My first instinct when selecting the audience for my posts here was "adults over 25". I just switched it to a younger bracket since it seemed wiser. Truth is, I am never sure. Okal Rel has always had appeal for teens but two of the readers who contacted me, in person, over the last couple of years -- one in Prince George, via her husband who wanted to get his wife the last few books of the series in the original editions, and one from Germany who graduated years ago but "met" the ORU while attending UNBC where I worked as a lecturer at the time -- were over 30.

I also learned of a 12 year old who read the series! Much to my surprise. And I was delighted by the colleagues  my own age, with PhDs in everything from Computing to Theology, who read and enjoyed, and would discuss the themes and issues in it with me. Not to mention friends in the publishing circles I was pleased to be welcomed into during those busy, hectic years. Friends like Bobbie DuFault, Stephanie Johanson and Randy McCharles to name a few. I'm sure you'll meet them through their story interweaving with the ORU's in future posts here. But I was talking about audience ...

I never liked the ORU to be pigeon-holed. Or to condense it into a one-liner elevator pitch. This may be one of the reasons I was so hit and miss with the marketing thing. I can mount no argument against the advice a writer needs to be laser focused on pitch and push these days for commercial success. It just isn't me. No quarrel with those who do it well. More power to them. It isn't easy! But the ORU for me is exploration and engagement through story. And a bit of a lifelong obsession.  A peculiar, genre-morphing, multi-POV, possibly acquired taste, that connects with people across marketing categories, gender, educational levels and who knows what else. Possibly a marketing nightmare?

I really don't know. Truth is, the older I get the less I care. The Okal Rel audience knows who it is when it stumbles in and hangs around to live in it for a while. :-)  And that's pretty awesome when you think about it the right way. Every reader is a universe with which the ORU intersects.