Sales of my novella of been good. The story is about young men in combat during the Vietnam War, and how they live with themselves and each other years later. As I promised, I am donating half of what I collect from sales to organizations that help our veterans.
With a match from my employer, today I’ve been able to donate another $500. Last time I donated $150 to the Wounded Warrior Project. This time I have donated to the Veterans of Foreign Wars Foundation.
I have now donated a total of $650.
Without the match, that is $400 from my book sales. And if I say so myself, that is pretty damn good for a first book priced at $1.49, of which I only get ~$.52 a copy.
For a detailed explanation as to why I’m doing this, read what you can see at the “Look Inside” feature of the book on Amazon.
The reviews have been strong (4.6 “stars” after 37 reviews), and it has made it into the top 10 of four of Amazon’s bestseller lists worldwide (two of which are pretty obscure, I have to admit), and the top 100 of about ten bestseller lists.
Separately, my book has also been #1 out of more than 5,000 titles when you search on “Kindle Store: Vietnam War” for many weeks. It is still in the top 20 on that list a year after I published it.
When you search on “Books: Vietnam War” at Amazon, over 81,000 titles come up. My little book is hanging on in the top 10 of this list as well. 🙂
More importantly: $650. That helps. But let’s not stop here.
You can help me raise more money for veterans organizations by buying and reviewing a copy of Youth In Asia. The review part is especially important. If you buy a copy I’ll continue to pass on about $.26 to an org that helps veterans. But a review of the book can help drive more sales because it will inspire other people to buy a copy and raise even more money.
You can also give a copy as a gift to someone who would enjoy it. When you go to the Amazon sales page, on the right-hand side you’ll see the option to do so as highlighted below. It is easy to do.
This has been a heck of a year in many ways for me and my family, many of which have nothing to do with writing. However, writing and publishing my first novel has been a life-long dream, and extremely scary.
I was terrified that it was not going to be well received. I feared that the story would be ridiculed or the writing would be criticized. Neither happened. In fact, the opposite has been true. I owe my wife and editor and my anonymous reviewers at WWW.CritiqueCircle.COM a huge thank you for all the help getting the story to where it is.
And thank you to everyone who has purchased a copy and reviewed it. The fact that this little story is generating money for veterans in need is also exciting and rewarding because it is important that we give back, and we did that together.
Separately, next week I’ll post a blog about what I learned from a publishing perspective. It has been an amazing education, and I’ve done more than a few things wrong…
