Margaret Skea's Blog, page 7

Countdown deal on Amazon (US)

Yesterday was the start of my first ever countdown deal for Turn of the Tide on Amazon (US). It took me a while to sort out the technicalities – fortunately you can play about with the buttons until you (think) you have what you want.

First decision:  the number of price increments – I’m not sure why I went for 3 – or maybe it was auto-suggestion as the example that Amazon provided was 3. Is there some significance to 3? Some hidden reason that only the Amazon computer knows? Maybe. Anyway I’ve gone for 3. $0.99 / $1.99 /$2.99 and I’m happy with that. But will any buyers be?

Then there was timing – how many days would I have at each price level? Thinking in terms of days would have been straightforward and convenient, but Amazon, in their wisdom, counts in hours. Of course that makes  the system extremely flexible – I could have gone for 27 hours at one level and 33 at another and so on, but I took the simpler option – 3 days, 2 days and 2 days – 72 hours, 48 hours and 47 hours. I’m not quite sure how I ended up 1 hour short on the last day, but I’d had sufficient of a struggle to get that far, so 47 hours it stayed.

And finally – the biggest decision of all – would I do it in both the UK and the US simultaneously, or separately. Amazon allows one promotion in a 90 day period on each book enrolled in KDP Select. But having discovered that each territory is considered separately I decided to try the .com site first and then at a later stage try the UK one, thus perhaps maximising the promotional value. (Or maybe not – time will tell.)

The unintended consequence? Looking at the .com site from Britain does NOT  allow anyone to see a countdown deal  that only applies to .com – I hadn’t realised that – mild to moderate panic that the deal wasn’t happening, especially as I’d signed up to a promotional site – fortunately free to use.  After a flurry of Facebook posts and sending ‘help’ notices to Amazon someone in the US I discovered all was well – the deal was up and running. Amazon even helpfully sent me a screen shot to prove it. 

Everyone says to expect a spike in sales…I’ll keep you posted (but I’m not going to hold my breath).

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3 Months on… Part 1.

 

Three months on since setting up my own imprint, publishing my second book A House Divided and buying back the rights to the first Turn of the Tide, what am I doing now?

Research – It’s fun to buy books and feel virtuous while doing so, after all they are essential research material… Even more fun delving into them, even if they (and the experience) aren’t always what I expected.

Winning the toss was a little book on Henry of Navarre and the Huguenots.

My first experience of reading non-fiction on a Kindle and I must say I prefer hard copy – much easier to flip backwards and forwards and mark the text. I have added highlights, but am not absolutely sure how (or if) I’ll be able to find them again. The content was a mix of fascinating and slightly shocking – the quotations from letters and speeches (if they are accurate, as claimed) provide wonderful insights into Henry’s character, but some of the author commentary is outspoken and definitely not pc.

 

 

I was hoping a book on the plague in 17th century Italy would provide information relating to the early years of the century, but no. However as with a lot of research, the wealth of information it did give of later periods kept me reading right to the end (and  just maybe might be the basis of an entirely different book, once my 3rd book in the Munro series is done and dusted.)

But I’m putting it well away out of temptation’s reach for the time being and turning to French Peasantry in the Seventeenth Century, which is looking, at first glimpse, very useful indeed.

 

Now here’s the thing – I love research. I find it endlessly fascinating and generally the difficulty is pulling myself away from research to start writing.  But just now that isn’t an issue because although I’m gathering a lot of information, what I haven’t found (yet) is an historic event that has so caught my attention that I have no choice but to write about it.  And so, as yet, I haven’t fixed a time frame for Munro no 3.

There are several more books awaiting my attention though, and any one of them just might contain the ‘nugget’ I’m looking for.

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A new week, a new beginning…

One month to the day after the publication of A House Divided I am coming to a (temporary) end of promotional activities and beginning to look forward to Book No 3. Which means I can happily begin to immerse myself once again in the closing years of the 16th century, though I just might stray into the 17th…

Either way I am starting my research – first to find appropriate key events to form the backdrop for the new story and then to start fleshing out my characters’ likely reactions to them.

Will there be new characters? – Who will take centre stage? What will be the time frame? Will it be set in a single or in multiple locations? I have no idea of the answers to all these and many other questions, so there are exciting times ahead…

(And a deadline to find some answers – I want to have lots of ideas / plot points to work on when I go to Hawthornden Castle – probably half-way through February.)

