I’ll be at the New Forest Book Fair this Saturday if anyone wants to say hello. I’m not sure what to expect but I’ll set my stall out and see what happens. The most I can hope for is to sell a few books and at least make the money back for the pitch.
It’s a second-hand book fair so most of the punters will be looking for old books, not new ones by an unknown author, but we’ll see. At least they can read which is a start.
Posted in Productivity, self-publishing, writing
Tagged ambition, best, book, bookfair, career, dream, Festival, forest, goals, how, important, job, life, Literary, New, Novel, personal, productivity, publishing, Readers, reading, Scared, self-publishing, selfpublishing, story, success, support, tips, Writing
I’ve been festivalling this weekend. (It’s a verb these days) The Isle of Wight Literary Festival to be specific. The great thing about this literary festival is that it’s literally down the road. It’s as if someone arranges for writers, publishers and agents to come to my house for the weekend. It’s very good of them.
Listening to so many great writers over the last few days has filled me with inspiration. I heard Kate Mosse talk about her new book and the reason she fell into writing, Deborah Moggach regaled stories of hotels, Conn Iggulden confessed the torturous journey to publication, and Jessica Mann talked about killing people.
Posted in Productivity, self-publishing, writing
Tagged ambition, book, career, ebooks, editing, Escape, Festival, important, inspiration, Isle of Wight, job, kindle, life, Literary, productivity, publishing, Readers, reading, self-publishing, selfpublishing, success, Writing
Well, well, well, today marks the 200th post on this blog. I hope you don’t mind me taking some time out to mention it.
I started this blog at the end of July 2012, about 14 months ago, with a clear intention of the subject matter which I wanted to stick to. When I started writing the blog I had not personally published anything and so the blog was to follow my progress as a writer and as a person who was committed to making a go of it. I think I’ve done that.
Posted in Personal, Productivity, writing
Tagged 200, ambition, best, book, career, dream, ebooks, Festival, goals, great, Habits, how, important, inspiration, job, life, Literary, personal, posts, productivity, publishing, Readers, reading, routine, self-publishing, selfpublishing, story, success, Writing
I’ve recently become part of a marketing group for fellow writers. It’s called Writer’s Room and it’s based in The New Forest, not far from where I live. At the moment there are 29 other authors included and this number is growing.
The main purpose of the group is to encourage better marketing of our books. The one problem I’ve noticed with self-publishing is the capacity you have to market your work. I’ve complained on this blog before about the lack of time available to market effectively and how any sort of marketing takes you away from the business of writing books. Hopefully, this group will help.
Posted in self-publishing, selfpublishing, writing
Tagged ambition, book, career, ebooks, Festival, goals, job, life, Literary, marketing, productivity, publishing, Readers, reading, self-publishing, selfpublishing, selling, success, support, tips, Writing
There has been another release from the prolific Short Stories Group. This time all of the short stories are centred around the theme of Valentine’s Day and love is well and truly in the air. Any money received from the book will be donated to Diabetes UK which means a great deal to one of our best authors, Angela Kelman.
Included in this edition are 13 completely different stories from 13 different authors. A number of genres are represented giving the reader a little bit of everything to get them in the mood for love.
You can get it from Amazon UK here,
Or, Amazon US here.
Posted in Short Stories, writing
Tagged anthology, book, day, ebooks, Festival, goals, kindle, productivity, publishing, Readers, reading, self-publishing, selfpublishing, short, shortstory, story, valentines, Writing
Hot on the back of my Christmas Short Story Collection called The Christmas Number One (Available still on Amazon UK and Amazon US), I am currently busy writing another short that will be included in a Valentine’s Day Anthology from the Short Stories Group.
I don’t even like Valentine’s Day which is funny given that for the last two days I’ve been writing a story that carries the spirit of what the day means to me. Is Valentine’s Day not just some commercial nonsense that was made up about a hundred years ago by a jewellery company anyway? That’s romantic.
Posted in self-publishing, Short Stories, writing
Tagged book, career, day, ebooks, Festival, inspiration, publishing, Readers, reading, romance, self-publishing, selfpublishing, short, shortstory, story, success, valentines, Writing
If you have children, or indeed if you have Christmas, then you need to read these books. This Top 10 is not my own, The Huffington Post posted it a year ago, and some of them I haven’t read yet but with Christmas coming up, and children seeming to always be in my house, what a perfect opportunity.
I’m going to start writing some Christmas stories this week for an Anthology that I hope to get out before the big day. These books will get me in the groove. Also, I’ve stated before that one of my favourite books of all time is a Christmas book (A Christmas Carol) and the season of goodwill doesn’t start for me until I’ve read it. Here’s the chart…
The inaugural Isle of Wight Festival of 2012 took place this weekend. I now have to include the year because I’m sure that it will establish itself as an annual bash. I thoroughly enjoyed the sessions that I went to and, from speaking to other festival goers, it seems to have gone off rather well.
It was centred around the lovely stately home of Northwood House, overlooking views of the Solent, and even the weather behaved itself. Every session, or turn, that I witnessed was very well attended, with most being sell-outs. There were some incredibly interesting speakers, full of anecdote, experience, and wisdom. But the real success of the festival was the intangible buzz around the place, as if the crowds were pinching themselves that these people had actually come to see them.
Posted in self-publishing, writing
Tagged book, ebooks, Festival, inspiration, isle, IWLF, Literary, of, Readers, reading, self-publishing, shortstory, wight, Writing
To my dedicated readers, those who think I live somewhere in the time/space continuum, you are wrong. I’m actually a normal human like you and live in a real place – Cowes on the Isle of Wight. If you do not know it already, it’s a small island about 20 miles across by 15 miles down, located off the middle of the south coast of the UK.
It has a surprising literary history with famous authors like Charles Dickens and Lord Tennyson penning some favourites upon the shores. What is even more surprising, given the local trend for putting on festivals, is that they have never had a literary festival until this year. It kicks off on Friday.
Posted in self-publishing, writing
Tagged Festival, inspiration, isle, isleofwight, IWLF, Literary, of, self-publishing, shortstory, wight, Writing
Please could you read this and let me know if you enjoyed it; it’s only short. (I guess that’s why they call it a short story) This is a new thing for me but something that I want to do more of. I think a short story is the same for a writer as a professional footballer dribbling around some cones.
The rules for the Isle of Wight Literary Festival competition are pretty loose. It must be no more than 300 words long and start with the phrase, “The weekend didn’t turn out as I expected…”
So, here goes…
Posted in Short Stories
Tagged 2012, competition, Festival, Isle of Wight, IWLF, Literary, short, shortstory, story, Writing
Michael J Holley - Writer 