'Red Kite' Book Launch

I finally launched my children's novel ' Red Kite' this week on Amazon Kindle.  It's been a long time but I am so glad that now it's out there and doing something positive.  I hope to have a hard copy soon too as I am working on the Lulu self publishing site to get it printed and ready for sale.

I started writing it ten years ago and tried desperately to get it published in the conventional way, or at least get an agent but it was so difficult.  Most of the places I sent it to took around six months to reply and only wanted it in isolation, so I couldn't send it anywhere else. Then finally after months of waiting it would come back rejected.  There is so much competition out there and it seems in Children's fiction, unless you are already very famous or destined to be the next J K Rowling, it will be very hard to get published in this way.

I did have many good comments though from major publishing houses which is rare as many only send a standard response, I think that is why I refused to give up as some of the comments were very encouraging.

The story is about a teenager who is trying to cope with the death of his identical twin brother, it shows his journey through bereavement, while trying to cope with being bullied at school, his only pleasure is Birdwatching.  I will not say anymore, just in case you wish to download it and read it at the very reasonable price of  £0.77 pence.  (Well I had to get a plug in somewhere)

It will probably never be a best seller but at least I did something with it and now I can concentrate on other projects like the sequel and I want to do some more article writing.  I got fresh inspiration for writing magazine articles just this week when one of my articles was published in the December issue of Dogs Monthly.

So, it may have taken ten years but at last 'Red Kite' has flown the nest and I can move on to other things.

A speedy sequel with NaNoWriMo

After weeks of consideration, I finally decided to have a go at Nanowrimo this year. National Novel Writing Month ( www.nanowrimo.org)  is certainly a great way of making you write instead of putting it off until the housework is done, the dog is walked or any other tasks that stop you from writing.

I felt terrified when I opened up a blank screen today  but as soon as I started I couldn't stop.  It was amazing not to worry about spelling or grammar or how it reads.  I simply let it flow out of my head and onto the keyboard and computer screen. Within 30 minutes I had nearly 900 words which spurred me on further so now on day one, I am slightly ahead.

Just have to keep this up for another 29 days and I may just have a very rough draft of my next novel.  I hope this will be the sequel to my novel Red Kite which I hope to publish this month on Kindle.  Red Kite took my almost ten years to complete so this has to be a better option.  I think if I can at least get the bare bones of  the novel down I can add the flesh at a later date.  Sounds a bit like a horror story but I am certainly not scared of having a go.