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That was a week, that was.

I know – slight mis-quote, but you get the message.

Having spent half of the week wrestling with an Amazon glitch, I am pleased to announce that anyone buying Turn of the Tide for the first time can now be confident they will receive the correct file. Whoo hoo!

For those who downloaded Turn of the Tide last weekend and may have got the text of a House Divided you will all have been offerred an updated file – take it just in case – that way you too will be sure of the correct file.

For the 5 people who returned the book earlier this week I haven’t yet received a definitive answer to the question of how you can get the Amazon computer to send you an updated file, without the hassle of re-purchasing. – But if you do re-purchase you will (so I’ve been told) get the same file as before and should then be able to ask for an update. A roundabout route I know – sorry!

Hopefully this won’t ever happen again…

On the plus side this week I’ve done an interview for the Ayrshire Post which will appear before my trip to Ayr Writers Club at the end of the month – all I need now is a decent photograph to email them.

And completely off-topic, I’ve just been to Lyme Regis and walked out to the end of the Cobb. Hard to believe that as a convinced Jane Austin fan I’ve never done that before. The wind was quite strong, but the tide was quite far out so no waves crashing over the Cobb – pity – that would have been quite exciting.

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Amazon Glitch Update.

Ridiculous as it seems the only way that the small number of people who were sent the wrong file when they tried to buy Turn of the Tide can ever get the right one is to re-puchase the book, which because the system remembers them will mean that they are sent the wrong file for the second time. They will then be able to contact Amazon via

https://www.amazon.com/gp/help/contact-us/general-questions.html?skip=true

explaining they have the wrong book and ask for an updated file. Which apparently should be forthcoming.

I have repeatedly contacted Amazon over the last several days. if this isn’t resolved soon I’ll need to go right to the top. Anyone know who is Amazon’s CEO?

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Amazon glitch – Writers and readers beware!

Readers and writers beware – there are some features of Amazon’s ebook system that could give you a major headache if something goes wrong.

This week I had a problem with the ebook file of Turn of the Tide. Bizarrely (I’m not sure how) some folk downloading it around last weekend got the cover, description and title heading of Turn of the Tide, but the text of A House Divided. One reader commented online that they were reading TotT and enjoying it, but the reasons they mentioned made me realise that it couldn’t be TotT they were reading.

Fortunately as it happens otherwise I wouldn’t have known there was a glitch.

Just so you know – Turn of the Tide has an historical note at the start referring to Mary Queen of Scots’ abdication in favour of her infant son James. If your version doesn’t have this historical note it isn’t the right file.

But don’t rush straight out to return it and buy the newly sorted file.

This is what happened when the reader who had alerted me to the problem tried to do exactly that. They returned the book, I contacted Amazon and was told that the problem had been sorted. That same reader then re-bought it and received the same (wrong) file for the second time.

I contacted Amazon again and below is their response. – There is a logic to it, but it makes solving a problem like this tricky.

Hello Margaret,

This is Anna from Kindle Direct Publishing.

I understand that your customer returned the book and now purchased it again. Please note that at this time, customers who bought your Kindle book aren’t able to download updates automatically. This also means that our system remembers what version a customer originally bought and when trying to buy it again delivers the same version. At the moment this is a current limitation of our system and our technical team is working on improving this process.

Since your customer already bought your book, there is one option for her to receive the updated copy in case if the updated copy has not pushed to her already. Please let her know that she can contact Kindle Department via this form and they are able to push the newest content to her Kindle Library:



https://www.amazon.com/gp/help/contact-us/general-questions.html?skip=true

I am sorry for the inconvenience this issue has caused!

She’s sorry? I am too!!!

Now here’s the thing. This will hopefully solve the problem for the reader who alerted me to the issue (I’m waiting to get a linkedIn message to set my mind at rest on that score) but via KDP reports I know there are 5 other people who have returned the book in the last couple of days, presumably because they also realised it was the wrong file.

I have no idea who they are – if you are one of them the above advice from Amazon should make it possible for you to receive the right file too.

I certainly hope so!

