I consider my 2011 novel Doria a flop. No sales. No reviews. This is fortunate because it could have benefitted from substantial editing. As for the cover, well, it clearly wasn't done with AI. I'd been meaning to go back and revise it, but I turned my attention to new stories.
Doria convinced me to look for publishers for my future fiction instead of publishing it myself. I concluded it was better to send my fiction through the gauntlet of submission, rejection, and refinement to make sure my best work went out to readers.
I hadn't thought of Doria for years, until I got this comment on the book at AuthorsDen.com.
"It's interesting that you choose this time period and culture/politics to write your stories about. What is the purpose of your writing these types of novels?"
Here's my answer.
Doria began as stories my brother and I made up when we were kids in the early 1970s. It was our way of processing the Vietnam War, Watergate, and other things happening in the news. I also wanted to learn more about Latin America. As native Southern Californians, we were steeped in Hispanic culture, but we knew little about the countries we shared our hemisphere with. (Contrast that everything we know about Europe, which is on the other side of the Atlantic.)
So, I learned enough Spanish to read literature (but not enough to hold a conversation). I took a course on Latin American film at UCLA. And I also learned about what the US has done in the region. Árbenz and Allende. Pinochet, Somoza, and Operation Condor.
Doria was my attempt to combine the adventures we made up as kids with the realities of what happened to that part of the world. With the things I've learned since then and are happening now, there are a lot of changes I would make to that novel. At the same time, Doria has taken on new relevance with its themes of totalitarianism, compassionate leadership, the true effects of revolution, and how history is actually shaped by ordinary people.
However, I realize I can do a better job exploring those themes in new stories, such as the one I'm writing now.
If you're curious, you can learn more on my Doria page. You can also buy the eBook for $2.99, which is now less than a price of a small soft drink at a fast-food place. Who knows? Maybe you'll like it.
Like you, it was 9/11 that encouraged me to write my American Mole Trilogy. The second novel, The Cartel was set in Central America. I consider it one of my best novels, but it hasn't sold well at all, too.
My publisher tells me that it's because only women are reading books written by women. Based on the authors I see featured on national television, Ninty percent of them are women.
I have several books with no reviews and little comment. However, when I give my books away and people actually read them, they tell me they really like what I write. There are just so few readers these days and they tend to read established authors who are cranking out books every month or so with their team of writers. Very hard to compete with.
Your cover does attract attention but I'm not sure it conveys what's inside. A fellow right here in my town of Houston, came by and bought all my books. And then, he offered to publish my latest novel. We both edited the hell out of it, but there are still a few kinks. And it isn't selling very well.
I used AI to come up with the cover images and he put together a cover that is bright but I don't think really conveys what's going on inside either. AI isn't sophisticated enough yet to clearly create images the way we state them. Yesterday, I asked for a fawn and got a deer with horns!
I might suggest that you post all of the chapters of your books here on AD. I got as many as 2000 reads of chapters of my latest novel here. And someone commented on nearly every chapter.
Keep going and learning, there's no such thing as an overnight success.
Ron