Launch day: from bottom of the pile to bestseller in the mountaineering category

Yesterday was, I'm glad to say, an unqualified success. Even though it was a Sunday and therefore relatively quiet on the social networks, the ball got rolling pretty quickly and an overwhelming number of people spread the word. I'm lucky to have a lot of friends from my time up in Scotland who have been waiting patiently for the book to be released for a long time now, and they did a brilliant job of sharing the link and generating a huge amount of excitement.

Some of you may have realised by now that the book was actually available to download a couple of days before the official launch. This is because any changes you submit to a published book on Amazon take up to 48 hours to take effect, so I needed to give myself the time to check the final product. A few people actually found and downloaded the book before the 21st; this meant that, early on Sunday morning, the book had a bestseller rank of #30,862 and #23 in the mountaineering bestseller list. I decided to go for the #1 spot.

It took twelve hours, but we got there! #1 in the mountaineering bestseller list happened just before 10pm last night. It peaked at #2,230 in the overall bestseller list yesterday, which is a spectacular rise through the ranks and I'm extremely pleased.

Current rank as of 10am on the 22nd

Although this success can be attributed to every single person who posted, shared, or tweeted the book to the world at large, thanks must in particular go to two of my advance readers who made a huge difference. Susan Fletcher was kind enough to read my book and provide a glowing endorsement, and Chris Highcock, having also read an advance copy of my book, provided my first 5* review--in addition to this recommendation for my book on his blog. I'm overwhelmed that real authors actually think my work is worth reading!

It also made me smile this morning to see a friend of mine post the following message on Facebook: "Damn You Alex Roddie. Stayed up so late reading your absolutely brilliant book last night I'm friggin shattered before 11 hours of work."

What happens now? This is, of course, only the beginning. Yesterday's social media whirlwind only just scraped the surface. I have posters and flyers to distribute, magazines and newspapers to contact, review copies to send out, a paperback special edition to design and produce, a launch party to plan ... and two more books to write!

Thank you all again--you've been brilliant and I hope you enjoy the book. For those who missed it yesterday, you can find it here.