Just Keep On Truckin' - Bruce Atchison

Have you ever felt like you were flogging a dead horse, yet you believed that the animal would somehow revive and take you somewhere? That's how I feel about my latest memoir. I know that it's a good book and I gave it my best effort, yet marketing it feels like pushing a rope uphill.

In November of 2012, I finally published How I Was Razed: A Journey from Cultism to Christianity. Four-and-a-half-years of effort went into that testimony of God's providential work in my life. I hoped it would bless the lives of its readers and sell enough copies to show Canada Pension Plan that I wasn't merely lounging around all day. After sending out press releases and promoting my new book on my blogs, I waited for the orders to come in.

My hopes were dashed when the expected flood of orders was more like a few drops. Thanks to a few kind friends, I managed to sell my paperbacks at various meetings and a crafts sale. Even so, the number of books sold was, and still is, patheticly low. Even my e-book version, which various folks assured me was the new wave of publishing, didn't sell very well.

So why am I still whipping this dead horse? I believe that my testimony shows, not tells, the great mercy of the heavenly Father and the diabolical nature of cultic organizations. My hope is that victims of toxic churches will discover and identify with the story of my years devoted to the wrong cause. Perhaps what I wrote about turning painful memories to Christ will give them the tools to undo the damage done to them by cruel misleaders.

I also believe that the Lord placed the burden on my heart to tell my story of being deceived and then deprogrammed by his truth. Far too many new believers lack discipleship and become easy prey for cults. In my case, I wanted the power and advanced knowledge offered by the house church. I had a great hunger for the Word of God but the mainline churches never provided me anything substantial. In fact, it was the cult which provided me insubstantial spiritual food. I know I'm not the only one to whom these false shepherds offered outlandish promises of power and secret knowledge.

I plan to quit actively promoting my latest memoir at the end of this year. Short-story writing has interested me for years but I only dabbled in the genre thus far. Because I've had a love for making up stories since I was a boy, I'll give fiction a whirl and see what happens. No other form of writing has attracted my attention as of this writing so I'll try writing short stories.


Bruce Atchison is a legally-blind freelance writer as well as the author of How I Was Razed, Deliverance from Jericho, and When a Man Loves a Rabbit. He lives in a small Alberta hamlet with his house rabbit, Deborah.

KNOW YOUR READERSHIP by Bruce Atchison

There are only two ways of working effectively, harder or smarter. I learned the hard way that the subjects I thought were interesting are obviously not of interest to others. My three memoirs are an apt example of this.

When a Man Loves a Rabbit: Learning and Living With Bunnies sold well, particularly since it was a debut book. I knew many rabbit owners and having been their friend, they bought a total of  two-hundred-and-fifty copies.

My second memoir, Deliverance from Jericho: Six Years in a Blind School, did poorly. At first, I felt astonished. The fact that most people with perfect sight have no interest in accounts of life in that sort of institution did not occur to me when I wrote my memoir. Neither did I record any sensational stories of abuse in it. Only blind people wanted the book but I lacked the money to have it in an accessible format. As a result, I barely sold fifty print copies.

I assumed my third book would do better. How I Was Razed: A Journey from Cultism to Christianity has been out for less than a year but it also has done poorly. Though I promoted it on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Linked In, only a few copies sold.

I now realize that I should have done research on how well books on the subject of toxic churches sold. My second mistake was to assume that apologetics ministries would jump at the chance to promote my testimony of God's providential leading. Every ministry to which I sent a copy politely said "no" or failed to reply.

Though we writers find it difficult to step back from our creations and see potential pitfalls, it is possible. What we can do, and what I should have done, is enlist friends who we trust to give good suggestions on where would be the best places to plug our books or articles. Of course Googling can be of help but it does consume a lot of time. Writing groups which point the way instead of the finger are also good places for advice.

I certainly have learned my lesson. Like attracts like. My rabbit book sold well because my friends love to read about bunny antics. If I had my blind school memoir in an accessible format, I might have sold more copies to sight-impaired people. I'm now concentrating on  telling cult recovery organizations about my journey to biblical Christianity. Time will tell if I'm successful or not.

Bruce Atchison is a freelance writer and self-published author. His articles have appeared in a wide variety of magazines since the nineties. Atchison's first two books are available at Bruce Atchison's books while his latest memoir is at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Virtual bookworm publishers.