It’s that time again that I look back at the last twelve months and set out goals for the next year.

The year started with the release of the final book in the James Fisher, crime thrillers with a twist series, SHATTERED DESTINY. For fans of the first two books, it was well received and it marked the release of the last book from my back catalogue, bringing to an end a long held target.

I set out the year to write STOPPING POWER Season Two but when I came to work on it I couldn’t quite find the inspiration, instead I concentrated on my new science fiction series, delivering the first book, LOST AMONGST THE STARS mid-year to an amazing reception, and almost completing the second in the series.

The book was well received both online with my existing readers and at my events, helping to plug a gap in the market.

This year I attended 26 events, compared to 25 in 2023, and achieved a 22% increase in overall event profit, despite only attending one more market than last year. The increase was 17% per market, which is a more accurate measure of general performance. Looking back as the sales figures for each book, this increase was driven by adding LOST AMONGST THE STARS to my catalogue.

My writing book continued to sell well at events and FATE’S AMBITION remained the standout best seller.

Due to production issues I wasn’t able to have any dyslexia friendly format books at my events which was a major disappointment, I haven’t even seen the versions of BEFORE THE END, AFTER THE END or BEGINNING OF THE END, but I’m hoping everything will be resolved for the new season which starts in March.

2024 IN NUMBERS

Figure shown units for 2024 (against 2023).

Ebook & Paperback Sales (Online) = 609 (+31)

Free Ebooks = 5,000

Paperback Sales (In Person) = 562 (+96)

Kindle Unlimited Page Reads = 335,960 (+610) (Around 962 books)

Audiobook Sales = 246 (+115)

Paid book sales total = 2,379 (+244)

These figures represent a ten percent increase in sales, which is the same increase I managed last year. I’ve done a decent amount of advertising again this year, with significant growth in the audiobook area and event sales. It’s very interesting to see that my page reads showed very little change from last year.

NEXT YEAR

Events

Next year I’m hoping to attend a county fair / show which has been recommended by another author who can no longer attend them because of his age. They’re three long days in a row. With that three day event I’ll have 26 events planned, matching this year’s attendance.

I have some updates planned for the table dressing, mainly upgrading the signage to make it more professional, and I plan to focus on getting more multi-book purchases, i.e. selling complete series by offering significant discounts, like a fourth book free, or the third book half price. I don’t see it as missing out on the full price as I see if more like capitalising on the sale at the time.

RELEASES

The second book in the LOST AMONGST THE STARS series will definitely be out before the end of next year, probably Q2 at the latest, but I think that will be the only release for the year, and my next release, be it an new series, the third sci-fi, or a new Agent Carrie Harris book, should come in 2026.

I will be restarting advertising in the February and looking again at the audiobooks for the James Fisher series. A couple of weeks ago the narrator dropped out of our deal to produce them on a royalty share, so I’ll be thinking again about who I use and what path I go down. I already have someone else in mind though.

I’m very optimistic about next year and my growing back catalogue and steadily rising income. You never know, I might even make a profit on the year one of these days!