I have a dream

Tags

audiobook, BBC, Claudie Blakley, Fatal Forgery, library, Martha Plank, PLR, review, sales, Samuel Plank, The Selfies

At the weekend, for reasons too complicated to explain, I spent a couple of hours thinking about my dreams – not the sort where your teeth are falling out while you’re being chased by your O-level maths teacher for your overdue homework, but the sort where you imagine and plan for the future (as in “hopes and dreams”).  The brief was to dream big – to write down anything, regardless of likelihood or practicality.  Of course several of my dreams related to the Sam books and I thought I would share those with you:

• To publish two more Sam Plank books, taking the series to seven
• To hear one of the Sam books read aloud on Radio 4 as their “Book of the Week”
• To win “The Selfies” in April 2019
• To see “Fatal Forgery” on sale in Tesco and Waitrose [one for the numbers, the other for the snobbery…]
• To open a national newspaper and see one of the Sam books unexpectedly and favourably reviewed
• To have the Sam series recommended by Mariella Frostrup
• To see the Sam series turned into a Sunday evening costume drama on the BBC, with Claudie Blakley playing Martha – Sam is still to be cast.

Here’s Claudie in “Lark Rise to Candleford” – and maybe moody Brendan Coyle would work as Sam…

What surprised me when I went back over my Sam dreams was that none of them mentions money.  Sure, winning an award or getting a review heard/read by thousands would increase sales, but what seems to matter to me is a wide readership rather than earning a fortune.  I do appreciate that I am in the lucky position of having a day job quite apart from my Sam writing, which means that I do not have to rely – thank goodness! – on Sam income, but still, it’s shown me that I am motivated by getting people to read Sam rather than by getting them to buy books.  I’ve blogged before about my unhappy experience with libraries and the PLR system, but despite this I would be just as happy to see more people borrowing the Sam books as I would to see sales increasing.  (I just love checking our local library catalogue and seeing all the Sam books out on loan.)  So that’s the dreaming done – now on with the reality of writing.

Shades of Forgery

Tags

Amazon, cover, CreateSpace, Fatal Forgery, IngramSpark, KDP, POD, print-on-demand, review

Matters are moving forward at a sedate pace in my quest to use IngramSpark as well as KDP for my print-on-demand paperbacks.  The cover of “Fatal Forgery” has been suitably tweaked to accommodate the slimmer spine of the IS edition (because IS uses thinner paper stock and over nearly 300 pages – 150 thicknesses of paper – it makes a difference), and I have today received my proof copy from IS and am happy with it.

I am now working out my next steps, which will involve (scarily) un-publishing my current KDP paperback and then republishing it with the new ISBN that I bought for the IS edition – all paperbacks of the same title, regardless of who actually prints them, must have the same ISBN.  This would be simply an administrative thing – unpublish then upload the files again – except that I am not sure what will happen to all the lovely reviews on Amazon that are associated with the current KDP paperback.  I certainly don’t want to lose them, so I’m investigating if/how I can get the reviews carried over to the “new” paperback.  It may be simple (if the reviews are associated with the title) or it may be awkward/impossible (if they’re associated with the ISBN).  Who knew that writing the darn book was by far the easiest part of the process?

On a related subject, it has been very interesting to compare the look of “Fatal Forgery” as produced by the different printing presses:

On the left is the original version, printed by CreateSpace in (I think) South Carolina.  In the middle is the version that I now get from KDP (who took over CreateSpace, and moved the printing for UK authors to Wroclaw in Poland).  And on the right is the IngramSpark version, printed in (I think) Milton Keynes.  They all use the same cover file from the point of view of colour – it’s only the trim dimensions and spine width (and spine print size) that are different.  And yet, how different they look!  The cover designer said this about the trio: “The one on the right appears to be slightly closer to how it was intended than any other.  Somewhere between the one on the left and the one on the right (but closer to the right) would be as intended by me.  The one in the middle is much too bright.”  Thankfully very few buyers will see the difference as they won’t have all three versions, but I thought you might find it interesting – and it certainly shows that being too precious about precise shades of colour when designing a cover might not be worth the fuss!

