Wednesday 30 June 2010

What a day!

Today has not been good:
  • Routine boiler check: Several hundred pounds in repairs and the plumber coming back tomorrow.
  • Flat sale: After all the paperwork & legal checks were done, and the buyer was supposed to sign yesterday, he now wants to ask even more questions. This comes after we've had a trickle of questions one at a time from his solicitor over the last few weeks, and after saying they want a fast sale.We've been ready since end of May - can they get a move on please?
  • Garage damage due to broken nails: when we went to repair it the hammer broke.

Please let tomorrow be better.

Tuesday 29 June 2010

This week.

If last week was a rollercoaster, this week can be summed up as worry. I find myself second guessing everything I did last week: Did I address it to the right department? Is it sitting lost forever in a slushpile somewhere? Are they going to be interested? Is it really what they are looking for?

It's ridiculous of course, but knowing that does not make it any easier.

I've done the basic housekeeping, putting a promotion plan in black and white in case they ask, getting twitter and other infrastructure ready for a launch, looking into self publishing and distribution. The fact remains all this work doesn't actually achieve anything until I know where I stand with the book.

They said I'd know in four weeks. I'm hoping it's a yes. I'm also hoping they can make it sooner, since my nerves are shot.

Friday 25 June 2010

The week in summary

As of Monday I had a book deal, at final galley stage. The week in summary:

Monday - Suggestion that they would not be able to exploit publicity/distribution. Offered a release.
Tuesday - Accepted the release. Back to submitting to agents. Arranged a fallback to self-pub just in case.
Wednesday - Contacted an established UK house for permission to submit unagented. Came away with a request for the full*.
Thursday - Checked manuscript, dotted i's crossed t's made sure it was as perfect as possible. Posted it.
Friday - Reading writing forums, extremely frazzled and biting fingernails.

*there are no words to discribe the mix of elation and sheer stark terror experienced at this point.

All I can think now is, please let this work out.

Thursday 24 June 2010

An interesting week.

If you'd told me the Monday before last about this week, I'd never have believed you. Try "Rollercoaster" for an example of how I feel right now.

You see my book was let go, not because it got too little interest, but because it got too much. Apparently since the publisher had switched to POD and ebook, they usually do a soft launch and let it build.

Enter me, with experience of marketing my own books, links to distributors, and a lot of media experience, who started gearing up on promo at the start of the week...

There was a bit of a mismatch, to be blunt. On Tuesday my book was released by mutual consent, with the advice that I really needed a print house because of the demand for ARCs and similar.

On Wednesday the manuscript went back out to agents and I got a lead on a publisher. Today I spent getting the whole thing into the publisher's in-house format and submitted it.

Frankly I'm still a bit stunned. Monday morning I was booking promos, now I'm hunting publishers.

But the book, will be coming out, even if I have to self-publish. I've put too much effort into this one to let it sink!

Thursday 17 June 2010

Cats and targets

The cats are at the vets, and not happy about it. We get them back this afternoon, fully recovered hopefully.

Meanwhile I'm back to working on the writing. My sales target for Year 1: 5,000.

It's going to be tricky. Because of the way Bewrite works my access to my standard distribution channels (which got the self-published works sales up into the thousands) is restricted. Therefore it is going to be promotion and marketing that matter.

At the moment I am simply at the stage of telling everyone I know that a book is coming out. The problem is that I find myself running into issues with endorsements and similar because the publisher is in Canada and I am UK based - sending out galleys and such is proving complicated.

On the other hand I have been asked for ideas about the cover, which is also a problem as I frankly have no idea. I'd like to avoid the formulaic aircraft-and-big flame approach.

Tuesday 15 June 2010

Testimonials and endorsements.

And now I am on the road, hunting for endorsements and testimonials which can make or break a book. The problem I have is that I got a number of subject matter experts to contibute (and they were extremely helpful, so thank you very much for handling all my endless queries), but these are not necessarily the people you can ask for endorsements.

Very few have a profile in Canada, or even outside aviation in the UK. The one that does has a policy of not endorsing products, after being badly burned some years back. I got the help and sanity check in return for not asking.

So now I’m digging back through my address book to find anyone I know who might be able to help. And on top of this my nerves are kicking in, and the little voice of sanity is busy telling me that I can’t possibly bother anyone important about my little book.

I’m going to, of course. Ater all, all they can say is no, and to get this far towards publication, believe me you get used to hearing “no”. You just can’t let it stop you.

(On the practical side, if you can think of anyone who might be interested, please drop me a note. Bound manuscripts can be supplied if required.)

And don't forget the Gatwick Aviation Museum Open day this weekend! I don't know how I can be thinking about endsorsements, when I'm so nervous I just checked they actually wanted to be mentioned in the thanks.

Monday 14 June 2010

Different markets and promo nerves

With my first publication, it was a small, specialised and generally friendly market: one where even reviewers who slate your work are likely to run into you at the next convention and give some decent feedback, and you spend you time chatting to competitors about joint ventures, successes and ways to promote the entire market. Out in the open market things are less friendly and more competitive. My book is going to be one of thousands published this year, and that means I need to promote it.

As the sort of person who, if I got a chance to shout my name from the rooftops would rather whisper it while hiding behind the chimney, I find self-promotion challenging. It is very difficult to fight the urge to let the book be released, do very little promotion and just say that if it is good, it will sell.

This is how you guarantee a flop. To be honest I suspect that is partly why it is tempting: if anything goes wrong, if my research has failed me, if there is a huge clanger in the plot, if the book is actually horribly written, not many people will see it. Unfortunately it is also how you can guarantee you won't get another book published.

To counter this I keep telling myself that the book deserves better than me hiding under a blanket and pretending it didn't get published. The publisher has sunk significant funds and time into it, in the belief it is a good book and they are counting on it to sell. People don't buy books they've never heard of, and with the book publisher being Canadian that gives me another obstacle to overcome - people in Britain can't order a book they've never heard of.

So I'm compromising: hiding behind my PC screen for the illusion of privacy and meanwhile setting up as much of a web presence as I can and telling everyone I've ever met on any forum that I've written a book. Doing all these wonderful things they keep talking about: book trailers and banners and buttons and blurbs. I can only hope that will be enough.

And here's my gratuitious ad for today: http://www.squidoo.com/Firestorm.
It's my book. It's hopefully great. Please buy it when it comes out.

(Doesn't that sound like a confident, driven, self-promoting author? No? Oh well...)

Sunday 13 June 2010

First Novel Nerves

Oh dear. At the moment my brain is working in fits and starts at best. The final version went back to the editor yesterday, and now I am left extremely nervous.

Instead of working on my other novels, I find myself torn between frantic promotion setup and reassuring my cat that he is in fact furry and can purr while trying to relax. I think he thinks I have gone crazy.

The issue is that because I used to write horror, and have a range of non-fiction article out under my name I've used a pen name to avoid confusion. Now I need to consider whether to link all the blogs, videos, twitter etc to a new set of accounts under that name, or whether to add it to my own feeds. Frankly, if I put it solely under my own accounts it will get lost in the traffic very quickly, so I'm currently working on a "best of both worlds" set up.

If my nerves will let me...

Writing presence for now
Also a Youtube, Google site (until the website is set up), and forum are present, although content is limited at this stage.

Friday 4 June 2010

Dueling expert syndrome

Something I have learned and want to pass on to budding novelists: Once you've done your research and written the book, don't ever, ever, go back for a second opinion. They won't agree. Put two experts and a room and get three opinions (actually about five and a lively ongoing debate in my case).

On the other hand, there is a certain black humour in saying "I just torched a house because it was the only way to make the firefighters happy."