Category Archives: The Never Prayer

Heavenly Fridays: Angels Are Selling My Book

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The only way I am ever going to make it as a writer is if people who read The Never Prayer and like it tell other people. I am relying on that old marketing standby – word of mouth. That old reliable. Did I ever tell you about old reliable?

Are my Lady and the Tramp allusions lost on you?
I have a friend at work, Susan Poper, who read The Never Prayer back when it was a simple Word document. She adored it and has become the angel who’s pushed my book harder than anyone. When we travel for work together, wherever we go, she’s always telling everyone we meet, “Aaron Ritchey is a published author. His book is out and it’s awesome.” I blush, go slack-jawed, and say, “Yeah, a book, I wrote one. Huh.”

She was just traveling to a client site–that Susan Poper, she’s a road warrior–and she gave the kind folks at the Evansville Airport my books to sell. So in southern Indiana, I have a presence. All because of Susan Poper.

She sent me this picture of my book in front of the Bestseller’s rack. We can only dream. But with Susan Poper out there, working it, talking up my book, I just might make it.

Thank you to Jeanna Costello and Ayse Schablik at the Flying Saucer Cafe and to everyone at EVV!  If you are from southern Indiana, you know that EVV are the call letters for the Evansville Airport.  

A huge thank you also to Susan, and to everyone out there being an angel and getting my book out there. Alone, I can’t do much. Together, we can do anything.

 

Mondays are Hell: Demon Links From Outer Space

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Hello, all you happy people,

Now, normally, you would be regaled with me writing about evil, desire, demons, hardships, nightmares, and general angst.  Oh, angst, why do you torment me so?

But no, not today, because my website has been hijacked by demons links.  I tried to exorcise them, but  I got grossed out by the pea-green soup.  I tried to contain them with my Ghostbusters “Proton Pack” but ended up melting the concrete floor of my garage.  I tried to ax murder the links, like in the movie Frailty but they turned all Bill Paxton on me, Hudson from Aliens, game over, man.  So I gave up.

I am on Ciara Knight’s website today, MY IMAGINATION WANTS TO KILL ME!

And I am on Jean Murray’s Author Open MIC website today, ANATOMY OF A FIRST PAGE – RED PURSES AND ROCKY MOUNTAIN ANGST.  She also interviewed me.

I swear, next week, more demon fun.

Aaron’s Radio Debut – I’m not much but I’m all I think about

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So, Monday, I am being interviewed on Bookmark Radio!  Yeah, Monday, April 30, 2012 at 4 p.m. mountain. I get to talk about me, my book, some more about me, and if you haven’t had enough, a little bit more of me.  Just click on the link above.  It’s an internet radio program, which is awesome!

In a way, given my nature, this is all rather unfortunate.  I mean, I’m naturally self-aborbed.  I know, real freakin’ shocker there.  Yes, I’m a solipsist.  Love that word.  But being self-centered has brought me lots of sorrow.

But in a sense, this is the normal, human condition.   Even the caretaker types have their own brand of self-centeredness.  It’s call co-dependence.  “I don’t want to think about me, so I’ll think about you, but it’s really about me.”

I believe that the natural progression in my life and the lives of the monkeys around me is to move from selfish desire to selfless service.  The older I get, the less I care about my own, stupid drama, and the more interested I am in the stupid drama of others.

But here I am, promoting myself, my book, me.  It can be a hard, lonely thing.

Don’t get me wrong, I am thrilled to be interviewed, at a real radio station, the big leagues, taking internet radio by storm, but still, really, me talking about me?  For an extended amount of time?  At least I’ve had practice.

One thing I’m learning, and believe me, it’s not been an easy lesson, is that The Never Prayer is less about me, and more about the universal power that story has in the lives of the people in the world.  If one person is moved, inspired, shaken by my book, doesn’t that justify the time and effort and energy I spent writing and selling it?

The politically correct answer is yes, yes it does.  I’m not so sure.  If I’m sacrificing time with my children and my wife, if other parts of my life are suffering, if I’m hurting others to write, what is the real good of that one person being affected by my writing?  I don’t know.  I try and juggle it all.  Lord, I do try.

Only time will tell if my work has been worth it.  So we’ll talk about that, good and evil, love and desire, demons and angels, on Monday, April 30, at 4 p.m. mountain.  Let the drama continue!