March is over. It was a long, strange month, with some ups and down in terms of my writing goals. I never actually set out my goals for the month, so I’m going to detail some things that happened, then give an update on the missed goals from last month.

Most importantly, my new novel Yes or No launched. Doing book launches is new to me, and this one lacked the fanfare of most launches, but I did run a pre-order for about a month beforehand. It came out on March 13 and sales were … better than expected. In the spirit of transparency for this journey, I sold just about 30 copies. The most surprising part of this is that most of those sales are paperbacks and moved through Draft2Digital and their non-Amazon channels.

Yes or No was my first paperback through D2D and I don’t think it looks as good as it could. I’ll be making some updates when the window opens for that. I learned to do better. The process for paperbacks at D2D is pretty easy and I spent a good bit of time uploading almost all my books to D2D for paperback format.

My independent release sales and expected royalties for March are probably higher than they’ve been for any other month. That said, it’s just a little over $60, which is not enough to live on. There has been growth every month since going wide, so I’m hoping the trend continues … and the growth is faster!

On a little side note, audiobook sales have really dried up and I’m not sure why.

I came across Mark Leslie Lefebvre’s book Wide for the Win (affiliate link) through the Facebook group of the same name and am a little more than halfway through it. One of the things I learned right off is that I’m missing out on a major sales channel. So, I’ve made an account with Google Play and have some of my books uploaded there. My account should be approved within a couple of days and, if there are no problems, I’ll be uploading the rest.

Okay, let’s look at those leftover missed goals …

Finish copy editing The War Lord and make a decent cover, then publish it. This is the first novella in my Tarod the Nine-Fingered sword-and-sorcery fantasy series. February edit: I want all four novellas edited this month.

That’s a no. No on the first novella, and no on all the rest. I don’t think I even opened that file in March. Part of the problem is that Tarod is a little shit in the first two novellas. Those are necessary to show his growth, but I don’t like them. But, to spur me toward finishing, how about I reveal the covers for the first four volumes?

After a quick succession of e-book releases, those will be collected into a paperback volume with a sword-and-sorcery fantasy cover.

Record at least one episode of The Werewolf Saga Podcast. (I want to have three recorded before I launch; microphone issues are holding me back.)

Once again, no. However! I did buy a nice new microphone recommended by Thomas Umstadtt Jr. of the Novel Marketing Podcast. I also learned how to create an envelope in Audacity and have created my intro for the first episode. So … progress! Oh, and I started a separate website for the podcast. It’s not ready yet.

Judge my category in the OWFI contest by the deadline.

Success! My old Klingon friend Vickey Malone Kennedy won’t be hunting me down to kill me for being late. You should come to the OWFI conference and hang out with me.

Begin writing Stamped, the fourth book in the First Kiss Romance series.

I didn’t do it. And it’s not likely to happen this month, either. Those Tarod fantasy books are my top priority.

Get my TikTok account up to 500 followers.

This didn’t happen, either. With the talk about TikTok being banned, I’ve slowed down on the platform. I’m not sure it is helping sales, anyway.

Have at least 10 of my titles up on GumRoad (currently there are two).

Yes! I think I’m at 12 titles, plus a couple of merchandise items (a mug and a sticker). The process is still tedious. I’ll get the rest of the books there as soon as I can. I’m considering offering signed paperbacks there, too. Would anybody be interested? I have a few out-of-print editions to sell.

There were three other things there, including finishing my airplane horror story, writing the prequel short story to Sleeper, and learning more about Amazon ads. Neither story is written. I did add a few words to the airplane story, but nothing significant. I’m pretty much done with Amazon ads and am going to focus my attention on other avenues.

The only other notable thing in writing for March was resolving an issue I had with the ending of First Born, the new book in The Werewolf Saga. It isn’t a change in what happens, but with help from my son Alex, we came up with a more plausible explanation for why and how such a thing happens.

Until next time, keep howlin’!