What I AM going to talk about, though, is the brand new step I’ve taken this year - brand new to me at least - as part of the promotion package for the new DS Heckenburg thriller,
ROGUE (the ebook of which, I reiterate, can be pre-ordered right now, though both the ebook and the paperback will be available immediately on October 24):
It’s this dramatisation business I alluded to earlier.
I’ve no doubt there are several questions you’ll already want to ask about this. So, let’s go:
1) Why bother doing your own promo?
Well, it’s an understandable position to take. We all like to think that our publishers and their promotions people will take care of publicity. They should do. And most of the time they do, and sometimes they’re even successful ... but not always. In truth, I’ve never met a working author yet who doesn’t gripe at least a little bit about his or her experience of the mass-market publicity machine.
But even if you implicitly trust your publisher to showcase your new book in the best way possible and literally drive an avalanche of sales, how can it hurt you do some promotional work yourself? Most of us do that already, of course. We sit on panels at literary festivals, we attend launches and signings, we give interviews to the press, we write guest blogs for book review websites. But in this age of mass media, there are other things we can do too. Granted, not all of them are cost-free, or can be done on a whim and require next to no time or effort ... but I suppose it all depends how much you want to put into promoting your latest piece of work. It’s your call in the end. No one will force you.
2) Isn’t self-promotion a bit self-indulgent?Well, the short answer is: Yes, of course it is. But if you want people to read your book, or even just be aware that it’s out there, what else are you going to do? Yes, word of mouth will travel, but it doesn’t always travel quickly. Unless you’re prepared to pay for big advertising, there aren’t too many other avenues open to you.
3) Won’t internet folk just get sick of seeing you talking about your own book, and switch off?Absolutely they will. Which is why it pays dividends to think laterally, varying what you are doing in terms of promo, experimenting a little, creating a campaign that is slightly different from the norm, and perhaps more interesting each time. In truth, the only limit to what you can do here is the limit of your imagination, but it’s easy to say that. In any case, today, we’re only going to talk about one new method. The one I’ve already mentioned: dramatising passages from the text, getting seriously talented people to perform it, and then weaving it all into a series of eye and ear-catching trailers. Here’s how it happened in the case of
ROGUE ...
My wife (and business partner), Cathy, and I, are fortunate enough to both be members of
WIGAN LITTLE THEATRE, a dynamic, multi-award-winning operation, which produces top quality on-stage drama at a rate of one play a month, all the year round. Yes, you heard that correctly - ALL the year round. this means, producing about ten plays, invariably to semi-professional standards, every year. After one such exceptional production, Tim Firth’s
Sheila's Island, way back in April this year, it suddenly struck me as astonishing that I hadn't tried to make use of this remarkable pool of talent to assist me on the publicity trail. And when I raised this issue in the theatre bar with a group of actors who Cath and I are particularly friendly with, I was amazed at how keen everyone was to participate.
Of course, it wasn't as simple as that.
The first thing I had to do was select chunks of the new book,
ROGUE, and narrow them down into pieces of drama, create mini-scripts in effect, which I could then send out to people who didn’t know much about the plot at this stage, and thus had no real context. Next, I had to secure a producer/director/production manager, who could turn what at the time was a still a concept rather than a workable plan into something solid. Then I had to secure a recording date on which everyone would be available. And then find a recording venue, a studio in effect.
The first of these challenges I met quickly because the positive response from all concerned had kindled my enthusiasm no end. It was also the case that I was very in tune with
ROGUE by this time. Though I’d completed it several years earlier, Cathy and I had been working hard to devise promotional strategies, and so had refamiliarised ourselves with the book massively. The actors meanwhile were very receptive to my context notes, and so that hurdle was overcome relatively quickly as well.
Securing a production manager/techie guy was also relatively painless. My first port of all was
Cash Productions, as owned and operated by pro TV cameraman and movie-maker, Iain Cash, who was more than willing to lend us his expertise. But it was after this when the problems started. All those who'd initially agreed to participate were still willing, but by now it was summer, and so the holiday season was approaching and all the kids were off-school. It was going to be asking a lot therefore to find an afternoon that would suit everyone, and not just the cast, but Cash Productions too.
Somehow, we managed it. Don’t ask me how. Sorry if you were expecting pearls of wisdom on this. I honestly think we just got lucky on that front.
In terms of studio space, this was even more complex. Obviously we had to try and keep the costs down, which meant trying to avoid hiring somewhere. In the end we settled for our own house. We had enough room thankfully, and our springer spaniel Buddy, who’s been moping a lot since the loss of his brother last year, was content to sit quietly and be petted. This would also enable us to reward our amateur cast with as much food and booze as they could manage once the recording session had wrapped.
With everything in the can, it was then a matter of Iain Cash and I going into postproduction, assessing the raw material we’d gathered, editing where necessary - and we had to do a lot of that because, by design, we’d recorded far more than we knew we’d need (to keep trailers interesting, you must keep them short and tight) - and then splicing it all together as effectively as possible.
As to whether we’ve succeeded in that, you can be the judges. Several of the trailers we made - or perhaps I should call them SOUNDBITES - are posted below. Just make sure you TURN THE SOUND ON when you check them out, as otherwise that will defeat the whole object.
