by admin | May 7, 2014 | Fallout, promotion, self-publishing, selling, structure
The lady in the local bookshop was impressed. ‘You wrote this?’ she said, as I showed her a poster about my new book. ‘So, you’re an author,’ she continued. ‘I know lots of sheep farmers, but I’ve never met an author. Except you.’ She turned to another customer who was waiting to be served. ‘This lady’s an author,’ she said. I felt as if I had two heads, but I smiled and agreed that I should sign all the books of mine that she had on the shelf.
People certainly seem to like to have a book signed by the author, which is why booksellers are keen for you to do so. Without the signature a book can feel like an artefact, produced far away by someone you can’t envisage. It may have a function and even bring pleasure in an impersonal disembodied way. Perhaps the signature makes the author seem more like a real person.
I’ve been writing for as long as I can remember, first at school when I was taught to make marks on paper, then copy words and finally to think of the words in my own head before I wrote them down. Then for the next fifty years or so my writing was about my work, dictated by experience and reality, but all that time what I really wanted to do was write fiction – stories, dialogue, descriptions of people and places and events that I made up. It took all that time to carve out the time and energy and stop worrying about not making any money out of it. Non-fiction writing was part of the job, but fiction would be part of me.
It was much harder than I anticipated. You don’t just write sentences, then paragraphs, then a scene or a chapter. You have to have an idea of where you’re going, and why. It took me a long time to figure that out, which is why the first novel took four years and was frequently dropped – or hurled – into the ‘too hard’ basket. Once I found out what I needed to do, then it became a process to follow, with countless hours spent tapping away, staring at the screen, thinking, changing things that seemed false or unnecessary. At some point the changes begin to feel like sliding back down the hill you’ve just climbed, and then it’s time to stop.
Being an author doesn’t feel like a mystical process, worthy of the awe of the lady in the bookshop. I couldn’t call writing a job for me, more of a hobby, like growing sweet peas or knitting. And when you self-publish as I do, writing is the easy part. After the writing is done the book has to be produced, and people persuaded to part with their money in exchange for it, which is much harder. But still they want you to sign on the author page, and when the new book comes out in a couple of weeks I’ll sign away until my hand aches, because it’s the scribbled name that makes the author seem like a real person.
(If you buy a book via my website, by the way, I’ll try to sign it before it’s sent out, if that’s OK with you.)
by admin | Apr 28, 2014 | critique, Lake District, old posts, readers, self-publishing, trilogy, writing shed
I have two places to work. If the weather’s really good, or if I want to immerse myself with no distractions at all, I pack up the laptop and whatever materials I need and walk the 50 metres down the garden to the writing shed, the one I blogged about earlier. If it’s hosing down or very cold and windy and I don’t want to venture outside I use the alternative indoor space, facing into a cupboard in my bedroom that I’ve arranged as an ‘office’ with a computer table and book shelves. It’s where I’m sitting now. Behind me is a spectacular view across the Esk valley and west towards the sea. Facing into the cupboard I can’t be distracted by the glory of the Western Lake District – or at least that’s the theory.
Pinned on the wall of this tiny space, directly behind the monitor, is the only letter I’ve ever received from a famous author. It’s quite old now and the ink is beginning to fade from black to brown, but it’s important to me, not just for what it says but more for the fact that the famous author took the trouble to write it.
Plenty of people have read my books over the past two years. Those readers who’ve spoken to me about them have been very positive, but the feedback has usually been about the overall impression, ‘couldn’t put it down’ and such like, which is gratifying but non-specific. The letter in the fading ink is more of a critique, and not all of it complimentary. The author was someone I had heard of and read, and who lives locally for part of the year. I got her address from a friend and wrote to her, unsolicited, asking her to read my first book and to say what she thought of it. And she did, good and not so good. It was my first novel and I knew that it wasn’t good enough, but after four years I had to decide to ‘finish it’ or throw it away, and finishing it meant getting it into print, which I did, and I’m glad I did, even though I still wish I could have managed yet one more draft.
The author’s letter was dated May 2nd 2013, less than a year ago, although it feels much longer. Since then I’ve written and published a second novel – which was much better – and the third goes to the printers tomorrow. There have been ‘reviews’ in the sense of articles in the local press about the details of the plot how the books came to be written, but nothing that could really be called a ‘review’, written by someone as knowledgeable as the author of my fading letter. It’s rare and difficult to get a self-published book reviewed, or so I’m told. Local media say they don’t have the time or the staff to do it, and national media seem to focus only on conventionally-published books.
