New episode of A Self-Publishing Author’s Diary Podcast is up. This one is a numbers episode. I’m focusing on numbers a little bit, and the stories behind them. This will most likely be a recurring segment.
Also, you can listen to this podcast on your favorite podcast platform, but I’m also just adding the audio here for ease. The text below isn’t a transcript but a short summary. If you’d like me to provide transcripts in the future, let me know and I’ll try my best.
I’m going back to the archives for this one. The book I’m talking about is A Summer Like No Other. I released it in 2015. It had 23 preorders. And it became one of my most read books.
I released it as a 99-cent novella, and I had a real plan. Cover reveal with Xpresso Book Tours, NetGalley, YouTube videos, a blog series called The Making Of, emails to every reader who had reviewed 123 (my very first book) asking if they’d want to review the new one. I really worked on the craft too — I’d just done Margie Lawson’s Deep Edits packet and I was trying hard to make every chapter ending pull the reader forward.
I got 23 preorders. In the first three months, I made about $200 on A Summer Like No Other in English, and about $300 on Always Second Best. I still make about that amount on Always Second Best every month, 11 years later.
According to PublisherChamp, A Summer Like No Other in English has now been downloaded 66,550 times. 40,279 audiobooks, 24,414 ebooks, 1,360 paperbacks. Best month was May 2024 with 7,930 downloads.
The French versions tell their own story. Un Été Pas Comme Les Autres had 20 preorders. Une Seconde Chance (Always Second Best in French) had 131. Love in B Minor in French had 229. The French version of A Summer Like No Other is now perma free and has been downloaded 48,368 times, and the translation got picked up by a publisher that was part of Hachette — which is how I became a hybrid author. Lifetime royalties on the French version, including the publisher contract, are a little less than €7,000. (I have seen gotten my rights back as per my contract).
My books in Auchan (a French grocery store!) (including close to Jenny Han… well her book :-))
In March 2026, the French version of Always Second Best was my number one most sold book of the month. About ten years after that book came out, and it is consistently one of my most sold books every single month.
So preorders really don’t make or break a book. They didn’t then, and they don’t now. If I get 22 or 25 preorders on a book today, I’m okay with it, because I know what can happen.
I’m also working on a third book with Nick and Em. I have a draft I need to expand over the summer. I haven’t written in their voices in more than a decade, so I’m excited and very nervous.
A few other numbers from this week, because that’s the segment:
- Two days with more than 6,000 words, thanks to dictation. Dictation has never worked for me before. This time it’s actually fun. I tried it on a walk and it thought I said “could be there a couple of course, and I don’t want to tie her back, so I’m just letting her too washing her face and her chemist,” which is definitely not in my Christmas romcom.
- The two YouTube videos that helped me get dictation working: Real Time Dictation Session: Dictate and Edit a Scene With Me by Alyssa in the Books, and Book Dictation for Beginners by The Courtney Project.
- Last week’s newsletter (Elodie Now): 205 subscribers, 48.19% open rate, 0.49% click rate, one unsubscribe.
- Fun fact — more than 50 subscribers across Apple Podcasts and Spotify. I didn’t know that until this week. Thank you to all of you.
The two YouTube videos that helped me with dictation:
- Real Time Dictation Session: Dictate and Edit a Scene With Me — Alyssa in the Books
- Book Dictation for Beginners — The Courtney Project
The Margie Lawson Deep Edits packets:
- Deep Editing, Rhetorical Devices, and More: https://www.margielawson.com/product/deep-editing-rhetorical-devices-and-more/
- Make Endings POP! Deep Editing Style: https://www.margielawson.com/product/make-endings-pop-deep-editing-style/
PublisherChamp:
If you’d like to tell me you’re listening, reading and where from, let me know in the comments. 🙂 And tell, what numbers would you maybe like me to look at closer?
Thanks for reading/listening!
❤
Elodie
Numbers: The Book That Had 23 Preorders and…became my most read book. – A self-published author's diary: The Ups and Downs of Self-Publishing (and everything in-between)
- Numbers: The Book That Had 23 Preorders and…became my most read book.
- This isn't a grand gesture …
- My Self-Pub Weekly Diary: Some Wins, Some Wobbles, and Absolutely Zero Words (on My Manuscripts)
- My F***-It Book: She Had Cancer and Still Gets a Holiday Steamy Rom-Com
- New Release Hiccups, Metadata, Pen Names, and Mild Panic
Elodie Nowodazkij 