From tlcurtis.blogspot.com

To be honest, I COMPLETELY forgot that I had set up a promo day on Amazon. So, when I got the notice that the promo had begun, I was surprised and excited and terrified.

What if no one reads my work, even when it’s FREE?!?! But I rushed to check my stats on KDP and, sure enough, about 80 people had downloaded ‘Show Her’. At that point, every Christmas morning, birthday party, crush, and moment-before-revealing-fantastic-news were all rolled up into an elatedness that I would love to feel again some time in the near future, and feel lucky to have experienced at all at the age of 25. I wouldn’t have thought that even 10 people would want to see what I had written, so breaking 50 was amazing for me.

Then: the scramble. I post to Facebook, Twitter, SheWrites, DeviantArt, LiveJournal, Google Plus, and LinkedIn letting everyone know that the story is available for free. I check KDP again: 118 downloads. Then, of course, I post to thank everyone for their support.

I carry on with my life as best I can: eating meals, spending time with my fiancé, playing with my pets—intermittently sneaking off to the study to check KDP: 130 downloads…160 downloads…198 downloads…

When I hit 200, the fear really kicks in. These people are going to read this and hate it! They’re going to write scathing reviews that out my unskilled attempt at storytelling and grind my name under the blood-caked heel of public distain. I’m done for!

Then I thought to myself, you know what, there will probably be some truth in those harsh reviews. Maybe your character development is lacking, or maybe your plot is too tangential: but at least you’ll know what they’re thinking. At least you’ll have an idea of what will make your story even better the next time.

The day ended with 230 people having downloaded ‘Show Her’. I think I’m still a little shocked. However, still no reviews. Nothing on my web site, any of my social media pages, or left on the product page itself.

And, at this point, I’ve gone about a week and no one has actually purchased ‘Show Her’.

So, it seemed to be good enough to download for free, but not to buy for 2 bucks.

If that’s the case, what’s my next move? Lower the price? Make it permanently free just to get my work out there?  Was the whole thing just a fluke—people grabbing up any free content they can just because it’s become available, no thought at all given to what the story is actually about, or any plan to follow through with actually reading it? Am I totally overanalyzing this entire situation? Is that not my job as a self-publisher?

*sigh*

Emotionally, a very active week. I just need to think about all this for a little while.

Made some serious progress on the story I’m notebooking. I guess I should give it an actual title at some point.

Thanks to everyone who downloaded ‘Show Her’. I feel really supported and appreciated. Although, I guess, for all I know none of the people reading this actually downloaded it, but thanks anyway for showing your support of my development in some manner or another.

Also, I sketched and uploaded an image of what I thought my main character (of “Show Her”) Erika might look like in the opening scene. WARNING: I AM NOT A VISUAL ARTIST. You can see (and laugh at) it (and pics of my puppy ^_^) on DeviantArt. Thanks again!