As of 11:15 a.m. CDT, The Scent and Other Stories is #94 on Amazon’s list of free Best Sellers in Mystery, Thriller & Suspense Literary Fiction.
I am happy to see that people have an interest in it. I am looking forward to seeing the results of today’s giveaway after the numbers come in, which should be tomorrow morning, taking into account other time zones.
I have to ask myself if the new cover has anything to do with people’s interest in it. Looking at the diagram of today’s 100 best sellers in this category, the new cover makes it stand out from all the others. With a photograph of a young lady looking directly at the viewer on the cover, the book may have a subtle psychological effect on viewers, because the human mind has evolved to be attentive to faces and to remember intricate details in them. Her eyes are also big and open, which is characteristic of people who like or love someone they see. This may have an additional psychological impact, because the viewer finds himself/herself suddenly looking into the face of someone who likes him/her.
When I design covers in the future, I will try to orient them toward a photo of someone attractive who looks directly at the viewer and whose gaze says, “I like you.” I suspect people will tend to naturally remember this cover more versus covers of people looking away or not of a person.
I am considering putting out another edition of The Scent… just to change the title to make it pop up more often in search results. The primary place people search for keywords is in the title of a work. Ergo, critical keywords should be placed in the title. These should be keywords that reflect the intrinsic nature of the work. For The Scent… I am considering modifying the subtitle and swapping it out for the current title resulting in Stories from the Dark Side of Love: The Scent and Other Short Fiction. I will need to work on the subtitle more, but that’s an initial draft at least.
Let me know what you think.
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Hasta luego.
Phil Slattery, Writer, Publisher 