It’s been a rather tiresome few months and I’ve been up to my neck in work and courses plus glued to the news with all the terrible things happening in the world and how things could escalate. Rather distracting and unsettling pertaining to wars and refugees, people losing their lives, and we should take notice of what’s happening particularly when it has potential to affect us.
I’m still working on the comic. The sequel to The Tribulations of Kharman is in the self-edit stage and should be out later in the year. I will however like to use this platform to express my disappoint at the reception or lack of reception my YouTube video received. I WhatsApped this video to several ‘friends’, family members, and a couple of groups and only received two positive responses. That’s rather telling of the lack of support, respect, praise and encouragement I’m not receiving from people who should really have my back as I’ve had their backs in their accomplishments and endeavours. Overall I’ve sent texts, unrelated topics and business prospects and those messages have been ignored. As far as I’m aware I’ve not falling out with any of them but I will be more clinical on whom I send information too in the future and it won’t be to them. Now I’m just human so I’m keeping everything 100. I won’t be sugar coating anything on my blog space. Their attitude could indicate jealously, it certainly doesn’t communicate support rather they don’t care so I’ve got the hint clearly. Some, who’ve purchased, haven’t been bothered to leave a review on my Amazon page despite me repeatedly asking them to do this. A couple of sentences, about the purchase, and read of my book, will go a long way. It is a simple request just like leaving a like on a YouTube video.
The sales of my book are rather dire even considering running paid ads and utilizing social media. This is me telling the truth not me making out false narratives or looking for pity. In spite of all this negativity I will continue to strive and the second book is still on the go from here regardless of what anyone thinks or does.
Errors Made in Publishing
When I began this journey in the early 2000s I wasn’t serious. This was a hobby with no plan and so I just kept writing not taking into consideration the word count. The novel went through several name changes and the original concept was spread over several planets not just Kyliea, and when I decided to do a word count it was originally 250k words long. I realized the book was longer than it should be also I was in over my head when I had it set on multiple worlds. Instead I just decided to make the planet Kyliea the whole focus of the first novel with the city Pealara holding some familiarity to the potential reader. This is a decision I’m happy I made. Other sacrifices such as cutting away interesting characters, dialogue and shortening the the story to a reasonable length had to be drastically made. The research on the genre of book and guidelines, rather then rules, were made after and right before publishing.
Finding an editor and one that was professional was another challenge. in 2014 I attended a so-called self-publishing course, spent or should I say wasted, £250 on a pointless class I didn’t need to be in. Even my martial arts teacher, who is an author of many books, said I didn’t need to be on any self-publishing course but by then it was too late. At an induction evening, down South London, I remember seeing a room with only two other prospect authors, one whom was looking for an illustrator so I gave him my details, but he never contacted me. Some weeks later, on the day of the class I was the only student and then there was the course runner, and his two assistants, one whom was an editor the other a previous student and an accomplished author. I don’t wanna rubbish my time there completely. I did learn a few things, things I could have learned without the expense of paying £250, however I’d built two connections, with only one being of any real benefit. I mentioned the previous student on the course who was helping the course provider and got to know him and the roadmap of his journey as an author. He even held a second book launching event and QnA where I attended.
The second connection was the editor I chose. I built a friendship also and asked him if he’d be happy to edit my book. He took the job and initially I felt his method of work was okay. We’d met up, in my local library, weekly where he’d discuss the progress of the book. I was pleased until he started avoiding me, by not answering my calls or communicating, and lying about things. His progress on the work was becoming slow and his manner was displaying unprofessionalism. One evening when I called him up, on a different number, he pretended to be someone else. I made the decision to seek another editor and fortunately I hadn’t paid him yet. Naturally he was upset with me but I’d lost trust with him because of his actions. My martial arts teacher recommended another editor, this was a lady in my class, whom I hadn’t had any contact with prior. I handed her the manuscript and she got to work. She exhibited the same level of positivity and enthusiasm towards my work but was more professional than the other editor and I paid her £250. However she ghosted me later on even when I had other work in the pipeline that she could also earn from.
Another error, I made, was the tagging. I complained in a previous blog post that I wasn’t able to advertise my book on Amazon and the reason being one of the tags I used was ‘Erotica’. This was a mistake as it’s not Erotica, it is mainly Sci-fi and though it does contain sex, those scenes are a minimal when compared to other books. Once I corrected this the book was passed and I’m able now to run paid ads.
These are just a few mistakes out of many one can make on their journey to publish and understanding the pushbacks you could receive from your closest and dearest. The idea is to learn from them and not expect a smooth journey should you choose to go through this route.