How My Self-Published Book Made Over $4000 In Its First Month

And how yours can too…maybe

Photo by John Jennings on Unsplash

Let me get the bad news out of the way first. Yes, it was a romance novel.

Before you click the back button out of immediate disinterest (disgust?), let me make it clear that I didn’t choose to write romance because I’m a huge fan of the genre. Romance is not my go-to when picking up fiction novels to read. I chose it because it is the most lucrative fiction genre to write in with a low barrier to entry.

And I wanted to make money.

That said, even writing in one of the most popular genres doesn’t guarantee a 4-figure month after release. I got lucky.

However, as the saying goes, luck is when preparation meets opportunity.

My Preparation: Understanding the Marketplace

My path to creating that first romance novel began when I started writing 5,000–10,000-word erotica shorts as a way to make beer money. I’d just moved to New York and fretted that I’d have to give up my drinking-in-bars habit in the face of drafts that were $7 even during happy hour reduced pricing.

While exploring various side hustles, I came across a user on Reddit in the Financial Independence subreddit. This person mentioned writing erotica as a way to make extra cash. That led me to the erotic authors subreddit, where I learned how easy it was to pump out a few thousand words of smut to make a little bit of side money.

For the next few months, I typed away at my keyboard each night after work. I wrote outlandish tales of sex that were, if not anatomically impossible, were at the very least anatomically uncomfortable. It was outrageously fun, and yes, it paid for the occasional beer or two in an expensive New York City bar.

I got my start with erotic shorts, and it taught me several valuable things.

I learned: the nuts and bolts of publishing on Amazon; how to create a halfway decent cover; how to write a good blurb; all about tropes and niches and subgenres (oh my!); valuable tools of the trade; and most importantly, how to get over my fear of actually hitting the Publish button.