Ugh! Welcome to my list of screw ups, today’s addition is not collecting any money. Yep, all of my PayPal transactions, ever, through my website were cancelled. I never knew this was happening because I get dozens of PayPal emails, and I don’t usually read them. Well, I should have been reading them!! Since I set up e-commerce on my website there was a problem with my PayPal account, and I wasn’t able to collect any sales. They sat there until PayPal cancelled them. I’ve requested that the ARC readers who bought physical copies fix their transactions because they were just cancelled, but I’m not going to send them a bill. I started to write a note to the four people who were so excited they bought the ARC the first day it was available, and thus their transactions are cancelled, but I just couldn’t do that. It doesn’t feel right, it’s my mistake.
I’m having a raffle for all of the ARC readers who posted a review, on Halloween. I just reached out to everyone who signed up as an ARC reader letting them know the raffle is coming up and they need to post their reviews and let me know they did it so they can be entered in the drawing. I’m giving away an Amazon $25 gift card and a Starbucks $10 gift card, plus swag. At the bottom of my message, I let the physical ARC readers know their transactions were cancelled and I gave them an easy way to resolve it. I left it up to them if they want to pay, I don’t want to make any demands on anyone, but it stings knowing how much money I lost. Maybe I can count it as losses on my taxes, it certainly wasn’t sales.
You know, if you follow me long enough on this blog, I’ll probably make every boneheaded mistake possible and come up with some creative ones that you would think are impossible. You should definitely learn from me; I'll teach you everything NOT to do! This feels almost as bad as when I lost my husband’s wedding ring. He’s an electrical contractor so it’s not safe for him to wear a metal ring during work, so he never wore it. When I was pregnant with my son, I hid all of our jewelry in a safe place. Famous last words, right?
Being pregnant with pregnant brain, I forgot I hid them in a boot. When my in-laws decided to have a yard sale I brought them a bunch of items for the sale, including my boots. My pregnant feet weren’t comfortable in them anymore. The morning of the sale, my mother-in-law found my husband’s grandmother dead in her room. It was horrible and we were all there bright and early for the sale. I went into labor that day, he didn’t arrive for three more weeks, I just had contractions every fifteen minutes for three weeks.
We cancelled the yard sale and donated everything to charity. Including my boots which contained not only my husband’s wedding ring, but a diamond white gold ring that belonged to my grandmother, and my mother's high school ring. It haunted me for years. I used to wake up in the middle of the night and think of a new place I might have hidden the jewelry. I would go tearing through the house to see if it was there. But it never was, no, some needy person, got those boots and all of my jewelry, at least that’s what I tell myself to feel better. The first thing my husband ever gave me, gone. This feels the same, but on a much smaller scale, thankfully. I know I won’t wake up searching for the money, lucky me, I know exactly how and where I lost it.
*An update, one person read my email and paid me the money for the ARC so far.
Speaking of lost money, I’m having a banner week! My bank just contacted me, and someone has spent $1500 at Uber Eats using my debit card. I know exactly how it happened too. I’m calling the police as soon as I get all the information from my bank. I ordered a pizza during the hurricane, and I gave my debit card info to the restaurant over the phone. It was an extreme situation, normally I NEVER give my card info to anyone. I use PayPal, Zelle, Venmo, or similar so nobody gets my information. Because I know this is the only time I’ve given my information, I know for a fact it was whomever took my information for that order. I’m assuming they went on a shopping spree through UberEats. I’m hoping it’s on camera at the restaurant what they’re doing, and they get caught. $1500 is a huge amount of money to lose in one day through no fault of my own.
I’m getting super excited for the stuff your kindle events I’m participating in later this year. I continue to see sales of Haunted Hunting Camp that I attribute to my participation in the Horror SYK event in June. I’m pretty happy with the lasting effects of that event. If the faux SYK event I manufactured by paralleling a romance SYK with my own free event, pays off it could be huge. I made almost a thousand “sales” in that event, and I reached #2 on the ghost romantic thriller charts and #31 on the romantic suspense chart, it’s an amazing thing for me. I’m hoping these events go as well. I entered the horror SYK with VioleNt and a note to readers to subscribe to my newsletter for the free copy of Origin of Violet. I’m hoping to cash in on new subscribers, new readers finding my books, and pages read from the free books people pick up on Amazon. I'll keep you posted on the results.
I’m also going to be making dangle bling for cell phones and some bookmarks for my website and the book signing events I’m attending next year. I found the cutest bloody knife, bloody handprints, skulls, and rose beads to make them. They’re going to look great. I’ll let you know when I get some made and have them up on my site.
Vile is coming along. I’m on chapter Twenty-one and I’m definitely enjoying the dual POV of Violet and her new beau, Pierson. My cover designer is hard at work making the cover for it. I want it to have Violet and all three of her guy's vs just her on the other two covers. I have to save up some money to pay for editing. It’s so expensive because I can’t seem to write a short book. But I wouldn’t have it any other way. Violet needs lots of words to tell her tale the way it needs to be told. I can’t believe I started her story thinking it would be a short story!
I hope you all have an exciting weekend planned. I have a tattoo consultation on Saturday and an eye doctor appointment Sunday. My eye doctor is doing makeup appointments from the hurricane, so I have an actual doctor’s appointment on a Sunday. First time in my life I’ve seen a doctor on a Sunday that wasn’t in an emergency room. The tattoo appointment is just an initial consultant visit. I’ve never met this artist or seen their work but they’re in a shop I like, the owner did my husband’s tattoo. I can’t get it until next summer because my incision needs to be completely healed for a year before a tattoo can cover it. Wish me luck that I don’t make them crazy with my thirty pages of images to illustrate what I want.
As always, thanks for reading!
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