Tuesday 31 December 2013

And so it ends



2013 was a funny year, full of challenges, change and a year when nothing really went right for very long. I entered the year as one person and I will exit as someone completely different, a complicated journey.
It was a year that saw me publish 3 very different e books, followed by paperback versions, that in itself such a huge achievement but 2014 will mark the end of one story and the beginning of so many more.

It was a year when I learned a few things, even at my tender age of 45. See you are never too old to learn a life lesson. I learned the true physical meaning of the word isolation. It’s a good state of affairs for a writer, because if you don’t isolate yourself you get bugger all done!! But, I learnt the meaning of the word in so many ways.
People walked into my life last year, and people walked out. It became a year of change caused by many things but those changes isolated me. For a while I was angry, didn’t understand, now I do and it remains to be seen in 2014 if the isolation is complete. I came to realise at times I am my own worst enemy and I push too hard, so for once, I stepped back, now I will let things come to me. If nothing happens, nothing happens.

Isolation forced me to learn to put myself first and that skill alienates others that are used to being first. I reach out and the hand is slapped away, another lesson learned
So what do I want from 2014...fame, riches etc

Nope, all I want is a decent cup of coffee, a smile from my granddaughter, a bowl of tiramisu, to love my family, to continue conversations through whatever resource with my great friend in the coldness that is Canada, to laugh and for the ideas to keep popping into my head.
Life is a series of small happiness’s and these are all I need.

So 2014 do your worst !! Bring it on !!!
Happy new year whenever it comes to your piece of this world. xx



Sunday 29 December 2013

Trying Something Different

Been a while since I posted but with issues with my shoulders time to write or edit has been at a premium anyway...

Im trying something different yesterday and today to get my work out there. I have 4, yes 4 self published works and since xmas is just by us I thought I'd try something dofferent and catch all the folks who just got kindles for xmas.

I stuck all four of my novels on either free promotions, made them half price or used kindles new coutdown price feature for a few days. Four promotions are running simultaniously in the UK, three in the USA, with one to kick off the next day.

So far the coutdown deals and half price dont work, folks just want free which I find puzzling when Amazon themselves are offering half price reads in the 12 days of kindle. V strange but hey ho, we'll see what happens at the end of the three days.

I was never convinced of the strategy to run a coutdown deal unless it was for a longer term . I may run one agan when the next book is published as an introduction to the world we'll see

Fingers crossed for now xx

Sunday 1 December 2013

Finished



Well there's a certificate I didnt think I was going to get this year. Having been ill for a fair amount of November and unable to sit to write, so reallly it was 19 days of work rather than 30, not that i'm making excuses...

So it was ment to be a funny book and I'm not sure what happened but it turned into someone finding themselves ...so the idea now is to take a few days to rest, then finish it, put it aside and edit the last one and repeat the process.

A lot people I know seem to think this is easy, after all you can type a single word 50,000 times, and its true you can but then thats cheating and the idea here is to have the start of a whole book to then edit to perfection

We all spend weeks, months, sometimes years trying to perfect a story that we believe in, to give it over to the public to read and hopefully love as much as I do....maybe this is the next story ...time will tell but at least its been a successful month and a good achievement

This time last year I was writing about Blackpool and thats gone on to be published !!