I was sitting in the Minion’s Mess the other day, enjoying my weekly ration of gruel (a thimbleful! I’ve progressed), when the EM walked in (with his spiced lobster with baby fennel, celeriac purée, saffron beurre noisette and fennel chilli mayonnaise) and joined me. We exchanged a few pleasantries. You know the sort of thing: how was life now that I had a candle to light my quarters, did I enjoy knife and fork privileges, third-world economy, the plight of the polar bear, yada yada. Anyway, we got to talking about what to feature in my future posts, and he suggested I could perhaps write about what authors did that I might find just an eensy bit annoying. Good heavens, I thought, that would set me up for the next twelve posts! O-n-l-y j-o-k-i-n-g…honest, honest.
But it was food for thought.
People, generally, are not backward in coming forward. We’re rather good at complaining, aren’t we? The British used not to be…stiff upper lip and all that…but we can sit along with the rest of the complaining community quite happily now. You see, it’s so easy these days: pick up the phone, or write a snotty email. No one can see you, you feel you can say what you want. Why wasn’t my fridge delivered on time? Why is there a dent in my new table? You forgot an item in my parcel. Just not good enough!!! Continue reading “A tribute to…you, the authors”
I don’t know about you, but sometimes it seems like every fifth indie author I meet is writing some kind of genre fiction – sci-fi, fantasy, thrillers, romance….
Approximately nine years ago, after sending a manuscript to just about every mainstream publisher, I was eventually told that the only way I would find the right publisher and actually have my work looked at seriously was to present my material through a literary agent. I then went about systematically, submitting the manuscript to every single literary agent I could find. Take into account that this was at a time when everything had to be submitted in hard copy and very few agents could be located through the internet; it is enough to say that it was not an inexpensive exercise.