Greetings from the wilderness of Alaska. My name is Anna and Sonya has graciously invited me to write up a little something for her blog. First, a little about me. I live what some might consider a homesteader’s life out here in the wilderness of Alaska, and when I say wilderness, I don’t mean out in the country, I really mean wilderness. To get in and out of this place a boat is required during the summer and a snow-machine is required during the winter. A bush plane will work both seasons, but in between, nothing works – there’s no going anywhere.
Living out here has giving me a very eye-opening perspective on the value of things. Since getting things here, it is imperative that we weigh the importance of what we buy carefully. Not that I was one to surround myself with all the comforts of life, but light was always available at the flip of a switch and water was always there when I flushed the toilet. You thought I was going to say ‘turn on the faucet’, well that qualifies too – I can do neither here.
So, what is important to me? What is enough? Over the years I’ve gotten pretty good at shopping for the entire year, and if I don’t get enough of something, well darn, I generally do without whatever that something is.
I don’t buy clothes every day, or every year for that matter, though since I’ve managed to lose fifty pounds last summer, I’m due for some new clothes. I buy food. I buy fuel. If I had school age kids, I might need to get some clothes for them once in a while, but I raised my kids out here and they never ran out of clothes either. Most of the neighbors all had kids too, give or take a few years so hand-me-downs were abundant.
What else do I spend my summer wages on? You’re reading this post so I have electricity (our own generator) and I have internet – the one really incongruous thing about my homesteader lifestyle. That and the phone bill are about the only monthly bills we have.
We got internet because I published a book and needed to do my own advertising. AuthorHouse wasn’t going to do any for me – they made their money from my book, they could move on to the next author looking to self-publish a book. What I can do on the internet isn’t what most author’s can do so living out here has its drawbacks, but I try my best to remind people every day that I do have a book out there. Good news is, I’ll have another one out there early next year, and the great part is, quite a few people are already waiting for the news so they can buy a copy.
The only thing about having a book out there, it’s not a consumable product – it doesn’t go away after it’s read, so an avid reader doesn’t need to buy my book more than once. All I can count on is that they will tell their friends and someone else will buy a copy.
Since I’ve had this nice little connection to the outside world, I’ve kept an eye peeled for tips on how to write better. I’ve also gleaned all the advice about advancing my writing career that I can find. So, thanks to the www, I now have three blogs, when at one time I didn’t have a clue what to do with one.
My first and primary blog is my writing blog, Anna’s Obsession.
Following advice I’ve gleaned from several different sources that said I should be willing to give something away, I started a second blog. I wrote a story that happened to break into very short chapters so I thought it would make a great blog, and it would be free. I post up a chapter a week, and it is purely for my readers’ entertainment. When it’s finished, I plan to publish it as a book. I’m not sure if I will charge for the book then or not. I’ll make my decision when I get that far. I hope you stop by and read it, and I really hope you enjoy it.
And for those of you who might be interested in my private life. I’ve created a third blog where I share many of the funnier stories about my life. Be assured that I welcome questions about my life – they help me decide what my next post will be.
So what is enough for me? Well let’s do the math. I make about $1500 a month for most of four months during the summer, and at this point, I make roughly $2 per book if you buy a new copy from Amazon. Amazon offers my book at a sale price calling them used and maybe they are, I can’t say, but I don’t make any money from those. At this point, I’m just thrilled to get them out there. At any rate, to break even and make it so I don’t have to work summers any more, I need to sell about 3000 books a year. Ah well, maybe someday, when I have a few more books out there. I have a dozen full length novels waiting to be published and a bunch of short stories too. I’m looking for an eBook publisher to help me with those.
You say, use Lulu or CreateSpace or SmashWords. I could, but you see, I need help with advertising and these places won’t do any more for me than AuthorHouse did for $2400.
Nice chatting with you all
Hope to see you in my corner of the world soon
Anna L. Walls