Commissioning Artwork on a Budget by KeriLynn Engel

I'm delighted to welcome KeriLynn Engel to my blog.

 

In these days of self-publishing, finding someone to do the cover for your book can be a nightmare. That's why KeriLynn's fantastic piece is so topical.

Commissioning Artwork on a Budget

It can often be true that when buying a creative service, you get what you pay for.

An experienced professional who makes a living off their artwork is necessarily going to charge you more than a college student trying to make some cash on the side, and you’re more likely to have a smoother experience and more polished product from the experienced professional than from a part-time noob.

Still, as a writer, you know that countless factors go into determining a price for creative work. Just because someone is “cheap” doesn’t mean their work will be. It could just be they don’t need to make a living from their artwork and enjoy making affordable pieces for people on a budget! You never know.

There are ways to purchase creative services within your budget without sacrificing quality. It might require a little more work on your end, or a willingness to be a bit more flexible, but it definitely can be done.

If you think you’re stuck searching through endless pages of cheap stock photography looking for a model who’s “close enough” to the character you’ve envisioned so clearly in your mind for years, because you’re on too tight a budget to ever afford artwork commissioned just for you — that’s just not true.

I’m going to share with you a few tricks on using the magical power of the interwebs to find artists who will be willing to work with you within your budget to produce custom art you’ll love.

Budgeting & Payment

Firstly, you must have a clear idea of how much you’re able to spend on your art.

Some artists have their prices posted, and with your budget in mind, you’ll know right off the bat whether you can afford them. For the ones that don’t have prices posted, you can tell them exactly how much you’re able to spend. Then they can let you know whether or not they can work with you within your budget.

It might help to set up a savings account specifically for this purpose (or just for your book budget in general). I use Mint.com for my finances, and they have a feature where you can set up savings goals for specific purposes. It lets you input a target date and amount, and lets you know what you need to do to get there. (I’m not an affiliate, I just really like Mint!)

Most artists accept payment via Paypal. The generally accepted practice is to put down a deposit or the entire payment upfront.

What if you fall in love with an artist outside your budget?

If they’re not TOO much outside your budget,  I would still contact them. Tell them how much you love their work, and be upfront about exactly what your budget is. Let them know you don’t expect a discount for no reason, but you want to know if there’s any way they can work with you. They might consider bartering services for part of the cost, or come up with other ways to accomodate you. Some artists might be insulted at this, but I think it’s worth at least asking as long as you make it clear that you respect their work and time.


Finding an artist

Etsy

Etsy is known for having lots of sellers with handmade crafts, from the mundane (scarves, jewelry, purses, notecards), to the bizarre (check out Regretsy.com for a laugh... some posts are NSFW).

It may surprise you to find out that Etsy has tons of artists and designers on it as well. Some sellers specialize in custom work like painting pet portraits from your photographs, or creating custom digital clip art or even logos.

Etsy used to have a feature called “Alchemy” where you could post a request for a custom item. Unfortunately, they discontinued Alchemy in February 2011, supposedly to revamp it, but there haven’t been any updates yet that I could find. Instead, they encourage you to find an artist you like and contact (“convo” in Etsy lingo) them to request an item.

Searching for an artist on Etsy

Etsy has a tag system for items — it works like tags for blog posts. Sellers can tag their items with any number of keywords, which makes it easier to search for them.

When searching for potential artists for your custom work, you could try searching for “custom art”, but then again you’re limiting yourself to artists who have done custom items in the past, or who have custom items posted. What if there’s an artist out there that perfect for you, but hasn’t done any custom work on Etsy yet?

Instead, try searching for the specific style you’re looking for. Some keywords to consider might be:

1. Oil painting
2. Character illustration
3. Digital art
4. Abstract painting
5. Steampunk art (or whatever genre you write in)
6. Romantic portrait
7. Paper art

Here’s a really cool piece of art I found with the last search: 2 ORIGINAL ARTWORKS Mr & Mrs Giraffe posing- Mixed Media, Hand Painted on 1922 Parisien Magazine 'La Petit Illustration' by Coco De Paris.

On the right side of the page, you can click on the artist’s shop name to see their storefront. Here you can read about them and see if they mention anything about custom work. This artist does paintings and illustrations over antique paper- love it! Doesn’t say anything about custom work, but you can always contact the artist using the “Contact” link on the left. Even if an artist has never thought about doing custom work before, they may be flattered you ask and excited about the prospect, so give it a shot!

deviantART

Deviantart is a more well-known source for commissioning artwork.

