I had the pleasure of speaking with Court Lewis, host of American Variety Radio on select public-radio stations, about storm chasing and my novel “Funnel Vision” for a show that will air starting this week. Catch it at 8:30 p.m. this Thursday on WETS 89.5 FM (Tri-Cities, Tennessee); at 7:30 a.m. Sunday on WFIT 89.5 FM (Melbourne, Florida); at 4:30 p.m. Sunday on WMFE 90.7 FM (Orlando, Florida) and 9:30 a.m. Wednesday, Feb. 15, on WQCS 88.9 FM (Fort Pierce, Florida). Or you can always catch it in the archives online after it airs.

If you missed me on Nerdy@30 on Blog Talk Radio, listen here. That was a lot of fun, too. Host Marcus Kastler lives in Kansas, so he has firsthand knowledge of severe storms.

I had a great time today chatting with UCF students in online classes. Great questions. My madly typing fingers got a great workout. Does your group need a speaker, or would your book club like to discuss ‘Funnel Vision’? Let me know.

My brain was so full after last weekend’s Space Coast Writers’ Guild conference in Cocoa Beach that I think it took a whole week to digest the information I gathered there. The truth about a writers’ conference is that, even if you don’t get practical advice (though you pretty much always do), you’re going to get inspiration. You’re surrounded by ambitious writers, by smart authors and editors and literary agents, and no amount of mediocre hotel food can turn off your appetite for everyone’s enthusiasm. You go home wanting to plot, and write, and do all the things it takes to get your book out into the world. Make that books. Which leads us into five takeaways I got this time around:

1. Your writing career isn’t about getting one book published. It’s about writing and publishing multiple books. Agents and editors are looking for career writers, not one-tome wonders. Even if you’re doing the self-publishing thing, the one sure way to build fans is to write multiple books so they have somewhere to go when they’ve finished reading the first one. To write all those books, you need the discipline to write every day, even if you have another job. There are no shortcuts. And while one project is well under way, another (or two) should always be in the works. (Thanks, author Davis Bunn.)

Sure, I'm game: With my novel "Funnel Vision," I was among the writers signing books at the Jan. 28 event.

2. Most writers have another job. Most writers don’t get rich writing. Even authors published by big houses can’t necessarily support themselves by their writing. Your fortune is not assured by a publishing contract. Oh, yeah, and if you sell five books at a conference, you’re doing great! (Thanks, agent/author Lois Winston.)

3. The dream of getting your book into the big bookstore above all else may be misplaced. While it’s lovely to get your book into the big bookstore, more book sales take place online now than in stores. And even though it’s important to know your genre so you can market your book and pick the appropriate categories for it, self-published or not, keywords and online marketing may be just as important as being on a particular shelf. (Thanks, Cadence Group‘s Bethany Brown.)

4. Don’t fear Twitter. It’s a great way to (a) raise awareness of your own books, but (b) even better, learn from other writers and publishing industry types. This is a message I conveyed in my session on how to present yourself professionally to the press, but it was echoed in many sessions during the weekend. Social-media immersion continues to be important, as long as you keep in mind it’s not all about self-promotion. The experts say 70 percent of what you post shouldn’t be tooting your own horn. Share knowledge, share links, and respond to other folks online. In other words, be the person you want to listen to. (Thanks, Jeremy Reis.)

5. This may be the age of DIY self-publishing, but the key to success at self-pubbing is to be just as professional as the pros. Have a professional cover, a professional interior design, and professionally edited text. Readers can smell an amateur project a mile off, and they won’t respect your book if it’s not done well. And as much as we writers would like to hide in our respective garrets/basements/ivory towers and write, and have someone else carry our book outside, package it and share it with the world, that’s our job, too, more than ever. We’re all doing our own marketing. Horrible word, right? So think of it as sharing. Make friends, be supportive of other writers, do your research, spread the word, and people – with luck – will discover your book. Because in the end, it’s not about the money and the fame, both of which are in short supply. At least for me, it’s about the love, it’s about telling the stories, and it’s about finding readers for my book – and writing the next one. See point No. 1.

I am so grateful to friends and supporters who downloaded or bought the paperback of my storm-chasing novel Funnel Vision during its launch Tuesday. While it didn’t stir up a tornado on Amazon’s charts, it did create a bit of a dust devil.

'Funnel Vision,' a novel about storm chasers by Chris Kridler

The novel briefly bumped up above 6,000 (rankings, NOT sales) on the paid Kindle chart. That’s from selling 40ish Kindle editions within a couple of days, so it doesn’t take that much to jump from 25,000 to 6,000. I hope my numbers will grow, but it’s going to take a while to see a day like the launch day. This morning it was in the 8000s, so it’s kind of cool that it hasn’t yet fallen from its lofty (ahem) heights. And it means that 8,000 books sold more copies than mine did, in whatever time period they’re measuring.

For more insight into rankings, check out Richard Mabry’s guest post on Rachelle Gardener’s blog. He cites Rampant TechPress’ guesstimation that books ranked 1-10,000 are calculated every hour; 10,000-110,000 every day; the rest, once a month.

For a little perspective, Amazon offers more than a million books and periodicals on Kindle, a spokeswoman told me today. More than 800,000 books cost less than $10, plus there are millions of free out-of-copyright works, she said.

The Kindle charts are divided into paid and free, and a lot of authors are taking advantage of “free” to boost their sales, their visibility, or their supposed readership. I say “supposed” because I know I’m not the only one who’s downloaded free books to my iPhone’s Kindle app or the iBooks app and never read them. Still, it’s hard to ignore the potential of ebooks, now that 29 percent of American adults own a computer tablet or e-reader, according to a Pew study. In December, Amazon says, customers bought more than a million Kindle devices a week. These figures answer with an emphatic “NO” the question some have posed about whether e-book sales have reached their peak.

Russ Grandinetti, VP of Kindle Content at Amazon, said today that Kindle book sales have outstripped print books, according to an item in eBookNewser. That’s from an online retailer, though; print books still account for 80 percent of the market, according to a USA Today story.

I found that my own paperback did better than I expected, and its “real book” ranking this morning was in the 17,000+ range. I think some people want to feel the book in their hands and get it signed, too.

Since there are so many charts on Amazon, and none cumulative (at least that I’ve seen) that combine your print and ebook sales, one could argue that rankings are kind of meaningless (but incredibly awesome if you make the top 100). Plus I’m selling on Nook (Barnes & Noble’s figures seem to be lagging reality) and eventually iBooks, if Smashwords delivers it. But if you look around at where you are as an author – pretty much wherever you are on a given day – you’re probably in pretty good company. And as someone who has just published a novel, I’m just thrilled to find readers. Get more information on Funnel Vision here.