A serious question..

Does anyone out there read ever read my blog? If you don’t - I understand but do please, read this one!

I find each day I’m inundated with emails from companies, people, and services that I’ve signed up for in the past, bought something off or sometimes neither - cheeky. I first look at the name, topic line, and unless I know who they are from and what they want, I quickly and without any remorse or guilt press ‘delete’ as fast as possible. If I rarely have some time, I’ll even unsubscribe; however, that can take a time too!

Ever the optimist, I hope you read my blogs and enjoy them as much as I enjoy writing them. It’s an opportunity for me to update you on what’s been happening in my life, especially with my Stones Corner journey.  

What was the weather like those few weeks back? It was amazing, and I’m thrilled that I FINALLY have a trace of a tan. It’s taken me nearly two summers to get the old tan back up, albeit there are lots of white bits too - I know, let’s not go there! Since the sun was out for that one week , there was no blog, and so here’s my latest news.

Darkness will be on its way shortly to Orla Kelly Publishing, ready to be typeset and printed for ACR or Advanced Review Copies (I can never remember that!). Anyway, I’ve booked the Verbal Arts Centre in Derry/Londonderry for its official launch on Friday, 24th. September. For anyone who has preordered Darkness, an automatic invitation will be on its way to you in mid-August. The idea is for me to do a quick reading, mingle whilst enjoying a lovely glass of wine or beer and then an opportunity for me to sign and present any preordered copies of Darkness. I’ll also be bringing copies of Turmoil to tease those who haven’t already bought it. So, save the date.

I received a 5 star* plus rating for Turmoil from Reedsy.com books and was thrilled - take a peek! However, on the other hand, I received a 1* review on Goodreads. Simply put, the reader loved Turmoil until the last chapter where she was about to give me 4 *s, having not realised it was Book One. She was correct; I hadn’t made it clear on the platform that it was the first of four and duly contacted her to apologise and update the summary. Job done, and hopefully, she’ll go back and up the rating. Another significant learning on my publishing journey!

Joe Duffy at Highland Radio has been instrumental in helping me advertise Turmoil to the Northwest, last week, you might have heard a few daily pitches for Turmoil. Now that was a fun exercise, and I admit it’s exhilarating to listen to your book being advertised on the radio - thank you, Joe!

My website will be updated shortly, too, and a fantastic company Bounce have been helping me design a site that is not only user friendly, streamlined and focussed but fun and fresh. They’re also producing an e-book sales brochure for me to send to traditional publishers and agents. My editor, Lynn Curtis (who is honestly amazing), felt that the reviews I’ve been getting could add kudos to future submissions!

I’m not sure how many of you saw the recent Derry News article, but it was amazing to receive so much positive coverage, although I was a tad embarrassed when the lady in the shop noted it was Ned (the mutt) and me on the front page!

I’ve also taken the pluge and have appointed a scriptwriter for Turmoil in the hopw with a few contacts, we can pitch it. A humungous task, as you can imagine. Turmoil is now available at Alan Hanna’s book shop in Dublin, and I was thrilled when they accepted my proposal to stock them. Finally, I was a guest speaker at Linen Hall Event recently. It was great fun and an opportunity to spread the word and answer any questions. Take a look for a laugh!

I hope you all have a peaceful weekend and continue to keep safe and sane!

J :)

“If you try, you might fail,

But if you don’t try, you’ll never succeed”

― Thomas A. Knight