Today's The Day!

 Yey! Finally, it’s arrived! Today is the publication day for my debut novel.

 

I’ve been writing for many years now as long term readers of this blog will know, and although I’ve had some success with short stories, that elusive book deal has always been, well, elusive.

 

When I sent Things They Never Said to Choc Lit, I felt as though it was my last chance. I’d decided that if Choc Lit didn’t want it, then I would publish it myself. I had faith in my book and I was determined to see it published one way or another.

 

But to my delight, Choc Lit offered me a 3 book deal and the time in between has been a roller-coaster ride. 

 

First came the edits which initially scared the heebie-jeebies out of me. The extent of work required was staggering especially as it was suggested that a suitable turnaround time would be two weeks. At the time I was due to go on holiday in two weeks’ time, and what with work and family commitments, I wondered if I would be able to do it time. But I did and as I worked through the edits I felt I was making it into a much better book.

 

Two more rounds of edits, each one easier than the last and the book was finally finished. 

 

The next excitement was receiving the book cover which I was delighted with. 

 

The book became available on Amazon on pre-order and I began to grow increasingly nervous as people I know said they couldn’t wait to read it. Was it any good? Would they enjoy it?

 

And then last Friday I received the audio files for the audible version. I downloaded them and with both eagerness and trepidation began to listen. I couldn’t believe my ears. The actress had brought my book completely to life. For the first time the characters who had been living in my head for some many years sounded like real people. And as I listened, I realised that all that time spent editing had been well worth the work. I won’t deny I shed a tear or two then.

Yesterday I received this.

 

 

 

And today is publication day. It's a moment I've bee waiting for, for years. I can't believe it's actually happening.

Things They Never Said is available on Amazon on Kindle, Audible and paperback. At the moment it's on offer on Kindle at an introductory price of 99 pence,

Into the Groove

Well now, the suitcases are all unpacked and put away, clothes washed and ironed and I’ve spent the week trying to catch up on the things I should have been doing whilst I was lying in the sun.

Before I go away I always think that I’ve done everything I can to make my homecoming as smooth as possible but I always seem to be on the back foot playing catch up.  It doesn’t help that we have a lot of social / family commitments this month so I’m trying to get my head round what needs to be done.  Still, I’d rather be busy than bored.

And despite all this I’m still trying to hang onto the holiday vibe.

As usual we stayed at an all-inclusive hotel.  One of these days, when the boys are older, I dream of staying in a remote villa with complete peace and quiet, but I know if we tried that now the boys would be complaining within five minutes that there is nothing to do.

Here at least there are plenty of other children for them to play with and all sorts of facilities and activities to keep them occupied and entertained.  The complex was fairly small so now that the boys are older, we can give them some independence, but it was good to still be able to keep an eye on them.

I’m afraid we’re not very adventurous on holiday.  For a long time now my husband has been working seven days a week, most weeks and he just needed a break.  As long as the sun is there he’s happy to lie by the pool working hard on his tan, and I’m equally happy to read and write.

For this my Kindle is a godsend as I am not limited to the amount of books I can take with me and can pick and choose what I want to read whilst I am away.  Also, I send my own writing to my Kindle and this holiday I reviewed the first draft of a novel I have written and plotted out what needs to be changed or added.  I love seeing my writing on the Kindle, it feels as though it is “proper” writing, and I was pleased that there were a lot of things I really liked about the novel.

It is set in Chester both in the present day and during World War II.  To have written it to this stage I have already done quite a bit of research, both about the war in general and more specifically about life in Chester during the war.  Now it’s time to delve a bit deeper and so I’m looking forward to going to the Records Office to get down to the finer details.  In the meantime there is plenty I can edit in the sections which cover the present day. 

I have come back with renewed enthusiasm to start work on this and just hope I can maintain that enthusiasm now that I’m faced with the nitty-gritty of real life.

Bad, Bad Blogger

I've been meaning to post for a while now - honest guv! But of course the longer you leave it, the more there is to write, and the longer it will take, so I kept putting it off!

 

So, what have I been up to?  Well for a start we went away for half term - yeh!  Ten days in Lanzarote.  It was quite a small all-inclusive complex in Costa Teguise, which meant the boys could have a bit more independence, make new friends, and I could read - and yes, write!

 

I took my trusty Kindle with me, which has been collecting books and free downloads for a while now, and I managed to spend some time idyling in the minds of my favourite authors, while lying in the sun - in October - what more can you ask for? We certainly needed the break I can tell you.

But now it seems like it was a long time ago - even if it was only a few weeks ago - but I've been a busy bunny since I've been back.

