On Saturday I watched a live recording on YouTube of a publishing event taking place in Dublin organised by Kindle Direct Publishing.  Each hour through the day a varying panel of writers talked about various aspects of self-publishing in response to questions from a chairman and the audience.  Livechat went on from listeners in a corner of the screen.

I’d received an email alerting me to the event just the day before.

Featuring bestselling authors and Amazon experts, this day-long conference in Dublin will be streamed on the KDP YouTube page. Topics under discussion will include “How to Write a Bestseller,” “The Art of Editing,” “Marketing Your Book,” and “The Business of Being an Independent Author.” The conference and stream begin at 9 a.m. (GMT) on November 19th.

With the aim of learning something about marketing, I tuned in on the 19th about 11 o’clock.  I could see no way of learning the programme of events, so I kept on watching, hoping that something would be said that would be of relevance to me.   I should have realised from the email, quoted above, that the conference was geared to people writing and publishing their first novel as an ebook.  All well and good for aspiring writers, but not for those who are further down the line.  In the end I live-chatted a question: when will the subject be marketing?  I was told (quickly, efficiently) that it was scheduled for 3 pm.

I returned to watch at 2.30 and stayed watching until 5 p.m.  I did learn something about marketing, namely that being active on social media is essential.  So is a blog.  Content should be varied, and everything should be linked together.  The panellists I saw were dynamic, fluent, and hugely successful.  As far as I could gather, they’d each written one book after another, at the rate of at least two a year.  I was open-mouthed.  They seemed to inhabit another planet.

Here is one panellist’s answer to the question I’ve put in my subject heading: 65,000.  My jaw dropped to my knees.  I had 147 on my list of people to receive emails announcing publication of my books.   How do I increase the number from 147 to 65,000 and do I want to?  No.  For one thing, best-selling authors write the kind of books that sell best:  romance, thrillers, crime, war stories, often in series.   That is not the sort of fiction I want, or am able, to write.  Writers of what’s called literary fiction have a much smaller potential pool of readers but we still have hopes of increasing sales.  I believe there are a good number of writers and readers who inhabit the same kind of planet as I do.   I wonder if KDP’s marketing advice works for us, too.

A friend has just resigned from the Complaints Department of a vast national organisation.  As she says, it ‘got the better’ of her.  I’m not surprised.  Think of working in such a negative environment every day. You’d need the skin of an ox.  The organisation in question is in such a parlous state that it naturally generates large numbers of justifiable complaints.  It also attracts complaints from the growing number of professional complainers: people who need to express their bile at any available target.

I’ve suggested we set up a counterorganisation, The Office of Fair Dreams and Laughter.  She immediately saw its marvellous acronym: TOOFDAL.  Almost up and running, it’s of course staffed by optimists.  People ring in with positive stories which are broadcast to the world at 5 pm daily (5 pm being the time when negativity-resistance is at its lowest in the average person).  Mid-morning and mid-afternoon there is a statutory break for R&R.  Each staff member can choose what they want provided during each long break; for instance, re-runs of Some Like It Hot, Fawlty Towers, the Brandenburg Concerto, or an Ayurvedic massage to the sound of waterfalls.  On offer is a constant supply of excellent coffee, tea, fruit juice, sparkling wine, spring water, take your pick.  Anyone who can eat jam-filled doughnuts without putting on unwanted weight can order bucketloads of them.  The staff conduct the business of the day lounging in soft armchairs, with their feet resting on footstools.

Seriously though, there is so much wrong in so many parts of the world at the moment that optimism is in very short supply.  It’s no wonder that complaints departments are overloaded.  What can anyone do to turn things around?

Two happenings in the last couple of days have added more chewy cuds to my present thoughts:  the first, the delivery by Amazon of a book; the second, a talk by a writer in a bookshop.

I’d ordered on Saturday a friend’s just-published book.  (Do as you would be done by – I can’t help it!).  It was delivered on Sunday by Amazon.  Isn’t it amazing: to want a book one day and have it in your hands the next, without leaving your house!  How I appreciate the speed and ease.  But then the thought kicks in as I watch the panting courier appear and disappear at a run.  He’s driven by the need to earn as much as he possibly can in the hours he’s awake.  He’s freelance, without any cover.  Amazon take no responsibility.  Should I be morally obliged not to use Amazon?  Would it make any difference if I stopped using Amazon?  Would I ever stop?   No.  I’m extremely glad that Amazon exists.  Not just for the speedy delivery of books but because I’ve just taken advantage of their print-on-demand programme to publish three books.

