One eyed Optimist

June 5^th. 2016

Today I’m sitting in front on my computer just four hours after a cataract operation. My glasses are on crooked because of a patch over my ‘new’ eye, which makes reading and typing rather awkward, but I soldier on, ever the eternal optimist. By all accounts my eye should be back to normal very soon. Then I’ll have the other eye done to balance both eyes. What it will do for my writing is a different matter, apart from the physical aspect of focussing in on the PC screen and the keyboard.

This past week has seen two events on my calendar. My author group, CHINDI, was part of the Worthing libraries “World of Words” literary festival, and on Tuesday we held a seminar at Worthing library about the steps involved in getting a book published. It was well received by those who turned up — about fifty people — and the feedback we received was encouraging. The following day was a book launch by Jim Morley, also of the group, for his latest novel, A Summer of Law and Love.

I also had a piece about me published in the Chichester Observer. It was about my latest book, A Dangerous Game. I was surprised at the amount of column inches used for the article, and also a nice, big photo of me in my ‘killer’ pose as a thriller writer. Lovely stuff.

I’m in the throes of considering a Facebook campaign, and thought I would target readers who enjoy standalone novels. I Googled ‘standalone’ writers, but was disappointed with the results. When I checked them out on Amazon, there was nothing that inspired me. If I want to aim for a high reader market, I need those who like my kind of books. I could stick to the best-selling thriller writers like Lee Child or David Baldacci, but find myself doubting the wisdom in doing that. More to the point though, is what kind of advertising campaign am I going to run, how much will I spend and for how long? At least with FB you can control the amount being spent, and also manipulate the advert if you think it might improve the click through rate.

I have also been re-writing my current novel. I looked back through the 18000 words or so that I had written, and could see plenty of areas that needed improvement. It wasn’t too much of a problem, but now I can push on from there and drill down into my creative senses for a cracking read. I wish it was that easy.

I’m looking forward to Wednesday, when I’ll be the subject of an interview on Skype. The interviewer will be Canadian author Alexandra Amor. It will be published on YouTube, and as a podcast. Naturally I will be putting it on my FB page and my website. Hopefully it will get a lot of people reading and watching. Might do me some good. Wish me luck!