I recently came upon this article about planting a garden: http://www.almanac.com/content/planting-moons-phase-gardening-calendar
The idea is to plant certain crops during different phases of the moon. I can, without a doubt, say this works. Years ago when I was still a kid living on Lyon Ave in Howard County, my father would plant a small garden. One of the first things he would plant would be onion sets. One morning he looked out his back window and saw every onion set sitting above ground.
In his most Pop-like way, he growled, “Goddamn it. Someone’s dug up every damn onion set.”
Well, each set was up and sitting above ground. No animal or prank-loving neighbor (we didn’t have those back in the 50s) had done it. The onions had done it themselves…at least that’s what an “old” farmer told him. He’d planted the onions when the moon was bright. Onions grow below ground and should be planted at the dark of the moon.
Just how does that relate to stories…er books, the ones you write and want to sell?
Let me begin by saying that I am no expert on the subject. My books sales sit as flat as a river rock. So I’m trying to learn…about marketing, about the times of the day to market (checking my Facebook insights), about to WHOM to market (again with the insights), checking books similar to mine in genre and how their authors are marketing.
Traditional publishing used to say that now was the time to market “the beach reads” – big thrillers, romances, sagas, etc. Then September, then December…the winter months, not so much.
But with the change in publishing, does that hold true?
I don’t think so.
I buy books all the time. Granted, I’m a bibliophile and I also buy books as gifts at certain times of the year.
But do I buy more (and read more) at certain times of the month…of the moon?
That I’ll have to check.
In the meantime I’ll keep plugging away…writing and marketing and blogging and writing and Facebooking and Twittering and writing.
And hope it was at the right time of the moon.
Mitzi Flyte 