An aspiring author who went viral after selling two books at an event described her new Amazon seller charts as “amazing” and “unbelievable”.
Vicky Ball, a 48-year-old man from Colechester, presented two plays, one titled Powerless and the other Abandoned, at the organizers’ event on Tuesday at the Galleywood Heritage Center in Chelmsford.
“2 books sold,” he wrote X afterwards, which he said affirmatively, because: “I made some where I did not sell them.”
Globe’s X post has already had more than 24m views and 745,000 likes. His new powerless, a thriller with “twisted fates”, hit the Amazon charts in the following days – and now there is no 3 in his “teenage and young adult fiction on sexual abuse”.
Speaking about his recent success, he said: “I’m seeing people on Instagram saying: ‘I’m in Colombia and I bought your book’; ‘I’m in the city’; ‘I’m in Belgium.’ It’s really amazing – it’s just incredible.”
Ball, who was at the University Essex and also studying for teachers in creative writing, he said that he was unable to write in the vault of Covid in 2020. He wrote mainly on weekends – because he was then working as a teacher – in the living room, with a laptop on his knees, in the house he shares with his husband and two daughters.
“It’s so helpful to have a purpose and something to keep my mind off the stress and anxiety” of the pandemic, Ball said, noting that writing helps fill a need for the time she craved for connection with friends and family.
Virality has catapulted otherwise hidden authors to public attention in recent years, with posts on platforms such as TikTok and X exercising the power to boost sales and interest. In 2023, struggling YA (young adult) author Shawn Warner top of the Amazon album after the Texas-based TikTok video went viral.
Ball’s advice to other aspiring authors was simple: “Just write!” He doesn’t wait until his stories are perfectly planned before putting words on the page. “I just go with it. It’s like a journey, and I really enjoy the process,” he said. “You never know where it’s going to go.”
He is powerless about his two sisters, one of whom is absent and returning home, leaving his daughter with her drunken mother.
The new ball was published by Burton Mayers Books. Richard Mayers, director of a small publisher in Dundee, said: “He sent me a message saying: ‘I’ve gone viral! I had 25 million views, and I was like, ‘Oh my gosh, this is crazy.’
“Like a lot of index authors, they certainly do these things … and maybe you sell a book or two. So to be pushed to the limit like this is a real positive, “said Mayers. “I say to all the runners, you have to prepare for the slog. The marathon is not a sprint – the message is: keep going.
Ball wrote to thank his supporters later on 10: “I’m amazed and so grateful for all your likes, comments and purchases 🥰.”