Remember last week how I said I was going to try starting to write on Mondays? About that — can you guess which day a piece of my critical equipment decided to fail? Also, I conducted an analysis of read-through rates on Evolution’s Hand. That gave me good news and bad news. But before we talk about that, let’s look at the numbers.
Last Week’s Progress By the Numbers
I was happy to see I wrote more than 10,000 words this week! At least that went well.
I had hoped to push close to 13,000 or so words this week by writing this Progress Post Sunday night and keeping Monday night free to work on The Sword of Sirius Book 3: Firebreak. However, I encountered a Real Life Family Event (RLFE) that ate most of my evening. Then the UPS powering my Apple Studio decided it was a good time to die. I could have worked around it, but instead, I made a trip to the local Staples. After the RLFE and after installing the new UPS, I was done for the day.
And that was after a full day of work.
But the new UPS is happy and silently doing its thing. The Sword of Sirius Book 3: Firebreak is still humming along. The characters continue to make decisions that positively affect the plot. This week, it was Jackson Scott’s turn. I think he might have gotten a big head because the beta readers liked his character in the short story Fallback Position. I’m going to use that as a lead magnet. It’s in the hands of my proofreader now.
Read-through Rates for Evolution’s Hand
Marketing a book is hard. Marketing six books isn’t much harder, at least in terms of how I’m doing it. I just market the first book and hope the reader likes it enough to buy the next in the series. I also announce each new release in my newsletter, but, well, I haven’t been able to grow it very much, so it’s not an effective tool yet.
How’s that plan working out for me? Let’s set the context first. The website Kindlepreneur suggests that a read-through over 50% when the series is over three books (and Evolution’s Hand is six books long) is pretty good.
The bad news? Read-through from Executive Action to Drying Breath is a dismal 9.6%. That might mean the book sucks, but it’s gotten good ratings. So, pretending I can convince myself the book doesn’t suck, I might conclude that I’m marketing it to the wrong audience.
Why do I say that? Because the read-through rate for Dying Break to Primary Target is 68%. Primary Target to Blind Exodus is 50%. And Blind Exodus to Split Infinities is 64%. It’s still too early to draw any conclusions from Unnatural Crypsis.
People who get to the second book are likely to keep going. That’s actually not bad news at all. Now, if I can just figure out how to market to the people who will like it!
Progress against Last Week’s Goals
Here’s how I did against last week’s goals:
- Finish Owen Payne’s Pinch 1 Part IV: Done!
- Finish Luisa Brunner’s Midpoint: Done! It turned out to be two chapters.
- Finish the helper plot’s chapter, “Unseen Eyes”: Done!
- Start Payne’s Midpoint (as I said last week, this’ll probably grow; looks like Payne’s the main POV in this book!): Not done! I didn’t know Payne’s Pinch 1 would have 5 parts! So I have one more chapter of his to write. However, I also finished Ira Malhotra’s Pinch 2 Part I!
- Receive the final beta feedback on The Sword of Sirius Short Story: Fallback Position: Done! That short story, which will become a lead magnet, is now in the hands of my proofreader.
Goals for the Week in Progress Report 2024 Week 20
Here’s what I hope to accomplish this week:
- Finish Owen Payne’s Pinch 1 Part V
- Finish Luisa Brunner’s Midpoint Part III
- Finish Owen Payne’s Midpoint
- Finish Owen Payne’s Pinch 2
- Finish the Helper Plot’s “Ungrateful Receiver” (stretch objective)
What Do You Think?
How you written very many series? Do you favor short series or longer series? Do you do anything special to encourage read-through? I’d love to head your opinion in the comments!
