Authors Electric

With the holidays fast approaching, I thought it would be apt to offer a little festive post. A year or two back I was asked by a fellow blogger to write a Christmassy guest blog for her. As her blog covers mostly historical fiction, she asked me to take the theme of 'Christmas during the reign of King Richard III', King Richard of course being the focus of my two books to date (four if one counts the  two  charity  anthologies  I’ve edited!) King Richard Christmas tree ornament! Given that only two Christmas seasons were celebrated during Richard’s short reign, it seemed a slightly tricky prospect and I fell back on the idea of the ‘topsy-turvy Christmas’ of the medieval period, which features in  The King’s Man   – when a Lord of Misrule is elected and servants are waited upon by their masters, etc. (See  https://alexmarchantblog.wordpress.com/2017/12/18/topsy-turvy-christmas/ ).               ...

What a year it’s been! A life-changing year. This month, and almost to the day as I write this, it’s been a whole year since I published my first book. A year in which, for the first time, I’ve been able to call myself an author. Not just wish for it, or dream about it, but actually introduce myself as an author. And because I decided to launch my book on the anniversary of the birthday of my leading historical character (2nd October), I was able, courtesy of a totally unexpected, but rather fabulous invitation, to celebrate its first anniversary at the same time as his birthday  –  in his old home, surrounded by other devotees – and with cake! Lots of cake! (More on that later.) Did I think a year ago just where I’d be now? No – not at all. My only aim was to get that book published – to master the labyrinthine processes needed to produce an ebook, and paperbacks via two different suppliers. And to adhere to US, as well as my own UK, tax regulations, becaus...

Reviews. They’re a new thing for me. Being on the receiving end, anyway. Some authors don’t read them apparently. A. L. Kennedy, writing in  The Guardian  some years ago, said, ‘They emerge months, if not years after the book is done with, so they're not that much use to the author. If the book's a car crash, it's already happened and we've walked or crawled away long ago.’ Maybe that’s just traditionally published authors. It may be a different scenario for those of us who have published independently. After all, we’re told how important it is for sales for our books to have good reviews on Amazon and GoodReads, or from the many bloggers worldwide. We use snippets of them on social media, such as Facebook or Twitter, and in our blogs and websites as part of our never-ceasing promotion. A review is not just about helping readers find new books – it’s about authors actively helping them do that. New books? And, let’s be honest, a good review can ...

Здравствуйте . As Rabbie Burns said, ‘ The best laid schemes o' mice an' men / Gang aft agley’. Not that my schemes were particularly well laid. Perhaps I should have stepped back and thought, ‘You’re going to Russia for the World Cup for ten days in June. Is it really wise to publish a book just three weeks before that and arrange events to attend all through the summer – including every remaining weekend in June and July?’ If I had, I might have come to the conclusion that it wasn’t all that wise. And then add into the mix the serious illness of a close family member... I had been planning this blog post to be all about my trip to Russia and my impressions of the country thirty-odd years after my last one – when it was still part of the Soviet Union, albeit already changing under glasnost and perestroika. And of course this time I was going during the biggest party on the planet – in the country that had inspired my love of football all those years ago.......