It’s called The Air Between Us, and my royalties are going to charity
It took three full weeks of grinding work to make this a reality. I loved every minute
Never am I happier than when I’m storytelling. I love everything about the process (perhaps apart from the editing), and I feel incredibly lucky to be able to spend time on my craft because it never feels like work.
Originally for this project, I had set myself the goal of creating a full length novel in two weeks. Well, it turns out that was a bit optimistic. It took me three to get it to a place where I was happy with the quality of the story. And it was one hell of a roller coaster journey fuelled with coffee and a Jon Bon Jovi playlist on repeat.
But the moment has arrived – It’s out now at Amazon in eBook format and priced at the very reasonable sum of £1.77. Of that, my royalty is around £1.20, and for every purchase made, I’ll be boosting it to £2.00 (which is approx $2.65 USD) and donating it to my chosen charity: The Alzheimer’s Society. It’s also available as a Kindle Unlimited subscription, and likewise, all royalties from there will also be added to the donation pot. I’ve created a dedicated charity page on my website (Link Here) to provide monthly donation totals, and it will include any future books that I add to my charity library.
For me, finishing any piece of literature is always a bittersweet moment. A part of me wants to continue working on the characters and adding new scenes in the world I’ve built. But as a great philosopher once said; anyone can make something more complicated. It takes vision to keep things simple. While I might lack the vision, having the short time frame to produce a full-length novel has been a great lesson in learning to know what’s important to a story. For The Air Between Us, it forced me to keep only the important bits in, and discard those ideas that would have just been window dressing. As a result, the final book has a very taut, very punchy story that is going to stay with me for some time, and I hope that for anyone who decides to take the plunge and read it, you are left with the same feeling.
Now that this project is over, I have an opportunity to start work on something new. I have a couple of ideas in addition to my ongoing commitment with the Blackchapel Chronicles, and once I’ve made them tangible, I’ll be providing an update very soon. The past week, I’ve been recharging my batteries and reconnecting with people after being holed-up in a room typing on a laptop for so long. Already, I can’t wait to start writing again.
To anyone who does buy the book, thank you so much, it means a lot to me to know someone is reading my words. And if you just read the sample, that’s great too. When all is said and done, my motivation is to reach out to people with my words and provide an entertaining set of stories. There is so much going on in the world these days, settling down with a book feels like one of the last refuges we have left to escape for a precious hour or two.
The book is finished, and I’m getting it (self)published
It feels a lot longer than the two-and-a-half weeks it’s actually been since writing the first page of my very first (and possibly last) romance novel. Getting it over the finish line has resulted in a lot of missed sleep, and hours upon hours of writing and editing that felt like it would never come to an end. It’s been a real slog that’s seen me not shower for three days, and sometimes hardly even acknowledge the existence of my wife at times.
Seriously – she’s actually left me to stay with her parents this weekend and keeps messaging me with photos of all the great things they’re doing. What can I say – I suffer for my art.
It will completely blow me away if people do buy this book, not just for me as a writer, but more importantly for the charity I’m supporting – The Alzheimer’s Society (link goes to their website). I’ve put a lot of work into the quality of the final product, and I’ve even made my own map of Northern France from scratch so readers can follow where the story is at any point. For an idea of what to expect, here’s the synopsis;
My dream is for the short deadline to not be noticeable while reading it. In terms of the book’s format, it will be available first in eBook, then (very soon after) in paperback. Regardless, all my royalties will go to charity so it can make a great gift for someone.
The next post I make on this topic will contain the details on where it can be bought and how much it will cost (it won’t be a lot of money because I never charge a lot – I’m terrible at business). It will also have a ‘look inside’ feature so you can take a peek of the first chapter or two.
Until next time, stay safe & happy writing / reading!
Since I’ve been writing-up a summary to go on the back cover of my latest book, I’ve been thinking about its purpose, and what makes a good one ultimately sell more books, regardless of the quality of the pages’ contents. Many writers work for days on a punchy, hard-hitting blurb to go on that all important back cover or Amazon store page. Word for word, it probably takes up more time than writing the book itself.
The more I’ve reviewed my old blurbs, the more I realise I must subconsciously keep a pattern, regardless of any of my works’ actual content, because they all fit the same kind of structure. So for anyone out there who’s writing their own, or for those who simply have an interest, I’ve laid out my four-step approach to writing this very important bit of marketing for any book:
Photo by Tim Gouw
1. Go straight-in with the setting, and build outwards.
If you’ve written a taut thriller set in Germany at the beginning of WW2, a simple first line of; Berlin, 1938, will speak more to anyone with an interest in the genre better than any amount of expository background. It will also save on word count, which I always plan to have at around 150. Any more than 200, and people switch off and continue skimming the bookshelf. It helps to keep the first line short and sharp to define a book’s genre like a slap round the face. It allows those readers without an interest to move onto something else, and for those that do, to read more.
