Down in the dumps

May 16^th. 2020

Pat came home from hospital yesterday but has now declined further treatment. This means we are heading into the unknown. Whatever comes, we have to face it because, sadly, that’s life. My hope is that I can give Pat a quality of life that will sustain her for however long she has. I’m sitting beside her at the moment, writing this blog post while she is watching TV. I took her for a slow and gentle walk round the garden just now so she could see what I’d been up to while she’s been away. I’m struggling with the compulsion to finish writing a blog post each week, and to abandon all thoughts of book sales, promotions etc., but that might be counter-productive; I need to keep my spirits up somehow while making sure I don’t neglect Pat.

My book sales are steady. So far this month I have sold 45 ebooks and a couple of paperbacks. And my page reads are trickling along nicely. This is all down to my current campaign on Facebook although needless to say it is costing me money. But I’m sticking with it. The majority of the sales are for The Boy from Berlin of course, and it’s good to see some of my other titles selling as well.

I have to say I have given up with Joffe Books. There has been no word since the last email saying they still wanted to publish my book Past Imperfect, and they would let me know after their ‘big’ meeting to discuss back titles. I know it might happen, but it no longer seems important.

How are you all coping with the lockdown and everything that entails? We have a family visit this afternoon. Our No.2 son, Terry, is coming over with our grand-daughter, Gemma and our great-grandson, Orin. They will go through to the back garden and have their lunch while me and Pat chat to them from our bedroom window. It would be nice to sit out there with them and keep our social distance, but unfortunately little Orin might want to run over and give me and Pat a hug, and that is a risk we cannot afford to take, even though we are quite sure Orin doesn’t have the bug, nor do his mum and grandad. We have to stay safe. Even more so now with Pat’s condition.

I’ve stopped reading Alex Shaw’s thriller. I did try but just couldn’t stick with it. I think it’s more my problem than the quality of the book, but it is, in my opinion, formulaic writing: writing for a market. Bit like the Die Hard films really and their ilk. I watched Lethal Weapon 2 on Sky during the week. Pure, over the top entertainment: just the kind of thing you find in a lot of action books that sell well. I wasn’t tempted to watch Lethal Weapon 3 the following night though; there’s only so much dross you can take, isn’t there?

Well, that’s my lot for this week. I might write another post next week. If I had something exciting to share with you, I would. Hope you are all staying safe and in good health.

Life can be a four-letter word at times

May 10^th. 2020

I would like to say this has been a good week for Pat but I can’t. Since being discharged from hospital, it has been mostly downhill. We learned that as a result of her CT scan last week, her final chemo session has been cancelled (not postponed) and the PET scan due later this month is not going to happen. We have a phone consultation this coming Tuesday with the consultant when I think he will dot the eyes and cross the tees for us. We are clinging to the hope that there will be other options. I’ve already taken Pat off one of her pills because of a problem the haematologist couldn’t solve for us: something I thought I would never do, but I reckon most people who have cared long term for a family member would recognise decisions like this. So now we wait for the outcome of the phone call. Our sleep patterns are virtually non-existent now, and it usually depends on Pat where and how and for how long we sleep. I won’t leave her on her own, so when she’s awake, I’m awake.

 

I can say however that I gave both my girls a bath this morning. Neither of them enjoyed it. Tuppence went mad when I’d finished with the blow drier and had a crazy run round the house and the garden. I think she was drying herself off. Thank goodness Pat didn’t try something like that. I wish she could have a run round the garden though. Tomorrow I might give Tuppence a clipping.

In my book world I can see the benefit of using Facebook ads over Amazon. Since the 19^th April I have sold 53 books and had 330 page reads. For me that is phenomenal. I’m still losing money on costs against revenue, but that’s something I’m prepared to do. For now anyway. I’ve also picked up five sales on D2D but that may not have anything to do with FB ads. Taking the page reads into account, the average is about three books a day. Not bad, eh?

My creative spark has disappeared: it went long ago, and now I don’t even bother with reading through the training videos on Bryan Cohen’s Amazon Ads School, nor those on the Mark Dawson SPF 101 course. These are things I may pick up again in the fullness of time; after all, I have paid for them.

My current reading, Alex Shaw’s Cold East is difficult. This has nothing to do with the current situation in the Parker household, nor what is going on in the outside world: I just don’t feel drawn to the book at all, and only manage a few pages a day. My other avenue of attraction now is the garden. I’ve done a lot of weed clearing and have planted seedlings ready to move into those spaces I have cleared. I’ve also tackled the weeds out front with my hot burner weed killer. It’s like an elongated hair dryer and burns weeds at 2000 degrees C. But I still get on my hands and knees to tackle some of the stuff.

