Is it important to have my books available in the public library?

Evening folks,

Another monumental effort by Team GB at the Olympics today. We've won another gold medal in the last hour in the Taekwondo courtesy of Jade Jones. We also won gold in the Women's boxing and more awesome medals in the horses! Top work all round.

Tonight saw a world record in the 800 metres too as well as Usain Bolt making history by being the first man to do the double double in retaining his sprint titles. This was significant to me particularly because I had family in the stadium tonight who apparently had an amazing time.

I and others have noticed the ongoing feelgood factor up and down the country which I think has continued on from the spectacular Jubilee earlier in the year. At the moment Britain feels like a fantastic place to live.

And now onto the books. Regular readers may recall this post where I mentioned that someone I know had requested one of my books from the local library and met with some resistance. Since then, another person who works with my wife has been into their local library to request another of my books. Again they met with a little resistance although in both cases the book, I believe, has been ordered. But nobody, least of all me, is going to get rich from royalties from lending. But it's important to me as a writer to have my books as widely available as possible. I honestly feel that libraries should be actively supporting writers, especially ones local to them.

Still, it's done now and when I hear that the books are on the shelf I plan to wander in and have a look just for my own satisfaction, my own feelgood moment.

In other news, the follow up to The 24 Hour Jazz Cafe is progressing well. I have written over 42,000 words so far although I am struggling to hold onto the plot in places and some careful editing will be required when it's completed. The plan remains the same. Finish the book then put it away and publish a book from the back catalogue. Then I'm either going to publish the new book or.....

I'm not going to tell you what the other option is just yet. But it's something I've had on the back burner for about three years and the idea has never gone away. If I pursue it, I'll announce it here first.

Right, beer and pizza time until the small hours before one more day of work until the weekend.

Jessica Ennis, Mo Farah, the long jump & crumpets

Evening all,

So then, Team GB won a few epic gold medals today. Jessica Ennis will get all the headlines and rightly so, she's the best at what she does and looks stunning. But hands up how many folk had heard of Greg Rutherford before tonight? And now he's the Long Jump Olympic champion. As for Mo Farah, he's been good enough for ages, he just needed the Olympics to come round so he could prove it.

The thing is, it was all so exciting before this. I spent all day glued to the 100m qualifying, Serena winning the tennis, the rowing, the cycling. Utterly immense. Then I realised it was almost tea time and all I'd eaten all day was two toasted crumpets and a cup of tea. That's what the Olympics does, it draws you in and takes over your life.

In an attempt to link this excitement to books in some round about way, I suppose Jess Ennis is the bestseller, the Peter James, the Stephen King, Dan Brown, the EL James. Meanwhile Greg Rutherford is...me, and all the other Indie Authors who quietly go about their business, waiting for their moment to shine and hit the big time.

Of course it's all about talent, but even more important is the support to get there. In which case go and buy my books so I can be Jessica Ennis. Failing that stick yourself in front of the tele and enjoy the greatest show on earth courtesy of Great Britain.

I'm feeling humble. It won't last.

Evening gang,

I'm watching Blur via the red button on BBC Radio 2. UK readers will know exactly what I'm on about. For everyone else, I hope you've heard of a band called Blur but if not just tap the word into Itunes or Amazon Music Store. There's over twenty years of quality music waiting for you.

Blur were arguably my favourite band growing up, along with the Rolling Stones (thanks to my dad and his vinyl). Now I'm 36, their back catalogue is attached to so many memories for me.

This is a Low - New Year night out in Lancaster, eary 90s. 2 dozen of us out together, the only time it happened. A friend turned up late and unexpected, very drunk and very upset. He sang this song as we stumbled through the town.

The Universal - Morecambe Dome, saw Blur live in the mid 90s with friends, one of whom was best man at my wedding just 2 years ago. I was best man at his 3 weeks before this.

Couple this with an awesome day for Team GB at the Olympics and I'm feeling unusally proud and humble. Not like me at all.

But in short, to those that have been there with me and done all the things we've done, I'd change nothing because we're still here doing it.

And finally to the books. I don't sell millions...yet. But to those who have bought my books all round the world, thank you. If you enjoyed them, and most seem to, even better. Stick with me, let's see where we end up. In 20 years we can look back and remember how awesome it was when the Olympics were in London.

