The fifth book in my Lou Elliott series is now underway (at last!)

Hello! Yes I know, I only ever seem to write blog entries when I want something but I really do intend to start blogging more regularly (honest!).

Anyway, I have some important news to tell you about: work is now underway on the fifth book in my Lou Elliott mystery adventure series. I know it's been a long while and many of my readers will probably have thought I'd abandoned it but it's not the case. I've just been waylaid with so many other things which have demanded my time.

But it's great to get back to the series and to pick up again with the characters and find out what they've been getting up to. Lou, Jack, David and Emily are all fine and they've been having a great summer holiday in Snowdonia where they've been camping. The parents of the Johnson children are with them this time, and wrongly supposed that they could keep their eye on them and stop them from falling into another adventure. How wrong can you be!

I am hoping that the book will come out in time for Christmas (2017) but it's possible that it may not be ready until early January. The important thing though, is that book five is on its way and it definitely won't be the last. So watch this space, I will post regular updates on this blog.

And now, if you'll excuse me, I better get back to writing it. Things are hotting up!

Tomorrow - my latest children's book is published

It's all very exciting. The fourth book in my Lou Elliott mystery adventure series will be published on Amazon tomorrow, July 4th, 2015. Trouble at Chumley Towers is supposed to go live (having been available for a month or so for advance orders) at midnight but with the time difference, I am guessing that will be 8am tomorrow Saturday here in Britain.

Perhaps appropriately for a children's book I am almost childishly counting the hours down to lift off! Well, you're never too old to be enthused about something are you, or at least you shouldn't be! I am really looking forward to giving readers another chance to catch up with Lou, Jack, David and Emily, having taken so long to come up with book four in the series.

I went badly off the boil - not only with this series but with writing in general - and also had other things which took up a lot of my time. Also, during my days in the literary wilderness, I lost touch with a number of people with whom I was corresponding via my George Chedzoy hotmail address, which got deleted by Microsoft due to inactivity. So do drop me a line, anyone who has emailed me in recent months and who has not received a reply - and for that matter, anyone else who wishes to get in touch (georgechedzoy@hotmail.co.uk)

I feel very pleased to be back into writing fiction again and looking forward to publishing my next book, which will be a fantasy adventure novella based on the characters from The Mystery of the Misty Woods. So look out for that in the not too distant future. It's already written, but needs quite a lot of editing before it will be ready.

As for the one after that - it might well be book five in the Lou Elliott series because I am so keen to keep going with those children and join them on further adventures and life experiences. I think they're a great bunch and in Trouble at Chumley Towers they enjoy getting together at Christmas with snow falling and tackling the mysterious thefts taking place from the stately home.

It's also my intention to bring out all my books in print format as well in the coming months - not everyone wants to read off an electronic screen, of course!

I hope you enjoy Trouble at Chumley Towers and I look forward to receiving some feedback on it. Remember - if you want to be among the very first to read it, it's available on Amazon for advance orders for a few more hours, before going live at about 8am tomorrow (British Summer Time).

Meet the author of Smugglers at Whistling Sands . . . on Whistling Sands

Thousands of apologies for my lack of blogging over the summer, there is no excuse for it.

Anyway, despite my silence, I've sold a good few dozen electronic copies of my children's adventure novel Smugglers at Whistling Sands over the last three months and have been delighted at the feedback I've received from some readers, including a good few who say they are now inspired to visit Abersoch, Whistling Sands and other locations in the book.

Well, on that note, and another apology for the short notice, I will be on Whistling Sands on Sunday, August 26th 2012 from 10am until about 1pm if any readers of my book would like to come down and say hello - or for that matter, any would-be readers. (That's tomorrow as I'm writing this).

Whistling Sands is, as the title suggests, a key location of Smugglers at Whistling Sands and readers can actually tread in the footsteps of Lou, Jack, Dan and Emily during their exciting stay at the beach and imagine what was going through their minds when they encounter smugglers there.

As I say, I'll be there from 10am with my wife and our two young kids, blond-haired boy aged five and daughter, 4. We usually sit near to the rocks on the left hand side of the beach as you step off the road leading down to it - fairly near the beach cafe. I'm the ugly one in black-framed spectacles!

So if you're in the area, do come and say hello. And if you've never been to Whistling Sands before, I'm sure you'll love it. I'd gladly offer to sign books but sadly, it still only exists in Kindle format!

