Show me the (2011) numbers!

I've seen quite a few self-published author's do posts on their sales numbers and I'm always very interested in reading them.  I always think "Maybe I should do one of those" and then chicken out.  I've just always felt weird putting my numbers out there.  But then I think how helpful I find it, reading those other author's numbers and so I am finally going to do it.

Here are my numbers for 2011.  Keep in mind that these are JUST for Amazon Kindle.  Barnes and Noble's sales reporting is kind of a headache so I'm not including them (and I don't sell a ton on B&N).  And these numbers are the US and UK (though the vast majority of them are from the US).

Branded (been out for almost 2 years now): 23,579

Forsaken (been out for 1 year): 12,729

Vindicated (been out for 55 days): 3,619

Afterlife (been out for 55 days): 1,594

Eden: (been out for 7 months): 5,249

2011 Kindle Grand Total: 46,770

I think my Nook sales were roughly around 5,000, which pushes me over 51,000 digital copies of my books for 2011.

Here's a chart to give you a little idea of what sales did this year (again, just from Kindles):

So as you can see, this was quite a crazy year.  Going from selling almost nothing at the beginning of the year, to about 11,000 in July.  And then a huge, fast fall through the fall.  Thankfully December went well and even though I didn't sell as many books as I did in the summer months, I did make more money because I am charging more for my books.

It's been an interesting experiment to play with pricing.  It always seemed that charging $0.99 was the way to go, and most of the time it is.  But Eden wasn't doing that well priced there, so I decided to raise the price, just to see what would happen.  It actually started selling better.  And honestly I don't know that I would have gotten this whole movie deal if it had stayed priced at $0.99...  The probably wouldn't have looked at it if it had.

So all in all, this has been a FANTASTIC year for me.  I am so grateful for everything that has happened.  I never would have imagined I could make it this well on my own.  I made more than a full-time living doing my absolute dream job.  I just hope 2012 will be just as wonderful.

2011 Year End Report

Wow, what a crazy and amazing year 2011 has been for me!  There have been a ton of high's and I'm happy to say, almost no low's this year.  I wanted to take a minute and reflect on some of the things that happened this year.

January
The year got off to a weird start for me.  Guess this was the one low, when my daughter ended up in the hospital for a week and underwent a month of home health care.  Thankfully everything cleared up and she's been fine ever since.  Soon after that though I finished the first draft of Eden!  Weird to think that happened this year!

February

I did a post on how author's personalities affect my decision to read their work.  I also adopted a new mantra in regards to my writing:

March
I released a new Branded book trailer.  Branded also really started taking off this month in the UK which was wildly exciting!  I also announced the launch of my new graphic design business and its website www.IndieCoverDesigns.com

April
I did a post on where I live, Orcas Island, WA and it's probably the post that's had the most hits on my blog.  I also attended the SCWBI WW conference and had a awesome time!  I did two post on it, here and here.  I also found out some scary info on the technology I created in Eden is evolving NOW.  Yeah, I was a little freaked out, and promptly stopped looking into the real deal stuff.

May
This was a really awesome month!  My sales all the sudden did some major jumping, I was finally starting to make some money!  And I revealed the cover for Eden.  And then it was just time to prep for it's release!

June
I ranted and raved about my love for the Goo Goo Dolls.  I also dove into the first draft of Vindicated!  And then I released Eden on June 8th, a full 13 days earlier than I had announced I would.  I also did a post about my own, true love story.

July
I posted a picture I hashed together, something I made out of boredom, titled "A girl can dream, right?"  Dreams do come true, sometimes.  I also did a post about how writing has become my job.  The best job in the world!  And on the 27th I turned 24!

August
I got the coolest present ever.  I also realized I'd written almost half a million words between all my books.  And I finished the first draft of Vindicated!

September
I made a new book trailer for Eden: 

 
The highlight of that month was probably doing my very first author photoshoot with Jenni Merritt.

October
I revealed Vindicated's cover!  I also read a really awesome book, my favorite of 2011 titled Anna Dressed In Blood.  My son also turned 2!

November

November started off in a majorly exciting way.  I got contacted by KK&P about the movie rights to Eden.  I thought keeping it all a secret until the announcement was made was going to kill me!  I announced that I'd been keeping a(nother) secret from everyone, finally telling everyone about Afterlife!  And then I released it and Vindicated a few days earlier, about 3 weeks ahead of schedule!  And just after Thanksgiving I started the first draft of my new WIP (which I will be doing a title/cover/synopsis reveal of in a few days).  My oldest, my daughter, turned 4!

