Well Meaning Pal ( WMP) “Hey Kathy, how’s the new book coming along?”
Me: Look at this thing I did on Instagram.
WMP: So the new book..?
Me: Yeah, sorry, I’ve got fencing training, and I don’t want to be late…
WMP: I heard it was much easier to get a second book published.
Me: WHY DO YOU HATE ME SO MUCH?
Thank god for writer friends on Facebook reminding me I am not alone. I love you. You are all fab. And hey, it’s not QUITE that bad (now.)
Last week I wanted to put a brick through my computer.
Now, I’ve just started on the fourth draft, the one where I tweak all the relationships, and you know what? It’s not rubbish. I like it. Some of it, I really like.
Of course that’s today. Tomorrow I might be reaching for the brick…
This week I had the honour of being part of The Notes from The Slushpile team, along with Teri Terry, who attended a Book Trust Bloggers Brunch. The idea was to learn more about what The Book Trust do . I knew they were involved in the Laureate scheme and I knew about Book Start, giving books to all preschool children. But I had no idea about the amazing Letterbox scheme, designed to get books to children in care so they can build their own libraries and the new Story Hunters scheme to assist under-privileged children in the same way. In the days when our public libraries are under threat, it was so great to see there was a broad government funded organisation really supporting the importance of books. I hope to be sharing more of what they do in the future.
A Sample Story Hunters Pack
Books and libraries are so much a part of my life, it’s hard to imagine how anyone couldn’t recognise how important they are, especially when you like to hang out with the UKYA crowd.
With Sita Brahmachari former Writer-in-Residence for Book Trust
So, I’ve been thinking a lot about blogging and bloggers, particularly about the UKYA people. You’d be hard pressed to find a more friendly and passionate group of readers and writers. They get together on twitter under various hashtags #ukya #YAtakeover. Probably the most dynamic of these chats is organised by blogger Lucy Powrie under the #ukyachat tag. It usually happens on a Friday night and I usually miss it because I am out doing this:
But when I have holidays or when, hoorah, it’s bumped to a Saturday night, I get to join in. I absolutely love it – so many people sharing your passion, even though we’re all sat behind a computer or a phone I can see their hands flapping as they recommend a book or excitedly share some thing we all know from some book we’ve all read. I can see it because that’s what I’m doing!
As we gathered to chat this week, I was reminded of a tweet from someone asking how to find book bloggers. It was a good question – if you don’t know, you don’t know right? So here’s a good place to start:
Follow hashtags on twitter: the ones above and also these #bookbloggers, #tbr #books and #yabooks .
Google them! To make it even easier, I’ve made a list of as many as I could remember before I had to cook dinner. I even included the one who didn’t really like my book *sniffle*, because that’s OK, not everyone is going to like every book or every character – that would be weird. Besides, she didn’t hate it, she just didn’t connect with Teva, which seriously, I’m fine about it, really…
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Okay, enough of that. Book Bloggers! There are heaps of them, please add more in the comments and correct me if I’ve got any information wrong- I thought it might be good to add Instagram links too – let me know if you’d like to.
Here’s the list so far – In alphabetical order according to Twitter name:
It’s been three weeks since More of Me was launched and I am well aware my attention to this blog has been SCANT. I am ashamed but I also have no idea where to start in sharing what it’s been like. It’s been crazy. So I’m taking a little writerly advice and am “showing not telling” everything that has basically run through my brain in the last few days. Don’t worry, edited highlights only…
As launch week draws to a close, this happens:
I’ll just have a little look on Amazon- sales rank 189? What does that mean? Am I doing OK? Is anyone (apart from my fab friends and family buying the book?) How do I know? Oooh! New review…Better check Goodreads…
Oh.
1 star?
Really?
Okay…I can live with that, there are all these other stars – these other lovely stars.
And look at this! My book on a table in Foyles!
When friends spot your books out and about.
But there’s still that 1 star and no explanation. Really? Ok, let it go, let it go, it’s fine.
Oh that’s nice, look at that blog post for the Scottish Book Trust, I forgot I did that – and look how many people are tweeting. That’s great. It’s all great.
I wonder how many books we’ve sold?Can I ask that? Is that a thing? Oh, it’s too early to tell. OK.
COCKTAILS at the #Yaspeakeasy event in London’s Drink, Shop, Do. What a great night! Nicci Cloke, Holly Bourne, Eve Ainsworth and ME!! Reading our books, drinking our own book cocktails and making up ridiculous stories about dinosaurs ( Nicci Cloke and I were on a team and quite frankly, our dino snakes and ladders improvisation was genius – we should have won, we so were robbed…) My fab editor Sarah Stewart even came along, so I genuinely could pretend having so much fun was work…
More of Me book and cocktail!
Booktails!
My first public reading of More of Me!
Me, Eve Ainsworth and Holly Bourne
Plus – I came home with a haul of signed books – most of which I’ve already read and already love (you may have seen me blubbing over the first in Holly Bourne’s “Am I Normal yet” books in this review) but LOOK – I also got Eve Ainsworth’s new book and it isn’t even out yet ! ( I started reading it on the train and it is FAB)
Book Swag – The Best Kind.
Today, I am back at my desk checking invoices for the farm, fixing the network printers in the office and this is running through my brain again:
But on the whole, life’s being pretty kind to this author. I even managed to cope with this review:
A very original and interesting idea that is sadly very very badly exploited. The whole plot makes no sense, in the end none of the interesting issues are “solved”, but just magically wished away by a plot device. Characters are bland and generic, and the one very interesting idea of having copies of you laying around is criminally under explored.
I remember the many questions I had, but didn’t like to ask, when friends got their first deals. I thought I might start a series of posts about the process of getting a debut novel from acceptance to the book shelf. Feel free to ask questions and I’ll do my best to answer. Continue reading “What’s it like: working with an editor for the first time?”→
Who’ve I missed? Over to you!
Kathryn Evans 