The store-release date for Blood Game is now set at February 4th, and I think that’ll be the pattern going forward. My limited market research suggests early February is a good spot for me to appear — not many other big thriller releases, plus there’s all the post-Christmas gift card usage at online retailers, plus the avid readers who picked up a lot of books over the holidays will have finished some or all of them by then.

So I’m leaning toward three consecutive first-week-of-February releases for the opening trilogy, and we’ll see after that.

I’m starting to get my marketing ducks in a row. It’s exciting watching my book pop up on most of the worldwide Amazon sites and lots of other sites I’ve never even heard of. Available for presale in most places. I have no way of knowing how many pre-orders have been made — probably not many yet. I’m still learning how to acquire that sort of information. Tack that on to my ongoing and evolving list of chores.

I’ve sent out most of the non-family ARCs (advanced reader copies), though some of the family and friend ARCs are delayed due to some holiday printing delays (another reason to release in February). Most of the poker/gambling folks I reached out to responded to me, and most will at least give me a nice blurb-quote for my website or future book jackets. Maybe mention me on their platforms. I may or may not get invited onto a podcast or three. That’s all up in the air for the moment.

All of the autism influencers and experts I’ve written have ignored me, with the exception of one flat rejection from the person’s agent. Honestly, that was expected. There was only one of those I really wanted to talk to anyway, but so far that one has ghosted me. Maybe it’s because the holidays. I’m hoping that’s all it is.

It’s really hard to break in when no one’s heard of you, and no one thinks what you’re doing matters. I’ve never doubted myself for even a second, and it certainly helps that I’m quite well off and don’t need to be financially successful as an author. Takes the pressure off, at least. But I do doubt whether the literature space will ever accept me. I have doubts about whether my message will reach its audience.

In the mean time, all I can do is keep banging away at all the chores — all those little things you have to do to self-publish properly. I’m having a hell of a time getting the USPS mailer software installed in my order pages, which is why the book can’t be purchased pre-sale on my website yet. In the next few days, I may have to rig up something functional but not as good, just to get things going while I continue to wrestle with the post office.

I should also start an LLC for “Eagles Hill Publishing,” my personal imprint. I hear that’s inexpensive and not very difficult, but we’ll see. Aiming for the end of the week to have these things done. The struggle continues.