Tired of the Olympics? Try a free book!

Afternoon all.
Obviously you're not tired of the Olympics, they're awesome. Plus Team GB started winning golds today thanks to the women rowers and Bradley 'Wiggo' Wiggins.

But if you fancy losing yourself in a 5* rated crime thriller for a few hours you can download my book The 24 Hour Jazz Cafe for free from Smashwords. That's right, any format you like for nothing.

You'll need to register with the site and then use code SW52C at the checkout.

Here's the blurb: The book begins with Mitch Johnson returning to his home town where he tells his lifelong friend, Rupert Watts, that a young woman is going to be murdered. Mitch thinks that the killing will mirror that of a schoolgirl fifteen years earlier, a crime Mitch himself was suspected of committing.
With no idea when the murder will take place, or who the victim is, the friends endeavour to find the girl before she comes to harm. But they must also contend with Don Hague, a senior councillor and central figure in the dark underbelly of the town who holds Mitch responsible for the ruin of his career and his reputation in the town. The police are watching Mitch, and they are also watching Don Hague.
Who is the girl Mitch is convinced will die? How is her death linked to the schoolgirl murder? Is Don Hague, or his associates, involved? Can Mitch and Rupert convince the police to take them seriously before it’s too late to save a girl’s life?              

So to recap. Go to Smashwords, search for Jamie Sinclair, click on The 24 Hour Jazz Cafe, and use code SW52C at the checkout and it's yours on your Kindle, Sony ereader, Ipad, anything you like.

Enjoy.

Am I more successful than Michael Phelps?

The short and obvious answer is a loud and confident NO. He is, as of tonight, the most successful Olympian of all time in terms of medals won and it's a mighty achievement.

But humour me just for a moment. In terms of goals, mine is to be a published author. Done. I wanted to sell books. Done. In multiple countries? Done that too. So that's success right?

But of course we do rather need to quantify our success, to put a number on it and guage the degree of that success. So in those terms I'm something of a failure. I'm not a bestseller, I don't sell millions of books, I don't have a lucractive publishing deal with Hodder or Random House. I'm not Michael Phelps.

But to stick with the theme. I might end up being Michael Phelps. I still have time to sell more books, to become a best seller. At 36 I'm a long way from being too old whereas the most successful Olympic athlete in history is at the tale end of his glittering career. So I'll keep plugging away, putting in the hours, not giving up or being defeated and I will strive to achieve my goals. And that, folks, makes me Michael Phelps! Maybe.

One final note, and this will only mean something to UK readers. I searched for myself on the WH Smith website tonight and one of my books is listed. It was oddly satisfying to see my work being sold by such a British institution. Admittedly I have yet to sell any books through Smiths, but it felt good nonetheless.

Night folks, I think I'm going to do a book promo tomorrow to kickstart sales for August. I will decide exactly what format this will take during tomorrow and announce it after work.

London 2012 and job applications

Evening folks,

Just a quick one tonight. How utterly awesome is the BBC coverage of the Olympics? I admit some of the commentary might be a bit mundane but in terms of the way the BBC has made the events viewable it's staggering. Press the red button, all the events on live as they happen. I've been like a kid in a sweetshop flicking between Federer on the tennis, Adlington in the pool, bit of archery, bit of Gymnastics, some diving while I had a snack, then some more swimming, bit of cycling. Brilliant!

In between all this I've applied for a new job! Just submitted the forms now. It's a huge step up from what I do now but I have the skills (on paper at least) and if I don't go for it there's next to zero chance it will come up again before I get made redundant. I'll let you know how that goes.

On top of that the new book is pouring from me. 31,800 words completed now. The aim is to keep as much momentum as I can for the next 3 weeks which will be busy at work and then I have a week off so I can hammer it then.

Sold a couple of books over the weekend too, it's never enough but thanks anyway. We also found time to go see Woman in Black in the park. If you follow me on Twitter you'll know this already but it was superb, very atmospheric in the dark with the wind rustling through the trees. Plus a young lady who had too much to drink nodded off and fell off her bench to the floor. She was fine and it was hilarious. Oddly enough the lady in question saw my Tweet about it and retweeted it!

So, as you can see, it's pretty much all go and non-stop but I wouldn't have it any other way.

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!