Days to remember

January 22nd. 2107 There were a few dates I had to remember over the past week: my wife’s birthday, our 57th. wedding anniversary, my older brother’s birthday and my older sister’s birthday. Oh, and there was something else that happened: Donald Trump got sworn in as the 45th. United States President. He’s the only one of that lot who could write a book and guarantee it becoming a best-seller. He wouldn’t need any marketing, and promotion would be a cinch. How nice it would be if I could say that, but as all budding writers know: that isn’t the case. The latest excitement to hit the author forums is “Cross-promotion”. It’s been brewing for a few months now. I’m planning to take advantage of it (if that’s the right word) and get stuck in to this new wave of book selling. But like all these monthly flavours that come along, I expect this to get swamped and bore readers to death eventually. That won’t stop me jumping on the bandwagon while it’s rolling though; hopefully I will get some good results from it. My Kindle Scout campaign slumped for a few days. My book was “Hot” for a while, and then it kind of disappeared without trace. Now it’s hot again. I need to look around for more promotion opportunities that won’t break the bank and get more votes. And if you haven’t voted yet, please click the link for me and vote. https://kindlescout.amazon.com/p/1EC59ZYJLQ07G I’ve been toying around with an idea for my next book. I tend to wait for inspiration before embarking on any new story, but sadly it isn’t happening yet. I still get amazed and a little envious of those writers who can knock out a novel in a few months. I’m a slow writer generally, and expect to take up to a year to complete a novel, but in this day and age of digital publishing, speed could be something of a bonus — except for one caveat: quality. I would probably lose any quality I might possess in my writing if I tried to complete a novel in less than four months, and that would be a bad thing. Another event that took place during the week was our Chindi book group meeting, only with a slight difference: it was yours truly and two other writers, Christopher Joyce and Carol Thomas, meeting as directors of the group’s official company (CIC), to formulate a new structure and explore the way forward. We have also re-jigged the logo CHINDI to mean “Celebrating and helping independent writers”. The idea was to drop the parochial stance of the group and become more global. This is so we can reach out to other writers who want help and advice, and who are willing to offer the same in return for us already established within the group. We managed to come up with a ten point plan that hopefully will be challenging as well as rewarding for us all. I dropped the price of The Devil’s Trinity (£0.99/$0.99) today in readiness for my Bookbub promotion on Wednesday. Wish me luck!