Build it and they will come

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Faith Hope and Trickery, marketing, Plank 6, plotting, review, Shots eZine, The Fussy Librarian, Victoria Blake

I know, I know: it was but a few short days ago when I declared that I was – temporarily – abandoning all marketing efforts in order to concentrate on writing.  And to be fair to me (if I can’t be fair to myself, what hope is there?) I have indeed concentrated on the writing – or, more specifically, the plotting – of “Plank 6”.  And I can announce that I have a twisty, turny and frankly rather nasty plot in mind for you – I had no idea that I could be so unpleasant and devious.  But, in the odd manner of things, as soon as I turned my back on publicity it started seeking me out.

In example one, a review that has been pending since May, when “Faith, Hope and Trickery” was published, has just appeared.  It is on the website of Shots Crime & Thriller eZine and has been written by the lovely Pippa Macallister, whom I know from a local crime book group.  You can read it yourself, as I blush rather to repeat it, but let me just say this: “There is a wonderful warmth between [Sam and Wilson] and Sam’s wife Martha, which contrasts with the cold, hard reality of life in the areas where they live and work.”  You will also spot the typo in the title of the review: I am minded to leave this as it is, as I figure that people might notice it and – as the marvellous Oscar Wilde so astutely commented – “There is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about.”

And in example two, I have been contacted by an e-book marketing company called The Fussy Librarian and asked to take part in their regular author Q&A feature.  I was recommended to them by my fellow – and kind and generous – historical fiction author Victoria Blake (if you haven’t read her novel “The Return of the Courtesan”, a real treat awaits you), and the questions the FL has sent to be answered are really interesting and quirky.  I don’t know when it will appear on the FL’s newswire (I haven’t even sent in my answers yet) but when it does, I’ll let you know.  The FL is based in Iowa in America, so it certainly can’t hurt to introduce Sam to a wider transatlantic audience.

Stars and walls

Tags

Amazon, Daunt Books, Faith Hope and Trickery, Martha Plank, research, review

It can be something of an anti-climax, the weeks after publishing a book.  And for the purposes of this blog, there is little that I can report on the progress of the new book – “Plank 6” – as I am immersed in the research phase.  But I have promised to keep you updated on the life of a part-time, self-published author, and this week I have two highlights to share with you.

First, two new reviews of “Faith, Hope and Trickery” have appeared on Amazon.  This takes us to a grand total of six reviews and they are all *pause for preening* five star reviews.  This is an enormous relief as, with “FHT” having taken eighteen months to produce rather than the twelve months for the others, I was even less able to maintain any objectivity at all about whether it was actually any good.  And by the end of it, I was in a lather of uncertainty – particularly as I had rather put Martha through the wringer, which I knew would concern some readers.  But she and I have both survived (I don’t think that counts as a spoiler), and I am beaming as I read the reviews.

And second, I went into Daunt Books in Cheapside yesterday to deliver some books.  As is my wont, I wandered into their fiction basement (it’s not imaginary; it’s where they stock the fiction) to say hello to my books.  And what should greet me but this:

I should explain.  This is a wall display of books right opposite the stairs, so you have to see it.  All books are turned cover out – the best angle, of course.  And there are my books…. at eye-level.  Eye-level!  The tippest, toppest place to be.

Flying(ish) off the shelves

Tags

CreateSpace, Discovering Diamonds, Faith Hope and Trickery, G David, Heffers, Kindle, Plank 6, research, review

I’ve been a bad blogger, I know, but I have an excuse: I’ve been away on holiday.  I spent a week in Galle, in southern Sri Lanka, and I can report that – lovely though it is – Sam will not be visiting it in future books.  Although Ceylon was a British “possession” in the 1820s, I can’t imagine Martha being keen on her husband sailing off for distant tropical lands – and Galle was a pretty rackety place back then, with more formal policing confined to Colombo, nearly seventy miles to the north.

Now that I am back in Blighty, I can update you on the launch of “Faith, Hope and Trickery”.  After a tense time when my original order from CreateSpace nearly failed to show up before my departure on hols, the box of books finally arrived an hour before I left and my husband was roped in as delivery boy to take the reserved copies to my two local bookshops, Heffers and David’s.  Here they are in prime position in the window of David’s – note their wonderful promotion of me as an “local (award-winning) author”, referring to my Discovered Diamonds award for “Portraits of Pretence”!