It’s easy to browse or search through artists right from the front page. You can use the search bar on the top if you’re looking for something specific, or choose from categories on the left such as Digital Art or Traditional Art. In each broad category there are tons of subcategories, so it’s easy to get as specific as you’d like. You can sort your results by “Popular” or “Newest”.

Once you find a piece you like, view the artist’s page by clicking on the “More from [artist]” link on the right. From here, you can view their entire gallery of artwork. Contact the artist using the “Send a Note” link on the top-right (you’ll have to login first).

Sometimes the artist will say on their profile page that they do commissions. If not, don’t be afraid to contact them anyway and ask if they would be interested in doing a commissioned piece. You never know, they may have never thought about it before, or are dreaming about making money from their art but just don’t know how to get started! You might be the first one to make their dream come true =)

Other Sources

Even if you’re not quite ready to commission your artwork yet, or are still not 100% sure what you want, it helps to keep your eyes open for artists you like. You never know where you might come across the perfect one!

“I found out about Sarah Ellerton from her web comics. My boyfriend was the one who pointed out that she opened for commissions a few months ago, and when I saw her style, I knew it would be perfect for the book cover.” N. M. Martinez, author of Ruin

“I found the artist that I'm working with Lisa Falzon via an incoming link to my blog. I'd never heard of her before (sorry Lisa if you read this) but followed the link back to a post on another blog where she said in an interview that my blog was one of her favourites. I had a look at her art work after that and was hooked! I also immediately knew that she would be the perfect person to illustrate the cover of my upcoming book.”
Madame Guillotine, author of The Secret Diary of a Princess: a novel of Marie Antoinette

Advice from other writers
“My budget is about nil as I'm a housewife and mother, who fundamentally lives off my husband. However, I knew that having a good cover can really make a book POP and capture attention so was prepared to forgo a few shopping trips to make it happen. It's definitely something that should be done properly so I was prepared to save up and make some sacrifices for it!

“I think my main advice is that covers are very important and definitely worth doing as well as possible. I was lucky in that I found the perfect artist quite by chance, but if I hadn't then I would have asked around friends until I found someone who was right for the commission.”
~ Mme Guillotine http://twitter.com/MmeGuillotine

“Know how much you can spend. Make sure that you are very clear with the artist what you are going to do with it and what you want it for. Most of the time the prices artists list on their websites are for personal use only, not commercial use, but you can still get an idea of how much they charge from seeing the pricing on their work.