In the meantime I’m writing back to Amazon to ask if they could contact those who returned the wrong file and explain to them how they too can get the right one.

This publishing business defintiely isn’t a piece of cake…

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Oops! (And apologies.)

Anyone following this blog will probably remember me mentioning my first ‘return’ of Turn of the Tide and my wondering what in the title page could possibly have turned someone off.

All has been revealed. It appears that (and I don’t quite know how) at some point in the last 2 weeks the text file for Turn of the Tide was replaced by the text file for A House Divided. Net result – anyone attempting to download Turn of the Tide in the period between 26th October and yesterday (10th November) may have been sent the wrong file. I say may because I checked with someone who downloaded it on the 30th October and their’s was ok, but someone downloading last weekend got the wrong one.

And my first ever return? Probably (hopefully) someone who immediately picked up on the error.

So huge apologies to anyone who was expecting to read Turn of the Tide and got A House Divided instead. I hope you will all realise and return the ebook file.



And to the 6 people who have already done so – the problem has now been solved, and you are safe to re-order. This time it should be right.

A very frustrating problem to have arisen – especially as I don’t know how many folk have been affected, in fact the problem was only discovereed because one reader kindly sent me a message on LinkedIn to alert me.

It looks like November may also be a roller-coaster month!

Positives: In the last week I have had the feature in the Southern Reporter (local newspaper), a review in the Scottish Herald (national newspaper) and have just been interviewed for a feature in the Ayrshire Post. Brechin Library Reading Group have begun reading A House Divided (as part of a Reading Agency ‘Home Grown Talent’ initiative) and I will be making a visit next Monday evening to a local Book Group, who are also currently reading A House Divided. I’m really looking forward to their feedback and discussion.



Negatives: The biggest one is, of course the problem with the ebook file – and I do hope not too many folk have been affected (not often an author hopes that there haven’t been many sales). But running a close second was the discovery that there was a mistake in the bookshop discount set for the paperbacks of both books on the distributor’s system, resulting in a net profit to me for any sale of the princely sum of 10p per book. Not the best hourly rate for the effort involved!

Happily that has now also been rectified and the book is set to a normal shop discount, but yet again I found myself hoping that sales over the past 2 1/2 weeks have been slow.

But now I’m looking ahead to Book Week Scotland when I have several speaking engagements and hoping, now that these teething problems are sorted that sales will start to increase… and especially that folk haven’t been put off by the glitches.

Still, winter is coming and the long dark evenings – perfect for curling up by the fire with a book…

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Roller-coaster month…

October was interesting, exciting, nerve-wracking, scary, in almost equal measures, but ultimately very encouraging.

Perhaps the most interesting – daily (well, ok, hourly for the first few days – I’ve calmed down now) watching the totals of sales

and pages read of both books on Amazon,

and armed with a currency converter working out the royalties. I’m not planning a holiday in the Bahamas yet, but I am pleased so far – no days with nothing happening – definitely beats the last few quiet months as a mainstream published author. It’s hard to describe how excited I was the first day I topped 1000 pages read (sad, I know) and I’d love to have a breakdown of that – was it 3 people each reading a whole book or 33 people reading a little each?

Then there was the day I had 1 page read – yes you have read that right – 1 page. Now, assuming Amazon doesn’t count the cover that means only the Title page – what could have turned someone off there I wonder? And turned off I assume they were because that co-incided with the day I got my first return…

Also exciting was watching the rankings change

– the high point when Turn of the Tide was sitting at #4 in British / Irish Historical right next to Bernard Cornwell. – Sadly I didn’t think to get a screen shot of that, but I did remember later when it was at #6 – just underneath Cornwell. Nice picture to have.

Definitely into the ‘exciting’ category – Two separate bookshop launches of my new novel – thank you Blackwells in Edinburgh and Mainstreet Trading in St Boswells – both lovely bookshops. Favourite comments – from Ann Landmann – bookshop organiser in Edinburgh – ‘See you next year!’ (That’s a bit optimistic actually – I’m planning on spring 2017 for Munro 3) and from John Wood – chair of the St Boswells event – ‘You can bag a couple of Munros without leaving your armchair.’ (For those who mightn’t know a ‘Munro’also refers to any mountain in Scotland over 3,000 feet and climbing them is called ‘Munro-bagging’.)

