long overdue update

 It has been a while since my last update. Just seem to lose track of time. My book has now been available to buy on Amazon for a year and a day. (meant to post this yesterday) Slowly but surely sales are ticking over with 462 in total. However the spark has yet to ignite and the dream of being contacted by an interested agent still hasn't happened. Whilst sales are still happening there is still hope.

I have decided to invest a little of my earnings by paying for a consultation with a company that deals with self-publishing. I need to find ways to reach a wider audience as the majority of my sales have still come through a small target audience. This is namely the people I engage with on Facebook and Twitter. The appointment is in a couple of weeks. 

Reviews are still very positive, 61 in total at present and 70% of them are five star reviews. This keeps me going and helps me to remain positive in relation to attracting an agent. 

As suspected, I still have not got around to buying the self-publishing book and do not really follow the chap I started to follow at the start of this journey. 

Will update after my professional consultation.

My Debut Novel

This is the cover for my debut novel. I am hoping to have the novel uploaded and available on Amazon within the next two weeks or so. 

This blog has been created with two main purposes in mind. Firstly this is an attempt to promote and market my work,including a second novel I am currently on. 

The second main purpose of this blog,is to track my progress as a self publishing author. This blog will either grow and evolve or remain a virtually ignored creation floating about within the electronic ether of life. 

I hope to update on this journey as often as possible and also to open up discussion and debates around the publishing industry. If a fellow struggling author finds this blog useful, then it will be a worthwhile experience.

Me and the inspiration behind my debut novel

 I am 57 years old and have had a desire to write novels from an early age. I grew up on a council estate on the outskirts of the city of Coventry. Though growing up wasn't exactly easy. being in a single parent family with  a brother and two sisters, it was still enjoyable and enriching. This environment also helped to shape both the stories and the characters I wanted to write about. I want to write about believable characters in believable settings that the reader can connect to and relate to. Perhaps this is why my debut novel is based very much on the streets and within the world I grew up in.  I would not like to describe the novel as autobiographical, more a sense of being influenced by. The main stumbling blocks to my ambition of becoming a writer were perpetuated within these said streets, as a lack of both confidence and belief go hand in hand with the environment I grew up in.

The image below is not my own but never-the-less is a very important image for me. It show a park on the edge of Bell Green that I used to play in as a child. In the foreground is a small bridge that spans an equally small river. In the distance, located at the top of the image, in between the two blocks of flats, one can just make out 'The Live and Let Live public house. This particular public house along with Bell Green and other areas of close proximity feature heavily within the novel. The pub and the flats are no longer there, in fact a lot of the area has changed considerably since my childhood. 

The novel itself is set to the backdrop of the 1973-74 football season and centers around the main character, a fourteen year old boy called Philip Knott. I wanted to have the main character face similar stumbling blocks in his life as I have faced in my own based upon his class and social environment. His family life is difficult but both his abilities as a swimmer and as a shoplifter could offer him a better, brighter future. The main character also strikes up a correspondence friendship with his favourite footballer after entering a competition through a comic and it is this friendship that inspired the main narrative and the title of the novel 'The Boy Who Saved Billy Bremner'. 

The Shop Is Closed

As I am sure it is the same for many other aspiring author's out there, my writing is very important to me. Due to having a young family and a full-time job, it may not come as a surprise that 'The Boy Who Saved Billy Bremner' took over four years to write.

Once completed, proof read, re-written and re-written again, I went in search of an agent willing to represent me. However, it did not take too long to discover that for certain authors from certain backgrounds, with certain types of work, the shop is closed.

What do I mean by this? If you care to visit a particular agency online, it will quickly become apparent how drenched in white middle class profiles it is. It would be interesting to look closer at the last ten people the agency took on. To look closer at the type of person, their background, their education and to look closer at the type of work being chosen. It is all well and good to write about the lower classes and their issues but not if you are actually from this environment. One cannot risk you turning up and running off with the family silver. 

It is this closed shop, this narrow minded protective world of the middle classes that hinders so many novelists from the wrong side of the tracks. Agencies will not take risks, will only select certain types, a sense of cultural industries, only prepared to promote a product that is guaranteed to make a profit. To put it simply, certain types that do not fit the profile are not economically viable

If only I hosted a quiz show, or maybe if I was a weather forecaster, a TV chef, a well-known athlete, because as we all know it is easy to write a well crafted novel. Then maybe an agency would look at my work, be interested in my work or will it actually be my name and not the quality of the work that would make me economically viable.