The book that was delivered was produced in the same way.  A friend, Susan Jordan, followed my lead and has published a few years’ worth of Blog with Amazon’s Createspace.   Ever since we first met, I have understood the importance to Susan of writing; not just writing, but being a writer; of being a published writer.  And that probably goes for everyone who writes.

This leads me to question myself once again: why do I write?  I asked this question publicly when, years ago, I was interviewed by a Radio Devon reporter.    I’d just had a novel published and the publisher’s distribution channels had failed in the south west.   Writing a novel seemed pointless.  The interview ended like this:  “Well, Susan Barrett, you don’t know why you write and your book’s not available in the south west.  Thank you.”  I scraped myself up from the studio floor.  But it did make a memorable anecdote.

Today, my answer is that I can’t help but write, in the same way as I can’t help but want to help other writers.  Like the tale of the scorpion and the frog, it’s in my nature.   Writers would have been the story-tellers in the caves of prehistory.  Gather round the fire and I’ll begin.  In any population, there will be a small proportion of people who want to entrall an audience with a story.  It’s a fair barter.  I’ll tell you a story.  You’ll listen and you’ll clap.  If there’s no clapping, then — does that mean it was a rotten story?  This would have been the case in the cave-dwelling days but not now, in the 21st century.  As I’ve said before, both good and bad books get turned down; both good and bad books get published.

Yesterday evening Salley Vickers was talking about her latest novel, ‘Cousins’, as part of Taunton Literary Festival organised by the Brendon Bookshop.  We were there.   I wanted to witness what it’s like nowadays for a novelist to sell her wares.  I also wanted to give some copies of my three Createspace paperbacks for sale or return in the bookshop.   I was very much aware of the difference between Salley and me; she, a writer with the backing of a mainstream publisher and me, a writer hoping to sell a few self-published books.

The big task for me over the last decades has been to accept non-acceptance.  Writing novels and getting published had been so easy when I started.  I didn’t have to do anything to sell my books; the publishers did everything.  There were no literary festivals in my heyday.  Perhaps that Radio Devon fiasco was a sign that things were changing.  Since 1988 when Collins published ‘Stephen and Violet’, I have had nothing but rejections.  It’s been almost impossible to keep faith in my own ability.  Nobody is clapping in the cave!

Does that mean I write rotten stories?  I have a loyal husband and enough good friends who have continued to enjoy what I write not to give up.    Until yesterday evening, I was still harbouring the hope that maybe, perhaps, somehow, sometime, I’d regain my writerly perch, become known once again, reviewed and acknowledged.  I listened to Salley talking with intelligence and charm about her novel.  I listened to the questions from the audience and even asked one myself.  And all the time I was curling up inside at the idea that I might want to put myself in that position, to have to talk about my writing, to read from a book I’d written – in order to sell how many?   To have my ego stroked?

Say there were 45, or 50 at most, present.  Say a quarter of the audience bought Salley’s book.  Well, we know only a very few writers make a good living, let alone a fortune.  To help the publisher sell books and to stay in favour with them, a writer has to tread the boards like the repertory actors of old, tramping from town to town.   Certainly being a Name feeds the vanity – but there is something that makes me squeamish about the fawning process on both sides.

I came home after Salley’s talk, feeling elated.   I’d made a decision.   I do not have to do this!  I’m so fortunate that I’m at the tail end of a career, and have enough money to live on.  I do not have to sell my wares in this way.  Most importantly, I’ve given up pandering to my ego.  I don’t need people to clap!

Only ….

Perhaps a little bit of clapping?  I want some readers, I want some recognition, and some return on expenses.  Like the Amazon couriers, we’re freelance and have been all our lives.  So I’m still hoping to spread my net beyond my contact list.  This morning I woke up with this nursery rhyme in my mind, and I think  you’ll see its relevance.

This little pig went to market

This little pig stayed at home

This little pig had roast beef

This little pig had none

And this little pig went weeweewee all the way home.

I’m so pleased that the IWM has ordered a copy of “Alive in World War Two” for their library.

I wonder if the Queen is watching Netflix’s brilliant new production ‘The Crown’.  I guess all members of the Royal Family will be interested to see how their history from 1947 until today has been translated from reality to the screen.

