HOW TO SELL A BOOK YOU DON'T ACTUALLY HAVE YET...

OR DIARY OF A NIGHTMARE...

Feb/March 2005
I am in the middle of marathon training. It's cold and wet, and to keep my spirits up I post merry little accounts of my doings to my very good writing friends on one of my e-groups. Some of the accounts seem to get the thumbs up, particularly one I write (in what I hope is an amusing vein) about what you do when you're out running and need the loo...

It occurs to me (ever one to spot a commercial opportunity) that maybe I should write up some of these doings and put them in a book. The trouble is most of them are posted online, I haven't got time to save them all, and I have a marathon to run... The idea goes on hold...

May 2005
The marathon's over, and it feels like there's a big hole in my life. The euphoria of crossing the line has diminished, I still ache everywhere, and running has kind of lost its appeal. But having a good response from people I've emailed my account of my marathon day too, I decide that this book thing might be a goer. Added to which over the last couple of years, I have been watching in envy and awe, several people with no previous publishing knowledge self-publishing their books and making a success of it. Hell, I've worked in publishing for seventeen years, if they can do it, surely, so can I?

June 2005
By dint of trawling through emails I've sent in the last year (a laborious process, and I'm only up to August) I've cobbled together enough background to start the book. I'm going to call it Running on Empty, because I was most of the time. My idea is to write a light-hearted account of my experiences, to try and inspire other wannabes. As a serial non-runner before all this nonsense started, I genuinely feel if I can run a marathon, anyone can...

I also want to donate a percentage of any profits to The Children's Trust. They are such a wonderful charity and their support for my efforts has been top notch.

July 2005
I've written a synopsis and three sample chapters. My agent doesn't normally deal with this kind of material so she suggests a few small independent publishers to send it to. I do and get nowhere. The summer holidays are coming up, my work time is limited, perhaps it's no good? I put the idea on hold...

A rather fatal mistake...

October-December 2005
My friend Taryn has written a book about her battle with bowel cancer, entitled A November to Remember. I've been an editor long enough to know when I've hit gold dust. So I offer to help self publish through a company I've heard of, who use Print on Demand technology to produce books. It's an incredibly cheap and effective way of getting something out there.

Taryn's book takes over for a while, but seeing how easy it is to produce a book POD has given me the confidence to have a go at the marathon book again. My agent meanwhile has got another publisher to send it to, so I promise to revise the sample chapters in the New Year. My aim would be to get a book out for next year's marathon. And like Mr Incredible, I still have time ... just.


January 2006
I've nearly finished editing Taryn's book, and in a lull, I go haring off on my marathon account. Thanks to my computer crashing and dying in the autumn I have lost ALL my emails from the previous year, and AOL have no way of getting them back. They've vanished - pouf! - into the ether. Bugger. I spend about a week trawling through the home page of my egroups and manage to get everything back eventually. Phew! Now I have something to work on.

Having very little time, I send my agent the sample chapters, but my aim is to finish the whole thing and get to work on finishing the damned thing. Interspersed with all of this of course is my normal work, plus the usual mayhem of looking after the kids, and dealing with afterschool clubs. I so long for days when I can work 9-5, but I expect I'll miss all this when I get there...


February 2006
I manage to finish the marathon book, and send it to my agent, who really likes it. She sends it to a publisher, but in a way I wish that I could go hell for leather with the self publishing malarkey. Taryn and I have nearly finished her book. Although we keep finding errors and things are always changing, so there are days when I think we'll never put it to bed...


March 2006
Marathon book on hold as agent hasn't heard from publisher. I am getting twitchy. London Marathon coming up very soon, and if the publisher take it on there is no way that it will be out in time. If they don't take it on, there is no way I can get it out in time... It's a lose lose situation.

On a more heartening note, I send the book to my brother in South Africa and he writes me a cheery email to say how much he enjoyed it. I have shown bits to various friends - lots of them are mentioned in it, and I don't want to offend anyone - and so far the responses have been positive.

After a few hiccups, Taryn finally has a book. It's taken just under six months to get from ms to final copies - which given that we have nine kids between us, isn't bad going. And now I know I can do it for the marathon book, if need be.

