Ye gods, do I hate marketing and everything connected with it.  I want to flip a switch that magically makes everyone who might like my book aware of it, and then never have to think about it again.

Here’s a thing I just did.  This comic showed up on Penny Arcade today.  Then, a few hours later, Gabe followed up on the comic with this post, providing a bit more context and detail.  And when I went and looked at the book’s page on Amazon, there are at least a couple of reviews that mention the sex scenes screwing up the tone of the rest of the book.

(Also, she seems to be doing remarkably well for a debut novel for an indie author– “Blue Bedlam Books” doesn’t appear to actually exist.  I’m sure sales have spiked today even though Gabe didn’t like her book, but those 80-some-odd reviews had to come from somewhere.)

(Also also, you’re just gonna have to click on the links.  It’ll only take a minute to catch up, and you only need to look at the first two.  That’s all the context you get; pbbbbt.)

I saw the strip first thing this morning, and it got me thinking.  And this is a thing I just did:

@cwgabriel (deep breath) I genuinely think you might like my book. Try the free sample out: http://t.co/RaO7bsxiQU No rasping, promise.

— Luther M. Siler (@nfinitefreetime) July 16, 2014

The thing is, I actually do think Gabe would like The Benevolence Archives.  He’s well-known to be a Star Wars fan, he talks about the books a fair amount on the site, and he says right in that post I linked that putting the Millennium Falcon on the cover of your book guarantees a sale.  Well, there’s no space ship on the cover of The Benevolence Archives (dammit!) but I gotta feel like if that sort of thing is appealing than my actual cover is going to get a second look out of you.

And just… blech.  Argh.  I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that that Tweet is gonna get ignored because that’s how Twitter works, and the guy’s got a hundred and fifteen thousand followers so I suspect he gets pretty well inundated in @s and replies and other such nonsense.  But I’m practically hyperventilating over here, like I’m harassing the dude or something.

Ugh.  Haaaaaate promotion.  Hate it.

Tangentially related:  As I’ve spent more and more time fucking around on Twitter lately (and talking to celebrities/more well-known writers than me who have no reason to pay attention to my nonsense) I’ve been downloading lots of sample chapters of books and seeing lots of little Tweet-sized promotions for them.

Holy crap is there a lot of terrible stuff out there.  And the problem is, most of the time, when I come across this stuff, I’m finding it because it’s people who are following me who I’ve followed back, or who follow me back after I follow them, and it just feels mean to rip their shit apart as it so richly deserves.  I may have to start a Tumblr or a second blog or something just to have a place to make fun of terrible indie books, because oh man, some of this stuff.

Then again, somebody’s probably saying that about my book, so… what the hell do I know, right?

(Note:  If I have actually talked to you about your book, I am not talking about you here.  I promise.)

(Second note: want to really fuck with my head?  Buy my book tonight.  I haven’t had a sale in a couple of days and I will go completely nuts wondering if Gabe actually bought the thing or not.)