days I'll figure it out, but until then I'm writing.

The 3rd book in my mystery series is called Black and White and Red all over--catchy title that I have to google to make sure it isn't out there a million times. My first book, The Moonstone, competed with several other books of the same name and it didn't do me much good, but in the scheme of things who really cares? It still doesn't come up first when I google it but at least it's there. And so I'm marching ahead despite poor sales and the feeling that I'll never figure it out. But I have to tell myself that it's the writing I care about. And the writing keeps me going because I absolutely love it! I just hope that readers will find my books and decide they like them and come back for more....

Thanks for reading!