I just hit the publish button on The Deadly Design. This is the fifth and last (for now) book for my Cozy Series called the Q Mysteries. It’s written under my pen name, Elliot Droit. All this means is that I’m doing editing that last book, and my time is finally free to finish Shadows in the Bloodline.

I’ve made it to the mid-point reversal, which has a shocking twist (or maybe it won’t be completely shocking). I’m now focused on the scenes between the midpoint and the final act. There will be yet another shocking twist at that point.

Other Things…

I’m still thinking about what comes next. Usually, I have a new plan in place before my current book has been completed. This time things are different. Why? Because I’m intentionally leaving my options open. I still don’t have any stats on the Q Mystery series. I ran Ads for a week or two and attracted a reader or two (they read a few KU pages and that was it). That was unusual. Normally, even for a book that fails, I get some readers right off the bat. But there are possible issues I might have to get around. First, there’s the problem of Elliot Droit having only four published books (until the fifth one shows up today). That contributes to people’s reluctance to buy or read a book from that author. Next, there were zero reviews for any of the books. The first book had been published back in November of 2024, so it “appears” that those books have been out there and nobody is interested. That’s an incorrect assumption, but I understand the psychology behind it. Amazon algorithms probably aren’t going to give those books any love either. It considers them to be old.

I managed to get some reviews. Those came from a newsletter special. Basically, I sign up to drive traffic to my first book to get reviews (it’s like an Ad). The newsletter’s deal is that I have to discount the book. It’s priced at 99 cents right now (So go out and grab a Kindle version while it’s cheap!). I’ll give that another week, then I’ll raise the price back up (I’ll probably strike this text so future blog readers don’t get confused), and turn on the Facebook Ads. Then I’ll see what happens.

Results from the Q Mystery series will determine which general direction I will go with future writing. Right now, my Daphne Blazefire series is doing great. Of course, I’ll make an announcement the moment I solidify a plan for future books that I’ll write.

Stay tuned.