All the above is weather permitting of course. If it's pouring down, we'll make it another day!

My children's adventure novel set at Abersoch, North Wales, free on Kindle today!

Well I am sitting here on holiday at Abersoch on the Lleyn peninsula coast of North Wales enjoying glorious sunshine. I've just been down to the beach with my wife and kids and come back to find that I've had three people so far who have downloaded my book for free today.

I thought it would be a nice way to mark being back at wonderful Abersoch to have another free day for my novel, Smugglers at Whistling Sands, in Amazon's Kindle store. So PLEASE take advantage of it, go on to Amazon.co.uk, or Amazon.com and get a free copy of my children's adventure novel.

If you like it, all I would ask is that you mention it to others and - if you have time - consider leaving me a short review on my Amazon listing which will really help me as an unknown author to get known.

The book, as regular readers of this blog will know, is intended for children aged 9+ but is also intended to be perfectly readable by adults. It should appeal if you enjoy good, wholesome, mystery/adventure stories, loosely inspired by the great Enid Blyton and her Famous Five series.

Anyway, enough talking from me, I'll leave you to get a copy of your free book - just click on the Amazon links to it on the right hand side of this page - Amazon.co.uk for British readers and Amazon.com for the American site.

Do let me know how you get on!

Not brilliant sales but a brilliant new review for my book!

Well, sales have continued to bump along not very fast in this second week since my first free promotion on Amazon. But this is how it can pay off - I've just had my first book review on Amazon.com (I've got two on Amazon.co.uk) - and it's very positive. Four stars out of five from somebody who lives in Illinois, and a nice write-up, which I include as follows:


4.0 out of 5 stars Fun book to read, March 1, 2012
By Happylakedreamer (Illinois) - See all my reviews
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: Smugglers at Whistling Sands (Kindle Edition)
This was a great book to read. I enjoyed the characters and the story very much. It is great to read on a rainy Saturday or while on vacation, especially at the beach. Everyone loves hidden treasure and this book delivers a bit of both that and the mystery of the smugglers. It is a quick read with modern characters and present day life situations that will entertain young as well as old readers. I would recommend this book to anyone who wants a good story to keep them entertained.
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Good reviews are vital to have any chance of making it in Amazon's Kindle book store and to have my first ever one on Amazon.com is fantastic.

And here's a bit of exclusive info for you readers of my blog out there - I'm running another free promotion tomorrow Saturday March 3rd 2012, so if you haven't already got a copy of my ebook Smugglers at Whistling Sands, tomorrow would be a great opportunity to do so. Mind you, it's only 77p in any case of course!

Sales-wise, not a great week: Monday: 1; Tuesday: 0; Wednesday: 2: Thursday: 1; Friday (so far): 0.

Tomorrow freebie day, so hoping lots of people will download the book and maybe it will help create a buzz and help to kick sales off. I remain convinced, as I said in a previous post, that it is important for unknown authors to swallow their pride and sell cheap with free promotions.

Free promotion on Kindle has helped - seven sales so far today

I was too ready to feel disappointed about my free 24-hour promotion at the weekend. I have had seven sales today, six on Amazon.co.uk and one on Amazon.com. I feel pretty certain that they may well have been sparked from my promotion.

If so, that is a very good sign, because it is an indication of a sales increase caused by word of mouth from satisfied customers - the same basis on which a good restaurant will thrive. So I have just a nugget of hope that my book might start to take off. The six UK sales all came this afternoon, and have pushed me into three bestseller lists on the paid-for side: (correct as of 8.56pm on Weds Feb 22):

Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #3,307 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
#34 in Kindle Store > Books > Fiction > Children's Fiction > Literature > Action & Adventure
#50 in Books > Children's Books > Fiction > Crime & Thrillers
#78 in Kindle Store > Books > Fiction > Children's Fiction > Literature > Science Fiction, Fantasy, Mystery & Horror

I am really pleased about this, coming two days short of a week since my new, improved book went back on sale. I was reading it myself on the train to work today and, maddeningly, came across about half a dozen errors that need putting right. But these are minor ones which readers might not even spot (although they may spot ones that I don't see!) - what I am so pleased about is that I had the sense to withdraw the book from sale last October when I realised the plot construction was flawed and needed improving.

I do feel now I've got a book to be proud of - just need more buyers!

