What am I up to?

MONDAY SEPTEMBER 11, 2023 9:56AM

It’s been over three months since the launch of The Dent in the Universe and I couldn’t be happier with its success in finding an audience. It spent most of the summer burbling along just below the threshold of Amazon’s Time Travel Science Fiction Bestsellers list. From time to time it would pop onto the list for a few hours or a day, and that was about the best I could expect from a debut, micro-independent published, weirdo science fiction novel.

But then, in the last week of August, it popped up into the Amazon’s bestsellers list and stayed, and stayed and stayed some more. It sat on that list for three solid weeks without interruption. It peaked at #20 for Time Travel Science Fiction. But it also made it onto the lists for Hard Science Fiction (#29), Time Travel Fiction per se (#33), Technothrillers (#37) and even Humorous Science Fiction (#99).

The word was gobsmacked. I spent those three weeks stoked on the hourly dopamine hit of seeing my book among names that I have cherished all my life. Old names like Asimov, Anderson, and Wells—but also new heroes like Butler, Scalzi, and Crouch.

It streaked like a comet across the firmament and then fell off the list last week. Now it’s back to burbling along just below the threshold. And that’s fine. It’s my first book. Baby steps. 

But while it was up there in the rarified air, it sold enough for me to qualify for entry into the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers Association. That was the goal I set for myself this year. My late father would have loved that I reached that goal. 

“That’ll do, pig. That’ll do”

Be Good

Doc