What Books Sell?

As an avid reader, I must say, I don't know about everyone else, but for me (even as a nurse making a fairly comfortable income) I am on a tight budget. Our economy continues to deteriorate despite encouraging words of improvement from our (very depressing) government. So, with that being said, I don't care what others say about $0.99 books not being up-to-par, I love choising from the cheaper section, not only due to the fact that I need to save money but I have actually found alot of good talent in that section. I have purchaced many, many books in the past year and most were only $0.99. Out of all of these books, 80% were readable. Sure, not all of them were as professional as the more expensive brands but on the other hand let me say this: I bought a Dean Koontz book (a new release) and paid about $15 on my e-reader for it. Sitting down on about twenty different occasians, I cannot for the life of me get interested in this book. It is all over the place! I had another similair experience with a new Stephen King book, however, my problem with his book was that I paid $9.99 for it, only to discover it was a short story (and not a good one at that). And before you begin throwing rocks at my head let me add that I am a huge Stephen King and Dean Koontz fan.

Now, getting back to the topic. What books sells? Well, I guess my answer would be that it depends on who is reading what at that particulair moment. When I began writing my book, The Gifted, me and my children (who are avid movie goers) watched many movies (based on novels of course) of teens with magical powers: The Lightning Thief, Harry Potter and so on... I wanted to write a book for my kids with a similair topic in mind. I wanted it to be kid friendly (meaning no cursing or sex scenes) but with enough adult context to attract the attention of a wider audience. So, I sat down and wrote and wrote and wrote, doing exactly what I set out to do. I centered it around the main character, Flower, who lives in an isolated town in rural Alabama. An entire community is suddenly built next to her (which is odd in itself because she lives almost in the middle of the woods) and the children appear with strange glowing eyes. Another Vampire book you ask? Nope, I wanted to be original!  I even tried to keep it realistic. The glowing eyes are due to the discovery of a formula by some government scientists. The formula changes the cell structure in the eyes causing the user's eyes to glow and have a magical power. Sure my book is selling, but at a slow and dreary pace. I guess I just assumed that due to other books in this genre being so popular, that mine would be as well, especially since it is original! Well, we all know what assume stands for right? Making an ass out of u and me, lol.

So, knowing what I love to read (Horror, Romance and anything with Ghosts)! My best guess is that right now, fiction is selling, but only for well know Authors. People read what they are used to reading. Meaning that when I find a good Author, I stick with them. I found a free E-book called The Mating (about werewolves and such) and it really peeked my interest (even though I usually don't read that kind of stuff ) so, I got all of his books in that series (which were also free) but my point is that after reading the first one, I would have bought the other ones even if they were not free. So, maybe us as readers should branch out and give other (not so well known) Authors a chance because like my experience with the above mentioned book, there are so many talented, undiscovered Authors out there! Keep reading...books are our adventures into other worlds!