What a difference a week makes

So, it's been a week since I missed my deadline for uploading Dead at Eighteen to Amazon. Do you want to know what happened? I'll tell you, because I can't keep a secret. First a little back story - I set October 30 as my release date for Dead at Eighteen back in June. I worked tirelessly on it in order to get it ready. I knew that I had until Midnight October 26 to upload the manuscript and cover to Amazon so they could release on the 30th. What I failed to consider were the three little letters following 11:59 pm. They were GMT.

For some reason, I just never took the time to consider what they were or their significance. I knew that Amazon was based in California, but my brain just skipped over the letters every time I got a warning from Amazon not to miss the deadline. I simply didn't pay attention.

I finished the last edit around nine PM Central standard time, here in Kansas, and tried to upload. It wouldn't go. I finally figured out that GMT stood for Greenwich Mean Time and it was then several hours after Midnight in London and I was plain out of luck.

After gnashing my teeth and some frustrated emails, I accepted that all my presales were gone and the connectedness that Amazon built into the sequels of DA16 and DA17 were gone as well. I would have to build the audience back up for Dead at Eighteen. In the last week, I've been able to salvage a part of the momentum I had going into this latest release and even created an e-book box set of the three books for a discounted price. Lesson learned.