The first two episodes, which held me riveted, have led me to think about the process of creating fiction.  I know that in my novels I draw on my life experience although I have never served up the facts of my life without cooking them.  The closest I’ve come to presenting raw material is in my recent novel, White Lies. (Link has to be put in, self-advertising being the point of this website) https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1536806847.  Peter and I have two children by adoption.  Some readers who know us find it hard to disentangle their perceptions of us from the fiction they see on the page.  I protest the story is not our story.  I would find it extremely hard to write autobiography.  Fiction gives me the freedom to produce an attention-holding narrative.  Facts can be obstacles to entertainment.

In “The Crown” Stephen Daldry has produced a spellbinding narrative out of real life.  The film captures the essence, not necessarily the looks, of the people represented.  But of course the pictures we have of the Royal family stem from the versions we have of them, courtesy of the media.  Only a few close associates can know how well the film represents the real people.

Did the elephant episode at Treetops really happen?  No matter.  It made a dramatic scene which illustrated the birth of Philip’s role as devoted supporter and protector of his wife, the Queen.

I am a monarchist, though I hope the next generation will tighten the budget and reduce the pay roll.

Come to think of it, will the family get a cut of the royalties?

The novel ‘White Lies’ was the first.  https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1536806847

‘A Home from Home’, also a novel, was the second. https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1537014838

Out now is the third, this time non-fiction and the reason why I set up this website.  Its title is a bit of a mouthful: ‘Alive in World War Two – The Cousins’ Chronicle, commentary and memoir.’

http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/153766032

I’m going to retire to my study now, after three months spent getting these titles out into the world.  The two novels, ‘White Lies’ and ‘A Home from Home’, were written between 2010 and 2014.  During this time I also began work on what became eventually ‘Alive in World War Two’.  That was far bigger task than I’d  imagined at the start – as I’ve probably already said several times with varying degrees of pride and/or chagrin.  I slipped into this exercise by way of offering to type up a collection of family newsletters exchanged during the Second World War by a number of cousins.  Gradually I found myself wanting to serve up the collection in a digestible way for a wider readership than just the family.  Well, that’s now done.  I have no idea if there will be a wider readership or not.  I shall just let the book float away under its own steam.

Meanwhile, I’m off on a new tack: another novel with the working title ‘Greek Gold’.  Making the stuff up is the fun part, even while it is difficult enough however practised you are.  The production and sales are the hard grind.  Fortunately, I don’t feel the need to expend more energy in this direction than I already have.

I may post again, every so often.  Research will be the topic, probably …

At last – this book is about to become available as a paperback on Amazon.  It’s the reason I set up this website.  My aim was to go out into the virtual world, as best I could, and establish some kind of communication with potential readers.  Apart from the good friends on my contact list, I was doubtful if I’d manage to reach anyone unknown.  Nor did I expect to reach new readers with the publication of the two novels I’ve brought out with Createspace to pave the way for this non-fiction title.  Yet today I was thrilled to bits to see three reviews for ‘White Lies’ on Amazon.  Of course they may be by friends in disguise, but somehow I guess that “A’s Mum” and “Sally Woods” are dedicated book reviewers in their own right.  The “anonymous” first review may be a kind and supportive friend.  Will anyone own up?

Any feedback on these lines is much appreciated, particularly as I’ve been in the wilderness so long.  It became a bit pathetic to go back to reading glowing reviews from the 1970s to summon courage to continue writing.  How feeble could I get?  But now –  —  Michael Frayn, the support of good friends, and unknown reviewers —– I’m basking in the writerly equivalent of golden autumn sunshine.

While visiting an old schoolfriend in New England this past June, I found myself in a space ship with her and her three-year-old great-grandson.  There were chair legs and a blanket involved, and a script being created minute by minute by the film’s director.  Silas knew exactly what was happening and what we, the cast, were doing.  Scene changes were swift.  One moment we were approaching galaxy Z (don’t expect me to remember the plot) under the chairs; the next moment, we were firing missiles from the woodpile in the garden.  Diny and I in our late seventies kept up as best we could, despite shortness of breath induced not just by age but by our gamely-withheld laughter.  We were absolutely part of the story and in tune with its tension.

This morning, in an email to Diny, I wondered if and when I’ll cross the Atlantic again to have another wonderful play.  But by that time Silas may be too grown-up for such games, and we – and our limbs -too grown-down.

Have I coined a new expression?  First, we grow up.  Then – let’s say after middle-age – we begin to grow down, some of us more quickly than others.   Old age is a process of growing down, eventually and literally into the ground.  Let’s play while we can.