CaitlinTureaud

I am now back from my vacation and I have posted Chapter 20, "Keeping the dream alive", of Temporal Exploring 101 - Full Circle.

CaitlinTureaud

Posting chapters of Part 6 of a series is a humbling and potentially demoralizing experience for an author. You watch the number of reads and readers steadily decrease from one part of the series to the next, and Part 6 is pretty far down the line. 
          So why do I keep doing this? There are two reasons.
          Firstly, I love writing Temporal Exploring 101. I like the protagonists a lot and I enjoy spending time in their world. I will continue to do so even if at some point it turns out that I am the only reader left ;)
          Secondly, I believe in that story. I think it is original and great fun to read and that it deserves to be read. At this point, the problem is mainly one of visibility. I am sure there are lots of potential readers out there who have no idea that TE 101 exists and what it is about. This does not mean that I am going to reply or even pay money to one of the agents (many of them bots) who offer their services here. Writing is a hobby for me, and I do not intend to change that.
          What I am going to do is finish writing the TE 101 saga. There will be about two more books in the series, I expect. Then I plan to go over each part to check for consistency and to do rewrites where necessary. After that, I will decide if and how to make TE 101 more visible to readers.

CaitlinTureaud

@designsforthetimes Thank you for your kind support.
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designsforthetimes

@CaitlinTureaud I wish I knew the answer. Do you find more reads when a story is complete? 
            Have you tried different cover designs?
            Not original suggestions I know.
            What I do know is that your stories are great to read and have a strong story, characters and plots. The building of all of those keeps me looking for the next chapter. Thank you for sharing and I hope you get more readers that your story deserves.
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CaitlinTureaud

The good news is that I just finished writing Book Six of Temporal Exploring 101. I loved loved loved writing it! It will have have everything you like  (or as the case may be, everything you dislike) about TE 101. I will start posting chapters at the end of June or at the start of July, after a much needed vacation.

CaitlinTureaud

@anon3761 Thank you. I will start posting real soon now. Perhaps as soon as next week. Stay tuned ;)
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anon3761

@CaitlinTureaud I am looking forward to it!
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CaitlinTureaud

I went to a Bob Dylan Concert last night. Awesome. Natty would have loved it :D Anyway, I will take this experience as a kick in the butt to make  finally sit down and start working seriously  on Book Six of the Temporal Exploring 101 saga.

CaitlinTureaud

@anon3761 Thank you. And yes, I just could not let that opportunity go by.
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anon3761

@CaitlinTureaud, how nice that you had that opportunity. I am looking forward to book six!
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CaitlinTureaud

@designsforthetimes Dylan performed some of his old songs but also new ones. Plenty of inspiration!
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CaitlinTureaud

Logging in and finding that the number of reads on my stories stays exactly the same over months is a frustrating and depressing experience. I submitted Branch Cut for the Wattys, hoping that it might get on the shortlist and perhaps gain more reads that way. Today the shortlist was published and once again, no dice. It is true that I am writing stories mainly for myself, and Wattpad is a great place where to keep them. Still it makes me sad to watch my stories not being read, to the point where it takes away my motivation to continue to write. Idk, perhaps I will go offline for some time and come back if/when I have written a new book.

CaitlinTureaud

@WillFlyForFood I kind of get how they may be afraid of people starting to fight the freaking Culture Wars in the Wattpad forum which would be a disaster indeed. In my experience people who engage in the Culture War (on either side of it) tend to get extremely rude and to adopt a my-side-right-or-wrong attitude that is exactly not conductive to logical thinking ;)  But then, I have not noticed people starting to act like that in the forum before it was terminated. As to the paid stories, I am not a fan of that feature. It used to be a big part of the charm of Wattpad that you could read all the stories for free here. Anyhow, I need to try and  figure out how I can get readers for TE 101. Also, I hope you will continue to post your stories here so I can read them. There are few really good hard science fiction stories to be found here other than yours.
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WillFlyForFood

@CaitlinTureaud There are still lots of stories getting lots of reads...but most are watty-porn
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WillFlyForFood

@CaitlinTureaud On top of that, the Ranking Algorithm was changed such that any new story by a new or established author is now almost "invisible" and not "presented" by the site to readers. It used to be that stories were slotted into the genre hotlist. There were spots for mega-hits, new stories, stories with lots of comments and most of all, stories with CURRENT interest. The Science Fiction Hotlist was essentially static from 2019-just a few months ago. One of mine was ranked about #84-#104 for that whole time event though it got barely any reads!
            
            The VAST majority of "presented" stories are Paid, Creator or Webtoon based. That is why readers are constantly spammed by adverts for things like that "Korean Boy-Band by day, Vampire by Night" series.
            a few seconds ago • Reply
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CaitlinTureaud

Hey guys, I have just submitted Temporal Exploring 101 - Branch Cut to the Wattys 2023! Wish me luck! :-)

CaitlinTureaud

@designsforthetimes Thank you! Mostly, I am hoping that submitting Branch Cut to  the Wattys may draw some additional attention of potential readers to the TE 101 series.
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designsforthetimes

@CaitlinTureaud good luck with that it deserves to do well. Best wishes
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