John Wood giving his introduction.



Reading an extract.



Book signing.

Also exciting – my first real royalty statement from the distributors – I discounted the several (pre-launch) statements with 0.00 in every column!

The printing of the physical copies of the books went right down to the wire – that was nerve-wracking in the extreme – a huge thank you to the printers, Anthony Rowe of Chippenham, both for the fabulous job and for pushing me up the queue a little to make sure I had them in time. I won’t say how many panicky emails I sent them in the last few weeks.

And scary? I’ve just had a photograher from the local paper around to take pictures for a feature they will be running later this week on me and my journey as a writer. Anyone who knows me, knows that I hate getting my photo taken – hopefully it won’t look too bad. But a big thank you to the Johnson newspaper Group for suggesting an interview. Hopefully I was reasonably coherent – it’s quite hard to do a telephone interview. Slightly apprehensive as to how it will all come out, but pleased that they were interested.

And who knows maybe some folk will be inspired to pop along to one of the local bookshops – Mainstreet Trading in St Boswells and Grieves in Berwick-upon-Tweed – to buy a copy of my book(s) – ideal Christmas presents…

And didn’t the designer www.hayesdesign.co.uk make a fabulous job of the covers?

Turn of the Tide / A House Divided

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Launch Day

When the date for the sequel to Turn of the Tide to be published was set – way back in May – 15th October seemed a long time away. But now it’s here.

There have been a few times during the process when I thought the wheels might just fall off the wagon.

I imagine the printer and the distributor will be sharing my relief as I will no longer be bombarding them with my questions, fears and worries…

I’m delighted to be having my launch in Blackwells Bookshop in Edinburgh, as they have been very supportive to me since my debut novel was published in 2012 (despite the launch of that one being held in Waterstones in Edinburgh!)

A forgiving lot in Blackwells.

I’ve also been celebrating with guest posts and interviews on various blog sites – see the links below – and I’m hugely grateful to those who have hosted me already and those who will host me over the next month or so.

I’m more than grateful to the friend who is providing nibbles for the launch tonight – logistically more difficult than it might have been as neither of us realised at the time that this is Scottish schools holiday week and she is also entertaining grandchildren at her house in the Borders at the same time as treking to Edinburgh for the launch. So a huge thank you to Jenni.

A big thank you also to Professor Ian Campbell of Edinburgh University who has agreed to chair the event for me tonight. He chaired my first launch and did a great job, so I’m really pleased that although he has two other engagements today, he was willing to give up the time to be part of this.

I’m looking forward to tonight even though, due to timing and some other personal circumstances, some of my best friends won’t be able to be there. I’ll miss you folks, but for those who are, I’m sure we’ll have a good night.

Links to other blogs –

Starting off my own mini blog hop an interview with a fellow scottish author, Jane Riddell.

A blast from the past – a reprise of Turn of the Tide to celebrate the publication of the sequel, with thanks to Melinda Hence.

A slightly different and fun set of questions from Maria Grace.

Yesterday Dianne Ascroft gave her readers a peek into A House Divided thank you, Dianne.

The Dreaded Sequel with thanks to Jo for sharing today with me.

And still to come –

With Janet Emson on fromfirstpagetolast – c 20th October

Bristol Writers – c 25th October

Melissa Rose Around the World In Books – 16th November

and Helen Hollick – 8th December

Thank you, one and all! I shall be posting the links to the interviews, features and guest posts as they appear.

In between times I’m speaking at Berwick Literary Festival tomorrow (Friday 16th October)

– that’s slightly scary, in case no-one comes!

There is a Borders Launch of A House Divided in Mainstreet Trading on 29th October at 6.00pm for refreshments to which anyone within reach is welcome.

And when the dust has settled a little I have a few other groups to visit and I’m especially looking forward to speaking at Ayr Writers Club in November – it’s always great to meet other writers.

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Countdown to A House Divided

The countdown has begun… Just 15 days until the publication of A House Divided which I am celebrating with guest posts and interviews on other blogs and various giveaways and sales of Turn of the Tide

(There’s just time to read the first installment of the Munro family story before the sequel is out.)

Today I am featured on Melinda Hence’s blog – thank you Melinda. Pop over for a look. You just might discover something about me that you didn’t know.

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