“Start a DA account and follow artists you think are interesting. I find DA a great place to find artists who do commissions, and it's easy to note them and ask more questions.
Also, pay attention to lesser known artists. Don't be afraid to approach an artist who doesn't have commissions listed. If you know what you want, be clear with the artist and ask if they'd do it for you. Maybe they won't, but maybe they've never thought about it because no one's ever asked them before.” ~ N. M. Martinez, author of Ruin
http://twitter.com/loudquietgirl
http://loudquietgirl.wordpress.com/

~~~~~~~~~~~~
Your turn

Have you ever commissioned artwork before?
How did you find the artist? What was the process like, and what advice would you give to others?

About the Author
KeriLynn Engel is a writer, artist, knitter, and crazy cat lady with too many hobbies. She blogs about all the kick-ass women the history books left out at Amazing Women In History, and will be using the advice in this post for her upcoming book based on her blog. Follow her on twitter as @womeninhistory!

The Lady Astronomer by Katy O'Dowd

My good friend Katy O'Dowd, who works harder than anyone I know, has a book out.

Called The Lady Astronomer, the YA steampunk book is available in the UK and USA.

Here's the blurb from the publisher Untold Press -

"Lucretia's quiet life as an astronomer and hat-maker is quickly turned on its head by her brother. He is commanded by the king to build the grandest telescope in the land. Unfortunately for Lucretia, she is introduced to his majesty as her brother's assistant. Her nights spent on rooftops gazing at the stars are replaced by adventure and danger. In a race to build the Forty-foot telescope on time for the king, her misfortunes take their toll. When Lucretia finds herself held hostage at the Clockwork Court, the innocent country girl doesn't know who to trust. The lady astronomer finds court life to be more dangerous than she could have ever imagined. Even if her brothers manage to build the telescope on time, she might not live to earn her freedom.
With the help of her brothers, Freddie and Al, and her constant companions Leibniz the Lemur and Orion the Eagle Owl, Lucretia embarks on a journey that could change her life forever. Can she find the strength inside to balance her new life and overcome the obstacles threatening her destiny? Only the stars will tell."

To find out more about the lovely Katy click here to go to her web page.

 

The good, bad and the ugly of social networking

These days, it's banged into writers that they need to get stuck into social networking, but it can be a minefield. And it can kill your writing.

Here are the things I've learnt -

 

The Good

The internet makes the world seem a smaller place. You get to meet people you might not otherwise meet (in the cyber world at least). It's a great place to meet other writers.

Through social networking, I've discovered markets (and competitions) for writers that I wouldn't have otherwise known about. Not just in the UK, but worldwide. This increases opportunities for writers. Now thanks to epublishing you don't need to live in say Australia to be published there.

As long as you set time limits, you don't need to spend hours on social networking. Twitter for instance can take no time at all and you can tweet when you're waiting at a bus stop.

You can join forces with another writer to write a book.

The Bad

Most people you meet on Facebook and Twitter are lovely, but there are some disturbed people out there. You may find yourself being cyber stalked.

Social networking eats into your writing time, big time. Sometimes you just have to pull the plug on your computer.

Having a presence on Facebook, Twitter and other sites can help you raise your profile, but I'm not sure it helps sell books. A blog - in my opinion and a website - is far more effective.

Sites talk big about all the precautions they take to stop bullying and harrassment, but often they are useless when you are targetted.

The downright ugly

There are trolls, or as I like to call them trawls because they trawl sites, especially Facebook and they deliberately set out to upset people.

For example, if you post something about racism they'll post a racist comment or say that black people are too overly sensitive about being called the n word. Note - this is a real example.

There are some seriously weird people online. Old men posting comments on sites aimed at kids. If that's not a paedophile alert I don't know what is. People paid by companies to post comments, who often don't even hide the fact.


Bullying A Parent's Guide is now out in Kindle in the USA and in the UK. Priced at £3.99.

Bullying A Parent's Guide Now out on Kindle

When I wrote Bullying A Parent's Guide, I wanted the book to be available to as many people as possible because I genuinely believed I wrote a book that would help bullied children and their parents.

So, I'm delighted to announce that the book is now available on Kindle in the UK, priced £3.99.

Royalties v flat fee

Today, I was asked by a writer friend, who'd been offered the choice of a percentage of royalties or a flat fee for his book what he should do.

So far I've had six books published, all a mixture of advance and royalties and just flat fees.

 

Flat fee

The book that has sold the most copies, took 2 weeks to write, but was my own concept. It has sold in the tens of thousands and is still in print over a decade later and still selling.

I was paid one thousand pounds to write it and it's made the publishers many times that amount.

There are days when I regret not pushing more for royalties (the publisher commission most of their books on a flat fee basis), but I estimate that in total, including the fee, I've made three thousand pounds from this book. This extra two grand came from articles I sold to magazines and newspapers on the back of the book.

Royalties

I was paid an advance of 500 pounds for my second book and given royalties. The book took months to write and was very stressful. The topic gave me nightmares.

