I hope everyone will read this through. Thank you.
1. Replies to questions
When new readers ask questions, my replies often get swallowed by the system. So it's not that I'm refusing to answer. I might not even be able to see your comments.
And this "comment swallowing" doesn't just affect authors. For example, reader A posts something, but neither the author nor reader B can see it, while reader C can.
There are all kinds of other possible combinations, too. That's just how the system works. There's nothing I can do.
So I can only put some frequently asked questions in the earliest chapters, constantly editing the text, which makes those early chapters "wordy."
If I put them in the author's notes or at the end of a chapter, plenty of people skip them anyway.
And some of those people don't read the earlier paragraph comments either (maybe they can't see them?), then immediately bring up things I've already explained dozens of times in various paragraphs and chapter-end notes.
So for the most frequently raised questions, I can only work the answers into the main text.
I've been forced into this, too. If I could reply to readers normally, I wouldn't have to do it.
When nothing else works, I reply to comments like this:
"My, com.ment/ got-swallowed& again;"
Only then is there some chance it'll actually get posted. I've explained this several times, but apparently plenty of people still don't know.
2. Performance
I've replied to some readers about this earlier. Here's a brief summary of the situation.
This book has performed very poorly. At this point, it looks barely passable.
At 300,000 Chinese characters, it had a 5.8 rating and around 13,000 readers.
(In an earlier reply, I said "5.8 three months ago." That was a slip;