Free promotion going really well - 245 downloads of Smugglers

I am over the moon at having had so many downloads of my ebook Smugglers at Whistling Sands. By 10.15pm, there had been 245 downloads, of which 125 were from Amazon.com and 120 from Amazon.co.uk
Actually, two of the American purchases were before the free promotion started, which is maybe a good omen.

Very surprised that more downloads should be from the American site than the British one. For a couple of hours this afternoon, someone somewhere was downloading the book every two minutes. Demand has tailed off somewhat since, but still a regular trickle of orders.

Of course, I realise one shouldn't read too much into this since giving something away for free is asking far less of people than a paid-for novel. But nonetheless, there are plenty of other free books out there, it is still great news I feel to have had this number in little over 12 hours.

Will it bear fruit in terms of reviews and further orders once it has a price tag back on it from tomorrow? I am hoping so. For an unknown author, the important thing is to get my book onto people's Kindles, (or other electronic devices) and read and hopefully appreciated.

That is what a free promotion is all about and I feel sure that it will help towards that end.

At last - Smugglers at Whistling Sands is back on sale!

Hello again, have you forgotten me? I wouldn't blame you if you had! Anyway I have finally come out of hibernation to reveal that I have now got my children's novel back on sale in Amazon's Kindle store - the new, improved Smugglers at Whistling Sands is now back on sale!

If you click on the product link on the side of this page it will take you straight to it. I've listed it for an introductory price of just 77p - the minimal possible. Thanks to the VAT reduction, that is the cheapest it has ever been and there is now about 3,500 words more to read. It was originally 22 chapters long and I've had to create two new chapters to accommodate the extra length.

The important thing, however, isn't that it is longer, but that it is better. It is simply a much better read than before. I had the making of a good book before (if I may say so) but I committed a fundamental error by allowing the mystery involving the smugglers to be effectively solved by the forces of law and order. In short, the kids, and in particular Lou the lead character in the novel, simply did not do enough.

I believe I have now got a far more satisfying, rounded, exciting novel than before - fun where it should be fun - and nail-biting where it should be nail-biting.

It isn't for me to say that it's a good book, that's for readers to judge, but I can hand on heart say that it is in a different league to the earlier version. I had 46 buyers before I removed it from sale at the end of October - if you are one of them, you may find that the version you have already bought is over-written with the new file, it depends on your Kindle preferences. If not I hope you will not be too annoyed with me if I suggest that you might like to purchase the new version. I will keep it priced at 77p for the foreseeable future, and maybe indefinitely, if I can pick up reasonable sales at this price.

Please try it - and if you like it, please consider taking time out to post a review on Amazon, for unknown authors it can help enormously to picking up a wider following.

Bye for now, and sorry for leaving it so long . . .

Right, roll up sleeves - time to get to work on new ending for my book!

It's 9.45 Saturday morning, I've got the house to myself until at least the middle of the afternoon, at last a window of opportunity to make the changes I want to make to my novel, Smugglers at Whistling Sands.

I've been wanting to crack on with it all week, but have had a very busy few days and it's so valuable to have a few hours free and without interruptions. Phone do not ring! (If you do, I may not answer!)

Right, on which note, I'm not going to sit here extending this blog entry any further. I need to be getting on with it. Tonight, the family are going round to some friends in the village who are holding a bonfire party as we remember, remember the Fifth of November. Fingers crossed the weather stays dry.

I will report back on how I got on either tonight or tomorrow, and I hope to be able to report that I have made some real progress. Here goes!

Smugglers at Whistling Sands to get a new ending

I've spent a few hours today, including the extra one from the clocks going back an hour overnight, mapping out a new structure for the closing chapters of Smugglers at Whistling Sands.

As I explained in my previous post, because this is major surgery and not just minor tweaks, I no longer wish to be selling a version I am not happy with and am poised to replace and for that reason the book can't be bought any more.

Such is the flexibility of publishing a novel as an ebook, one can make these changes without having to wait for the end of a print run. I absolutely guarantee to allow those who have bought my book so far to have a copy of the revised ending.
I am very pleased at the progress I have made today in mapping out what I believe to be a better, more satisfying, more exciting ending for Smugglers at Whistling Sands and one which does proper justice to the confident, capable, strong-willed lead character, Lou (Louise) Elliott.

That now leaves me with the small matter of a complete re-write of the last 4,000 words. If the book becomes longer, and it might, then this will be possibly a writing job of some 6,000 words, some of which will ultimately be cut away in editing.