So far, I estimate I have made round about 4 thousand pounds from the book. I've had to do a lot to promote it and a huge chunk of that money has come from the PLR and ALCS.

Without that money the reward for so much work would be an insult. Well, at an income of four thousand, I estimate I made less than a pound an hour. Only a writer would work for that!

So, what would my advice be -

If you want a guaranteed fee, opt for the flat fee. But, only if it's FAIR.

I would still always try and get royalties and an advance. Your book might sell well, like my flat fee one did. But, remember, with royalties you will be relying on the publisher to actually sell your book. Of course, you need to be proactive there too.

 

 

 

 

Great things about being a writer

 

One of my books, Living Cruelty Free at the Frankfurt Book Fair

Okay, I hold my hands up. There has been some complaining of late from me about how tough it is to be a writer with publishers giving your books away free without telling you and creepy people cyber stalking you.

So, I reckoned it was about time to look at the good stuff.

1. You can look up any website and claim its research. Last night I searched for 'how to kill someone and get away with it.' If the police think I'm up to something, I have a ready-made excuse, 'I'm writing a book' even if I am plotting murder:) Only kidding.

2. You get to develop multiple personalities without ending up on medication.

3. You can sit doing nothing for ages and still say you're working. Well, you can't expect those plot knots to unknot themselves.

4. If you're life is depressing you can create a better one. Become a character you’ve created. Immerse yourself in it. Live in it.

5. You can get revenge on anyone you like by having something awful happen to them in your book, and there's not a thing you can do about it. A dentist who was horrible to me, was eaten by his dogs, penis and all. I did change his name.

6. You will never be alone. You have all those characters to keep you company.

7. You can change the world; mould it into whatever you want. Create happy endings. Make sure the bad guys (or girls) get their comeuppance. Things you don’t get to do in real life.

8. There is no better feeling that a parcel coming containing the books you have lovingly crafted.

Things I wish they’d told me about being a writer

1-You will see the world in a way that others will find extremely disturbing. To others an ice pick is for breaking up ice, to me, it's a potential weapon for my main character in Hell to Pay to use on the most vulnerable part of her attacker's anatomy.

 

Sadly, I don't earn as much as this guy. I wish.

 

2-Non-writers think you earn way much more than you do. That you're in Stephen King's league and if you're not they think your writing can't be that good. Well, it's easy to make money writing. No, sadly it's not.

3-When you try and build a platform for yourself to promote your work, you may attract unwanted attention. See Sinister side of Facebook post.

4-You'll have a deathly pale pallor from all those hours sitting in the near dark, crouched over a laptop/scribbling away. People will keep saying, 'Are you ill?'

5-You'll develop a belly from all that sitting down writing. There's no time for exercise unless it involves walking the dog. Well, he listens to you outlining possible plots (with his ears plugging up his lug holed).

6-People will think you're being rude when you don't acknowledge them, when you're really preoccupied with working out how your character can get away with killing someone.

 

The sinister side of Facebook

A few months ago, I set up a page for my bullying book, Bullying A Parent's Guide, on Facebook. I did this for two reasons - to help promote the book and two, to stimulate debate about bullying, a subject I feel very passionate about.

I was not prepared for what happened next.

The page started well, with people who had been bullied as I had (that's what inspired me to write a book I really felt would help those being bullied and their families) telling their stories. I thought, 'great, this is why I set up the page.'

Then someone who was a stranger to me, posted about their child being bullied and adults who could and should have helped not helping. Of course, I was sympathetic. I left the post up, as they'd named no names. If they had, it would have been deleted.

There's some creepy people on Facebook

 

Then all the craziness started.  Another person I didn't know posted and complained about me not deleting the first comment, saying it was aimed at them, which meant they'd named themselves. I ignored it. The person who wrote the first comment had named no names, as far as I was concerned it was a legitimate comment.

The complainer then sent me an aggressive message demanding I take down the comment. I politely told them the person who'd written the comment had named no names, that they'd done it themselves. They could delete their own comment, if they wished.

Then the personal and public slagging match between these two people began with the complainer doing most of it. ON MY PAGE In exasperation, I deleted the comments and blocked the two people. This was difficult to do as from what I could tell the complainer had four different aliases/made up names. At least. I'd block one then more bullying/aggressive messages/comments would turn up.

The last came yesterday, demanding that I block someone from the page (this person was a friend and one of the nicest people I know), despite the fact, they'd done nothing wrong. I deleted the message, as I will with any other nasty messages I get from them.

I've now been forced to ban people who are not friends from posting, because this person's aliases keep turning up, again with comments aimed at an individual who’s child was bullied.

What have I learnt from this whole episode?

 