Sour Grapes! No, not really, I do not think so. look for yourselves, see how many times, how many agencies will reject struggling authors out there. They all talk about finding something that captures their imagination, that excites them. What they really mean is something that is a safe bet from the right person and will make a profit.

So I, like many authors out there are now trying to go it alone, trying to be a successful self-publisher. Which brings me back to the purpose of this blog, to record the journey, the attempt to fulfill the dream. My next post will outline the next few steps of this process and will hopefully confirm when my first novel will be available in digital form on Amazon.

It's on Amazon

 The book is now on Amazon, the first step on the road to becoming a author. Here is the link.https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0B86LQ97M/ref=sr_1_1?crid=QFF8C49EY47Y&keywords=the+boy+who+saved+billy+bremner&qid=1659346640&s=digital-text&sprefix=%2Cdigital-text%2C69&sr=1-1

Now for the next steps. I plan to sign up to the course below, it is alleged to be free, so will update once  have something to update on. 

I will also be purchasing the following book from Amazon. Again I will update once I have something worth reporting on.

   

There is no such thing as a free course

 I have started the course above and yes it has been a positive experience in the main but as expected also a couple of negatives along the way. Firstly, as I do not own a 'Kindle', and yes I get the irony, I cannot download the free stuff which is part of the course.

 I feel I am okay with photoshop and as I want to drive costs down to a minimum at this stage, I am in the process of designing a fuller book cover so that I can upload a print version to my Amazon account. this will hopefully allow for other people without a 'Kindle' to buy the book. Obviously David recommends having somebody professional design the cover as they may well be able to create something that will appeal more to the target audience of the work. Costs will always be a factor in this process, especially at this early stage.

David also talks about creating mailing lists and connecting with readers but not sure how to achieve this yet, hopefully it will be explained in more detail further along the course. I am already aware that very soon I will need to create a Facebook page, Twitter account and Instagram account, along with learning how to use them effectively.

One issue, not with the course directly but still an issue all the same, is finding the time to devote all the recommendations to my work or 'product' as it is now called. This process would be wonderful for somebody with the finances behind them and therefore do not have to hold down a full-time job. 

Next stage for me is to look at advertising on Amazon and other author / book related sites. It looks promising as you can create an account and set your own budget. Being a working father of two, I do not have an endless supply of money to throw at this, but will see what it costs and will update my spending in my next post. I have a budget of around £500, which is not that bad, I hope but still need to try and spend it as wisely as possible. I haven't purchased the bock yet that I mentioned in my last post. I can also buy the books that are free in digital form on this course but am just waiting to complete the course first. As mentioned there is  no point overloading the in-tray with stuff to do and not having the time to do it. 

I will post again once I have completed the course and invested some of my funds in advertising the product. 

Progress Report

I signed my first novel this week. A wonderful work colleague purchased a copy of the book and asked if I could be so vain as to personally write a brief 'thank you' and sign it. Yes I was more than happy to do so. 

I did however notice a couple of typo's on the blurb on the back cover, these have now been corrected and the book is again good to go on Amazon.

I have had a few issues with Facebook. I have created an account and have been joining groups that may have an interest in the book. However I have had my account suspended on a couple of occasions. The only thing I can put it down to is I may be breaking the rules by trying to tout my book in the group chat of the groups I have joined. It seems to be acceptable to post links of naked women and hardcore porn sites in these chat rooms / groups but not okay to try and promote a book. I haven't done much else with it as yet but do intend to update my profile and upload the link to the book on my wall  / profile page.

I still need to create a Twitter account and an Instagram account with the same purpose, to self-promote the book. Will hopefully have them done when I next update my progress.

Another work colleague gave me a contact of a friend who works at Amazon and I am now waiting for a reply about advertising and promoting the book on this platform. I also now plan to look at other platforms for advertising which were recommended through the 'David Gaughran' Starting From Zero programme that I am still working through. Here is the link if anybody is interested.

https://davidgaughran.com/startingfromzeroresources/

Will update again soon.