This weekend, I sat myself down and took a long, hard look at a number of things. I’ve made no secret about the fact life in the Green household has changed the last few months. Mom’s fall and subsequent hospital stay in the hospital/rehab and her continuing rehab and needs here at home, life has been, well, interesting and challenging. I’m not complaining because I know how lucky we were that I was home when she fell. We were lucky the EMTs were less than a mile away from the house at the time and were here in less than ten minutes after the fall. We were lucky they took us to the hospital we wanted instead of the closest one. And we were lucky because she had the foresight to take out excellent supplemental insurance so we aren’t going to be left bankrupt trying to cover all her medical costs.
The real problem comes with time, specifically time for me to work. Even though Mom is making a remarkable recovery, she is still unable to get around on her own. That means simple things like going to the bathroom, getting dressed, and more require my presence. Another month and she’ll probably be able to do much of that by herself, at least with only minimal supervision on my part. Until then, every hour or so, I am helping her get up, move around to keep from getting too stiff, etc. That is not conducive to work of any kind.
It has really impacted the final work necessary to get Designation: Frejya ready for release. I’ve tried damned hard to do so but I had to admit to myself over the weekend it wasn’t going to get done. So I am pushing the release date back to Feb. 7, 2023. Draft2Digital allows me to do so with the platforms I publish to through them. Amazon, well, Amazon will cut off my ability to offer preorders for a year unless I can convince them to change their minds. But that’s okay. I’d rather lose that ability on a single platform than be forced to put out a product I’m not satisfied with.
So what does this mean? It means the book will still come out, just several months later than planned. It means I will continue to promote it on the D2D platforms and will do a push on Amazon once it goes live. For those who preordered on Amazon, my apologies. You will get notice from the ‘Zon about the cancellation. Keep watching here and on my social media channels for when it goes live.
Now, that doesn’t mean there won’t be a new title between now and February. It simply means for a new series, one that is darker in tone than most of my other work, I’m choosing be to more circumspect in when I release it. I am simply not in the mind space needed for a final edit and PR push for the project.
I hate doing it.
I hope you understand.
But I have always said family comes first and this is a prime example of that belief. Right now, Mom needs me and I’m going to give her all the attention she needs.
Until later.
Featured image created using Midjourney AI.
We’ll be here whenever it comes out. You go worry about your family. We’re patient.
Thanks. That means more than you know.
We’ll wait. Moms are important.
Thanks, Paul. They really are.
Good luck with your mother.
On losing the ability to pre-order, how many books do you expect to release in that time window? The opportunity cost of talking then into letting you put preorders up in that time may be more than the ability is worth.
Thanks.
I have talked with Amazon and got them to remove the ban on preorders. I will still probably do only short term preorders going forward. Amazon is much more restrictive on rescheduling them than the other platforms.
As for how many books. I try for four books a year, give or take.
I had Designation: Frejya (Augment Wars Book 1) on my Amazon wish list and today it’s gone. I saw that you got them to remove the ban but do you know when I can order it? Sorry if I missed that info in an earlier post. Thanks. Love your books.
Thanks for reaching out. If I put it up for pre-order, it will be approximately two weeks before it goes live. So around Jan. 24th. If you use any of the other major platforms, it should already be available for pre-order there. I’m not doing it sooner on Amazon for several reasons. The first is the problem with moving back the date. Amazon limits to only 30 days which, as I found out with this book, isn’t enough. But it will be out in Feb. 2023. That is written in stone, at least metaphorically speaking.
Take care of your mom and yourself. Period. We can wait on your next book. I spent 4 years first driving my mom, then taking over the bookkeeping, then the cooking…all due to the slow slide from dementia to Alzheimer’s. I was fortunate in that she never forgot who I was.
Sadly, Mom Knew Me but sometimes apparently thought of me as my father (her husband).