Apart from the fact that there are some people in urgent need of psychiatric care on the Internet (I'm not mocking anyone) and that total strangers can have you dreading logging into Facebook, I've discovered that Facebook should really come up with a f**k off button, because there are some people who really do need to be told where to go. Sad, I think, but true.

Note - this is an abbreviated version of what's been going on, as it would take too long to go through it step by step, not to mention bore the pants of you:)

Tips for posting on Facebook

Don't post anything you wouldn't happily let anyone read. If you do, delete it as soon as you can. Don't leave it and bitch about it as though it's someone else's fault YOU posted it.

Don't harass a writer on FB or you may find your way into their next book. The last person who annoyed me, was eaten by his own dogs.

Maybe this is why I write revenge fiction like Hell to Pay and How Kirsty Gets Her Kicks, because in my books the creeps always get their comeuppance.

 Bullying A Parent's Guide is now out in Kindle in the USA and in the UK.

 

 

Hell to Pay Publication (cue, happy dance:)

If you see this logo, it's a sassy book.

I'm delighted to have signed a contract with Sassy Books today for my revenge thriller Hell to Pay.

Here's a taster of what to expect -

Nancy Kerr refuses to be a victim. She walks in on her parents’ killers and is violently raped and left for dead. Fourteen months later, she wakes up in a psychiatric hospital with no knowledge of how she got there. Slowly her memory starts to return.

Released from the institution, she has just one thing on her mind – revenge.

Two men brought hell to her family home. Now they’re in for some hell of their own.

If I had to describe this brand of fiction, I'd call ir Die Hard for Girls. The novel's aimed at those of us who like our heroines sassy and kick ass.

Hell to Pay will be published in 2013.

www.con – 4 ways to spot a vanity publisher

Don't get your pocket picked by a vanity publisher

1. Their email address is a free one like a yahoo or gmail account.

Reasoning - a legitimate company should own their domain name i.e. JMcNumpty@welovetopublishgreatbooks.com

2. There's no phone number or when you call, it rings out and nobody answers it.

Reasoning - reputable companies will always have a phone number you can call, so you can ask them questions. Those that don't aren't to be trusted.

3. They'll mention money. You giving them money. This may be for things like 'photocopying fees,' or 'administration fees.' They may also ask for a 'reading fee.'

Reasoning - Genuine publishers don't ask you for money. Vanity publishers do.

4. They'll say they welcome all submissions and there seems to be no restrictions on what they 'publish.'

Reasoning - Genuine publishers are very picky about what they publish. They have to be to invest their time and money in a particular book.

She was wearing a violent jumpsuit...

Yes, really.

The kind of jumpsuit that'd banjo you if it saw you.

Aim a karate chop to your throat.

Kick your head in.

Strike you down.

At least it would have been a violent jumpsuit if I hadn't noticed it during editing my novel.

Watch out, her jumpsuit may be violent.

You see, that's why editing's so essential. Without it, you make mistakes and if a publisher/agent/reader spots that mistake, they will start to doubt every single word they read.

Editing that novel or article can be a lengthy process, but it's a vital one unless you want a woman in a violent jumpsuit instead of a violet one.

Editing Tips

Look out for words you use excessively often. Me, I'm a just gal. With most words, you can delete them or replace them. It may help to use a word cloud or a tool that counts the instances of words.

Speech marks. Decide on single or double and stick to that. Give yourself a style guide and stick to that.

The more descriptive the words the better. For instance, trudge is better than walk, mumble is better than talk quietly. Are there words you can replace for better words?

Do you have speech tags for every, single bit of dialogue? You shouldn't need to say 'he says/she says' all the time. Often you can let people know who's speaking with them doing something. For instance - Sally wheezed. 'I'm giving up the cigarettes.'

The reality of life as a writer

When people imagine the life of a writer they probably think that you sit under a shady tree on a hot summer’s day thinking about your wonderful purple prose and then go home and write a book in a week that tops the bestseller lists and goes onto earn you JK Rowling style riches.

But here’s the reality for most of us -

People will keep asking you when you will get a ‘proper job.’ This happened to me five minutes ago.

You may find yourself eating spaghetti with gravy for Christmas dinner with a duvet wrapped around yourself to keep warm, because you can’t afford to pay the electricity bill. This happened to me.

You will spend most of your time looking at your writing and seesawing between ‘this is brilliant’ and imagining who will play your brilliant characters in a movie (I want Kevin McKidd to play the suicide bomber Doyle in Deid Bastards), to ‘this sucks.’ Most of the time you will be thinking that it sucks. This is currently happening to me.

You’re partner/husband/wife may leave you because you don’t pay them any attention/won’t make dinner/fix that door/you didn’t pay that final demand and you may not notice for days because you’re too busy finishing that last chapter. This will eventually happen to me.

Your cat or dog may start to nibble on your toes because you haven’t fed him for a week and you may be too busy working on that last chapter to notice. I hope this doesn’t happen to me.  

Zombies & Living Cruelty Free is out on Kindle

This is probably not the cover for Deid Bastards.

Sorry, I haven’t posted in a wee while. A few weeks ago, a publisher expressed an interest inmy zombie novel Deid Bastards and I’ve been working away on that trying to perfect it. You know them zombies, they sure keep you busy.

I have a lot planned for them. I'm already the proud owner of www.deidbastards.com where I hope to be bringing you some zombietastic stuff in the near future. So stay tuned. The wecsite is currently under construction.

