Life & Times

A good many indie writers like myself are struggling to sell their books and consequently build up a readership, which I believe is the key to establishing yourself as a writer. I received my public library statement last week, and it tells me that my books were loaned out about 4500 times. Some may say that this not a lot, but the previous year my loans figure was 6000. I know a large number of public libraries have closed in UK, which I think is so sad, but it’s an inevitable sign of the times as younger people turn more to electronic entertainment and celebrity culture. When I think of my figures, I can see people searching through the library shelves and picking one of my books up as soon as they see my name. I used to do that when I visited the library: as soon as I saw a Hammond Innes novel, or Nigel Tranter, Alistair Maclean and a host of others, I would grab the book from the shelf and jealously guard it until I had finished making my choices. There are other elements to selling books of course, and here I’m thinking of reviews and catching the public eye. Reviews can be lifting, but they can also be damaging, and one thing that authors do not like is for a review to be personally damaging, rather than expressing an opinion that he or she simply didn’t enjoy the book. We have all experienced differences of opinions in life, and know that sometimes words are spoken that are simply not true. I was called “lazy” by one reviewer. I wondered if that person really understood what a writer has to do to produce a book. In my case it usually takes about a year. This includes research of course, which is time consuming and often I find myself reading stuff that I later reject. Then the act of sitting down and writing follows, and this can be tedious at times, even stultifying and no fun. Other times it can be enjoyable because the words seem to flow on to the pages like a flood. But I am not lazy, and no genuine writer deserves to be called that. And after all that work you find that a literary agent or a publisher doesn’t like it and so it goes on; rejection after rejection. I am fortunate because I have a publisher and a contract. Providing I produce a manuscript that my publisher thinks will sell, and remember: my publisher knows I have a bunch of people who will read my books, which increases the chances of sales, then I have a result and possibly an extension to my book contract. I enjoy writing. It isn’t a chore for me, nor is it a career; it’s my hobby. And so I will go on writing, publishing my books on Amazon (once the publisher has given me the paperback rights) and feel genuinely optimistic that there are readers out there who find that I am a writer who knows how to tell a story: a good one.