Second Time Around

by Colleen Gleason

Today is the release day of my second book.

When my first book was released (January 2), I was very excited, as you can imagine, anticipating that first day of walking into my Borders and seeing the book on the shelf.

It turned out to be a little anti-climactic, however, because I started getting emails from people the day after Christmas, telling me they'd bought my book already! (Not that I minded--of course I was ecstatic!) It was just a little surprising to me that the book was already out there.

This time, I sort of expected Rises the Night (the second volume in my Gardella Vampire Chronicles) to find its way into bookstores before its Official Release Date of June 5. In fact, I was surprised when, more than ten days before the book's release, I saw that a blogger had bought it in Hong Kong! (Granted, they're ahead of us by how many time zones...but not that far ahead.)

Anyway, so I've found it interesting this time around that while I have this excited feeling for today, I've also been less focused on the day because I know the sales have already begun in some places.

I've gone into several bookstores, and most of them still had the books in the back. They brought them out and I signed them, then back in the back they went until today--which is actually what I as an author prefer.

Those first-week sales are really important to authors, and by waiting for the book's "lay-down" date to put it on the shelf, the bookstore does us a big favor...because it's all in the velocity of sales that first week. And if there are sales before the official release date, it can affect the book's numbers.

In my case, as only a second-book author, it probably won't affect the numbers that much, so I'm just delighted to hear that people in Hong Kong, Vancouver, and Texas have already bought the book.

Believe me...that's the thing I'm most thankful for on this day.

Labels: Colleen Gleason, Gardella Vampire Chronicles, Rises the Night

posted by Colleen Gleason @ 7:32 AM