Author: photog

Critical Vindication

photog 3 Comments My Fiction, photog's Corner ,

So yesterday “The Sniper” sold over a thousand pages on Kindle Unlimited in one day for the first time (1,014 pages to be exact).  In fact, before this the highest daily total was 688 pages so it beat it by a good large margin.  And in fact, since the promo ran there hasn’t been a day where I haven’t sold pages on Kindle Unlimited and the total for September will exceed August by more than 100% (4,228 for all August versus something more than today’s 8,561).  I consulted Grok about how my progress compared with the average first self-published novel and it told me I was significantly above the average new book.  But it then qualified my success by adding that a mid-lister needs 50,000 to 100,000 pages a month to be taken seriously.  So that means I need to increase my sales by a factor somewhere between 5 and 10.  Well, that AI really knows how to put a budding writer in his place!  But when I showed it the graph of my sales before and after the promo it said that there clearly was a change:

“What stands out is the pattern, not the raw total. Through most of July and August the daily line is choppy with frequent near-zero days and isolated spikes of 300–550 pages. From mid-September onward the baseline rises, the zeros become rarer, and the last few days reach 600–700 pages. That timing lines up with a five-day giveaway of ~3,600 copies. Free promotions rarely convert 1-for-1 into paid or KU reads, but they do push the titles into more “also-bought” and “customers who viewed” recommendations and give Amazon’s algorithm fresh activity to work with. The chart is consistent with a fraction of those new readers later borrowing the books in KU.”

Well, some of that doesn’t make sense to me but without a doubt selling has increased.  I’ve calculated that sale of books (not pages but paperbacks and e-books) increased 59% after the promo.  So even though these sales amounts are objectively minuscule the fact that they’re being driven by the people who participated in the promo and the fallout it caused in Amazon’s “algorithms” is very significant in the way it affects the book’s visibility on the platform.

And just as a reader’s comment recently took most of the wind out of my sails morale-wise, a new comment has restored my faith in human nature (and good taste in literature):

“Lauriea

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent read

Reviewed in the United States on September 27, 2026

Format: Kindle Verified Purchase

“I thoroughly enjoyed “The Sniper”. It followed the main character through his days in the service until his eventual retirement. He had a lot of hard times, but was a good man wanting justice for the murder of his only child. Lots of ups and downs and I wondered often just how this book would play out to my satisfaction. But I needn’t have worried. The author knew exactly what he was doing.””

So, thank you Lauriea wherever and whoever you may be.  Your impeccable ability to recognize and applaud literary greatness is gratefully acknowledged by Jake Barter.

Conventional Activity

photog 6 Comments My Fiction, photog's Corner , ,

As part of my story development, I’ve been thinking about throwing a Constitutional Convention into the plot.  So, I checked my copy of the US Constitution and this is the relevant section:

Article V

The Congress, whenever two thirds of both Houses shall deem it necessary, shall propose Amendments to this Constitution, or, on the Application of the Legislatures of two thirds of the several States, shall call a Convention for proposing Amendments, which, in either Case, shall be valid to all Intents and Purposes, as Part of this Constitution, when ratified by the Legislatures of three fourths of the several States, or by Conventions in three fourths thereof, as the one or the other Mode of Ratification may be proposed by the Congress; Provided that no Amendment which may be made prior to the Year One thousand eight hundred and eight shall in any Manner affect the first and fourth Clauses in the Ninth Section of the first Article; and that no State, without its Consent, shall be deprived of its equal Suffrage in the Senate.

So, 34 states would need to propose the convention.  It’s a little unclear how the convention would be run (none have been called up till now) and no one knows whether its scope would be limited to some fixed agenda ahead of time or not.  Then 38 states would have to ratify the amendments.  Apparently, there has been much speculation in the past about the way votes would be counted and limitations on the scope of such a convention.  But as a plot device it seems singularly fraught with both dramatic opportunities and problems.

Now a careful count of red and blue states made me aware that the red states cannot call a convention on their own never mind ratify its results.  So, this convention will need to be some kind of a bipartisan effort that is seen as a last chance to head off secession by disgruntled red states.

The story telling opportunities I mentioned above probably occur where the various “sides” get to make their points of view known and haggle between each other about what changes would allow both sides to agree to stay inside the same political framework.

One amendment that seemed interesting would be the right of a state to secede from the union.  Recently we witnessed Brexit leading to the UK leaving the EU.  Quebec has twice voted on leaving Canada and other Canadian provinces have also toyed with voting on secession.

Beyond this, there are several other amendments that sound interesting.  But ultimately, I think the convention in the book will be a failure and non-constitutional actions will be necessary to resolve the disagreements between the various factions.  So, this book will be about a national crackup, I think.  But the main question is whether I can make it more than just a little entertaining.  War is not my forte so writing a story with Americans fighting each other sounds very controversial.  Can it be done without alienating enormous swaths of the reading population?  Well, that’s what I have to figure out.