Shell-shocked by Ishiguro's subtlety

Review of Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro (contains spoilers)

My wife's reading group chose this book but didn't like it. Then they had a film evening, watched the screen version and didn't like that either. Being the Contrary Mary that I am, when I saw a bargain copy of Never let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro in my local bookstore I had to grab it and read from cover to cover, trying to understand how and why it could have been Booker prize short listed. The answer is simple - it's a masterpiece of subtlety (still don't understand why the reading group didn't like it). I do realise I'm the last person on the planet to discover this book.

Ishiguro's world only differs to reality in one respect; the ethics of cloning and transplants. This novel is all about the coming of age of three key individuals for whom that difference is material. Their innocence and fatalism had a devastating effect on me. Bred and nurtured for a purpose, these young people move towards their end and 'complete' without coercion.

Religion has no part in this tale and the time period through which events travel is contemporary. That shook me even more with music, cars and cassette tapes giving time-stamps that moved the start of this alternative reality back to post WWII. If we had emerged from that era with a different ethos, if certain attitudes to genetics and superior / inferior race had prevailed, then who knows?

I have to confess I did itch to know the nitty gritty details of being a donor, the fourth donation and completion, but this novel is all the more powerful for avoiding the specifics. Ishiguro does get painfully close to explaining when Tommy and Kathy meet Miss Emily and Madame in their search for deferral, but he recovers the enigmatic delivery style in good time.

An analogous interpretation of Never Let Me Go's fatalistic overall theme is not to be recommended unless you're in the company of great friends and good wine, and can face the possibility of life's futility.

Not a feel good book, but nevertheless a wondrous read.

One thousand self-publishers share their thoughts

In February 2012 I came to hear (via The Vandal - Derek Haines) of a self-publisher survey being carried out by Taleist, an interesting writers' resource website. As one of the 1,007 respondents I was fortunate to recently receive a complimentary copy of Not a Gold Rush, the report from the Taleist Self-Publishing Survey.

What would you like to know about the report? Well, if you want to read it then you'll have to buy it, but the title story of Not a Gold Rush is about the 2011 earnings of the respondents. Their average earnings for the year was just over US$10,000. So, where's your 10k? Where's mine, for that matter. I shifted a lot of books but many were free copies of Peril with Amazon's price comparison (Peril reached #12 Amazon.com free on kindle in November 2011 in the days before KDP Select). Well, the earnings are distorted by a minority of 10% who earned buckets of money. The median (middle) income was $500. So if you earned less than that then you're in the company of half of the self-published author community (assuming the 1,007 respondent sample was representative of all of us).

The report is entertainingly written and well-balanced, clearly pointing out assumptions and sample limitations whenever any conclusions are drawn. There are one or two lighter moments, such as one bright spark of a correspondent who claimed to have published 16,000 books in 2011, probably meaning that they sold / shipped 16,000. That figure would have greatly distorted the average number of books published but the report authors took care to discount any such outlying data. What kind of twit would have made such a mistake in the survey? (I can say with some certainty that it must have been me!)

There are some indications and suggestions in the report regarding the effectiveness of different marketing methods but there's just no magic recipe to the marketing. I was gratified to find email considered as the least effective marketing tool, as I'm particularly bad at building a mail list myself. So help me out and join my mail list here ;-)

All self-published authors are looking for the Holy Grail of epublishing success. This report doesn't reveal the location of the Grail. It does reinforce some things that we share in common knowledge - a correlation between high quality product + writing output volume and sales revenue. Financially successful authors are, in the main, writing more, publishing more and have been doing it longer than lower earners. So, back to work!

The Baptist - he's on the loose. Run for your lives!

Following the Goodreads Giveaway of Peril (922 people entered for 1 paperback copy and it was won by a very nice young lady in Denmark), it's the turn of The Baptist. 2 copies available of this psychological thriller are available, enter at the box on the right of the page.
I can't lie to you, The Baptist is a very dark and twisted tale of love, sex, insanity and redemption.
But be careful - John Baptist walks on water and he's cleansing a path for the way of the Lord!
More about The Baptist here.

P.S. the winning copies won't be water damaged.

From vanity to pride

This post first appeared on the Have Your Say section of multi-story.co.uk (a great site for competitions and writing resources).

George Orwell said All writers are vain, selfish and lazy. The ebook revolution panders to these vices. Anyone can call themselves an author, throw a bit of a story together as an ebook and plaster their name, title and homemade cover across the internet within a day or two.

Want your pulp fiction made available in the old fashioned way? Run that manuscript through one of the many print-on-demand (POD) platforms and your paperback will be sitting on Amazonian virtual shelves before you can properly pronounce the name of a Welsh 19th century publicity stunt (Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch).

It's the ebook revolution, haven't you heard? Blog posts have swarmed globally about the predicted demise of traditional publishing due to the epublishing revolution but spare a moment to pity some poor souls who are really down in the dumps; vanity publishers. They who used to graciously take a few thousand quid from the hands of frustrated writers (vain, selfish and lazy Orwellians) who couldn't get past mainstream publishing's gatekeepers. Said unfortunate writers then carting piles of books around in the boot of an Austin Maxi and foisting those dubious creations upon members of the over-eighties walking club and other captive audiences at a tenner a throw. That time has gone. POD and ebook digital technologies now satisfy the vain, selfish and lazy without filling their dining room with fifty cardboard boxes of vanity. RIP vanity publishers. And good for the environment.

Just a minute. Are you an independent author and proud of it? If so, your hackles are probably raised by now. Independent authors are vanity fodder? No, these sweeping accusations of poorly presented, terribly titled and hopelessly unedited work don't apply to you. That's because you have a cover designed to rival the top 100 ebooks on the 'Zon. It shouts out to browsing readers and visually summarises the premise of your novel. Your product description blurb is the ultimate précis, memorable and relevant to its genre, converting passersby into readers. As for the manuscript itself, there's hardly a hint of word echo, your narrative voice is clear, dialogue resonates through the air and the whole thing is wrapped up in a well-paced plot so tight that, were it an arse, you would just have to smack it. Your digital manuscript appears on all reading devices exactly how you intended. You know that because you've checked (and avoided words like the famous Welsh train station). Grammar and spelling are impeccable. You're just one of several people that have proofread the thing before moving your fastidious document control to final. This novel of yours is as good as it can get. Or is it?

Did you put on the blinkers when some of your peers groaned as they trudged through your porridge of a blurb? Were you able to extract genuine opinion from test readers about your cover or did you take their damning faint praise as something more? Have you dressed your pride and joy in beige? Has your editing discipline been the best or have you really settled for good enough and can't face reading the thing through again for the umpteenth time?

According to the marketing crowd an independent author should be self-assured and assertive, fearless even. A kind of literary warrior. Before you climb up on your war horse to engage with the market, let your natural humility have rein for a few moments and consider this; your independent novel might not be as shiny as it could. Cover, blurb, content. Best efforts, please. You've invested a chunk of your life in writing this thing and you owe it to yourself not to eat the cow and choke on the tail. Stand above the noise of opportunistic amateurs and turn vanity into pride.



The New Author is a non-fiction self help guide for writers, social media marketers and self-publishers. Available in paperback and various ebook formats through a wide range of internet stores including Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Smashwords et al (see Ruby's Shop for full details).

Free paper copy of Peril up for grabs on Goodreads

Peril is Ruby's next Goodreads giveaway, 1 paperback copy available.
This crime thriller has accumulated 25 great reviews on Amazon.com as an ebook and was launched in paperback 22nd March 2012.

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Peril

by Ruby Barnes

Giveaway ends May 22, 2012.
See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

Enter to win