Fortune or Glory. What keeps you going?


Welcome back to another blog hop, with #OpenBook. Here’s this week’s prompt.


Even if you knew you would never sell another book, would you keep writing?


The short answer is yes, I would. For one very simple reason.

The concept of selling my novels doesn’t really interest me. I don’t assume that someone would automatically want to buy anything that I produce. Or that I should try and somehow convince them to do so.

At the moment I rarely sell more than ten books a month. That’s not a problem; I’m not in it for the money. I’m really doing it for no other reason than because I can. It’s a hobby; some people play golf or go fishing, I write and self-publish.

Sure, it would be nice to sell books in their thousands, but I suspect I would have to do a considerable amount of hard work to get to that level. Which I’m not really prepared to do. I spent a long time working hard, now I’ve retired I just want to relax.

Even with those low sales, I still get the odd positive review, so what I write must resonate with the people who have read my work, and that’s an incredibly good feeling.


To be honest, at this stage of my life, I’ve become very lazy and lack the motivation to start learning how to market my books. Having never had to sell anything in my working life, it’s all a bit alien to me. I was once asked for a refund on a paperback in a crowded room at a literary event, it soured me towards the whole idea of interaction and selling.

I’m not a big fan of salesmen (women) anyway, I find the whole pushy, buy my book thing annoying and slightly false. As a naturally shy person, who suffers from social phobia, I don’t like others to think that I’m boasting or showing off by shouting from the rooftops when I publish a new book or get a good review, so I tend to keep quiet about it. If someone else reads one of my books and wants to tell everyone, that’s greatly appreciated.

I have tried a bit of Facebook and Amazon advertising (because that’s anonymous), but with little success so far. I very often give my books away.


To return to the question.

The characters seem to want me to tell their story, why else would they flood my brain with their words and images of their lives?

As long as they keep doing that, I’ll keep writing them down.  


Because I’m doing it for myself; as long as the stories are in my head, I will continue to write and publish them, where they go after that is not really important to me.

You never know, perhaps I’ll be really famous when I’m gone. My grandchildren might reap the benefits.


Let me know what you think about this week’s subject.

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Now see what the other blogs in this hop have to say by clicking below.

Check out the other great blogs here.


While you’re here, you might be interested in these Bookfunnel promos. There’s one for September’s new releases, including The Hitman and the Thief,

and another including my Dual-time thriller Life and Other Dreams.

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20 Responses

  1. Jack Eason

    I continually go through the I can’t be bothered to write anymore thing matey. I think we all do. But its too late – we’re hooked. 😉

  2. Stevie Turner

    That’s the way to be, Richard. I can’t be bothered to do too much selling either. I’ve closed down Facebook and Instagram, and only mainly use Twitter, WordPress and Book Funnel now. It’s a hobby, and if anyone buys my books, then it’s a bonus.

    • Richard Dee

      I’m finding new Facebook very frustrating, nothing I want to see is shown any more. My feed is full of adverts and video clips that I have no interest in. All the groups and people I’m used to seeing automatically now need to be sought out.

        • Richard Dee

          The new layout hasn’t done anything to convince me to stay. Maybe I’ll try (again) to learn Twitter?

  3. Stephen Bungay

    Being a narrator I do it because I love getting immersed in the process and bringing the stories to life. The whole audiobook always seems to transcend the sum of the parts, its enjoyment by others makes it all worthwhile.

    • Richard Dee

      Hearing the audio version of what you have written is an incredible feeling. It’s often very different from how you saw and heard it in your head but that just adds another dimension to it.

  4. Phil Huston

    I do it because if I didn’t I’d go crazy, get dementia, or my head would explode. Like music. I don’t make noise occasionally, I go numb.

    • Richard Dee

      Yes, my mind overloads if I don’t keep emptying the images and chatter. And then the voices all go silent and I wonder if they will ever come back.

  5. Debra Purdy Kong

    I understand where you’re coming from. I’ve been writing since my mid-twenties and while it’s been great to get the occasional good review and make some sales, that wasn’t the whole point of being a writer for me. Sales and reviews were a bonus.

    I’m now retired from my day job but rather than use the extra time to promote my work more often, like I thought I would, I’ve discovered that I much prefer to spend the extra time writing and editing. This year, many of the selling events I usually take part in, and did enjoy for the most part, during the Christmas season are cancelled, which allows me to spend more time doing what I love most.

    • Richard Dee

      I can always manage to find a reason to do anything other than marketing. I do miss meeting my writer’s group, events not so much.

    • Richard Dee

      I have some automatic ads running, with little success. Being cross-genre it’s difficult to find relevant keywords that lead to sales.

  6. Amy Miller

    I don’t like the pushy thing, either. I think the web is flooded with Buy Me! I do have some marketing, but I’ve backed off temporarily. I needed a break.

    • Richard Dee

      If you’re not careful, marketing feels like you’re on a hamster wheel with no breaks. It’s good to step back for a bit every now and then.

  7. Roberta Eaton Cheadle

    I am a bit erratic about marketing, Richard. I should do it more and better, everyone says so, but I don’t have time and tend to suddenly remember and go onto twitter or Instagram and send out some posts. I do write posts on my blog and sometimes the posts are about my books, sometimes they are samples of my writing. My books are all along the side bars of my blogs if people are interested in them.

    • Richard Dee

      I have such a small following on social media, I don’t want to just keep repeating the same buy my book message to the same people.

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