I do feel that I have grown as a writer since I penned this book. I can see flaws in it now that I could not see when writing it. By putting those flaws right, I will then have a novel which I feel I can be proud of and be confident in offering for sale.

How long will it take before I am in a position to sell it again? I'm not sure, but I've set myself a month to get it sorted and back on sale from December 1, 2011. It's frustrating in a way, because I want to be getting on with writing a second book, not fiddling with my debut one. But by getting this one right, I've got more chance of getting my next one right as well.

A bit about my book, Smugglers at Whistling Sands

I said in my last blog I'd give people a bit more of an insight into my children's adventure novel, Smugglers at Whistling Sands, based at Abersoch, North Wales.

Actually, looking back through my earlier blogs, I did talk about it a bit in my entry on August 20th, that said, it's probably well worth offering a reminder, especially for those of you who have only recently discovered my blog.

As I mentioned just over a month ago, Abersoch and the surrounding area is in my blood - I love the place and have been going there on holiday all my life - ie. for 44 years! So when I decided to write a children's adventure novel, the part of the world which has such fond memories for me seemed the obvious location.

The title makes no reference to Abersoch, but refers to Whistling Sands as in "Smugglers At Whistling Sands". As you'll gather from that, this beach does feature prominently in the book, and the sand on that beach does whistle by the way. Well, not whistle exactly, it's more of a squeak - but in all the beaches I've ever walked on, I've known any other sand to make that noise as you walk across it.

The youngsters who feature in this book are on holiday at Abersoch but they do not just stay put there. Their adventure takes them to a number of places including Whistling Sands obviously but also the St Tudwal's Islands, Aberdaron and Porth Ysgo - a remote beach nearby, and the hillside above - and the disused manganese mine to be found there.

The owners of the Vaynol Arms public house in Abersoch might be pleased (I hope) to discover that their premises features in the novel. Oh and the grotty hotel where one of the smugglers stays is, I hasten to add, a figment of my imagination!

The action centres around the Johnson children, Jack, David and Emily (aged 12, 11 and 10 respectively) and a headstrong girl called Lou whom they meet on the beach. It is she who is the catalyst for these rather dull Johnson siblings to spread their wings a bit. And what better time to do that than when they should happen across the activities of smugglers!

As I said in August, there is quite a lot of realism in this story, for all the fact that it is a rather post-modern children's adventure owing some of its inspiration to Enid Blyton's novels which I enjoyed a great deal as a child.The activities of the smugglers are based on real life occurences and if you do a search on Google at the point when the children do their Google search, you might well come across references to real-life smuggling which was in part the raw material for the book.

I could say more, but Downton Abbey is about to start. (Martin in Canada, you may not know what I mean by that but all UK residents will!)

PS: Sales update: four sales over the weekend takes tally to 43 - will I make the big 50 by next Sunday? If I do, as I said before, I guarantee to write a sequel.

Couple more sales and a really nice email is spurring me on to thoughts of a sequel

My decision to put the price of my novel Smugglers At Whistling Sands back up to £1.71 seems if anything to have increased sales. I've had a flurry of three over the last couple of days and an email from my latest buyer very pleased with the book.

Interestingly, she actually thought it was too cheap at £1.71. I don't agree - I don't intend to increase the price on my Amazon ebook any further. £1.71 (£1.49 plus VAT) is the lowest I can charge to qualify for the 70% royalty. At its previous price of 86p I only got a 35% royalty which equated to 26p profit per sale. But at £1.71 I get 99p and I think, for an ebook that is a perfectly reasonable cut. I do not understand why it is that major publishers feel the need to charge almost as much for an ebook as they do for the paper and ink version.

That said, and maybe not everyone knows this, hard copies of books do not attract VAT - but ebooks do and Amazon - as the seller - must therefore apply 20% VAT to the £1.49 cost of my book, hence the VAT inclusive price of £1.71. But I still find it hard to stomach that an ebook, even of world-famous authors, should cost £6 or more. For me, £1.71 is just fine. A smallish sum for the buyer but a reasonable return for the author. Above all - and this is the key reason for dropping the 86p price tag - it is because it puts off more buyers than it attracts.

The sort of person keen to buy a children's novel like this, either as a nostalgic read for themselves or for their kids, aren't likely to need to be corralled into a purchase with an ultra-cheap price.

