Tales of humour, whimsy and courgettes
“That’s an odd-looking jacket,” said Bird.
“Yeah, Spectre got it for me,” replied Sprite.
“It looks like it’s made of flower stems,” said Bird.
“Yes,” said Sprite. “I didn’t like it at first, but then it grew on me…”
~
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Nobody likes a bad review. Thankfully with January, I received mostly positive and balanced reviews. A belated shout-out to Great Northern Book Owl.
Capricorn, however, was an entirely different kettle of fish. I have received six reviews so far across the web. All bad. The best was a 2-star review that said most of the tales didn’t make sense. Fair do’s, I understand my writing is incredibly British. Weird fiction and horror tales mixed with British oddness aren’t going to be for everyone.
The other five reviews were all one star. Two reviews just left me one star with no comment. The other three left one-star reviews because Capricorn wasn’t my usual puns. Despite there being no mention of humour anywhere in the description of the book, with a synopsis emphasising horror, they are reviewing a book they got for free and moaning because it’s not humour? Are you kidding me?
So what am I meant to do in this situation? Six bad reviews, not one single good review for Capricorn that I have seen yet.
I start writing the next book.
Out of all six reviews, only the 2-star review had something useful to say. I take that as constructive criticism. ‘Because it’s not more of the same’ is not constructive criticism. I accept my writing isn’t for everybody. If someone doesn’t like a book or film, you can’t argue them into leaving a good review. So instead of burning energy chasing them, I shall spend that energy writing the next book. Figure out the next marketing strategy. Get doodling new illustrations. Work on getting the third book, Spiders, out in May.
I have also headed back to Skillshare, looking for new writing courses. Turns out Monika Kanokova has created a new class, The Beginner’s Guide to Self-Publishing: Publish and Sell Your Nonfiction Book.
I took her original class, An insightful guide to becoming a freelancer some time ago and quite enjoyed it. Although she writes non-fiction, the new class still has good information, and have nabbed a few interesting bits to take with me to the release of my next book.
In the meantime, if you’d like to read the better reviewed January, or give the horrors of Capricorn a read, click the links to purchase either on Amazon. Kindle digital editions are £4.99 and are under the links below.
The Tap Dancer’s Dilemma played again, blended with the thumping of feet above.
Gerald crashed out of his flat, almost forgetting his cane.
“I’ve had enough!” he screamed, as he stumbled up the stairs with haste.
“Shut that shit off!” he yelled, banging on the door.
So they did.
Gerald regretted this, because then all he could hear was the sound of them breathing.
~
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Horse kicked the crumbling wall and gave a snort.
“What’s wrong?” asked Sprite.
“Just lost my new job after two hours as an acupuncturist,” moaned Horse.
“Oh dear,” replied Sprite. “What happened?”
“Eh…” sighed Horse. “I just didn’t get the point…”
~
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“Red has a job?” asked Cloud.
“He’s the local theatre’s chief locksmith,” replied Yuffie.
“I see,” said Cloud, not actually seeing. “Do they need a chief locksmith?”
“Oh yes,” replied Yuffie. “He’s a key employee!”
~
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“There’s a lot of waxy, yellow build-up,” said Amid.
“It’s not coming off with water,” sighed Sam.
“Yeah wax is a pain,” grumbled Amid.
“Acid bath?” suggested Sam.
“If we must,” grumbled Amid. “I just didn’t want to damage this one.”
Sean let out a muffled cry through the sock as Amid and Sam lifted him into the tub.
~
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“That’s a lot of magazines, Flower!” said Yuffie.
“New business venture,” said Flower.
“Oh?” inquired Yuffie.
“Gonna start a gardening magazine delivery service using ex-military flying drones,” said Flower.
“Ooh,” said Yuffie. “That’ll raise some issues…”
~
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“Good grief!” said Fuen, “did anybody survive?”
“Not a soul,” said Yuffie, as Cloud floated by.
“What’s ya talking about?” asked Cloud.