I won’t deny that we’re on a learning curve here. As far as I know, this is the first time something like this has ever been done to promote a book. I could be wrong on that, of course - don’t hold me to it. But I’m reasonably confident that readers and book fans won’t have encountered this very often before.
Is it something we’ll do again when the next book comes out? Very likely. And I suspect we’ll be better at it then. I urge all writers who want to do their bit when it comes to promoting their upcoming work to consider trying something similar, because if nothing else, you’ll have one hell of a time while you’re doing it.
My thanks now go to
Iain Cash and
Cash Productions, and the
Wigan Little Theatre crowd,
Mark Lloyd,
Stacey Vernon,
John Churnside,
Helen Gray,
Joey Wiswell,
John Dudley,
Nicola Reynolds and
Tara Haywood ... for going above and beyond the call of duty to make this thing happen.
One final time, ROGUE hits the shops both as an ebook and paperback, on October 24. And now ...
The scary stuff
It’s almost Halloween. So, it would be pretty remiss of me not to mention some out-and-out horror stuff. I think I’ve just got time to remind you all that
ELEMENTAL FORCES has now been published. It’s the latest entry in the excellent anthology series,
ABC OF HORROR from Flametree Press, as edited by the tireless Mark Morris.
My own contribution (my second to this series, I’m proud to say), is Jack-a-Lent, a Liverpool-set crime story drawing on the old myths of the city, which very quickly becomes riddled with supernatural terror. If that isn’t enough to interest you, look at some of the other authors involved. I mean, it’s a no-brainer really, isn’t it.
On a similar subject, I’m going to mention, as I do every year around this time,
SEASON OF MIST, my autumnal coming-of-age horror novella, first published in 2010, and still available as a paperback, ebook and in Audible.
Looking beyond October 31, in fact probably from the day after November 5, we’ll be thinking increasingly about Christmas. And if you like Christmas spook stories, why not grab another novella of mine from 2010?
SPARROWHAWK, one of my favourite pieces of work to date, is also available in ebook, paperback or Audible.
It’s set in early Victorian London during a bitterly cold Christmas, wherein a range of festive spectres are summoned to confront an embittered veteran of the Afghan War.
On top of that, if Yuletide scare-fare is to your liking, you might also try
IN A DEEP, DARK DECEMBER, or
THE CHRISTMAS YOU DESERVE, two collections of my Christmas spook stories, which again are available in Kindle, paperback and Audible.
And now, to finish things off today, as promised ...
THRILLERS, CHILLERS, SHOCKERS AND KILLERS
Works of dark fiction that I have recently read, thoroughly enjoyed and heartily recommend (sometimes with a few lighter ones mixed in).
BY BIZARRE HANDS by Joe R Lansdale (1989)The weird preacher whose obsessive lunacy always brings death. The Gulf Coast camping trip that quickly turns hideous. The roving teen troublemakers who get far more trouble than they can handle. Lansdale’s first collection of short stories is a mixed bag of horror and crime, but written to perfection, packed with odious fragments of humanity, terrifying scenarios and fist-in-the-face violence so gut-thumpingly brutal that you’ll never forget it.
SATURDAY NIGHT AND SUNDAY MORNING by Alan Sillitoe (1958) In the late 50s, a Nottingham factory worker causes domestic chaos with his drinking, his carryings-on with married women, and his general disrespect. All-time classic of working-class literature, still as raw, energised and passionate in the 2020s, and of course, flawlessly written, taking the reader right back to another time and place, making the boisterous world of the Angry Young Man as real today as it was then.
SOME WILL NOT SLEEP by Adam L.G. Nevill (2016) ‘The beautiful tall house on the hill’, where trespassers may suffer lifelong damage. The roommate engaged in something unspeakable. The innocent children menaced by the abominable pig thing. The isolated cottage in the Nordic wilds, and the monstrosity that calls it home. And much more. A masterclass in genuine, continuous terror. Nevill writes magnificent prose, but his stories cut like ripsaws.
ROOM AT THE TOP by John Braine (1957)
A former POW embarks on an ambitious career in an industrial Yorkshire town, using every trick in the book, and the local women, to advance his interests. Less an Angry Young Man diatribe, and more a bitter-sweet romance as a young tough learns the hard way that he’s a tad less pitiless than he thought. A stark picture of austerity-ridden postwar Britain, lovingly and handsomely evoked and deeply redolent of a land on the cusp of social revolt.
THE GRAVEYARD APARTMENT by Mariko Koike (1993)
A Tokyo family takes a new apartment amid a complex of old temples and derelict cemeteries, but soon wish they hadn’t. A real slow burner this one but jam-packed with all the typical jolts of eerie horror we find in Japanese spook stories, finally building to a bone-jarring climax. Koike writes with chilling effectiveness, while Deborah Boliver Boehm translates in style.
THE MONSTER OF FLORENCE by Douglas Preston and Mario Spezi (2008)
When US author Doug Preston moved to Italy, he became fascinated by a series of grotesque murders committed by ‘the Monster’, a predator who was still at large. His own investigation followed, and this is it. A masterclass in True Crime, packed with grim detail, but endlessly tense and intriguing (especially when the authors themselves become suspects!), and delving deep into Tuscan lore, arcane ritual, rumours of secret societies etc. As absorbing as any work of fiction.