December
I announced and released the combined version of the entire Fall of Angels trilogy.  The whole movie deal with Eden was announced!  MAJOR excitement there!  And just a few days ago I made a list of my top 5 books of 2011.  And I'm proud to announce that today I finished the first draft of my new WIP!  And oh the editing that needs to be done... lol.  And here we are, New Year's Eve!

So 2011 was a seriously fantastic year!  Far better than I ever could have imagined!  I just hope 2012 will be just as awesome!  Happy New Year's everyone!  Have fun and be safe!

My Top 5 Books of 2011!

We're almost to the end of the year so I'm jumping on the bandwagon and posting my favorite reads of 2011!

5) The Goddess Test by Aimee Carter

It's always been just Kate and her mom—and her mother is dying. Her last wish? To move back to her childhood home. So Kate's going to start at a new school with no friends, no other family and the fear her mother won't live past the fall.


Then she meets Henry. Dark. Tortured. And mesmerizing. He claims to be Hades, god of the Underworld—and if she accepts his bargain, he'll keep her mother alive while Kate tries to pass seven tests.


Kate is sure he's crazy—until she sees him bring a girl back from the dead. Now saving her mother seems crazily possible. If she succeeds, she'll become Henry's future bride, and a goddess.

Amazon

4) Across The Universe by Beth Revis

Seventeen-year-old Amy joins her parents as frozen cargo aboard the vast spaceship Godspeed and expects to awaken on a new planet, three hundred years in the future. Never could she have known that her frozen slumber would come to an end fifty years too soon and that she would be thrust into the brave new world of a spaceship that lives by its own rules.


Amy quickly realizes that her awakening was no mere computer malfunction. Someone - one of the few thousand inhabitants of the spaceship - tried to kill her. And if Amy doesn't do something soon, her parents will be next.


Now, Amy must race to unlock Godspeed's hidden secrets. But out of her list of murder suspects, there's only one who matters: Elder, the future leader of the ship and the love she could never have seen coming.

Amazon

3) Blood Red Road by Moria Young

Saba has spent her whole life in Silverlake, a dried-up wasteland ravaged by constant sandstorms. The Wrecker civilization has long been destroyed, leaving only landfills for Saba and her family to scavenge from. That's fine by her, as long as her beloved twin brother Lugh is around. But when a monster sandstorm arrives, along with four cloaked horsemen, Saba's world is shattered. Lugh is captured, and Saba embarks on an epic quest to get him back.


Suddenly thrown into the lawless, ugly reality of the world outside of desolate Silverlake, Saba is lost without Lugh to guide her. So perhaps the most surprising thing of all is what Saba learns about herself: she's a fierce fighter, an unbeatable survivor, and a cunning opponent. And she has the power to take down a corrupt society from the inside. Teamed up with a handsome daredevil named Jack and a gang of girl revolutionaries called the Free Hawks, Saba stages a showdown that will change the course of her own civilization.

Amazon

2) Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor

Around the world, black handprints are appearing on doorways, scorched there by winged strangers who have crept through a slit in the sky.


In a dark and dusty shop, a devil's supply of human teeth grown dangerously low.


And in the tangled lanes of Prague, a young art student is about to be caught up in a brutal otherwordly war.


Meet Karou. She fills her sketchbooks with monsters that may or may not be real; she's prone to disappearing on mysterious "errands"; she speaks many languages--not all of them human; and her bright blue hair actually grows out of her head that color. Who is she? That is the question that haunts her, and she's about to find out.


When one of the strangers--beautiful, haunted Akiva--fixes his fire-colored eyes on her in an alley in Marrakesh, the result is blood and starlight, secrets unveiled, and a star-crossed love whose roots drink deep of a violent past. But will Karou live to regret learning the truth about herself?

Amazon

And coming in in first place is...

1) Anna Dressed In Blood by Kendare Blake!

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Cas Lowood has inherited an unusual vocation: He kills the dead.


So did his father before him, until his gruesome murder by a ghost he sought to kill. Now, armed with his father's mysterious and deadly athame, Cas travels the country with his kitchen-witch mother and their spirit-sniffing cat. Together they follow legends and local lore, trying to keep up with the murderous dead—keeping pesky things like the future and friends at bay.


When they arrive in a new town in search of a ghost the locals call Anna Dressed in Blood, Cas doesn't expect anything outside of the ordinary: move, hunt, kill. What he finds instead is a girl entangled in curses and rage, a ghost like he's never faced before. She still wears the dress she wore on the day of her brutal murder in 1958: once white, but now stained red and dripping blood. Since her death, Anna has killed any and every person who has dared to step into the deserted Victorian she used to call home.


And she, for whatever reason, spares his life.

Amazon

So there we have it!  2011 brought us a lot of really great reads and I am majorly looking forward to what 2012 will bring us!