Very occasionally, it occurs to me to look at some of the statistics for my sites. (Well over 10 million hits over the years, and still counting… with about 100,000 per month across my blog, stories site and Tumblr).
What fascinated me when checking yesterday was the number of times my (free) books have been read. I can only get data for the last five weeks, but in that time 140 folks have downloaded “The Punishment List” (a collection of stories), and 167 have accessed the anthology of my best blog entries from the past couple of years.
I’m rather enjoying the thought of copies being furtively read on people’s summer holidays. That cute lass next to you in the hotel, with a smile on her face as she perused that eBook reader? The girl on the flight, having chosen the window seat, angling her laptop away from you so you couldn’t see the screen? The pretty student up the street, home for the long vacation, staying in her bed for a lazy morning with her tablet out and her fingers darting between her legs?
Yeah, the summer’s coming to a close. But I hope I’ve enlivened it for a few people! (And if you fit any of the above categories, or indeed any category at all, do comment or email to let me know!)