Incidentally, I received an email from David Gaughran: someone I have been following for a few years having bought one of his self-help books. He’s well known in the book world. He loves data: uses it a lot to break down the mysteries of the indie publishing world. He uncovered a strange set of figures from Amazon’s own pages on the comparison between ‘best-sellers’, and ‘most popular’. He chose the top ten thrillers and space operas genres, and of all the permutations, only one book featured in the top ten. The top ten in both categories did not match in a straightforward, side by side comparison, nor did the publishers, and the only consistently high publishers were ‘self-published’ in Space Opera. David Gaughran wondered how Amazon could rely on their own algorithms with those kind of contradictory figures. Needless to say, none of my books were in there. One day, maybe. Wish me luck!

Not so splendid isolation

May 2^nd. 2020

This time last week, Pat was in hospital and was discharged during the afternoon, which I thought was a bit quick. This Wednesday she was taken back into hospital because the infection was still raging through her body. Thankfully it is now under control and we are expecting her to be discharged either today or tomorrow. She had a CT scan yesterday which helped. At least her brain was clear; something I was worried about because of her stroke last year. But she’s OK now. I phone her four times a day because there are no visitors allowed and virtually nothing for her to do in her single room. I can’t wait to have her back home.

Naturally, Pat’s absence has given me plenty of time to work in the garden pulling up weeds, filling hanging baskets and mowing the lawn. Yesterday afternoon, having already done a bunch of weeding that morning, I decided to watch an SPF podcast. It was Evan Gow of Story Origin, a book promotional group of which I am a member. Naturally, I was keen to see Evan and what he had to tell us, but I fell asleep and only woke when James Blatch was winding up the podcast with Mark Dawson. I decided not to look at it again until later and forced myself to go outside and carry on with the weeding.

My latest read is Cold East by Alex Shaw. It isn’t too bad and basically does “what it says on the tin”. Shaw is a competent writer, successful too, so I can’t say he isn’t well read. But it’s a book that is written for a market. And I think that is one of my failings; I don’t write for the market. I’ve often wondered, although maybe not anymore, why my books are poor competition for other thriller writers that inhabit the genres in which I write. I have no doubts about my ability, never have, but other writers nail it consistently, while I struggle to attract a firm readership. I think the answer lies in the fact that I write by inspiration: I get an idea in my head, maybe from a news item, or perhaps some occurrence in my life that triggers a story. I then research the idea and write the story. This inevitably means I am writing for myself and not the market I’m trying to crack. Is that a lesson learned for me? Has to be, right? So what can I do about it? While I’ve been looking after Pat (eighteen months now), I have struggled to put pen to paper, and now have no inclination to write. The desire hasn’t left me, but the thought of preparing a draft copy and all the research that’s necessary, just leaves me cold. But there is also an underlying reason for that: by attempting to write to a market, I cannot get enthusiastic about a project. It’s almost as if I’m prostituting myself on the altar of market necessity, and that’s ruining whatever story I try to come up with. So well done to Alex Shaw and all his contemporaries; they’ve got it cracked.

I’ve had a little run of success with my Facebook ads programme. I managed to sell 25 books in eleven days. When you consider my average organic sales are about ten a month, that result could put me closer to sixty or seventy. Trouble is that its costing me money. My royalties are slightly lower that my ad spend. But that’s something I have to expect for a while; I simply need to learn more and not fall asleep when I’m watching a training video.

No news yet from Joffe Books. Wish me luck!

More than just a mixed bag

25^th. April 2020

Quite a mixed week for me one way or another. Pat had her chemo on Monday and by Wednesday she was very ill. She ended up in hospital of course, and I thank God for the way the system works in the case of cancer patients like Pat. Within an hour of calling the emergency ‘bleep’ number, Pat was in isolation, piped up to antibiotics with two nurses and a doctor in attendance. She’s home now, four days later and a whole lot better. Her chemo for next Monday has been postponed for a week. Me and the Tuppence are a lot happier now.

And talking about our dog, I had to resort to giving her a shower, blow dry and a clipping. She was due a full groom on Friday, but because of the lockdown, no grooming parlours are open. She wasn’t keen on my attempts to clip her with the electric trimmer, so I had to resort to snipping off bits of fur where I could get at it. I will try again because I can’t let the poor thing go too long without some sort of attention.

On the book front, I finally finished Scott Mariani’s book and have now downloaded Alex Shaw’s thriller, Cold East. I met Alex two years ago in Worthing at a book event. Since then we have followed each other on Facebook. Alex has just signed a two-book deal with Harper Collins. He is already with that digital outfit and very successful too. I’ll start it sometime this week and let you know what I think,

Joffe Books. Yes, I finally relented and contacted them, asking if there was any progress with Past Imperfect. Its been nine weeks since I uploaded the files they asked for. They said they still wanted to publish my book, but they had a big meeting coming up about their backlists and would be getting back to me. It sounded more like “don’t call us; we’ll call you”. I hope not because it was Joffe Books who approached me and not the other way around. I’ll keep my fingers crossed for that.