My agent emails to say the publishers aren't interested. Damn and double damn. With less then a month to the marathon, I have no chance of getting this thing out in time. Still, I think, I'll give it a go and see what happens...

So I start to turn my manuscript into a book. I know I should show Dave - he's in it, and he also has a very clear critical eye - but showing your written work to your spouse is the literary equivalent of having driving lessons with them. It is such a no no...

April 2006
Week One
It is the Easter holidays, and Dave has a week off. One day I am cooking tea and I hear John Inverdale on Radio 2's Drivetime talking about the London Marathon and what tunes people run to. In my last few weeks of training it was Show me the Way to Amarillo (as the kids loved it) and Black Horse on a Cherry Tree. I fire off an email about my book, mention my blog, and when it doesn't get read out think nothing more of it.

The next day we go to Legoland with some friends. We don't get back till gone seven, but when we do it is to gobsmacking news. There are two messages on the answerphone. John Inverdale has read out my email, mentioned my book and my blog! Oo-er missus. The only problem is, I don't actually have a book....

I send John another email to say that I haven't yet got books, but am working on it. I post a message on my blog to let people know the situation. And then I email Taryn. She has done a website for A November to Remember. How did she do it? Taryn gives me the details and I set about buying a domain and sorting out a website. Meanwhile John Inverdale generously gives me another plug - which is fabulous. But oh, the frustration of having this much free publicity and nothing to sell!

On Good Friday, Dave spends the morning watching King Kong with kids, while I construct a website. Luckily it isn't too hard. I post the details on my blog, hastily cobble together a top tunes to run to competition and sit back. I've had a couple of messages on my blog and twenty-two extra hits, so somebody is out there...

Late on Friday evening I get a message from someone who kindly wants to post my details on his runner's group website, The Wesham Road Runners. Woo! The power of the internet. This makes me think about other runner's forums. So I scour the net, posting messages wherever I can, mentioning the book, my website, my competition...

The response is a slow steady trickle of people emailing me with their top tunes to run to. My favourite is Highway to Hell.

WeekTwo
The kids are back at school, all except Stephanie - her nursery have inconveniently taken a month's holiday. Not only that, when she does go back it's mid week, followed by a bank holiday, so it's going to be the second week in May before I get some serious work in.

Still, by dint of ignoring all my other work I am ploughing through the proofs. I've got my designer mate working on a cover, so things are progressing. I take some extracts from the book and the week before the marathon email anyone and everyone I can think of. The person I'm really after is Lorraine Kelly - she ran the marathon last year and was refreshingly honest about how hard it was. For a plodder like me, it was dispiriting to read about celeb after celeb who was posting superfast times.

But it's hard being a nobody, running a company that no one has heard of, as really, why would anyone look at you? On the other hand, I've been in this business long enough to know that word of mouth is what sells unknown books. So if I can just get it going by increasing chatter on the running forums I've been on (I am much helped here by a group called Runner's Forum who kindly let me publish extracts from the book), maybe I can generate some hype all on my own. The internet is without a doubt a fantastic tool for a fledgling publisher - go to the right places and information can be spread, I hope like wildfire...

Week Three
The marathon comes and goes - I watch it feeling immensely jealous I'm not there, but enjoying showing the children where I ran last year. The following week I pound the forums again, email all the running mags, the London Marathon team... You name it, I do it. I'm thrilled to get a response from Sir Steve Redgrave's office. He is such a hero. Wish I had been running it this year, as he'd have crossed the line just after me...

Week Four
Meanwhile Dave has finally got round to reading the book. I know this is a mistake when I come back to find him having only got to page 50 and shaking his head despairingly. I know he's trying to help, but he does this to me when we're playing Scrabble. As he is a scientist and I am an artist, it gives him great pleasure to get one over me in the words department. I try to point out to him that every book has typos in, that's why you need another eye...

The resulting row means he doesn't look at it again for another week - as I am waiting to hear from The Children's Trust I can't do anything till then anyway. So he gets a week's grace...