 

Of course there has been the usual post holiday washing and ironing - yuck - although ironing does give me a chance to catch up on all the TV programmes I've recorded - the freeview box was nearly full (ouch).  We also had a 31 October deadline for applying for a high school for my eldest - it was a bit of tricky dilemma.

 

I've also done a few short story courses recently - one online and one in Leeds last weekend, more of that later, I've done some freelance work and I've signed up for NaNoWriMo.

 

Readers of this blog will know that I've completed NaNo twice, the challenge to write 50,000 words in the month of November. I didn't do it last year and I really missed it, so I decided to go for it this year, even though I had so much on before and during this month.

Well, I started off really badly, in fact I didn't even start until 3rd November, and I've been playing catch up ever since. There have been days when I haven't been able to write at all and days when I've written a lot, but despite that I was still behind. Yesterday, though, I managed to catch up. The stats on the website are brilliant, and I have to admit to becoming a little obsessed with them. When you update your word count, it averages your daily word count, estimates how many words you will have to write each day to finish on time, what day you will finish if you continue writing at the current speed - I've gone from 6 December to 29 November yeh! And there's even a graph showing where you are and where you need to be! Oh I love it. My aim was to hit the line on the graph and yesterday I did it! I'm now at 28,700 words and one the homeward run, trouble is I'm running out of plot. 30,000 - 40,000 are always the hardest to write so I'll have to hope I come up with some inspiration, otherwise I'll be writing complete nonsense! Who's says I'm not anway.

So, in a nutshell, that's what I've been up to lately. And now that I'm catching up a bit, I'm hoping to be able to blog a bit more frequently - I also need to catch up on the blogs I haven't had chance to read yet as well!

I don't know if any of you remember, but before I went away I found a cat in the road. In the dark it looked as though the cat had had a injury behind it's ear and by the way it was behaving it was obviously not quite right. It turned out that the thing behind the ear was a massive tumour - poor thing. A note that I put up in the local post office, managed to locate the owner, but when they contacted the vet, they decided that the poor thing was too ill to go on and so she was put to sleep. I was saddened to think that the poor little thing is no more, but can only console myself that she is no longer in pain. And it was a much more dignified ending than being hit by a car.

On that note I'll go now, but I'm hoping to be back soon. Watch this space!

Linda

Customer Service

In a post in November I wrote about how much companies put pressure on us poor, feeble consumers to buy.  But have you noticed that a lot of companies, while quite happy to take our money, aren’t quite as amenable when things go wrong?

In the past I have taken out extended warranties when I have purchased electronic goods – especially for the children – and this has helped to lesson the burden on replacement.  My oldest son cracked the screen of his DS and it was replaced and last year my youngest son’s DS also broke.  As DS’s had been discontinued, we were given a full refund of the purchase and put it towards a DSI. 

At that point I was keen to take out a new protection on the DSI but was horrified that the cost of this was nearly half the cost of the gadget itself. Youngest son was promptly told to look after it because there was no more where that came from.

What is annoying is when things go wrong through no fault of your own (grumpy old woman coming on – things aren't made like they used to be) and you get the reaction that you must have done something wrong.   I really hate it when that happens.

The other week my Kindle screen froze.  This has happened before, so I knew what to do.   Slide across the refresh switch and hold for twenty seconds and the Kindle reboots.  So I did and the screen went completely blank.   I did it again. Nothing.  After several repeated attempts I still had a blank screen.  Although I thought it was fully charged I plugged it into the mains but still nothing.

With a horrible feeling of foreboding I emailed the helpline at Amazon and received an automated email to say that my query would be dealt with within 12 hours.  To be honest I was quite pleased with this. When making enquiries complaints by email before, the timescale has been anything from 3 – 7 days.

Within an hour a response came advising me to call on the freephone number which I promptly did.  A lovely American lady answered (at which point I was rather glad that it was a freephone number). She advised me to slide across the refresh switch and hold it while she took my details. After about 1 minute (not 20 secs) she told me to let go and lo and behold the Kindle rebooted itself.

I felt a bit foolish but the lady was very nice.  So thank you Amazon for proving to me that good customer service is not a thing of the past. 

And if your Kindle freezes and 20 secs doesn’t do the trick.  Try holding the refresh switch down for a lot longer. You never know it might work for you too.

Too Much Clutter

Adverts are everywhere, exhorting the values of the next must have gadget. Items which will revolutionise our lives and make us wonder how you we lived without them.   Methods of payment are all too easy too – just one click and it will be on its way. So is it any wonder that we live in a “must have” society?

One of my resolutions this year was to de-clutter my house.   Well, I started but I have nowhere near finished, and over the year have probably accumulated more clutter than I have managed to dump / recycle / give away to charity.

