Mary Louisa Locke's Monthly Newsletter

March 2024: Some answers and questions.

Dear Reader,

I’m sorry to report that about three weeks ago, my progress working on my science fiction novel came to a screaming halt as I encountered two physical problems. The first was an injury to my right index finger, which has made typing painful. A few days later, I developed a bad infection in my right eye that has hurt my vision in that eye and made concentrating on writing difficult.

I’ve tried overcoming this problem by use of dictation (which is how I am doing this newsletter), but this has not been particularly effective for anything but short bursts of writing. Needless to say, I’ve been frustrated by these events because I am so very, very close to finishing the first draft of this book. However, I am trusting the both of the problems, which are resolving--albeit more slowly than I wish, will be totally resolved by the end of the month.

I am glad to report that my recent discounts of my audiobook editions of the two boxed sets of my Victorian San Francisco Mystery series on Chirp got me lots of new listeners, and I hope that when I run a sale on the most recent novel in the series, Entangled Threads, that people will buy in order to complete their collection. (Sale on Chirp starts March 30, and I will remind you all of it in April’s newsletter.

Meanwhile, I thought you all might enjoy reading Still Life, by P.B. Ryan, an historical mystery set in 19th century New York City, which is Free on Amazon (see cover and description below.)

To help me consider what other kinds of mysteries that are being discounted that I can recommend in future newsletters, it would help if you answered this survey below on the crime fiction subcategories you prefer.

Finally, I thought you might be interested in what the polls that I included in last month’s newsletter revealed about who all of you are. First of all, thanks to the over 200 people who answered the questions. That turnout was simply wonderful.

Not surprisingly, I discovered that 90% of you are female, and over 70% of you are 65 or older. What I hadn’t quite expected was that among the females who answered the questionnaire, there was a little more diversity in ages compared to the men who responded, since 91 % of the men were 65 and over, but only 69% of the women were firmly in this senior bracket. 

I also found it interesting that when I got to the questions about what formats and devices you all use, the percentages were very similar for both the respondents to my daily newsletter polls and to this newsletter, including the fact that only a minority, around a third, of respondents listen to fiction as audiobooks.

There are also similarities between the answers in both my daily and monthly newsletters when people were asked about what devices they primarily use. The largest percentage use a dedicated ereader, followed by around a third of you who use a tablet. The main difference was that while only 15% of the respondents to the daily newsletter use the phone, 20% of you all do so.

The biggest deviation I saw between those of you who responded in this newsletter, and those who responded to my daily newsletter came in the answers to the question about whether or not a person was a fan of only one series or both,

Only 3% of you said you were fans of just my science fiction series, with another 19% fans of both series, leaving 77% of those of you who responded that you were fans of just the historical mystery series.

For my daily newsletter group, 7% were fans of only my science fiction series, but another 32% were fans of both, leaving 57% fans of just the historical mystery series.

I do believe that more of you should give the science-fiction series a try, if you haven’t already done so (smile) because those people who have a tried both often tell me that they find similar things to like about both of series. In some cases, readers have decided they like the science-fiction even better than the mysteries.

However, given that less than a quarter of you are specifically interested in my science fiction, it’s a good thing that once this book latest book is done (and the Caelestis series is complete), I will be devoting the rest of 2024, and probably much of 2025 to working on the mystery series.

Mystery Recommendation:

Boston, 1868: The dawn of the Gilded Age, an era of burgeoning commerce and invention, of unimaginable new fortunes and lavish excess—for some. Born into dismal poverty, young Nell Sweeney scratches by on her wits and little else until fortune blesses her with a position as nursery governess to the fabulously wealthy Hewitts. But she soon learns that ugly secrets lurk beneath the surface of their gold-plated world.

A reminder of my Ebook Perma-free books:

Maids of Misfortune: A Victorian San Francisco Mystery (Book 1) This first book in the series permanently free and you can get it on Kindle and all other Retailers.

Between Mountain and Sea: Caelestis Series (Book 1) This first book in the series permanently free and you can get it on Kindle and all other Retailiers.

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For more information about either my mystery or science fiction series, check out my website. For daily information on my journey as an indie author trying to age gracefully, check out my newsletter, An Aging Author’s Daily Diversions.