One Month to Go

There is one month to go before Splinters is officially published.

QUICK, BUY IT HERE

Here is the situation.
 I've ordered the ISBN's (international standard book number) from the ISBN agency. There was an exciting moment when I got a phone call from them to tell me that there was another publishing company in the UK called Timeline Books. Apparently they'd registered in June 2012. I knew I should have done this earlier.
They've published a book called 'Rediscovering the Orpington Car'. It is a book about the Orpington Car. Thankfully it is not an awesome collection of dark fiction by an award winning author. Otherwise there might have been some confusion. The nice people at the agency told me that, as the subjucts of our books were so wildly different it wasn't a problem having the same name. It does however mean that the series of books i'd planned to publish on vintage cars may have to be put on hold.

I've been posting out uncorrected proof copies of the book to people who we hope will read, enjoy and review the book. Two dozen have been posted out and we have another 12 to send. The national newspapers do not give very much review space at all to short stories and even less to horror. It's been a real task to find the right people to send copies of the book to.
It's frustrating for me, and no doubt to other publishers and authors of short stories, that this format isn't given more exposure. Good short story writing is a joy to read. It takes incredible skill for an author to get across their message in this limited style. What the reeader is getting in a short story collection is actually 10-12 wonderful mini novels. That's value right there. In fact I might even put the price of the book up, it's that good.

I won't put the price of the book up. It is that good though.

If you know any friendly reviewers who appreciate the fine art of story writing, please point them in my direction.

Oh yes, and also with one month to go before publication, I have a proff  proof reader. A proper one. I have asked her to do this daunting task in about 10 days. This will give us enough time to do the changes and get it off to the printers for them to print copies of the book in time for publication. It's all very exciting.

The cover design has to be finished too.

Oh, and we need to get some posters together advertising the book launch to send to our friends at Horror in the East.

And we have another exciting announcement soon as well.

ps. Thanks to Ramsey Campbell for the very kind email he sent, wishing the book the very best of luck.