Anyway, it was great to have a few words of appreciation for the book because like most writers I am inherently insecure and love praise. And I am now seriously turning my mind to a possible sequel to Smugglers. I said I would start one for definite if I could reach a total of 50 sales by the end of September. I am 15 sales adrift so that might be pushing it - but when that milestone is reached, particularly if it's fairly soon, I will definitely consider it.

A few more sales - just wish I could invest more time in pushing my book

Despite having done very little to promote my book - including failing to keep this blog up to date - I have continued to pick up slow but steady sales. In my last entry I had reached a milestone of 20 sales of Smugglers at Whistling Sands. This tally has now leaped to 31 - well I say leaped, it is after all nearly a fortnight since I wrote that entry!

On Saturday evening I had two sales and this afternoon I had another two, which pushed me up to #35 in the top 100 in children's fiction action & adventure category on Amazon's Kindle bookstore.

I badly need to start pushing the book again to build on this - selective use of Twitter and Facebook spring to mind, but it all takes time and I've been very busy with work and also family matters over the last few days.

My very first buyer, fellow fledgling novelist Martin Jones in Toronto, Canada, has done me an excellent analysis of the first chapter of my book, which I'm very grateful for. The value of having a fresh pair of eyes can be summed up in just one observation alone of his - something no-one else has spotted, including my wife! I was selling my ebook with one of the principal characters, 12-year-old Jack, referred to in the first chapter as "John".

John was his original name, but I changed it to Jack ages ago, and thought I had altered every single reference in the book - but clearly I missed one. As soon as I read this, I changed the hard copy of the novel in Word format on my desktop, converted it to ebook format and uploaded it to Amazon to over-write the original file. I am not happy that a good few people will have bought my book with that mistake contained in it - that said, it will create no more than a momentary confusion and I don't think anyone will be that furious with me. But certainly I feel a little furious with myself!

There are three or four other minor changes I intend to make arising from Martin's analysis. And a number of his suggestions I will reject and leave things as they are, grateful though I am for them. It's a sign of strength to listen to criticism and be willing to change your novel - but it's also a sign of strength to reject certain observations and say, "well, I'm the author, that's how I want it!"

I shall soon be sending Martin a little analysis of my own of his part-written book, and I expect him to do the same - maybe take on board some of what I say, and reject some of it. Talking of which, I think it's time I plugged his book in this blog which I am very much enjoying. I find it's whole basis is highly original and unusual. It's called They Shoot Birds Don't They? - and you can find a long extract from it on the writers' site Authonomy.com run by HarperCollins, under Martin's author name MP Jones. Click here to go directly to it. Martin's book is now ranked very highly by fellow members, up to 117 as I write this out of several thousand other books. So take a look!

Talking of which, the Authonomy website is very interesting, not had time to get my head round it properly yet, but looking forward to delving into it in more detail. And I promise not to leave it another fortnight before updating this blog!

A five-star review for Smugglers on Amazon

My book picked up a fantastic review last night posted on my Amazon listing from Canadian buyer Martin Jones in Toronto - and it may well be no coincidence that I had two sales overnight, taking me to 9, of which 4 were in the last 12 hours. (Click the Amazon link to my book on the right hand side to see Martin's review and info about the book).

I was sort of dreading my first review so I was delighted to receive such a good one and a couple of criticisms made by Martin were delivered gently and constructively. Book reviews are in the hands of the reader and can be as harsh or as flattering as people wish to deliver them and that's the way it should be.

What particularly pleased me is that he clearly enjoyed Smugglers At Whistling Sands and felt that it had pace and was a page-turner - which is what I wanted. I hope other buyers will also find the time to post reviews and I really do hope I can keep getting the book out there and selling. I am not interested in acquiring riches - what I want is readers!

Martin described my book as "fantastic value" at 86p and said that its low price didn't reflect its quality. He felt it must be a marketing strategy on my part to set the price at that level. He is absolutely right - the marketing strategy is to maximise sales - ie. readers. My research tells me that setting the price low is important for unknown and self-published authors like me if we are to have any hope of readers taking a risk on us. At 86p I am hopefully worth a punt - but why should you pay £4.99 when you've never heard of me before?

Longer term, I would love to make money from writing novels for this very simple reason: if it paid the bills then producing creative fiction is where I want to be. The important point though, is to write for the love of it, and if it pays, it can become the day job. Until then, as the saying goes: don't give up the day job!

