A few years ago, I published a post called 7 Questions for a Self-Published Author. This week I decided to update it and here it is, thinly disguised as 8 Questions for a Self-Published Author.
Question 1:
What made you want to write a novel?
I’ve always been a writer, even as a school kid I was writing stories and screenplays. I used to write scripts and do all the casting. Not sure whether Steve McQueen would have appreciated the roles I was planning for him though.
Later on when I was in my 20s I tried to move away from all the sci-fi and espionage stuff I was writing and write about something more personal to me, something that I had a personal connection with so I started writing about life working on the buses, which is what I was doing at the time.
I wrote about working as a bus conductor and driver and jotted down my observations about the people I met and carried on my bus. Then there were other stories about my personal life, drinking in pubs, chatting up girls in nightclubs, listening to music and so on. Later I realised I could link all this stuff together even though it was just a series of essays and make it into a short novel which is what I did. The process involved rewriting my essays to fit in with the story but that was fairly easy as the story was actually a fictionalised version of my own younger life.
Question 2
How did you go about publishing the finished book?
Floating in Space was turned down by three publishers. That was of course disappointing but rejections are par for the course for any writer. Some time ago I wrote a blog post about books rejected by publishers and I found out that The Day of the Jackal was rejected 4 times, Gone with the Wind 38 times and The Time Traveller’s Wife 25 times. Publishers are only human of course but these days writers don’t need them, we can just publish online, just like I did using Amazon.
The most famous book to come from online publishing is probably 50 Shades of Grey which was first posted online as a story called Master of the Universe, on a fan-fiction website and later on the author’s own website.
Question 3
Tell me about the problems of marketing and getting your book noticed by the public.
Well, that is the hard part, writing a book was easy in comparison!
Building up a presence on Twitter, Facebook and YouTube was a gradual process and the same is also true for my blog on WordPress which I started really just to promote the book. I started off with essays about how I wrote the book and videos of me talking about the book and so on.
I read somewhere that over 5000 books are published every day on Amazon, an incredible figure, so how can anyone compete with that? Well, just by getting out onto social media and plugging away with tweets, new blog posts, videos and so on.
Question 4
Tell me about your website and your blog.
Well, my website was originally created just to promote my book and get my message out there to potential readers but it’s also a challenge, a writing challenge. My big problem is that I’m lazy and I need a big push to get me writing so having a deadline, 10:00am on a Saturday morning, is something that gets me motivated as a writer. I know that I have to write something by then.
That deadline actually makes me feel like a sort of writing professional as I’m always working towards it, trying to get something ready to post for my readers. I do feel really pleased when I have no idea what to write about but suddenly on a Friday afternoon I’ll settle down with my laptop and write a really good post.
The crazy thing is that the same problems that apply to my books also apply to my blog. Who has heard about the blog? Who will read the posts? I have to promote my blog as much as I promote my books and even when my posts get attention, does that convert to book sales? Not necessarily! I use social media a lot but I’m not sure I even understand it. Over on X (formerly Twitter) I have over 6000 followers and if all those followers bought copies of my books I’d be very happy, but do they? No. Why not? Well a large majority of those followers are writers and authors themselves who like to connect with other writers and authors. Ok that’s good but what I need are more readers than writers.
Question 5
What sort of posts will we find on your blog?
Generally, I try to write stuff that is similar to my book and short stories, little bits of fluff, anecdotes with a funny twist, things like that. The idea is that if people like the blogs they should like my book, Floating in Space, which is written in a similar style. A typical blog post and one of my favourites, is the one about hoodies (Hoodies and a Shaggy Dog Story) and an incident where an old lady’s handbag was snatched. Another favourite was called the Cat Wars and was about a crazy situation that built up when I was looking after my neighbour’s cat.
The only problem now is that I’m running out of anecdotes but I still manage to write about two other favourite themes, second-hand books and classic films.
Question 6
What about video, do you use video in your blogs and marketing?
Any internet post on social media performs better with images, a 37% percent increase in engagement and even more so with video.
Here are a few stats:
100 million hours of video are watched each day on Facebook.
500 million people watch Facebook videos every day.
Facebook videos receive 135% more organic reach on average than a photo.
Two thirds of content on Instagram is now video as opposed to pictures but video has to be snappy. If viewers are not hooked in the first few seconds, they just click away from your video to something more interesting.
I use video on my website to try and engage readers and all my adverts, because I do use advertising every now and then, are all video based.
A lot of years ago, in the 1990’s I really wanted to get into TV and video and I went on a video production course at the WFA media centre in Manchester. Subsequently, I made a few attempts to make some things for TV, all of which ended in failure but as a result I do have a bit of technical knowledge with video editing and production which has helped me a lot.
Luckily, technology today makes it pretty easy to create simple videos and I use them a lot in my blog posts.
Question 7
What are your plans for the future regarding writing and blogging?
Well, more of the same really. I’ve begun to work on a follow up novel to Floating in Space but a novel is hard work and I sometimes wonder if I’m up to the task. Even my latest book, Timeline, which is just a collection of stories and blog posts was pretty hard work. The big problem is just me, being motivated and just getting myself geared up to work and write. Writing short stories is much more enjoyable and I’m really pleased at how my stories have turned out. A few are available for readers to download and enjoy, just click on the download link above.
Question 8
Tell me about your other books
I mentioned above about my short stories and I put together a collection of those in my book Timeline. The title story is set in the present day but in a Germany which was victorious in World War II and there are another 10 stories in the book. Also included are some of my favourite blog posts and a little of my poetry. Talking of poetry, I have also published a collection of poems titled A Warrior of Words. Over on my YouTube page there are a mix of various video types and some time ago I decided to put all my poetry readings onto a separate channel. Click here to watch my poetry videos.
Click the links at the top of the page to read about Floating in Space, A Warrior of Words and Timeline. All are available from Amazon.
Letters from an Unknown Author! 