Social Waves

Over the years, I got a lot of "You'll understand when you're older." It's expected between birth and leaving high school. Maybe some more in your twenties and thirties. But I was told that a lot during my forties and fifties. I'm not sure why. Maybe my Coke-bottle glasses hid my lines and the bags under my eyes.

But one thing about turning the big 6-0 next year is I notice the ebbs and flows of our society. Especially when it comes to my chosen professions. For now, we'll stick to the publishing industry.

There were friends who were so excited about getting a trad publishing deal, only to have shit happen around the time of their release. One gal's came out on the second Tuesday of September in 2001. Yep, 9/11. Tons of books, movies, and records that came out at that time were dead on arrival all over the United States.

Another friend's debut novel was supposed to come out on September 16, 2008. She had personal appearances lined up in books stores all over southeast Texas, especially the Houston metro area. Mother nature has other plans. Hurricane Ike made land fall on Galveston and ripped through Houston. Most of her books never made it to stores between flooding, road closures, no power, etc.

People in the business longer than me will be the first to tell you to expect a dip in sales during presidential election years if you publish/sell fiction in the U.S. Citizens pay more attention to politics major election years. That's been especially true over the last four presidential election years, and the obsession has already started for 2024.

Writers also forget about natural disasters. Hurricane Ike hasn't been the only problem. Then there's the man-made disasters like 9/11.

But the big wave writers have ignore is the COVID-19 pandemic. Sales shot up during lockdowns because readers could download ebooks and audiobooks or order paper books for delivery to their doorstep. But the surge wasn't going to be sustainable or permanent. Eventually, the lockdowns would end, and everyone around the world would return to their real lives.

I made my prediction based on the Spanish Influenza pandemic a century ago. It took our great-great-grandparents roughly three years to gain herd immunity from that devastating disease. I figured it would be roughly the same with COVID-19.

Sure enough, all the writers I know and a lot I didn't bitched about the drop in sales in 2023 when things opened again around the world. Folks could travel, not just to see family, but to hug them. Who on earth is going to read when they haven't been able hug someone they love.

So, the 2023 travel surge led straight into the current obsession over the 2024 presidential election. I don't expect a major uptick in my sales this year, so I'm using 2024 for experimentation with both writing and new sales outlets. If I fail at either, well, no one's really paying attention right now.

Goddess, I miss the days when Johnny Carson joked about President Ford's clumsiness.