I’m not a shoe or a handbag fiend (although on recent review of these items I do seem to have rather a lot) but my major shopping weaknesses are books and notebooks.   This year I have made a demonstrable effort curtail my notebook habit and despite the odd slip have been moderately successful.   I’ve even tried to resist the temptation to pick up a paperback (or two) whenever I’m doing the weekly food shop or happen to stray into The Works.  I still look but I try not to touch. So I should be feeling moderately pleased with myself.  But I fear that this is just an exercise in self-delusion.  

Despite diligent attention, the “to be read” pile has not depleted, in fact, it’s beginning to resemble the Leaning Tower of Pisa, and I’m expecting an imminent avalanche.  How come?  Well, it’s partly thanks to lots of lovely family and friends who know how much I love to read and who insist on lending recommended books to me – yes I do love them, but please can you just hang on to them for a while to give me a chance to catch up?  It’s also due to the fact that my husband bought me a Kindle for my birthday.

The aim of the Kindle was to reduce the amount of books entering the house.  This has clearly failed. (Do you want to know what my guilty secret is?  I’ve started storing the overflow of  books in an empty filing cabinet at work – ssh! Don’t tell hubby.)

I do love my kindle, but it is incredibly easy to download books without the physical reminder to dog my day-to-day life.  So not only is my house full to overflowing (as well as my desk) but my head is too.  As if my to do list for family and writing wasn’t long enough, the reading one has gone ever so slightly viral too.

It has got to STOP!

So, one of my resolutions for next year as well as decluttering my house, is to stop buying any more books until I’ve read at least half of the ones which currently reside chez moi.

Its going to be difficult but I’m determined to do it. Might just slip in a visit or two to library if I find the temptation overwhelming.

What are your obsessions / guilty secrets?

Talking of Footie and Birthdays

Well what a weekend that was.

It started off early on Saturday morning as my eldest son who is nine was playing in the final of his football league.  All the matches were played at Chester football ground so this was a major event and incredibly nerve wracking, both for us watching and him playing.  The kick off was a nine am and by nine forty five I was physically drained.   I must admit the team played well and had many chances to score but unfortunately it was not to be.  However, the other team didn’t score either so no one lost.  Being only nine they don’t do extra time or penalties so both teams will share the Shield for six months each.   It was rather nice that there were no losers on the day and both teams should be proud of themselves for playing some very good football.

I’m not what you call a football fanatic, but living with three of them in the house, you do tend to get involved and it was a lovely atmosphere at the stadium with mums and dads shouting for their boys alike.  Talk about proud – I was positively puffed up.

More football followed in the afternoon with the FA cup final but the boys went to watch it elsewhere, leaving me in peace for a few hours.   And I used my time wisely by playing with my new toy – a Kindle.

I have been debating the merits of e-readers versus books for a long time but have finally decided to take the plunge.  My kindle will never replace the good old fashioned book as there is nothing like the feel or smell of a book so I don’t see it as the demise of the hard copy.   We live in such of an age of technology these days though that it doesn’t make any sense to ignore it.  Rather, I think you should use it the best way to benefit yourself.

Anyway, the Kindle was a birthday present (for yesterday) and it had arrived in the week.  Of course I had to take it out of its box in advance, just to make sure that it had arrived in one piece and on Saturday afternoon I decided that it would be prudent to charge it up so that it was ready and waiting for me on Sunday morning.  Well of course then I had to connect it to Wi-Fi, and register it, and it made sense to download some samples of books too didn’t it?  I did resist the urge to start reading then – because that wouldn’t be right now would it?

No, I put it away and went to get ready to go out.  The boys were spending the night at their cousins so we went out for a lovely Italian meal with some friends.

It was weird waking up on my birthday with no children, but it was very chilled out an relaxing and thoroughly enjoyable – although I did get to the stage when I insisted on picking them up because I was missing them.

In the morning I did have a chance to play with my new toy properly and so far I’m really pleased. I love the fact that you can download sample chapters of books for free so that you can see if you want to buy them.  I picked quite a few of my wish list and am now compiling a must have list.  I found the Kindle easy to use and to read and I’m looking forward to saving my baggage allowance when I go on holiday at the end of the month.  So far I’m really chuffed with it but I’ll let you know how I get on.  As far as I’m concerned it will never replace the paperback, but as I’m desperately trying to declutter my house, it will come in very handy.

In the afternoon we went swimming, went out for tea and then spent the evening with friends enjoying wine and cake.  I got some lovely kindle vouchers too, so I can spend freely on my first books.  Can’t wait.

All in all a fantastic weekend. Now I just need to recover.