A little more about my book based at Abersoch and the Llyn peninsula

A number of people are finding this blog from the Abersoch website www.abersoch.co.uk which is very pleasing and I'd like to give  you a quick introduction to the book and its connections to Abersoch and the Llyn or the Lleyn as many people still spell it.

Abersoch and the surrounding area is in my blood - I love the place and have been going there on holiday all my life - so for 44 years to be precise! So when I decided to write a children's adventure novel, the part of the world which has such fond memories for me seemed the obvious location.

The title makes no reference to Abersoch of course, but instead refers to Whistling Sands as in "Smugglers At Whistling Sands". The youngsters who feature in this book are on holiday at Abersoch but they do not just stay put there. Their adventure takes them to a number of places including Whistling Sands obviously but also the St Tudwal's Islands, Aberdaron and Porth Ysgo - a remote beach nearby, and the hillside above. The owners of the Vaynol Arms public house in Abersoch might be pleased (I hope) to discover that their premises features in the novel.

The action centres around the Johnson children, Jack, David and Emily (aged 12, 11 and 10 respectively) and a headstrong girl called Lou whom they meet on the beach. It is she who is the catalyst for these rather dull Johnson siblings to spread their wings a bit. And what better time to do that than when they should happen across the activities of smugglers!

I don't wish to give too much away about the plot but there is quite a lot of realism in this story, for all the fact that it is a rather post-modern children's adventure owing some of its inspiration to Enid Blyton's novels which I enjoyed a great deal as a child.The activities of the smugglers are based on real life occurences and if you do a search on Google at the point when the children do their Google search, you might well come across references to real-life smuggling which was in part the raw material for the book.

My chief hope is that my novel will appeal to youngsters and indeed adults who either have a connection to the Abersoch / Llyn peninsula area or enjoy traditional Blytonesque adventure stories. There's a bit more info on the book's Amazon listing - you can find a link to it on the right hand side of this page.

Well I better close for now because I am still trying to hack the bamboo roots out at the front of the house and pretty difficult work it is too. Oh by the way, for those of you who have been following my blog and my efforts to actually sell my book, my sales tally has now risen majestically from four to . . .  five! I don't care if that isn't very good, I'm pleased (and if I'm pleased, that's the main thing!).

Right, off to be bamboo-zled (groan).

Abersoch's top website tells the world about my book!

I'm delighted to say that www.abersoch.co.uk Abersoch's excellent no.1 website (literally no.1 - check Google) has just announced the existence of my ebook Smugglers At Whistling Sands to the world. They have done so far more effectively than I can.

Search Abersoch on Google, and this website comes up first and in its news section, you will now find a good write up on my book which is of course based at Abersoch and other locations along the Llyn peninsula. The news item contains links both to this blog and to the listing on Amazon.

I think it is a measure of how much I rate being publicsed by this site that I have given them the information about my book exclusively. I have not sought any newspaper publicity for it - I am happy to target it directly towards the two markets which really matter - the Abersoch / Llyn peninsula area and lovers of Enid Blyton's books.

I'll blog more very soon on my thoughts about targeted marketing for ebooks, but for now, I better get on with writing of a different kind - newspaper work (which is of course, what pays the bills!).

Sales of my Abersoch based ebook triple!

Oh yes, you can prove anything with statistics, can't you! Mind you I'm easily pleased where my ebook Smugglers At Whistling Sands is concerned. I had my second sale yesterday and my third sale about an hour ago. That's right I've sold three copies (since July 21, 2011).

It's great news. I was thinking I was going to go down in history as the only person to write a book and have no sales at all. So I'm very chuffed that I have made this progress. Here's to sale number 4!

My prediction yesterday that I was to end up on enforced gardening leave all day, so to speak, proved accurate. I ended up chopping down the enormous runaway bamboo bush outside our dining room windows. It was becoming a bit of an eyesore and it looks a lot better now. Still got the roots to dig out though - I'm hoping bamboo roots don't go down too deep. And today I was back at work at my beloved newspaper, writing a personal column and a leader column and finishing off a double-page feature which should have been sorted on Friday but wasn't. It had to be finished today because it's going in tomorrow's paper - a deadline is a wonderful thing.