I suppose what I really want is recognition from a professional writer or reviewer who is prepared to read my books and take them seriously, not just as a slice of regional life but as a literary work – or is that too pompous? There is a person, another writer with northern connections, who has said that she will read and review the whole trilogy, which would be wonderful, but it’ll be a while yet before that can happen, and I’ll just have to hope that she follows through.
The ultimate frustration came in a conversation with the books editor of a national magazine who said she couldn’t review the forthcoming book because it is part 3 of a trilogy, and she couldn’t review the trilogy because the other two parts aren’t ‘new’ publications. Maybe I should give up yearning for any professional feedback and be content that so many people have read and enjoyed the books so far. I wish that was enough, but I fear not.
by admin | Apr 22, 2014 | A Good Liar, Cumbria, Fallout, Forgiven, Lake District, readers, self-publishing
‘What’s your budget for promotion of your new book?’ There’s a question I didn’t know how to answer. I was enquiring about getting help with a video, but quickly realised I would have to plan, film and edit it myself or do without. And if I do without, what achievable strategies do I have for promoting the new book ‘Fallout’, the last in the Jessie Whelan trilogy that has the overarching title ‘Between the Mountains and the Sea’? For the second in the series – ‘Forgiven’ – which was published in June 2013 I arranged a ‘launch’ on the first day of a local festival, thinking that the regional media who would be in town anyway for the festival might be tempted to make an appearance. Wrong! Family, friends and neighbours turned up and we had a jolly time, but as a press launch it was a dismal (and quite expensive) failure. I admit I was disappointed, and decided that I probably wouldn’t do it again.
So here we are with the new book due out in about a month and no clear idea about a ‘promotion strategy’. One difference from last year is that I now have over 400 Twitter followers, and through Twitter’s exponential reach I can get the book details to people who might want them. Word of mouth will count for something too: the success of the first two parts of the trilogy means that there’s a fair head of steam around the publication of the final part. It’s hard to guess how many readers, many of them Cumbria locals, will beat a path to the bookshop door or my website to snatch their copy hot off the press, but it could be quite a few. Most of the paperback sales over the past two years have been in Cumbria bookshops, supplied through Hills of Workington who sell to almost every bookshop and tourist centre in the county. And sales have been seasonal too, with summer visitors looking for something to read which features the people, places and history of this great place where I live.
Once the paperback is out we’ll focus on the conversion to ebook and Kindle. My book designer John Aldridge will make sure the ebook looks as good as the hard copy – which is by no means automatic – and I hope I remember what to do after that. I’ve made it work twice already so that should be OK. Ebook sales have been steady but unspectacular. I know I could shift more if I dropped the price, but I do have a problem with selling something of merit, that took me a year to produce, for less than the price of a latte.
In the meantime, the height of my promotional activity today has been to design a poster for some of the local bookshops, which has taxed my Word skills to the uttermost. Once it was done, I took a photo and posted it on Twitter. I’m not expecting as many RTS as a selfie at a funeral, but who knows?
by admin | Apr 16, 2014 | cover, Cumbria, Fallout, historical fiction, Lake District, readers, trilogy
Everything’s coming to a head: final proofs, back matter, acknowledgements, they all have to be thought about, generated, discussed, revised and checked while the printer’s deadline looms closer. And still the iterations of the front cover continue, back and forth, as we consult about an image that will grab the readers’ attention, please the eye and intrigue the mind. John Aldridge my book designer visited West Cumbria while I was away in Canada and took some stunning pictures of beaches and sunsets, and this is the first chance I’ve had to see them. Then Kevin Ancient the cover designer got to work, aiming to combine beauty and message. ‘Don’t be too specific about the message,’ they say, but I want a sense of threat, because it pervades the book. Threat to the community, and then a different, more personal threat to one of my beloved characters. Beauty alone, however striking, will not be enough, hence the debate, and now I think we’ve finally found what I want.
