Monthly Recap: February 2026

TRANSPARENCYMONTHLY RECAP

3/1/20266 min read

Well. On paper, I ain't doing so hot. And since that paper I guess would be bank paper, that ain't good. But it's slighly deceptive, and I'm gonna explain why, and how this will be moving forward.

First lets talk income: it was fine. Online sales were down, but I can see that I sold 3 book on Ingram, which is a marked uptick from the month before where I sold 1. Maybe a fluke. Maybe this becomes something. Who knows. I did my rounds on places I have my books on consignment, and that brought in 60 bucks, which is nice.  Also, Patreon keeps ticking up (what are you waiting on if you haven't yet! There's lots of cool stuff there!), which makes me super happy.

Expenses though, that killed me. The big expense is Momocon. 1,700 bucks of my expenses go to that booth. But, here's the thing: I'm going to get at least half of that money back. Ben Meeks and I are splitting the booth. But, he hasn't paid me yet (which is as intended, he's not a deadbeat lol). So when he pays me, I will add that money back in, reducing my overall annual expenses on here. That make sense? I hope so, because that's what I plan to do from here on. 

So yeah. If not for that booth fee, I'd almost be back into the black for the year. As it is, I'm way in the red. But, that's the gamble. Big expenses on occasion, to hopefully get a big chunk of income. 

Fingers crossed. 

Income (Book Sales):

Total: $392.55

Income (Other):

Total: $59.97

Income (BBI):

Total: $60.00

Expenses:

  • Jordancon Booth: $35.00

  • Momocon Booth: $1,700.65

  • Inkarnate: $79.99

  • Schedchie: $9.53

  • January Taxes: $59.28

  • January Taxes: $88.92

Total: $1,973.37

Monthly total made:

  • Income: $512.52 ($2,235.82 last month)

  • Expenses: $1,973.37 ($2,608.02 last month)

  • Net Income: -$1,460.85

Yearly Gross Total Made:

  • $2,748.34

Yearly Net Total Made:

  • -$1,833.05

If you would like to leave a comment on this blog, a version of it has been posted on my Patreon and my Subreddit.

So as I've already said, I haven't really started doing some of the strategizing, planning, and executing that I want to do in this space yet. It's on the to do list, but I need like, two more hours a week basically. That aside, two developments:

1. My facebook page has been dropping a couple of folks a month since November. I peaked at 1074, and am now at 1069 (nice), which is odd. Looking back historically, I have never actually had a month where I ended up with a net loss of facebook followers, except for October 2021 where I was down 1 for that month, and a few months in spring of 2022 where I had a similar drop to what's happening now. April 2022 was the last time I had a net loss. Anecdotally, I am getting more and more sick of Facebook, and I know a lot of people are. So what I wonder is, is this a fluke? Or the canary in the coalmine indicating the start of a shift. Remains to be seen.

2. Hey, look at that, my first month since July 2025 with a net gain on my newsletter! What turned it around? I embedded a newsletter signup pop-up on my website. Is it annoying? Probably. Does it work? Yes. 

Social Media Growth:
Podcasts:

  • Podcast Downloads (Monthly): 181 (-223)

  • Podcast Downloads (Since April 2022): 5,541

BBI Social Media Growth:

  • Instagram: 127 (+0)

  • Bluesky: 5 (+0)

  • Threads: 27 (+0)

Here's what I am thinking I will do:

  • I will finish my edits on Capital of Nightmares, and submit them to Falstaff.

  • I will work on both new CCC zines.

  • I will finish Even Heroes Die and Thorn Hollow zines.

  • I will plan out my social media strategy with Schedchie.

  • I will decide on how I want to go about publishing all my new zines.

Here is what I planned to get done this month (copy/pasted from last months recap), with its status:

  • Keep working on Blackwater Requiem. (Yep!)

  • I will work on both new CCC zines. (Yep!)

  • I will publish Coins for the Dead. (Nope!)

  • I will plan out my social media strategy with Schedchie. (Nope!)

I got a lot done! Here is a list:

  • I updated my Dashboards.

  • I purchased Inkarnate, to help me with my game zines.

  • Made a couple of maps with Inkarnate.

  • Updated my discord, and set up some onboarding features.

  • Spoke to the River Region Authors Guild 

  • Went by my consignment locations and restocked.

  • Applied for a grant.

  • Finished the Coins for the Dead rpg zine.

  • Almost finished my Even Heroes Die rpg zine.

  • Worked on two CCC rpg zines, and one folk horror rpg zine (Thorn Hollow).

  • Applied to Foothills Book Festival.

  • Booked our room for Momocon.

  • Booked my table for Jordan Con.

  • Spoke to Kennesaw State.

  • Started edits on Capital of Nightmares for Falstaff Books (second major round).

  • Went to an author meetup in Opelika.

  • Took part in the Opelika Book Festival.

  • Wrote blogs. 

Alright, alright, alright! February is behind us. Man it went by fast.

The biggest news is I finished the first draft of Black Water Requiem, my 'Jaws meets Deliverance' horror novel set in the Jubal County universe. It feels amazing to have that finished. That said, I sort of powered through to the end a little quicker than I thought. So I didn't have a good plan in place to shift to what I would be working on next.

Also, weirdly, wrapping that book up sent me into a bit of a creative funk. It took me a bit to get my sea legs back under me. I'm rolling along now, but it meant there was a week or two in the middle of the month where not much got accomplished it felt like.

I'm now working hard on what should be my final editing pass on Capital of Nightmares, the book Falstaff Dread will be putting out (this year?). 

On the zine front, I made some great progress there. I could easily see a world where I have at least 3 new zines ready to go by the end of March, if not more. I'm sorta rolling there. 

I am holding off on publishing them for a second though. I am trying to think through how I want to go about this. I might try and kickstart one or more of them as an experiment, to get some experience under my belt. I am also toying with limiting myself to only ordering new zines when I have sold enough zines to cover the expense of the new ones. BBI has sold enough in zines this year to pay for probably two 100 zine orders for new games, but not all 3-4. So if I am going to shift to that, make BBI fully pre-self-funding, then I need to decide in what order to publish them.

But yeah. Outside of that, it was a pretty meh month. I did two small events, no cons, and my online sales were down a bit. I also didn't really dig into my social media strategy like I would have liked. And yeah, no podcasting happened. Because fuck me, I need more hours, less funk. 

Quick summary:

  • Word Count: 5,917

  • Pages Edited: 111

  • Hours Writing: 12.2

  • Hours Working: 15.25

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