Sunday, December 11, 2011

A Book of Hope

     My e-book version of I'm Listening With a Broken Ear is having a promotion. It was advertised to Kindle owners and offered free for download to any mobile device/computer/iPod for two days. For some reason, it is still free. I am not sure how long that will last. However, I had forgotten that they would be doing a promotion and just happened to check the website where I can track my book sales. I do that occasionally when I feel like tormenting myself and lowering my self esteem. It was in the morning yesterday.
     "That's odd," I told my husband Arvo, "I have sold a hundred books this morning."
     I then checked an hour later.
     "I have sold 300!" I was becoming famous and I wasn't even dead yet!
    Within the next hour, I had sold almost a thousand. I get no royalties during the promotion, but it didn't matter. My book was flying off the shelves. It had started as something like the 410,000 most popular e-book in it's category. By the end of the day, it soared to #2. Some people wrote to tell me they enjoyed the e-book so much that they were ordering the print version. The print version is currently about the 1 millionth best selling book on Amazon....but you just never know what a little promotion might do. A blizzard starts with one snowflake.
     My son Matt found the promotional site, which I had not even seen, and there were comments, from strangers all over the country. They said things like, "This one looks really good. I've started it and it is so interesting."  Another comment said, "This one looks like a tear jerker. I don't want to read another sad dog story."
     NO! , I wanted to tell her, it is not another sad dog story! In this one the dog overcomes!The dog  is even still alive when the book ends. This is a book of hope! This is the perfect book for Christmas. Similarly,who could have imagined that  the story of a frightened, unmarried teenager who finds herself pregnant and then  travels on a donkey hundreds of miles just before going into labor, and then huddles in a manger as there was no room in the inn to finally birth this seemingly illegitimate child  would end so happily?
Speaker#1:   Happily....? He ends up on the cross.
Speaker#2:   That's not the ending. You are forgetting what happened three days later.
Speaker#1:   Well yes...that part was happy.
Speaker#2:    And then what happens eternally to all who believe.....if that's not happy, I don't know what is!      
     
    My son Matt called late that evening, "Mom, I got a call back on the Federal Reserve internship for this summer."
    It was a day full of hopeful surprises.

Psalm 31: 4
4 Be strong and take heart,
   all you who hope in the LORD.

1 comment:

  1. Vicky, I would love to buy your book. I read the exerpt they had on Amazon and really want to finish the book. Of course, I knew it would be great because I enjoy your blog so much. Anyway, I was wondering if you sell them or do I have to order from Amazon? I kind of wanted an autographed copy (she asks shamelessly!!). Is that possible and if so, can you let me know how much and the shipping costs, etc., please? (I am so glad that Amy told me about you.) Thanks!

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