Newsletter #98 — Read Project Hail Mary
January 15, 2025
Newsletter #98 — Read Project Hail Mary
Project Hail Mary — Early last year I joined a Facebook group, the Science Fiction Book Club. I did this because I wanted to learn more about science fiction so that I could discuss it at various science fiction conferences. I'm enjoying the experience and learning a lot. Members recommend books to the group, write reviews, make "best" and "worst" lists, and so on.
Over the last month I noticed that several different people enthusiastically recommended Project Hail Mary, by Andy Weir. Although I saw and liked the movie, The Martian (based on a previous novel by Weir), I had never read a book by Weir. So I went to Amazon, read the first page of Project Hail Mary, and after I stopped laughing in delight, I bought the book.
I read it in two days. It will make you laugh and make you cry. I highly recommend it.
Amazon Ads — Last September I started a series of Exit Velocity ads on Amazon. If I recall, I created five different ads, aimed at five different groups of readers: those interested in women fighting back, those interested in science fiction, and so on. I read up on how to create the keywords for such ads and tried to apply them.
My ads for Exit Velocity were not successful. My ads for Guide to Writing the Mystery Novel and also for Charlie Chan's Poppa (created with the same guidelines I used for Exit Velocity) are successful. But both of those books are nonfiction. Fiction is much, much more difficult to sell.
On December 30 I paused all my Exit Velocity ads. I'm going to keep them in Pause mode for a month or more, while I consider whether there's another way to reach readers through Amazon ads. I might pick one of my five categories and concentrate on that one exclusively for several months, to see what I can learn.
What a pain.
Labor Heritage — As part of my January marketing work for Exit Velocity I wrote to the Labor Heritage Foundation to ask about a vendor's booth at the Labor Notes 2026 Conference. I was confused as to which organization (LHF or LN) sponsored the conference, which is held here in Chicago every even-numbered year.
Labor Heritage forwarded my email to the team at Labor Notes, and in addition asked me if I would be willing to be interviewed on the Labor Heritage Power Hour, and possibly other venues. I said yes, of course.
Awards — In January I submitted Exit Velocity for two different literary awards, and that was the end of all my awards submissions, a chore which started in June 2024. Well, it's not quite the end because there is an Illinois-only award I'd like to submit to, but the submission rules state that the books must be sent in April 2025. That, then, will be the very last of filling out award forms, wrapping books, typing shipping labels, and standing in line at the post office.
Setting— My January 15 blog celebrates Windycon, which I attended in November, 2024.