2. Start personal, you can always explain your book’s world towards the end.
The setting / genre is defined in the first line. Now it’s time to introduce the main character(s). Whether it’s children’s fiction or adult, everyone wants to know who the characters are as soon as possible. They want to know why they should be invested in your character over the course of four hundred pages or sometimes more, and why they should root for them, sympathise with them, laugh with them. The best way I’ve found to achieve this, is to lay out that character’s motivation. If they’re a disgraced hero, put that down. If they’re setting out for vengeance or a lost love, write that in.
Imagine you’re in a lift with Christopher Nolan on your way to the tenth floor. You’ve got twenty seconds to give him a spoiler-free summary of the manuscript you really want him to turn into a movie. He’s not going to care that your main character has a cat called Stanley, works out at the gym four days a week, and has an intolerance to gluten (the main character, not Stanley). He is going to care that the same character was left for dead by her best friend who’s since run off with her husband. So tell him that.
I’ve been cringing at an old summary I once made for a short story I’m now determined will never see the light of day. In it, I described how the main character looked – in the summary. I actually put that in. Since then, I’ve grown up a bit, and I see characters in a blurb as store mannequins that people can project themselves onto. They want the outline of a human being they can care about, so give them one.
3. Don’t give away the plot
Some of the best blurbs I’ve seen hardly give anything away. They’ll grudgingly throw you some morsels before threatening to mug you and kick you out the bookshop. Check out George RR Martin’s Game of Thrones summary next chance you get. It mentions some guy called Eddard Stark who’s Warden of the North. There’s betrayal and vengeance mentioned, along with an Iron Throne, and a Dragon King. And that’s it. Outside the low-fantasy genre setting, you’re left with no idea what’s going on. It makes you want to read more.
Sometimes it’s tempting to show off the hard work you’ve put in with a certain plot twist, and I’ve had to delete entire paragraphs from a summary because I’m getting close to revealing too much without a single page being turned. Less is more, and creating the setting or main character’s motivation is often enough right there in terms of any plot explanation. The reader’s imagination will do the rest.
4. When you end it, don’t just end it
I recently read the summaries of a particular author’s romantic fiction serial since I’m writing my first and was looking for inspiration when it came to my own blurb for this strange and varied genre (my personal opinion). I was a bit put out when the summaries for every book in the series (I think there were four), just…ended. There was no wrap-up, no cliff-hanging teaser, nothing. It just ended after a connecting sentence as though the printer had missed off the last twenty words.
The blurb’s end is probably as important as the beginning, since it’s the last words any potential reader will see before they (might) turn to the first page of your book. For mine, I always stick to the same formula, and it may not be the best, but here goes; I essentially remind any future cherished reader why I think they should buy my book. I draw them from the bowels of the plot and give a wide-ranging view of the body of work. Maybe the setting changes from the wet and rainy streets of modern London to the dusty plains of the Australian outback? Maybe there are twists and turns along the way? Maybe the book is going to evoke feelings of nostalgia, or a sense of loss? If I was ever given an award for my writing (never gonna happen), I’d remind them of that. In short, I’m trying to give a closing argument on why they should take a risk with my book instead of going for the safe option from tried and tested James Patterson.
And that’s it. That’s what I think through when creating a book summary.
To illustrate the above points, here’s the blurb for my new book that will be getting put to market just as soon as I’ve finished the damned editing today. You can probably see the four rules I’ve followed in order to create it.
My method might not be the best way to create the most compelling summary, and it certainly won’t work for every genre and style. If you happen to be a wordsmith yourself, drop me a note on how you tackle this thorny issue – I’m always interested to see how other writers overcome the problems we all face, often alone.
Going to bed last night, I was really, really worried. I had no book blurb, I had no front cover, I wasn’t even happy with the title I’d decided on for my completed manuscript. In short, I had a completely blank slate for a brain after 10 o’clock.
My wife was already fast asleep by the time I slid under the covers and drifted off, thoughts of failure etched on my mind. Then 2.30am rolled along. I snapped awake. My mind was on fire; I knew exactly how the cover was going to look, I had a better title – I even had a tagline. Whipping back the cover, I leapt out of bed, dashed into my study, turned on the computer, and…and…
It didn’t f***ing work! My computer had died during the night like my pet hamster from childhood. Painful flashbacks ensued.