A couple of lovely reviews – both stating that they think “FHT” is the best of the Sam series – have appeared on Amazon (you can get a taster on the Reviews page).

And I have just worked out my sales figures for the Kindle edition, and in March 2018 (the month of launch) I sold eleven e-copies.  Paperback sales are harder to calculate, as the CreateSpace website is not updated instantly, but I think we’re looking at ten copies sold via Amazon in March, plus the ten delivered to Heffers and the three to David’s.

Meanwhile, the withdrawal symptoms have started already, and I am turning my mind to “Plank 6” – I’m researching the history of the Cayman Islands, and of plant-based poisons…

(Review) points mean prizes!

Tags

Amazon, Fatal Forgery, Martha Plank, Portraits of Pretence, review, Samuel Plank, The Man in the Canary Waistcoat, Worm in the Blossom

I have written before about what a thrill – what a tonic – it is for authors to get reviews.  It tells you that people are reading your books (phew!) and not just buying them.  (I know that you still get the money, but it’s sad to think of someone buying your book, reading a couple of pages and then abandoning it – much nicer to know that they have finished it.)  And it gives you invaluable insight into what is working and what is not.  “Plank 5” now has much more about Martha in it than I had originally planned, because the overwhelming call from reviews (and other feedback) is “we want more Martha”.  But I don’t think I had quite grasped the mathematical significance of reviews.

I can’t find the original source of this picture, but it is being widely circulated by authors and writing websites:

As you can see, Amazon – and most self-published authors (including this one) rely heavily on Amazon sales – decides which books to promote based on how many reviews they have received (and, I assume, how positive those reviews are).  This seems to me an entirely sensible approach: if lots of people have bought a book and enjoyed it enough to say something about it, chances are that others will enjoy it too.

So where are Sam and I with our Amazon reviews?  On the Amazon UK site, “Fatal Forgery” has 27 reviews, “The Man in the Canary Waistcoat” has 13, “Worm in the Blossom” has 10 and “Portraits of Pretence” has 11.  And on the Amazon.com site, the numbers are 8, 1, 0 and 3 respectively.  (No, I don’t know why the reviews aren’t shared across all Amazon sites – they’re the exact same books, after all.)  In short, I have a way to go before I start troubling those “you might like” lists too often.

What many readers don’t realise is that you don’t have to have bought something from Amazon to be able to review it on Amazon.  Of course you need an Amazon account before you can post reviews, but if you’ve bought one of my books in a bookshop, or direct from me, or have read a library or borrowed copy, you can still review it on Amazon.

So can I put out another plea, please?  If you have read any of my books, could you take a minute to put a short review on Amazon?  Honestly: a star rating and a single sentence will count to the total – this re-post from last year shows how simple it can be.  It really does seem that on Amazon, points mean prizes.

Sam and Dan: compare and contrast

Tags

Debbie Young, Portraits of Pretence, review, Samuel Plank

I am sorry that I have been so silent recently.  A combination of two things has kept me away from Sam.  First there was the coming into force on Monday of this week of new anti-money laundering legislation here in the UK (which has required me to update all of my “serious” day-job books, and do all sorts of other activities to spread the word).  And the second was a dental infection (I’ll spare you the details – and thanks be to everything that I don’t live in the 1820s, with their rather more rudimentary and robust approach to dental treatment) that has sapped me of energy.  But I’m coming back from the brink now, and fully expect some quality Sam time this weekend.

But thankfully my marvellous writer friend Debbie Young has stepped into the breech, and has chosen “Portraits of Pretence” as one of the pair of books in her inaugural “Recommended Weekend Reading” blog post.  In this post, she compares Sam to the policeman hero of another series of crime novels, set slightly earlier and written by the lovely Lucienne Boyce – and they have a lot in common!  For those who don’t know her, Debbie is a talented writer and a voracious reader and reviewer – it’s very well worth following her blog.  And when she praises my lovely Sam, well, what can I do but re-blog?  Many, many thanks to Debbie.

I did consider simply putting the whole blog post in (I’m quite new at this re-blogging lark) but I’d much rather you toddled over to Debbie’s blog and met her for yourself.  So here it is: Debbie Young’s blog post.

Double diamond!