I’ve also been working hard to promote my book Living Cruelty Free: a guide for anyone who wants to live a more compassionate life and I am delighted to announce that as well as the traditional books, it’s now available on Kindle.

At the moment it's available on Amazon.co.uk, but I hope that will change soon.

Giving away free books won't sell books

Go on grab some and throw them at me. Writers work for peanuts.

This is an update on my earlier post Could your publisher give your book away free?

I honestly wish I was writing an upbeat post.

One where I would hold up my hands and say, 'I was wrong.' That 'those people at Need2Know sure knew what they were doing giving away e copies of my books, without consulting me.'

But then the royalty cheque came for Bullying - A Parent's Guide and it was puny. Pathetically puny. And I knew that over half of the few sales I did achieve came from the reviews of the book I got on Amazon.

Check out your book on at novelrank if you want to know how it's selling on Amazon. Note - it will only track from the date you start tracking it.

‘How puny was that royalty cheque?’ you will be asking.

Enough for a week's shopping - on a budget - because apparently despite being one of the most downloaded books by Need2Know on their free giveaway site, giving something away free did not translate into sales.

And why would it? If someone gives you something for free, why the heck would you pay for it?

The moral of the story: get it in writing from your publisher than they have to limit book giveaways to prizes and review copies. I know I will, because I believe all writers should be decently compensated for their work.

Have a peek inside Living Cruelty Free - It's Free

Although this blog was set up to keep you up to date with my crime novel, Vile City, I also like to keep this blog varied. Zombies and now bunnies. You don't get much different than that.

You can now see what's inside Living Cruelty Free: Live a more compassionate life. This is a guide to living a kinder life.

Obviously, I don't mean towards zombies because if you show them compassion you are gonna get eaten.

You can check out the book on -

On Amazon.co.uk

& Amazon.com
Amazon.ca

Released Deid Bastards - the movie (well, video)

I'm having such a ball writing about the zombie hordes descending on Glasgow and how it efects a ragtag of survivors.

There's Glasgow couple Scott and Emma who might be expecting a baby. Well, it's hardly likely to be a puppy.

Would you like to be up the duff with the undead on the run?

Would be suicide bomber Doyle, who picks the 'wrang day for it.'
Geek Kenny who owns the last video store in Glasgow and perhaps the world.

Mustafa, a patriotic Scottish Asian muscle man who has a tendancy to act first and think later.
The characters are so real to me that I can see what they look like in my head. I even have an all Scottish cast lined up for the roles.

I thought you might like a peak at the video my clever partner, John made for me.

So far, I've sent the book to three publishers and one agent. Wish me luck, because the Deid Bastards deserve to be coming to a town near you.

I'm now off to buy the domain and make the t-hirts.

Respect the Genre

This picture will not make you transform into a werewolf

One of my favourite TV shows, Being Human about a werewolf, vampire and ghost living together has left me feeling disappointed this series.

Why? Because they haven't respected the genre.

Episode one of the new series, a werewolf uses a picture of a moon and not a full moon to transform. Werewolves need the real thing to transform.

Last episode of the season, a vampire gets into a house without being invited. Sure he burns but he still gets into the house thus breaking another genre rule. You need to invite a vampire in.

Despite the good writing and acting, these episodes left me deflated. Why? Because as a fan of the genre I hate it when they mess with them.  When they break the rules.

Sure they can be innovative – think True Blood that’s turned the vampire genre on its head. Be thought provoking. Do things that have never been done before. But never blatantly break the rules.

Not just in TV writing, but in novel writing too. Because if you don’t like it when writers of TV shows break the rules, chances are readers of your work won’t like it if you do the same.

What does a writer do all day?

As a full time writer you would think I'd have plenty of time to, well write. If only that were the case. Here's how I spent yesterday -

Got up and had some breakfast. Too busy booting up my laptop and doing 'dog tummy' so toast burned and turned to charcoal. Had to make more.

He wants dog tummy (his tummy rubbed)

Had to go round my blogs and social networks changing publication date for my book Living Cruelty Free. Publisher thought it was on sale now from Amazon but it won't be on sale until April 5th. 
Publisher tells me it will now be on sale on March 29th. Go round social networks and blogs changing it, again. Have a minute to myself to scream. Boyfriend tells me to stop swearing. I tell him to f off.

Spend ten minutes agonising over why agent from agency who say they always send an acknowledgement for all submissions hasn't sent me one three days after I sent submission package.
Spent ten minutes agonising over publisher I signed up with a year ago not being in touch for months despite me sending change of address and follow up to as unpublished book.

Tell nuisance caller to stop phoning me. It's a cold sales call and they've been phoning every day, sometimes several times a day. Then worry I was mistaken and it was a publisher and I've blown it.
Have a look to see if other publisher is still giving 2 of my books away free, which means I get no royalties. They didn't even tell me they were doing this. Yep, they still are.

Post copies of Living Cruelty Free to friends who've kindly agreed to review it.

