Morning all,
Been raining again here in the north of England. I say 'again', it hasn't really stopped all year or so it seems. Officially the wettest summer in 100 years I think I read somewhere today. Perfect weather for writing books you would think.
Being back at work this week has had an impact though I've managed to write 500 words each day. The thing is I've just got a new job which will start in the next month or so and I'll have to pull my finger out a bit because it's a fairly huge promotion. This is awkward as my routine tends to be, get up and go to work, come home and sleep on couch, then stay up until middle of the night drinking ale, writing, watching (currently) the US Open tennis (though it could equally be the golf, a film or the Xbox) and then stumble into work again.
Anyway, we'll see how that pans out. On the plus side I've written 57000 words of the new book and All the fun of the Fair has been ordered by the local libraries which is very cool. Even more cool, and surprising, is that someone has bought a paperback copy of The 24 Hour Jazz Cafe from Createspace. Whoever you are, I'm very grateful and I hope you enjoy it.
The plan tomorrow is a significant lie in, then hit the supermarket and spend the rest of the day writing because on Sunday, hopefully, I'm off to Anfield to watch Liverpool play Arsenal. Clint Dempsey won't be lining up for the reds as we didn't sign him which was a surprise to all concerned. Still, I'm sure the manager has it all in hand.
Right, I'm off for a sandwich and an ale before bed. As ever, it's been a pleasure.
Showing posts with label Library. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Library. Show all posts
Saturday, 1 September 2012
Saturday, 28 July 2012
London 2012 and pink grapefruit
Afternoon everyone,
So then, how good was the opening ceremony then? Apparently 26.5 million folk stayed up to watch here in the UK. The wife and I sat pretty much mesmerised by the whole thing. I can only imagine Danny Boyle and his team will receive some sort of mention in the Queen's next honours list.
It seems that our American chums struggled to see the opening of the largest sporting event on the planet owing to NBC not showing it live. I don't know details only what I've seen on Twitter etc, but a lot of people seemed pretty unhappy that it wasnt being shown live. If it wasn't, it begs the question, what's more important than showing the opening ceremony of the Olympics?
I'm established on the couch today for a full day of olympic viewing - I am going out tonight though. Outdoor showing of Woman in Black in a local park. Hope it stays dry.
The BBC have pulled out all the stops with the coverage. They've got a fancy menu TV guide thingy where you can just click on the sport you want to watch and away you go. Epic.
The other bonus was that I discovered a tin of grapefruit in the cupboard so that became a late breakfast.
Since this is a writing blog I'd best mention the books. I've written 30,500 words of the new book so I'm still on course to have it published this year along with another from the back catalogue. My existing books are also still available on Kindle, Createspace, Smashwords, Kobo, Apple Ibook, Sony Ereader, Bibliocracy and doubtless a few more. They're all priced to sell too, except the paperbacks which are vastly over priced but look superb on a shelf.
Oh, one last thing. An associate of mine went to the local library yesterday and asked if they could order in a copy of one of my books. He was, I believe, armed with the necessary ISBN info. From what I can gather they seemed to suspect that he was, in fact, me trying to abuse the library and use them as some sort of self-promotion tool. I have to admit to being a bit miffed. After all, I thought libraries would order in pretty much any book if a customer asked for it. Add to that the fact that I'm local and it's win win all round. If I end up selling millions all of a sudden they'd have "local author" posters all over the bloody place to drag people in. Poor form!!
Now stop reading this and watch some Olympics!
So then, how good was the opening ceremony then? Apparently 26.5 million folk stayed up to watch here in the UK. The wife and I sat pretty much mesmerised by the whole thing. I can only imagine Danny Boyle and his team will receive some sort of mention in the Queen's next honours list.
It seems that our American chums struggled to see the opening of the largest sporting event on the planet owing to NBC not showing it live. I don't know details only what I've seen on Twitter etc, but a lot of people seemed pretty unhappy that it wasnt being shown live. If it wasn't, it begs the question, what's more important than showing the opening ceremony of the Olympics?
I'm established on the couch today for a full day of olympic viewing - I am going out tonight though. Outdoor showing of Woman in Black in a local park. Hope it stays dry.
The BBC have pulled out all the stops with the coverage. They've got a fancy menu TV guide thingy where you can just click on the sport you want to watch and away you go. Epic.
The other bonus was that I discovered a tin of grapefruit in the cupboard so that became a late breakfast.
Since this is a writing blog I'd best mention the books. I've written 30,500 words of the new book so I'm still on course to have it published this year along with another from the back catalogue. My existing books are also still available on Kindle, Createspace, Smashwords, Kobo, Apple Ibook, Sony Ereader, Bibliocracy and doubtless a few more. They're all priced to sell too, except the paperbacks which are vastly over priced but look superb on a shelf.