“A horror story. Sea monster attacking spirits with a refrigerator,” said Yuffie.
“Gosh,” said Cloud. “Sounds chilling…”
Second book out, with a third on its way in June. Going good right? A little bit about what I have learned and what’s to come.
First off, all self-publishing platforms have their issues. Create-Space sets the price way to high for picture books. I would need to sell a 96 tale book for £18 with £0.00 coming to me. I tried Comixology, better, but far more suited to actual comics. I ambled back to KDP. Published the paperback edition, ordered a copy, then unpublished. Better, but it removes the ability to pre-order. All jolly frustrating yes?
I know these problems are mostly to do with releasing colour picture books. Not much I can do about that. So KDP is where I shall continue publishing.
Getting reviews on Amazon as akin to drawing blood from a stone. Everyone says this. We cannot incentivise reviews now (see October 2016). I’m told getting 50 reviews is needed because from there on you get your book featured in the ‘also read’ more often. Makes sense. Doesn’t help newcomers when the market is flooded with ‘bought review’ books. I wanted to gather some reviews, but given how bias the system is, it’s not something I want to waste time on. Instead, I hoped to get people talking and sharing the book elsewhere.
For promotion, I fell a bit flatter than I should have.On KDP you can set an ebook to free for up to 5 days. I had a pre-made social media battering campaign ready. The intention was to go mad the first five days and gather up some Amazon reviews. The reason it fell flat, was because I got a bunch of freelance work dumped my way and I need to pay my bills. I should have prioritised the book. I didn’t. My loss. Learn from my own advice, and prioritise your own shit before others.
One other thing. On some social media channels, I only linked to UK Amazon. Some people didn’t realise it was available on USA Amazon as well. In future, I shall endeavour to link to both in every post on social medias.
The next book Spiders is almost ready to go, and I was aiming for a June release. Unfortunately, throughout June I have a stack of work and am moving a house worth of stuff towards the end of the month. I also need to share a few stories around to get a grasp on whether they are offensive or not. I m aware I have posted some stories that are deemed offensive. Old British humour dips that way sometimes without intending too. So, June, it’s going to be busy.
I had an unfortunate knock the other day. I write a long way in advance. The folk who followed me here from my old blog can attest to that. I currently have nine books written in flash fiction style. 9 of the buggers! At one a month, this will keep me releasing a book a month until the new year. But here’s the thing. At some point, my writing style changed. The books became more narrative instead of a series of unrelated puns. The 4th and 5th books have a theme. The 5th takes place entirely in a bar. The 6th, 7th and 8th books are entirely one story per book, each consisting of 96 tales. When I wrote the 9th book I went back to 96 unconnected puns. It was fun, it was me, but after the strong narratives of the prior books I have just written, I struggled to reread my own book.
Book 9 would be a December release time at one a month? I may feel differently then. At the moment though, I feel like I can’t go back to writing straight up stand alone independent puns. Of course, the alternative I have is to strip Bugly’s down and sell the stories to flash fiction books or magazines. That might be a better option aye?
If you aren’t interested in buying a book, you can still read the Little Fears here, as for as long as I can I shall be posting 1 tale a day here. Though I am only half way through Book 3, so you will have to wait a couple of years before you see that later books heh.
If you want to help keep a creator well stocked with Hydra’s kibble, you can hit me up over on Patreon and support me for as little as $1 a month. You’ll be helping to support the free daily tales I publish here and Hydra’s waistline.
Finally, a quick repeat, both January and Capricorn are now available in paperback form from Amazon ~
“Looking glum there, Spider,” said Yuffie, “Wos’ up?”
“What is up,” replied Spider calmly.
“OK,” replied Yuffie, “what is up?”
“Swallowed a bottle of Tipp-Ex last night instead of Viagra,” sighed Spider.
“Oh dear!” said Yuffie. “Any side effects?”
“Yes,” whimpered Spider. “I woke up with a massive correction.”
~
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Little Fears 