One of the problems of print-on-demand publishing is that you don’t get all the support that comes with a publisher-driven launch. Even though my novel is through the Barnes and Noble Press, I’m still responsible for the initial promotion. That made it more exciting when I got my first customer review on the Barnes and Noble website.
The anonymous reviewer gave my book five stars and described it as “Not a typical storyline pick for me…” This illustrates some of the difficulties I’ve had getting people interested in my novel. It is difficult to put it into a category but still has some nice pieces (so I think). Telling people, “This is different from what you like to read but you should give it a chance,” just doesn’t motivate them.
Because the reviewer was anonymous, I’m not sure how much weight to give it. Was it one of my friends? Was it a relative? On the other hand, a couple of weeks ago I sent out a bunch of gratis copies to the Bishops of the African Methodist Episcopal Church (those in the continental United States) because their church inspired some of the characters in one of the subplots. Could one of these copies have resulted in the review?
Either way, I’m a bit giddy about seeing the review. It’s an awesome thing. Now I just need a few thousand more, preferably accompanied by actual sales.