I was thinking of sketching out a bit of plot for another book I'm hoping to get started on on the train coming back but it was a bit packed, and I was a bit tired so I settled down to read Quentin Letts' 50 People Who Buggered Up Britain.  Very amusing and apt it is too - particularly reading it in the wake of the riots which have buggered up Britain even more of course.

Quentin Letts is an excellent, fluid writer - I recommend him to those of you unacquainted with his skilful prose. That said, it's a pity he's not prime minister. 

I got it! My first sale

Yes! It's official, I've found out this morning that I have had my first sale! It's to a chap in Canada who is also writing his own children's novel and who's given me a couple of interesting ideas for getting the book read by people and reviewed. I enclose the evidence below from Amazon.co.uk:

• Format: Kindle Edition
• File Size: 722 KB
• Publisher: Overton Press (21 July 2011)
• Sold by: Amazon Media EU S.à r.l.
• Language English
• ASIN: B005E0AK2O
• Average Customer Review: Be the first to review this item
• Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #10,985 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store) 

By the time you read this, my "bestsellers" rank will inevitably have sunk unless someone else has come along and bought it, but for now, I am into the top 11,000! I am very pleased that my first buyer should be someone who supported my early efforts to sell in magazine format on eBay.

Of course, you may be reading this and thinking, that it's pretty bad having only sold one book three weeks after publishing it. To that I would point out that the likes of John Locke had pretty poor sales at the start too. The first thing any unknown author needs to know loud and clear about succeeding, is that it is incredibly hard. The trick is not to give up - at least to give it a good go.

As I said in an early post, I am not that bothered whether I make it as a novelist, but I will be very bothered if I go through life feeling that I never tried. Now, I have a question for you: who is going to be my SECOND customer?

I think I'm poised to get my first sale . . .!

Yes folks, you read it here first! I think I might be about to get my first ever sale of my Abersoch-based ebook Smugglers at Whistling Sands on Amazon.

Quite a while ago, I sold a few chapters of the book while still unfinished, on eBay, actually printing them out in mini magazine format and selling them in parts, each containing two chapters each. It was not the most efficient or effective way to do it and ran aground in large part because I realised I wanted to re-edit the book as I was writing it.

However, a chap who bought a few of those opening chapters never entirely gave up on me and has rediscovered my book now that I have launched it on Amazon's Kindle in electronic format. It's pleasing to think that here was somebody who liked the thing enough to still remember my book and look out for it on the web, hoping one day it would get finished. And on that note, my book, although recently published, was started a good while ago in 2006 but then dropped before getting sorted out some two years later.

As I think I mentioned in an earlier post, I got it to one traditional publisher, only for it to be rejected, albeit politely, and I then put it on the back burner, until Kindle Direct Publishing and ebooks came along.

Oh and I've also had a very nice reply from a lady via Facebook who responded to my Facebook campaign targeting a number of individuals in Abersoch to let them know about the novel. No-one has moaned at me for "spamming" them so I think I may send out a few more Facebook messages. After all, isn't that really what social networking is all about - to allow people to contact those that they don't know but with whom they have something in common?

Anyway, here's looking forward to My First Sale - I'll let you know when it happens!

Traditional methods of publishing remain important

A contact of mine at the Oxford University Press has suggested I send some chapters of my manuscript to them for consideration. The OUP aims to give a two-month decision which is quicker than quite a few people.

Certainly my decision to self publish through Amazon's Kindle shouldn't persuade me to close my mind to traditional publishing methods which is likely to remain important well into the electronic age. In fact, I can't envisage a time when reading a book on paper and ink will ever be replaced by the e-book era. The popularity of e-books simply gives all authors, particularly indie authors, more options than before.

I am pleased to see I am gaining more presence on Google, both my name George Chedzoy and the name of my book, Smugglers At Whistling Sands, are easily searchable. The not so good news is that this blog has not achieved many hits and I have no reason to think anyone has actually yet found my book listing on Amazon, let alone actually taken the leap and paid 86p for it (USD $1.41).

But these are early days, anyone who knows the story of John Locke and Amanda Hocking, will realise that their starts were extremely slow and faltering. For those who don't know, both have gone on to sell more than one million e-books. Indeed, it was the e-book market which saved Amanda Hocking's dream of becoming a novelist - after having suffered countless rejections from traditional publishers.

The worst crime a rookie author can commit is to give up - the journey to making it as an author is a long and rocky one, but I am determined to forge ahead.