Remember the teeter-totter in the school playground? Do they still have those? I mean, it’s been at least 20 or 30 years since I left grade school. Okay, maybe a few more; I don’t count the years anymore, since I’m not good at advanced mathematics.
As a kindergartner in Muskegon, Mich., and an elementary pupil (yes, pupil; you’re not a student till at least high school) in schools around Des Moines, Iowa, I loved playing on the up-and-down board with a playmate on the other end. The more adventurous of us would compete to see who could propel the other highest off hiser (my gender-neutral pronoun) seat by crashing the board onto the ground on the down phase. Amazingly, I don’t recall any of us hurtling off the board and breaking our necks.
So where I am I going with this?
The activity of my book MURDER IN PALM BEACH: The Homicide That Never Died on Amazon, in the Kindle format, in the last 10 days has reminded me of the teeter-totter. I don’t know the derivation of the word Amazon, but it must have something to do with amazing. That’s been my thought every time I’ve viewed the rankings of MURDER on Kindle over the last several days.
Book rankings on Amazon go up and down, depending on vagaries known only to the Amazon algorithm experts. Last Wednesday, my Kindle book, which had been on a downward path, was at 453,000. I checked the next day, and it was at 50,000 and change. Incredible, I thought.
Next day it was around 32,000, and was No. 1 in the Civil Law Procedure category. And get this: It was an Amazon Best Seller.
I couldn’t believe it. I knew that the criterion for best seller status was a No. 1 ranking for one hour. Well, this is the 10th day it’s been at No. 1. Even more amazing, yesterday it was 3,700 and change Paid in the Kindle Store. That’s compared to 453,000 only days before. A Kindle Select Publishing agent told me not long ago that there were 10 million Kindle, or eBooks, on Amazon, and 40 million print books. Both the Criminal Law Procedures and Criminology categories were at No. 3.
What the heck is going on? I wondered. Then it hit me: I had less than two weeks previously hired a marketing firm to help with Search Engine Optimization for my website, www.bobbrinkwriter.com. They must have gotten to work right away and garnered a lot of attention for the book on my site. They’re going to design an entirely new site.
Meanwhile, I will wallow in the luxurious feeling of being an Amazon Best Seller, and watch with much anticipation to see how long it remains in that heady atmosphere before the downward phase of the teeter-totter kicks in, and some guy or gal on the other end is rocketed to the top spot. May hesh (he or she) revel in the intoxication of it – and may my bottom not be too bruised by the crash. Hey, maybe I’ll just hang around in teeter-totter purgatory for awhile.