My efforts at AMS ads has been abysmal, so I decided to put The Boy from Berlin up on Facebook; see how it went. I launched a fairly straightforward campaign and have sold twelve books in six days. And I am in profit even taking into account the VAT on the ads costs. It’s a very small profit but encouraging to say the least. I need to bite the bullet with AMS and increase my daily budget if I’m to compete with FB, but that will need a lot of thought.

And during the week I got signed up as an official carer for Pat. I have had calls from the two organisations involved and received a card for my wallet in case I end up in hospital unexpectedly. This will alert the emergency services to the fact that I look after Pat. I’ll also be getting a key safe for the outside of the house. Its amazing what kind of services there are out there for people who need them. And we are also being contacted on a regular basis by our church here in Aldwick.

And while Pat was in hospital, it gave me the chance to get on with a lot of the jobs that need doing in the garden: weeding, grass cutting, planting hanging baskets and so on and so forth. I could write a book about it. Wish me luck!

Different ways to cope.

April 18^th. 2020

I would like to begin by paying tribute here to Captain Thomas Moore, the 99-year-old veteran who has raised an incredible £20,000,000 for the NHS by walking round his house. Such a stalwart.

It’s been phone appointments and blood tests for Pat and me. Mine was a routine, yearly test with the cancer unit. I was given the all clear for another two years. Pat’s phone call was simply to confirm she was OK for her chemo on Monday. That will be the penultimate one: her final chemo will be a week later. It’s also been a week of tying up loose ends with the various support groups and on-line shoppers. I am now registered as Pat’s carer and have signed up with Crossroads; a professional support group used by the Social Services (or recommended anyway!) Sainsbury’s delivered our groceries yesterday. We got most of what I ordered. And Echo delivered Pat’s prescription milk shakes during the week.

We also had a family Zoom meeting on Wednesday, which meant a lot of smiling faces on screen from as far apart as USA and Australia. It was brilliant. I love to hear the banter between our four sons. They can be quite brutal at times, but it’s always taken in the best spirit. There were about twelve of us on screen, and it went on for about an hour. It cost nothing too. Modern technology, eh? That is one positive you can say about social media: it has brought people together in so many different ways in these trying times.

I spent some time on building ads on Amazon with Brian Cohen’s Amazon Ads School. As always, when the tutor explains the simplicity of formulating your ad etc., it rarely works in practice. My results have been abysmal, but I live in hope that one day the sun will rise on my efforts and I’ll see some really encouraging results. I am also working my way through the Scott Mariani thriller, House of War. I’m struggling but I will finish it: that could be next Monday when I’m sitting in my car outside the cancer clinic while Pat has her chemo.

I know from some posts on my FB book groups, that many writers are finding the forced lockdown extremely helpful in getting words on paper and looking ahead to finishing their books well ahead of schedule. Of course, there are those who have dried up completely, and I include myself among them. I know I’m trying to campaign on AMS, but yesterday I managed to fall asleep during one of Brian Cohen’s training videos. When I came to, Tuppence was sat watching me because it was time to share an apple. Its something we do each afternoon, and often she comes up and nudges me when its time. Dogs are so clever, eh? Perhaps I should get her to do the video training while I curl up at her Mum’s feet.

I’m still waiting to hear from Joffe Books. One of my boys asked me if I was tempted to write and ask what the delay was. I am tempted, but at the same time there could be a genuine reason, maybe related to absence from work because of the lockdown, and illness, or simply the amount of work and preparation that goes into taking on a new author. When I had my first book accepted years ago by Macmillan, I think it was about eight months before I was able to hold the book in my hand. Wonderful time that was. I know Joffe Books is a digital company, so it could happen a lot quicker. Just got to be patient, that’s all. Wish me luck!

No separation

April 11^th. 2020

What a week again for all of us. Doesn’t help having to look after a sick wife knowing that each time I go out I may pick up the bug. I received an email from Sainsbury’s though, telling me that they now have me on their list as a vulnerable person and I can register with them for on-line shopping and I am allowed priority slots. Great. I signed up, gave them my bank card details, filled a shopping trolley and went to the checkout. No, it doesn’t work like that. There are no slots. Not only are there no slots, their on-line calendar shows nothing at all: no reserved slots, no booked slots, and no special slots for registered, extremely vulnerable people. Can’t email them either because all their email addresses are ‘no reply’. And incidentally, I have a full shopping trolley parked on-line with Tesco too! Where next then, Aldi?