Tags

Discovering Diamonds, Helen Hollick, Portraits of Pretence, review

A couple of weeks ago I shared the lovely news that “Portraits of Pretence” had been chosen for review as a “Discovered Diamond” – an accolade worth a great deal to me, as it is the opinion of fellow writers of historical fiction.  And then today I learn that it is even better than that: “Portraits” is their March Book of the Month.  This is decided by Helen Hollick, who launched the “Discovering Diamonds” website – and she really knows her historical fiction onions, so I am thrilled.  I am now entitled to use an even fancier logo on my website – look over to the left!

And my bookmarks should be arriving tomorrow, according to the parcel people – I’ll let you know.

Progress on all Planks

Tags

ACX, Amazon, audiobook, Fatal Forgery, Guy Hanson, Portraits of Pretence, review, The Man in the Canary Waistcoat, Worm in the Blossom

I once spoke to a professional author – a full-time writer – who said that one of the aspects of his job that he had not anticipated was the overlap of books.  And now I know what he meant.  At the moment I am (a) writing “Plank 5”, (b) trying to promote “Portraits of Pretence”, and (c) checking the audiobook version of “The Man in the Canary Waistcoat”.  So here’s where I am with each of these.

“Plank 5” now has a completed first chapter and outlines for another twelve chapters, and I have been doing a great deal of reading around non-conformist religions in 1828 – from the familiar Methodists and Baptists to the more evangelical and (in those days) wacky Ranters.  We’re a bit too early for spiritualism, which is a shame, as I’d love to write a séance scene!  I am also looking at epidemics, but I’m not going to tell you why…

“Portraits of Pretence” is slowly, slowly gathering more reviews, including this lovely one today on Helen Hollick’s “Discovering Diamonds” blog (“Independent reviews of the best in historical fiction”, so I’m very flattered to have made the cut).  This means that I can now proudly display this logo all over the place:

And in a review on Amazon of the same book, a Mr L Moss said that “Worm in the Blossom” had been his favourite book of 2015, so that’s something I remind myself of when I am struggling with Ranters and epidemics.

And my fabulous narrator Guy has just sent me the final chapters of the “Canary” audiobook, so I shall listen to them over the weekend and we might just be able to audio-publish next week.  After a good start, the “Fatal Forgery” audiobook sales have slowed right down, so I am hoping that Guy will still be willing to record the other Plank books (we’re on a 50/50 profit share through ACX).  And if anyone has any ideas for how to promote audiobooks, please share them – I’m struggling a bit with this one.

Out of time and patience

Tags

Alderney Literary Festival, anachronism, dialogue, Guardian, review

Regular readers may remember that last year I was lucky enough to be invited to speak at the Alderney Literary Festival.  The lovely people who run that event have kept in touch, and today they have put a little piece by me on their blog.  It is about accuracy in historical fiction, which is something of a bugbear of mine.  And this demand for accuracy includes dialogue, of course.

My husband is away at the moment, which gives me the opportunity to go to the cinema and see whatever I want.  It’s not that we differ wildly in our tastes – the last film we saw together was “Fences” – but I have rather more tolerance for costume drama than he does, and his appetite for “bang crash” action is far greater than mine.  So when I saw that Hugh Bonneville’s latest outing “Viceroy’s House” was coming this weekend (lots of costumes, very little banging or crashing), I gave a literal little squeal of joy.  And then I read a review and watched the trailer…

The review is in the Guardian, with whose star ratings I often agree, and they call it “soapy”.  Now, soapy I can tolerate, but reading in the very first sentence that Lady Mountbatten says, “Our time frame for leaving won’t work!” – well, that goes beyond the pale.  “Time frame”?  In 1947?  I think not…  According to the Online Etymology Dictionary, which I consult regularly, that phrase came in by 1964, which sounds about right.  But perhaps one clunker can be overlooked, and so I played the film’s “official trailer”, linked to in the review.  And in that we have Lady M – a serial offender, it seems – saying to her husband, “We’re giving a nation back to its people; how bad can it be?”.  “How bad can it be?”  In 1947?  Very bad, it seems.  And so I won’t be watching Hugh this weekend; if the writers cannot even hear the thud of linguistic anachronisms landing around them, how can I possibly trust their account of historical events?