I haven’t been keeping detailed records, but the Real Life Family Event (RLFE) that started two weeks has set a record for longest continuous RLFE. Not only that, but it might actually be picking up steam! What impact did it have on my writing? Speaking of RLFEs, I had another big one crop up — and boy oh boy, did it left a mark! I also started evaluating another possible avenue for marketing, but I have reservations. Just what are they? Let’s look at the key performance indicators first.
Last Week’s Progress By the Numbers
Still no new words. Is that going to change any time soon?
I still haven’t written anything for The Fissure Kings Book 2: Thyone‘s Ascent. Last week, I got past a major hurdle in plotting, and I made progress. But I hit another wall this week. That wall was a power outage that lasted about a day and a half. I spent a ton of time going to get gasoline for my generator, and thank heavens I had it. I didn’t lose a refrigerator and freezer full of food. But man, was it a pain.
It’s amazing how much we’re still like the pioneers when you take our electricity away. And that’s with a generator powering my refrigerator, a fan, and one light!
That cost me at least three days of writing. Plus, the other RLFE is ongoing, so my energy’s at an all-time low. Still, I managed to expand the details surrounding the beginning of Thyone’s Ascent, which gave me a better idea of the trilogy’s overall arc. But it also has backed me into a rhetorical corner regarding Leah Flores. I know what I want her to do, but I’m too realistic to just have her jump right into it.
Huh. Just writing that sentence made me realize I need to drill down into what she does need to do first before fulfilling her eventual role. See? Writing down your thoughts can be helpful!
New Marketing Avenue
I follow the group 20BooksTo50K on Facebook. It’s a great group for writing advice and shop talk. At least in my experience, the signal to noise ratio is pretty good. Recently, a writer there talked about her great experience with a tool called AuthorScale. It’s primary focus is on TikTok marketing, but it’s expanding into other visually-oriented platforms like Instagram and YouTube.
At its heart, AuthorScale is a post scheduling engine. It posts slideshows or short form videos to TikTok in an attempt to generate buzz or awareness. It does so in one of two ways: it can accept content you upload, or it can use its own generative AI image engine based on the writer’s prompts.
This is what a rough draft of one of the slides looks like.
Now, in general, I am against using generative AI anywhere near the writing process. I briefly considered using it to narrate my audiobooks, but decided against it. Generative AI never supports my world building (except when I ask questions like “What would fourteen ten megaton nuclear-tipped missiles detonating at an altitude of one kilometer above San Francisco look from Morgan Hill?”). I don’t use it in plotting at all (not even a little). Nor do I use it for writing. ProWritingAid uses it to perform a grammar check, but I don’t let ProWritingAid make any changes to the manuscript; I review each suggestion myself.
But I can’t market worth crap, and I can’t draw or afford to pay someone to draw for me. So, I’m thinking about using AuthorScale for that The words on the individual slides are directly from my books; but the art will be from AuthorScale’s generative AI.
I haven’t published my first ad yet. The people who use it rave about it. My worry is that generative AI is really divisive, and I don’t want my brand to be associated with it. On the other hand, if I don’t do something with my marketing, I’m not going to reach enough readers for writing to be a viable source of income for my family after I’m dead. Sure, my Amazon ad this month is doing better than ever, but it’s only a few steps in the right direction. I need more.
I’ll let you know what I decide.
Progress Against Last Week’s Goals
Here’s how I did against last week’s goals:
- Continue plotting The Fissure Kings: Tyrone’s Ascent: Ongoing! I’m a little stuck on Leah, but I know what to do next.
- Monitor Summer Foovay’s recording progress for The Sword of Sirius Book 3: Firebreak: Ongoing!
- Engineer one chapter of The Sword of Sirius Book 2: Collapse Zone to ACX’s standards and document the process: Not done! The power outages hit me pretty hard.
- Monitor the performance of the Facebook and Amazon ads: Ongoing! The ads are actually performing better than expected, but not as well as I had hoped.
Goals for the Week in Progress Report 2026 Week 33
Here’s what I hope to accomplish this week:
- Continue plotting The Fissure Kings: Tyrone’s Ascent
- Monitor Summer Foovay’s recording progress for The Sword of Sirius Book 3: Firebreak
- Engineer one chapter of The Sword of Sirius Book 2: Collapse Zone to ACX’s standards and document the process
- Monitor the performance of the Facebook and Amazon ads
- Continue experimenting with AuthorScale
What Do You Think?
Are you against generative AI? Is that opposition absolute, or is it okay for things like marketing? I’d love to hear your opinion in the comments!
