Not sure where I'm going from here.

Okay, so getting pirated during the launch did have an effect on my sales. I don't know if it is what killed the book, but about 50 people downloaded the torrent, rather than buy my book that day. From what happened to my sales at that point, I suspect some of those would have been paid sales.

The circumstances that put the torrent link right below the Amazon link on Google surely did not help matters any.

The entire matter was rather frustrating and demoralizing, to put it bluntly. I am back to looking for consulting work once again. As for the next Portals book, I don't know. The plot is done and the first several chapters are finished, I may finish it up while looking for a contract, just have to see. It won't be edited, it may not even have a cover art piece, those things cost money and those are costs I have to lay out in advance. Maybe I should do a kickstarter to cover the cost of those? I don't know.

I already have a decent idea of how much the next POI book should make, by looking at the trends on sales from each book to the next. It should be enough to make it worthwhile, but it probably won't be enough to support me. Sadly I suck at marketing and promotion. If I was better at it, or knew more about it, I'd probably be able to sell a lot more. Book one in the Portals series really did do fantastic, but each book after that sold a little bit less, which is normal for a series. That's why really long series are very rare, because no matter how many people bought the first book, eventually very few people will keep buying. It's like a half-life.

I had left it open to write a sequel to 'The King of Las Vegas' originally. That will not be happening now, (unless sales inexplicably suddenly go through the roof). While the initial sales were very good, after the unexpected sales drop, it got kicked out of the Amazon promo system and still hasn't recovered. KU sales did continue to grow for a while, and are still good, but KU pays about half of regular royalties (in some countries it pays significantly less than that), and it's regular sales that appear to drive the ranking system, not KU. So I just can not afford to write a sequel. All future Hammer Commission books are on an indefinite hold now.

I have a shrean book that is more than halfway finished, I may finish it, I may not. I don't expect it to sell at all however, so if I do finish it, it won't be edited and it'll get a cheap cover, if any.

As for Portals going forward, I may still try to do some other stories in the universe, because I suspect everyone is getting tired of reading about Will. But it all depends on how the next one sells, if I do finish it. I have to admit to wanting to pull the one shrean book ('Lost Souls') put it out under a different author name, and see if it does any better. You know, dinging a book by an author you like because it isn't part of the series he's writing that you do like, does NOT encourage him to write more of that series. Quite the opposite in fact.

Two things encourage authors to write more of something: Sales, and positive reviews. And Sales is a very large part of that. Writing takes time, it takes a lot of time. I probably have close to a thousand hours in 'The King of Las Vegas', I'd hoped to make five grand over the life of that book, and have it bring in new readers to the Portals series and bring that up more as well. Right now I've made about a hundred dollars off of it (after expenses). Quite a break from expectations isn't it?

But, writing is like that. You don't know what people will like or won't like, I have been both blessed and cursed with the Portals series, blessed in that so many people have liked it. Cursed in that some people think anything I write will be like it, and if it isn't they're upset, or worse yet, they won't even look at something else because they don't like Portals.

The thing about Portals is, it isn't just about the worlds and the mytho's that William goes through. Oh, that's a part of it, a big part of it of course. But the real story is about William himself. When suddenly you've been handed tons of fame and power, what do you do? How does it affect you? How does it change you, and how will you grow as a man? Look at Ginger Baker, and look at Paul McCartney. (If you don't know who they are, go look them up). Both were very famous, both are still some what famous. Both have made millions. Yet one is still a madman, while the other one 'grew up'.

And to be honest, I can't say which of the two has really had a better life. They both took different paths and have gone different ways, and have made their mark on the world very distinctly. There isn't a drummer alive who doesn't know who Ginger Baker is (not if he's any good) but there are a lot of bass players who probably don't know anything about Paul McCartney.

So yeah, I'm a little down, but I'm not quite out. But for the writing thing? Right now I don't know what's going to happen with that. If you want to help, tell people about whichever book of mine was your favorite, and try to get them to read me.

Thanks,
-John