Too busy working to see to dinner and it's ruined. Boyfriend and I have words. One word is said more than others. It begins with f.

Updated my author page on Goodreads and posted a review of new James Thompson book. To write well, you need to read well.

More dog tummy - it helps with the stress.

Reply to comments on various blogs - I have 4.

Post things that dogs should never eat on much neglected Caring for your dog blog. Have to break off to chase my rescue dog Benjy around the room with his bone.

Have a lengthy discussion with my brother about the origins of zombies. All research for my zombie book, Deid Bastards. We talk about stuff like this often. We are weird.

Add Amazon book carousel to my website and blogs. Takes me ages to realise I need to copy code into html of website.

Make video for Amazon as instructed by publisher. Well, boyfriend does as I tweet.

Put Facebook badges for my pages on all my blogs.

Follow back and DM people on Twitter. 

Change header on cruelty free blog to reflect new publication date. Also change links.

Gather financial data for my accounts. Fret over how to pay bills.

It's 4am and I haven't written so much as a sentence of my book all day. Oh well, at least I wrote this blog post.

My Living Cruelty Free book will be on sale on March 29th, 2012

I know it's not crime or zombie related or indeed fiction related, but if you can't plug your own book on your own blog, where can you? 

I am so excited that Living Cruelty Free will finally go on sale on March 29th, 2012. The culmination of months of painstaking work, I really do hope it can make a difference.

I genuinely wish this book had been around when I became vegetarian 25 years ago because it's a one stop shop for compassionate living. Most importantly, it stresses that we all need to be kinder not just to animals but our own human beings.

You can buy the book on Amazon.com

Amazon.co.uk

Amazon.ca



Price: UK £9.99 | USA $14.95 | CAN $16.95

For more details of where to buy, click here.

I'd like to thank the BUAV for letting me use their world famous leaping bunny logo in the book, my friends on Facebook and Twitter for helping me to decide what went in the book and my long suffering partner in life and compassionate living, John.

Rejected Submissions - Some things to consider

The other day,  I received a nice thanks but no thanks from Jo Fletcher Books for my zombie novel. In the email it said that just because it wasn't for them didn't mean other publishers would feel the same way.

Your dog may share your sadness when you get a rejection.

At first I got upset, felt worthless, told myself nothing good would happen ever again.  Then I stopped mooching and thought 'hey, there's a blog post in this.'

 That brings me to my first point -

1. A publisher or agent saying 'no' is like someone expressing their opinion. Think of it that way and it doesn't seem so bad.

2. Before you send your manuscript have at least 6 other publishers/agents you can send it to. I did and I'm now working on a new submission package. Keep on updating that list.

3. Publishers & agents get deluged with submissions. There's a chance yours didn't get read. They simply don't have the time to read everybody's work.

4. Many fine books that have become classics were turned down by publishers time and time again, but their authors never gave up. Why should you?

5. Did you send it to the right person? Send a children's book to someone specialising in chick lit and off course you'll get a great big NO.

6. They might have a similar book planned/or on their books. Sometimes a rejection can be down to bad timing.

Note – Even if you do everything right you can still get a big fat NO.

It's a hard knock (writing) life

Since the decision was made for me that I was going to be a writer (does anyone actually choose to have a life full of disappointment), I have learnt quite a few things that have surprised me -

Go on punch yourself in the face. That's what it feels like to be a writer.

1. Publishers can give unlimited numbers of your books away free, without telling you. See Could your publisher give your book away free if you want to find out what I'm babbling about.

2. When your writing's going well you can feel it. You're desperate to write; to get back to your characters because they're real in your head. But, when your writing's going badly you can barely put an address on a freaking envelope.

3. Royalty statements are so confusing Einstein couldn't figure them out. What formula do they use? The pull it out your butt formula.

4. It's way too easy to live on junk food, fizzy drinks and prescription drugs when you're a writer. Grapes and herbal teas don't give you that sugar hit you need. Drinking way too much booze and puffing away like we're still in the steam age are problems too. And let's not start on the depression and the crumbling sense of self-worth tied into whether some stranger says nay or yay to the novel/article/poem you've been lovingly crafting by candlelight because the power's off again or maybe you just forgot to pay the bill. Again.

5. Sometimes you will actually wonder if your publisher gives two figs about your book. You may sign a contract and then discover communicating with them is like pulling out your own teeth with a pair of pliers. Emails will go unanswered or ignored. Deadlines they came up with will pass without so much as a tweet from them. You'll feel like the mouldy salad at the back of the fridge: forgotten and minging and waiting to be binned.

6. If you were a plumber nobody expects you to work for free, yet when it comes to paying writers people can be real tight wads. I've lost count of the number of editors who've told me how much they've loved my article - often ones I've pulled out of the hat at the last minute cos their pal ditzy dolittle who they asked to write it in the first place couldn't do it because she's having her belly button defluffed/her brain waxed - only for me to have to battle for the next 6 months to get paid.

Of course these negatives can be offset by the joy of seeing the book/article/poem you wrote published, but boy, have you earned it.