May 2006

Week One
I am beginning to get twitchy again. Rob has produced a wonderful cover, but I can't do anything with it till the insides are sorted. Eventually, after much headshaking (Dave), much lipbiting (me - ok I'll admit I'm an oversensitive little flower), he gives it the go-ahead and I have two days to check and correct and check again... Then it's off to the print shop to get a pdf file, go the printer's website and upload my file. Rob has sent me a disk with the cover on, but I don't have Quark so can't open it. So I send it to the company I am using, who send it on to their parent company in the States. This turns out to be a big big mistake...

I decide I should have a book launch, and ring Ottaker's up. They are very supportive of local authors, so one Saturday I pop in with the youngest two offspring (who behave appallingly) and organise a launch for 8 June. I am confident we'll have books by then.

Week Two
With a sigh of relief, I turn my attention away from the marathon back to the romantic novel I have been writing for the past two years. It's set around some allotments, and I am dying to write a scene where the hero and heroine part company in what I hope will be an emotionally turbulent scene. One of them is going to throw the engagement ring the hero had been planning to give her into an allotment from whence it will emerge sitting on a leaf in Spring, ready for them to find for the denoument scene when they make up (lest you think that too fanciful, Dave lost his wedding ring just after we were married in a similar way). The scene in the best tradition of nineteenth century fiction will take place in the pouring rain (the weather rather unsubtly reflecting the emotion of the characters. Well if George Eliot can do it, why can't I?)

May is a busy month for us with two birthdays, and a Holy Communion to organise, so I take my eye off the ball for a bit, till I spot a digital print shop on the way back from church. Great, I'll pop in there and sort out invites and posters for the launch.

By the middle of the month I am getting slightly anxious that nothing much seems to be happening. My account still says I am waiting for materials. I am? What happened to the disk I sent? I start chasing and get nowhere. Eventually on the 17th I discover that the disk has disappeared. After much toing and froing I manage to get Rob to upload the cover onto the website. I wish I'd done that in the first place. If there is a problem with the proof, as there no doubt will be, I am running out of time to correct it and get it back so the books will be ready for printing. And we're away for half term, the week before the launch party...

My contact at the printers assures me all will be well, so I am shutting my eyes, taking a deep breath and hoping for the best.

Week Three
An RNA contact Kate Allan has recently invited me to her online launch party. I couldn't make it, but it gets me thinking. In order to reach all those runners worldwide, an online launch party might be just the ticket. So I email Kate and ask if she minds me pinching her idea, and how she did it. She is very helpful, so I set up a blog, and spend a happy evening downloading pictures, and trying to work out what should go on the damned thing, while Dave sits downstairs cursing at Arsenal's misfortune.

The blog now set up, all I need is a book, a means of taking money off people, and then we're away... I think...

Week Four
After all the hiccups, a proof is finally on it's way to me. I have been handing out invites like billy-oh. Am absolutely amazed at how supportive people are. Also how what to me is a rather mundane working environment seems much more glamorous to other people. Will you sign my book they keep saying. Of course, that's the point, but er, I am really a nobody! Hopefully I can get lots of people into Ottaker's, who have also been immensely supportive.

I also send out invites to people I don't see regularly, try to drum up some press interest, set up a paypal account and a PO box address, so I can handle orders myself. Is there anything else I should be doing? Probably - this is where I miss working in a company, it would be nice to have someone to bounce ideas off.

On the other hand, for the first time since I've been freelance, I've been in total control of a project from start to finish.

I'm having a ball...

23 May
Stop press! A month to the day since the London Marathon, and I have a copy of my book. Wooo! The wonders of digital print. There are the inevitable (minor) corrections - I hope I've got them all - and I make them, rush down to the print shop before the school run, and get back in time to upload them onto the website. Then I dash off to school to proudly show off my baby, before taking the kids to their swimming lessons. While I'm there I hand out four more invitations - one to a mum from Steph's nursery who's thinking of running the marathon next year...

So by Friday I should be able to press the go button, which is just a bit exciting.

My only problem now is finding someone kind enough to accept 200 books for me, whilst I'm away...