Oh, one last thing. An associate of mine went to the local library yesterday and asked if they could order in a copy of one of my books. He was, I believe, armed with the necessary ISBN info. From what I can gather they seemed to suspect that he was, in fact, me trying to abuse the library and use them as some sort of self-promotion tool. I have to admit to being a bit miffed. After all, I thought libraries would order in pretty much any book if a customer asked for it. Add to that the fact that I'm local and it's win win all round. If I end up selling millions all of a sudden they'd have "local author" posters all over the bloody place to drag people in. Poor form!!
Now stop reading this and watch some Olympics!
Saturday, 11 February 2012
Email from Bang Publishing
Afternoon loyal reader,
I received an email from Bang today. Sadly it was just an update to say they were still reading my manuscript but that they would be in touch. Stil, at least they bothered to let me know and it's better than a rejection.
In other news I'm still awaiting a response of any kind from Aitken Alexander with regard to the 29 pages of finely crafted prose I sent to them in early January.
Meawhile sales remain steady at just over 1 copy per day despite the fact that I haven't done any promo since January 21st. The reason for the lack of promo is that I'm still hard at work editing a novel from the back catalogue which I hope to launch in the next week or so. I've actually made the effort to draft a bit of a marketing plan for this one so hopefully it will mean bigger initial sales of all three books.
Finally, just for the sake of sharing, I bought a huge hardback copy of the collected works of Jane Austen which I'm going to display in my library as a pretentious talking point. I may even leave it open at a random page when visitors come, just for the sake of it. What a ponce they all cried!
Anyway, that's it for now. Just finished reading Peter James latest effort and very good it was too. Now I'm off to paint a wall Lilac.
Thanks for stopping by.
I received an email from Bang today. Sadly it was just an update to say they were still reading my manuscript but that they would be in touch. Stil, at least they bothered to let me know and it's better than a rejection.
In other news I'm still awaiting a response of any kind from Aitken Alexander with regard to the 29 pages of finely crafted prose I sent to them in early January.
Meawhile sales remain steady at just over 1 copy per day despite the fact that I haven't done any promo since January 21st. The reason for the lack of promo is that I'm still hard at work editing a novel from the back catalogue which I hope to launch in the next week or so. I've actually made the effort to draft a bit of a marketing plan for this one so hopefully it will mean bigger initial sales of all three books.
Finally, just for the sake of sharing, I bought a huge hardback copy of the collected works of Jane Austen which I'm going to display in my library as a pretentious talking point. I may even leave it open at a random page when visitors come, just for the sake of it. What a ponce they all cried!
Anyway, that's it for now. Just finished reading Peter James latest effort and very good it was too. Now I'm off to paint a wall Lilac.
Thanks for stopping by.
Friday, 14 October 2011
The Battle of the Bookshelves
Hello again. Welcome along.
If you've read any of my previous posts my passion for books, real ones as opposed to our new electronic chums, should be obvious. So you can imagine my lack of delight when I read this article on the BBC website about plans to close hundreds of libraries across the UK.
It's a tale of cut backs, something we're all famliar with at the moment. The government has cut budgets in all sorts, not least the public sector in which I am employed. Closing libraries is seen by councils as a way to cut back expenditure in the wake of these budget cuts.
Don't get me wrong, I'm all in favour of increasing efficiency and saving money. But pick something else to close! I realise everyone has an opinion. If it was announced that they were going to close schools, there would likely be folk marching in the streets. Close a hospital? Can't do that, bodies in the streets. So I see that libraries are an easy option. But they're an important part of local communities and offer so much more than just a place from which to borrow a book.
Anyway, have a read of the article, then go to your local library and borrow a book, use their computers, join their bookclub, borrow a cd or just sit in the corner reading the paper. But use the library, before they're all gone.
If you've read any of my previous posts my passion for books, real ones as opposed to our new electronic chums, should be obvious. So you can imagine my lack of delight when I read this article on the BBC website about plans to close hundreds of libraries across the UK.
It's a tale of cut backs, something we're all famliar with at the moment. The government has cut budgets in all sorts, not least the public sector in which I am employed. Closing libraries is seen by councils as a way to cut back expenditure in the wake of these budget cuts.
Don't get me wrong, I'm all in favour of increasing efficiency and saving money. But pick something else to close! I realise everyone has an opinion. If it was announced that they were going to close schools, there would likely be folk marching in the streets. Close a hospital? Can't do that, bodies in the streets. So I see that libraries are an easy option. But they're an important part of local communities and offer so much more than just a place from which to borrow a book.
Anyway, have a read of the article, then go to your local library and borrow a book, use their computers, join their bookclub, borrow a cd or just sit in the corner reading the paper. But use the library, before they're all gone.
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