Getting Published: The Hard Truth

At times when you're trying to get published it can feel like you're standing outside a shop where the closed sign has gone up and then they pull down the shutters when they see you coming.

It's tough going but there are some things you can do to give yourself a fighting chance -

Read as much as you can and in as many genres as you can. Whenever I'm stuck with a bit in my novel, reading inspires me.

Write as much as you can and accept that you may have to write a lot of novels or non-fiction books before you get published. This may be because your first work is rubbish/not what they're publishing right now/needed more work that you realised. I wrote 4 full sized novels before I had my novella accepted by Pulp Press. I also started many more.

Accept you will have some near misses. The man who discovered JK Rowling was interested in my non-fiction book but it came to nothing. The publisher of my first ever published book, a humour title wanted my next two books, but then they decided to cut back on their publishing schedule and they couldn't do the 2 books.

Don't be snooty about any other genre. This is important because you might be missing out on the genre your writing might be most suited for.

Get to know other writers so you can share your tales of woe and success. Yes, I did say success. My favourite writers' forum is Talkback. Great people who are so supportive and know what it's like to be a writer.

Keep on submitting to publishers and agents and ALWAYS follow their guidelines. If you don't you might as well throw your submission in the bin. For instance, most agents & publishers don't want to see your full manuscript they may want to see 10,000 words or their first 3 chapters and a synopsis.

Get feedback on your work wherever you can. It's so difficult to see your work as others see it. If you can't get feedback edit your work by printing it out or viewing it on an ebook reader. It helps you to get your editor's hat on.

P.S. After writing this, I got the first rejection for my zombie book. Off to cry into a bucket then I’ll give myself a kick up the backside and get on with it. Writers who get published get published because they NEVER give up.

How to tell if you are a writer

Do you find yourself wandering off during conversations?

Do you have pens and paper everywhere around your home, including in the loo?

Do you find yourself writing on anything you can find, like toilet roll, napkins and even your arm?

Do you find yourself experiencing lost time because you're so immersed in you writing?

Do you wander off during conversations because you've come up with a new plot idea?

Do you use your mobile phone as a mobile word processor - as I'm doing when I'm writing this?

Then you must be a writer.

A writer is someone who is compelled to write whether they've been published or not.

The angry writer



I said 'I need a picture of an angry lady, not an angry baby.' Oh well, this will have to do.


Instead of doing New Year’s resolutions that I’ll probably break anyway, I thought I’d take this time to reflect upon the bane of many folk’s lives – crap customer service from so called big name companies. The kind of stuff that takes you away from writing.

Bit late you might think to mention New Year’s resolutions. But there’s a reason for that. Well two reasons.

I’ve been without the Internet for over a month.

The first and most important reason for that is BT. The letters used to stand for British Telecom. Now the T stands for terrible service and the B stands for what they used to nastily refer to children without fathers.

You see, in the modern era, the once great BT can’t put a telephone in my new flat for over a month. That means NO landline (which concerns me greatly as my dad has bone cancer and mobile phones aren’t 100 percent reliable) and NO internet.

There’s a phone line in my property, but it’s ‘the wrong kind’ of phone line apparently. If you don’t come from the UK, you won’t know this, but ‘the wrong kind’ is a phrase they trot out whenever things don’t work like the trains. Hence the reason the trains aren’t running is because there are ‘the wrong kind of leaves on the line.’

To go online, I would have used one of the handful of dongles I bought that supposedly will allow me to us mobile broadband, but none of them get a signal decent enough to take less than 20 minutes to load a web page full of rubbish ads and pathetic pictures.

Next on my hitlist is Orange. Why is it so difficult to speak to someone in customer service who doesn’t mangle the English language (I’m talking about British people, here)/sound like they have nasal congestion/thinks because you have a Scottish accent you are speaking Swahili. Apologies to anyone who speaks Swahili. I’ve heard it’s a beautiful language.  

After ten minutes of trying to get the person to understand my flat number – It’s 10E – I finally gave up. Decided to do it online using my phone.  

I had a lot of fun trying to put some money on my Orange phone on New Year’s day. Shops were shut. ATM Machine not one you can put money on your phone with. New credit card because someone tried to tan (use it on a spending spree) just before Christmas, so couldn’t top up the normal way. (Cheers, mate – hope you end up with a turkey rammed up your jacksy.)

As for the sick, perverted monster who invented Captacha (had to use that in a vain attempt to top up my account online), is it just me, or are the letters, numbers and occasional punctuation just a load of rubbish mashed the together that the human eye can barely see?

Footnote – I thought no Internet or phone line was bad enough, until the January storms came and with it went the electricity for THREE DAYS. With temperatures below zero in our home on an island, it was warmer outside.

On the plus side, I got to experience first hand what it would be like to live after a zombie apocalypse with no electricity, which came in very useful when writing Deid Bastards.