Once all the bits and pieces are agreed, off it all goes to the printers in Cornwall and we wait. Only three weeks and then the pallet with its precious cargo, the outcome of countless hours of work, will be delivered and we start the distribution to bookshops and tackle the long list of pre-orders. The trilogy is almost done: I can’t quite believe it. When I thought about the possibility several years ago I had no idea whether I could pull it off, but here it is. Amazing. Quarter of a million words about a West Cumbrian family in the first half of the twentieth century. There’s nothing quite like it anywhere, and it will still be there long after I’m gone, hopefully enjoyed by visitors and locals alike as a testament to this wonderful place and the people who live here.
by admin | Mar 14, 2014 | A Good Liar, cover, Cumbria, Fallout, Forgiven, Lake District, self-publishing, title, Windscale fire
You may have gathered that since the ms. of my third novel in the trilogy went to the editor last month I’ve been thinking about the details of publication. This past week, driving around the flat wintry landscape Manitoba, Canada, I’ve been watching the colours of sky and snow and thinking about the cover image that will make my new book jump off the shelf or the page saying ‘Read me’ and, better still, ‘Buy me’. This is the image that will appear on my Amazon page and Twitter and everywhere else, and it has to be both telling and compelling.
One of the great things about self-publishing is that you get to make these decisions for yourself. Writing a book is such a personal endeavour: it’s always bothered me that someone else – or worse still a ‘committee’ – should decide what the finished book actually looks like. I don’t want to use images of people: the reader should be able to imagine what characters look like from the text, or from inside their own head. The cover of this new book set in such a wonderful location should reflect that place, and say something too about the events between the covers. In the case of ‘Fallout’ – yes, I finally decided to keep that title – the image could represent two central themes, the importance of the beach and its ever-changing light and tides, and the fire deep in the nuclear reactor burning red, orange and blue. Sunset over the beach could fulfill both of these hopes in one image, if we could find the right one and not have to pay too much for the copyright. If that sounds mercenary, it is. Self-publishing a real book, as well as an electronic one, is an expensive business, but it’s what I’ve chosen to do. I love books, the look and feel of them as well as their contents. Creating a book continues to be a real pleasure, and one that has to be paid for.
When ‘A Good Liar’ was published, the cover captured the key elements of what lay inside. There was a stunning image of Wastwater under a stormy sky, contrasting with a faded grey picture of rural schoolchildren, taken in the very year of the book’s setting. The cover of ‘Forgiven’ was a gorgeous photograph of a lush green Lakeland valley and a granite wall, taken by my book designer John Aldridge, combined with a bright sky from a different location. This third cover, on the last book of a trilogy entitled ‘Between the Mountains and the Sea’, will focus on the Irish Sea of the West Cumbrian coast. Somehow I hope we’ll find the image that delights me and anyone who chooses to read the words inside. Let’s hope the bookshops will find the space to display the cover rather than the spine. I can’t wait to see it.
by admin | Mar 4, 2014 | A Good Liar, Fallout, Forgiven, readers, self-publishing, title, trilogy, Windscale fire
Here’s the thing…..for several months I’ve been referring to my new novel by a title. It wasn’t a brilliant title – intriguing, clever, achingly memorable – but it was pertinent, had a useful double meaning and I was getting used to it. The novel is about a continuing family saga, and part of the action takes place in a nuclear plant where there’s a fire and radioactive contamination of the area. All the detail about the nuclear reactor fire is real by the way, and makes a very suspenseful story. My chosen title is – or was – ‘Fallout’. Get it?
So far so good. The manuscript is with the editor; the book designer and I have been discussing the new cover, which has not been started yet. BUT today I hear via Twitter that another novel with exactly the same title is due out on May 1st, and is already visible on Google. No nuclear connection in this one, but it’s a resonant name for a dysfunctional group or relationship, and I’m sure it fits this other novel perfectly well.
Now what do I do? There’s no copyright on titles, so I don’t have to change mine, but do I want my novel to come out with the same title in the same month? The title of my first novel ‘A Good Liar’ was only a prefix away from other book titles, but they had been published years before. This feels different.
I’ve been jotting down alternative titles all afternoon, realising as I do so ‘what’s in a name’. Now the editor and the book designer and I – and you too if you wish to join in – are playing around with the possibilities, with a fairly imminent deadline. If we have to change, I hope it doesn’t cause confusion among my potential readership, and we can come up with something so magical that more readers are inspired to pick it up, and then also read the two previous books in the trilogy (‘A Good Liar’ and ‘Forgiven’) just to get the full flavour of my heroine Jessie Whelan’s courage, flaws and fierce protection of her independence. By the way, if you’re thinking of suggesting a title, Jessie does find love, even if she’s not sure what to do with it. When a decision is finally made, you’ll be the first to know.
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