My book world is showing a very small sign of an opening because of Book Bub ads. I’ve sold eight books this month on D2D, and this is often reflected when I advertise on BB. The sales are spread around Apple, B&N, Kobo and Nook. Some are with Amazon, so hopefully I can make some inroads into higher sales. Or maybe my AMS ads will come to life and show some presence on my dashboard. I’m in for an Advertising exercise with Bryan Cohen’s ad school next week in which he will be challenging his students, and any other outsiders who sign up, to spend five days with him on-line rising to the challenge and realising a profit on AMS. Don’t know how I’ll manage to keep up with him, but I’ll just have to set some time aside and make the effort. I won’t neglect Pat though.

Last week I mentioned memories, and how songs trigger them. Well, something else triggered a memory for me: a post on FB. The person was singing the praises of Sir Keir Starmer, newly elected leader of the Labour party, and at the same time making some unpleasant things about Boris Johnson. Don’t know why this person thought it necessary to sling a bit of mud, but maybe that’s how some extreme politicos work. Anyway, my mind went back to when I was working for a living at the potato factory. It was a twelve-hour night shift, I was the only maintenance man on shift, and a pump had stopped working over the potato store. It was at the bottom of a 50,000-litre tank and I knew it would be blocked with mud. It was ten o’clock at night; just the right time to be in the pub on a Saturday night, but I had no choice but to call in Wally and his gobbler. Wally was a small man, about 5’3”. He always wore a single-breasted jacket and wore a cloth cap. And his face was covered in lumps; loads of them like lumpy porridge. Poor Wally. The gobbler was Wally’s old tanker, which we often used to suck out blocked drains and sumps. And Wally was an ardent socialist. Anyway, I managed to suck out all the water with a submersible pump, and then removed the inspection plate at the bottom of the tank. It was obvious what the problem was as me and Wally peered in at the sea of mud. And while all this was happening, Wally was banging on about Margaret Thatcher and the workers revolution which was about to come. All the Tory wasters would be put to the sword and the country would become a true socialist haven where all the workers would enjoy what was rightfully theirs. So, there was a working-class Tory and a working-class Socialist with a problem, but I knew it wouldn’t be Wally who would be clambering into that tank with a shovel to dig the pump out. We’re all in this together.

Still haven’t heard from Joffe Books. Wish me luck and stay safe!

Fencing and painting

April 4^th. 2020

Another drab week for Pat, but she’s pulling through now. Two more weeks to her penultimate chemo, then one more. I know we could all do without the pandemic, but it makes it increasingly difficult knowing that I can’t put Pat in her wheelchair and take her for a walk along the prom at Bognor, just to cheer her up. When we were clapping at 8 o’clock the other night, I joked that Pat was clapping for me because I was her carer, but we are under no illusions as to who the gesture was for. I don’t envy those NHS workers who have to go into work daily, at the ‘coalface’ so to speak, and hope they don’t catch the virus. Quite scary.

I finished the book I was reading because of the amount of time I waited in the car while Pat was having chemo (not allowed in with her now). This was ‘House in the Woods’ by Mark Dawson. It was a five-star read; I would recommend it. I had planned to start on Scott Mariani’s book, House of War, but managed to get distracted by David Jason as Inspector Frost on ITV hub. Maybe next week I’ll give Mr. Mariani a look.

I found myself thinking about a development in my pulp fiction thriller, which I get to when I can and don’t expect to finish until the end of the year. Anyway, I came up with some pretty good ideas, mulled them around a bit and decided I should get them into the book and help get me somewhere in the development of the story. Trouble is I was in the shower. Perhaps I should have a waterproof pen and notebook with when I take shower. I can remember some of the bright ideas I had, but it was eight hours ago and I’m beginning to flag. I might get round to jotting them down somewhere.

My book sales for last month were pretty good, but that was because of the Book Bub featured deal. I sold about 400 copies of The Boy from Berlin, and a few of my other titles. I’m back on the flat line again but will be looking into adjusting my advertising campaigns. Doing that is quite complicated, and I’m almost in awe of those writers who can crack the minutiae of Amazon ads and sell hundreds of books a month.

Another job I have to keep on top of is the garden. And that’s the reason for the photo this week: our garden seat which takes pride of place outside our front door. It needed painting, which I did yesterday, and finished off retightening all the screws so it doesn’t fall apart. It’s this part of the garden — we call it our cottage garden — which looks lovely when the hanging baskets and the wisteria are in full bloom. That has always been Pat’s domain, but she’s too frail to tackle it now, so it’s my job. And I mustn’t let her down. I spent part of the week repairing a fence that had succumbed to the high winds in February and March. I had to patch it together because I couldn’t afford the time to spend at B&Q looking for the right wood and getting it cut. I don’t even know if B&Q are open though. Anyway, the fence is back up and soon the wisteria will be trailing its way through it.

That’s it for the week. Still haven’t heard from Joffe Books. Wish me luck.