Marketing is making my mind melt!

I've been either painting or writing for about thirty years now. The hard part has always been marketing. 

It takes time to make a story. It takes focus and a kind of layering of thoughts. Ideas are reworked and pushed into new shapes that fit the puzzle better. The first words written get rewritten and cut up into something that hopefully flows a little better than a blog post might. It's exhausting and frustrating and it all has to happen while life goes on.

Children need to get to all the places they need to go. (How can a three year old have such a full schedule?), the dog needs reassurance that he is important, dinner needs making and dishes need doing. All of that takes time, yes, but more importantly it occupies the mind and soaks up energy. That's if nothing goes wrong. If things go wrong, if there's chest pain or a tree lies down on the car, time evaporates and the thought of creating anything at all, much less a whole book, becomes something alien. 

I've been creating things under the harsh conditions that all humans deal with for over thirty years. (I know I look young. Like Batman, I've aged phenomenally). I can do that.

What I'm not good at is marketing under those same conditions. 

I enjoy it to a degree. I like making the websites anyway. The problem is, it just sucks the energy right out of me. An hour of sorting out how to market my book, combing through other author's suggestions, feels like four hours of work at my day job. I spent an afternoon writing to literary blogs to ask them to review my book. I got through twenty of them. I received two responses. One agreed, one turned me down.

An entire afternoon to get one review.

That's time I'd rather spend writing. 

Honestly, I'm not doing this for the money. I'd like some money, just out of recognition of the effort I've put into making something, but it doesn't have to be a lot. When I was a painter I was always happy to sell a painting at all and didn't quibble much over how much it went for, provided it wasn't an insult to the time and effort I'd put in. I feel the same way about writing. 

Where am I going with this? I'm not sure. 

I think, I am looking for simple ways to let people find my work.  I need ways that don't involve countless hours writing to blogs or agents. Ideally, places I can just place a link, or better yet, a cover image, and let it be seen.