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You have all been very patient as I vanished on holiday and trundled around eastern Europe on trains of varying degrees of decrepitude – at one point we were overtaken by a horse and cart, so that says it all really.  But now I am back, and we’re very much in the final straight heading for the publication of “Worm in the Blossom”.  So just what am I doing in this last month?

Well, I suppose I should be honest and say that I have here, in my sweaty little paw, my very own first copy of “Worm”.  I always order a proof copy to check for paper quality, cover colour and so on, and I am very pleased.  The reason for ordering so far ahead is that, as with much of self-publishing, you have to count backwards.  I am publishing officially on 16 October, which means that on that day I want to deliver copies to the bookshops that so kindly take Plank onto their shelves.  In order to have those copies in time, I need to order them from CreateSpace (the publishing people), which means having them delivered from America.  Postage is killingly expensive, so I try to avoid the top-rate speedy delivery and go instead for a slower – cheaper – service, which means ordering further ahead of time.  So although “Worm” is to all intents and purposes now finished, it’s not yet “published”.  In order to buy my own copies, I have to publish – but then I sneakily do not make it available through any sales channels, so no-one else can find it.  And in this final month, I also get cracking on the e-book versions – basically a rather painstaking formatting exercise – so that they too can be launched as close as possible to that 16 October date.

And the sort-of launch party?  Well, Toppings – a wonderful independent bookshop in Ely, with a fabulous programme of events – is giving me a whirl on 26 October, which is pretty close and I think counts as a launch event.  Click here to see details – but be warned that my face is VERY large!