June 2006

If only life were that simple.

We duly trot off to Germany on holiday with two grannies and four children, plus my laptop. I cunningly buy a set of adaptors, some of which are supposed to work out there, but of course, they don't... Three days into our holiday I am still struggling with it. I look for internet cafes in vain - the town we are staying with being somewhat of a backwater, and as we are here to visit my mil's aged rellies time being somewhat short. I am slightly amused the day we go to the place where my mil grew up, a beautiful mediaeval town en route to Berlin, and ask at the cafe we are in if there is an internet cafe there. We are the only cafe in Gardelegen I am assured firmly. Hmm. I thought the Wall came down fifteen years ago... but evidently the world wide web hasn't quite got here yet.

In the end in desperation I ring up the company (in hindsight I should have done that on Monday) to discover that NOTHING has happened. As we are leaving Gardelegen and the children are all causing mayhem in the car I get a phone call to say that there is a problem with my revised proof. Cue F***** F*** Hugh Grant moment - why didn't they tell me last week????? Could you upload it again? they ask. Er, no I'm in Germany. We'll have to charge you to change it. Just DO IT!!! I am by now screaming down the phone, AND send me my books!!!

Friday morning while in an old people's nursing home visiting mil's sister, I ring to check progress and am told that a proof will be generated by the end of the day. Please ring me back and confirm I say(given that my mobile is eating pounds faster then I can breathe) - needless to say no phone call came...

We got back on the Saturday and I check online - my proof has been generated but my order is pending. I can feel the blood pressure rising. Should I cancel the launch party? I have no idea what to do. It's about eight years since I've had this kind of pressure with a deadline. Whose idea was it to self publish again?

By Sunday I have calmed down a bit. Getting stressed isn't going to change anything. I have given out so many invites to the party I have no idea who's coming. I can't cancel now. Maybe I should hold a bookless launch party and just take orders - it would be a novel approach... And as my sister points out, rather postmodern.

Three days to go...
On Monday I ring up and am promised it will be sorted...

I have also cocked up on the PO Box front. You wouldn't believe how long it takes - I sent all the stuff off only to get it returned as I had misread the bit on the form that says you need to submit bills that are less then three months old to prove your address.

Less then three days to go and I don't have books, or any means of taking orders.

I think I may be grey by the end of the week...

Two days to go...

Phew! I think... I've spoken to the printers and they have promised books will be despatche dto me tomorrow night. I am shutting my eyes and holding my breath. When I wake up it will be Thursday morning and I will have my books.

Am now trying to sort out temporary PO box with Mail Box Etc. It is three times the price of the PO version, but I should get it sorted today instead of sometime never.

Nearly forgot that had to take littlies to a hospital appointment, so day now severely curtailed. Have emailed all the running forums I am on to remind them of the launch party. Checked my blog and I have had an extra 200 hits in the last week. Wow. And 32 hits at the party blog, even though launch party not open yet.

Trying to work out a mailing list of people I think should receive a copy.

Books also need to go out the lovely people at Freckleton who are running a half marathon on June 18 and have been very supportive. And I need to sort out order forms to go up there too.

Am sure there's loads I've forgotten, but the good news is that my book is finally up at Amazon. Wooohoo!!! Now that's a great feeling. From ms to finished book in around seven weeks. Infinitely more stressful then running the marathon, but hurrah for digital print!

One day to go...

The morning passes in a flurry of activity chasing up the local press, who seem interested but haven't come up with anything concrete yet. Dave and I are shattered as for the previous two nights the local authorities have seen fit to dig up our road, so we have been kept awake till two by lorries reversing up and down the road. They seem to have the knack of putting on the reversing beeps just as you drift off to sleep...

I wait till late morning to chase the books and am told the good news they will be leaving at midday... To my amazement and relief they actually arrive at 1.30. Thank the lord. Now I can sit back and relax.

That is, until I realise that I still have a speech to write, need to buy the drinks and nibblesI've forgotten that it's mil's birthday, and I'm taking her out for lunch... Hmm, once again I'm going to be running on empty...