So I got out my old Chromebook that has a broken ‘up arrow’ on the keyboard, and the ‘a’ and ‘s’ letters worn off their keys. And with it, I produced this…
For someone who failed Art & Design at school, I’m a little bit proud of it, and I feel it fits the mood of the book really well. Now that this project has an actual cover, it also feels a lot more real, and my biggest fear has gone from being; “will I be able to complete this?” to “will anyone like this book enough to actually pay money for it?”
Any and all royalties will be going to a charity close to my heart, and to ensure every penny gets to where it needs to be, I’m not recouping any incurred costs. Having begun this whole thing as a bit of a fun joke, I really want this book to stand as a good story in its own right. To that end, my philosophy in writing has always been the same; keep trying, don’t give up, and if you produce something that is entertaining, people will buy it.
And for any chance of that to happen, I have to get back to the soul-crushing work of editing.
I’ve written the final part of my manuscript while listening to Bon Jovi. Guess I’m…Livin’ On A Prayer?
At this point, the days have rolled into one and there just aren’t enough hours. My manuscript is finally finished and the word count stands at a respectable 81,000(!) Yet I have a shed load of editing to do, and a difficult decision to make. The choice before me is whether I rush this last part of the project to (almost) meet my self-imposed deadline, or go over that deadline to create a more engaging and polished story.
As this challenge has gone on, my biggest worry has come from not being able to do the story justice. What started as a whimsical project to raise some cash for a great cause has become a labour of, if not love, then something close to it. Coupled with respecting the book’s historical setting, I’ve come to realise I don’t want to screw this up after coming so far. I first began writing to produce something that people want to read, and I hope that by pushing back the deadline a little, I get closer to that goal, and ultimately raise more money for charity in the long run.
Therefore, I’ve decided to dedicate three additional days to do the editing and cover design before publishing this thing. In hindsight, to go from nothing, not even a story outline, to having the rough manuscript completed in two weeks has been an undertaking in itself. Now that I have it in my hands, it feels much more real, and the end is very much in sight.
I’m hoping to post the finished book cover tomorrow, and the book’s blurb the day after. Since the exhausting task of writing page after page is at least done, I’ll be able to post more updates over the coming days, culminating in the final (definitely final) novel very shortly.
Until then, please check out my chosen charity’s website here at: www.alzheimers.org.uk and as always, happy writing!
Before I go any further in this post, I have massively fallen behind on my updates, so I’m wrapping this one into days 6 & 7 – It’s that kind of a project.
At the end of the first week, I have (some would say inevitably) fallen behind by about 10,000 words. So to try and catch up, I’m intending to pull an all-nighter tonight (Tuesday) and then work through the next day until I eventually collapse on Wednesday evening. My current word count stands at 40,000. A mix of personal stuff and re-drafting had slowed things down over the weekend.
On the positive side, I’ve really begun to like some of the characters I’m writing, which is something I was not expecting in a romance novel. Before this, I would have scoffed at such an idea, having wrongly believed the genre was nothing more than two-dimensional mush wrapped up in three-day old bubblegum. More fool me.
There is one character getting under my skin more than the others though, and that is the main antagonist. Somehow I’ve allowed him to morph into a real villainous piece of sh*t. There’s nothing wrong with having an evil villain (in fact it’s the aim, after all) but I do try and set a limit in keeping with the theme of the story, and this guy is pushing it. I’ve known of a few writers whose characters morph in ways they hadn’t originally expected them to, and it’s always been fascinating to me; as their creators, you’d think we could keep to a rigid set of characteristics and stick to them, never deviating from the path. Yet they always seem to creep out the page with a life of their own.
The other thing I have to keep my eye on is the charity element of this book – I’m donating all my royalties to charity, and therefore any organisation associated with this project is probably not going to want it to be too graphic/controversial. On the other end of the scale, I’m a thriller writer who has never censored himself for anything, so there is a large push-pull going on inside my head right now.
Anyone who might have been following my clues in earlier posts may already have got this, but the majority of the book is set against the backdrop of World War One, which is quite fitting considering the awful events currently taking place in Ukraine and threatening to spill across Europe. The nice thing about writing, especially fiction writing, is how it allows you to shut the door on the outside world for a short time and seek solace in one that you can create anew from your own desk.
In portraying events of the Great War, I’ve been careful not to take too many liberties with history, or with the achievements of those who fought on the front lines, struggling against impossible odds on both sides of the conflict. To that end, I put extra research into some of the key events the story follows in order to maintain some authenticity and realism, and I hope the final product will stand as a testament to the sacrifices made by the generation of my grandparents and great-grandparents.
The speck of light at the end of the tunnel is visible in this project. Yet I still have the book’s front cover to start (hopefully by the weekend) and the front & back matter to do as well. There’s just not enough hours in the day…
Michael Averon 