The Rocky Road to Publication
The Death Game has
finally made it. It’s now published as a Kindle ebook. However, the road to
publication for this novel has been far from smooth.
This was actually the first crime novel I ever wrote. Prior
to this I’d written a historical saga which is now published as A Salt Splashed Cradle. I’d also written
a lot of historical articles, many of them published in the US magazine The
Highlander, as well as various UK magazines. So, I reckoned I was
a historical writer.
The Death Game
went the rounds and met the usual thanks, but no thanks response. Although
Penguin did seriously consider it, but at the last minute they decided they
didn’t like it 110%. Now I’m no mathematician, but I did wonder how a writer
could ever manage to reach that additional 10%.
Nothing daunted I continued to submit and was over the moon
when a new publisher ran a competition for the best unpublished crime fiction
in the world – notice I said world – and I was one of the twenty winners. I
thought I had it made.
However, the experience was, shall we say, less than
satisfactory. I had four different editors over the year I was contracted for,
and each one of them had different ideas. Being the nice, amenable person I am,
I changed and faffed about with my manuscript in an effort to please them all,
and you’ve guessed it – I pleased none of them. At the end of the day I was
glad to escape their clutches, and they only published five of the winners, not
the twenty that was promised.
This left me with a big problem. You see I’d mucked about
with the manuscript so much I’d completely destroyed the story. So, the
manuscript got chucked into the bottom drawer, otherwise known as my computer’s
hard drive, and I left it there to gather cosmic dust.
Well, I thought, that was a waste of time, maybe my forte
isn’t historical crime, maybe I should concentrate on contemporary stuff. So,
that’s what I did. I started to write what has now become the Dundee Crime
Series, and the door to publication opened wide when I won the Dundee
International Book Prize for book two in the series Dead Wood.
In the meantime I had another historical novel on the back
burner, and this one used the same character, Kirsty Campbell, that I had used
in The Death Game. After a few
arguments with myself I decided to resurrect The Death Game, and completely rewrite it. And that took every bit
as long as writing a new novel from scratch. But now it’s written, and out
there, I feel quite pleased with myself. My readers seem to like it as well.
So, hey ho, it’s the start of a new series The
Kirsty Campbell Novels.
If you want to buy the book, you’ll find it here;
But if you want to borrow it, or sneak a peek at someone
else’s copy, I don’t mind. I just want you to enjoy it. Oh, and before I go, if
you do like it and want to do me a favour, a wee review on Amazon would be
greatly appreciated. It doesn’t have to be much, just a couple of lines to say
why you liked it, and I’ll be happy.
Chris Longmuir
Comments
It's wonderful that a book which passed a big test but then was ruined by its own mentors should live again like this. But I bet you'd fight your corner with the editors now!