Still Hot But Smiling

Let's not dwell on the heat, which is all-consuming, distracting... oops, there I am dwelling. No, it is just here, it is only heat. Enough.

The niceness of the day is summed up by both a lovely new review on my Amazon UK page and by the astonishing fact that I sent three flash stories and a poem to a lit zine yesterday and they'd like to publish all of them! Well, very nice. Will post the links as they happen.

Third nicety is the discovery that the great and wondrous Margaret Atwood is coming to speak in Bristol, our soon-to-be new hometown, so tickets have been booked for that, how thrilling. Very very few of those sorts of names come through Jerusalem, be they writers, artists, musicians, and there is always a big hoo-ha when they do. I am looking forward to being in a place where these kinds of events happen more than once every few years. Where I might actually participate in something, too. Not with Ms A of course, although I have been invited to the 11th Conference on the Short Story in Toronto next June (can I plan that far in advance??) and she is scheduled to be there too, with some other wonderful names, so, well, there you are.

I haven't done any writing today, but writing-related things. Yesterday I sat for an hour very early in the morning in certain government offices waiting for something which was not, of course, granted, but taking in my fellow applicants, the shoddy surroundings, certain bizarre juxtapositions which started my mind wandering. I am hoping that the (very early) hour was not wasted, that it may lead to a short story. It is maturating right now. Will see what emerges. I also finished the screenplay adaptation of a short story of mine for the Waterford Film Festival competition (see link on right, Waiting to Hear from...). It is such fun adapting your own stories - the story is there but you need to make changes so it works visually. I also submitted a new story to the Manchester Fiction Prize, so fingers crossed. Only a week or so left for that - get your entry in.

In other news, the plagiarism discussion in which various of us had been very careful not to "name names" has now progressed, a name has been mentioned and the person in question has been asked to explain, if he can. If you'd like to find out more, visit the thread on How Publishing Really Works.

The fallout for me with all this discussion has been a heightened sensitivity, perhaps even insecurity, when I write as to whether I am really writing my own story, or has something from somewhere else slipped in. I just have to trust that I am, but try and still remain aware. It is a delicate balance.

Keep Helping Salt - Reviews

Salt's Just One Book campaign (see Twitter) to boost its sales so that my wonderful publisher can survive did definitely help! But there's more to be done. This is the latest from Chris Hamilton Emery:

Trade Summary

June's UK trade figures are in from our distributor, Gardners — 47% of our UK trade sales are now with the Waterstone's chain, 21% with Amazon. We had no sales at all in June from Borders. Trade sales for the first six months of this year are still down 4% on 2008, but we are beginning to close that gap. Total trade figures for June were up 21% on the previous June (the summer months are often exceptionally tough for Salt), growth was largely driven through the JustOneBook campaign. But conditions remain extremely difficult in the trade. 8% of turnover was library sales. Independent book shop sales accounted for less than 7% of trade turnover, very disappointing after a big sales push with the indies and three separate promotions.

The Challenge

Our challenge is to grow our trade sales over the coming months to keep the business on track. We need to find better ways at reaching the indies as we're still convinced that they are good partners for Salt's list. Despite the success of the JustOneBook campaign, this month's trade sales will be critical. We could easily eat into the revenues we've raised from sales made direct to our fans. One bad month in the trade can wipe out our campaign.

So.... this is the important bit. Listen closely:

How You Can Help Us

We need to keep Salt in the public eye. Here's how you can help. If you've bought a book from Salt and you enjoyed it please continue to support us by doing two important things (they're both free):

1. Firstly, tell your friends about the Salt title you enjoyed. Recommend it to them. Tell your friends on Twitter what you thought about it. Blog about it, if you like. Pass it on in anyway you can. Spread the word.

2. Secondly, please post a brief review of the book on Amazon to help the author. Amazon reviews do work.

Thank you for all your support. It really does matter.

Very best from me and Jen
Chris

Ok, you know what you need to do. I'm not talking about my book, please recommend and write reviews of any Salt book you've enjoyed, be it short stories or poetry. To get you started here's the link to a search for Salt Publishing on Amazon UK. This doesn't work on Amazon US (lots of books on saltwater fishing!) so here are a few choice links to start you off there:

Vanessa Gebbie's Words from a Glass Bubble. (Read The Short Review's review)

Elizabeth Baines' Balancing on the Edge of the World (Read The Short Review's review)

Charles Lambert's Scent of Cinnamon (Read The Short Review's review)

Carys Davies' Some New Ambush (Read The Short Review's review)

Alex Keegan's Ballistics (Read The Short Review's review)

The White Road and Other Stories I think I may have already mentioned!

Thank you, thank you, thank you for all your support!

Amazon Bestselling Short Stories - thank you all!

I have to blog about this even though - or because - it is so fleeting and will be gone shortly. This hour, The White Road and Other Stories is No 4 in Amazon UK's Bestselling Short Stories chart. And that's not all - my fellow Salt author Vanessa Gebbie's Words From a Glass Bubble is at No 12, Elizabeth Baines' Balancing on the Edge of the World is at number 34 and David Gaffney's Sawn-Off Tales is No 40. Thank you everyone for supporting Salt - we really appreciate it, it means so much to all of us.

In case you think we authors are just sitting back, I have bought Ballistics by Alex Keegan and Broken Things by Padrika Tarrant. Vanessa is buying too. Salt produces many, many excellent books, for more ideas see my earlier blog post or click on one of the covers below:

Addendum Number 2

Now that I am not shaking anymore, just grinning so hard my jaw aches, I am happy to report that today's fab news seems to have had a direct impact on sales: my Amazon UK ranking, which had been plummeting steadily, jumped from 197,000 this morning to 10,150, number 77 in the Bestselling story collections list (that dastardly clock radio is off the charts, ha!). So, in conclusion, these awards do something. Something shifted. Very very nice, although nothing beats those judges' remarks. I am off to grin privately at my cats. It's bound to scare them.

A bad few months made a little sunnier

It's not been a great few months, in fact this year started pretty badly, with illness and anxiety etc..., and has only got slightly better since now I have a space to write and the energy to actually do it, some of the time.

I was quite upset last week to discover, checking my book's Amazon page, that there was a negative review. Welcome to the real world! I hadn't yet experienced someone talking the time and effort to tell people what he didn't like about The White Road and Other Stories. Already not feeling so strong, I took it quite hard, all those initial urges to just burn every copy and disappear into a small hole. It took the help of a number of author friends, some with far worse experiences to share, to get me to calm down and see that the fact that he wrote at the end of the review " after the hype on the internet and in New Scientist, I was expecting something special" is a good thing - it means there was hype!

Ok, so, this morning's post brought me something to make my day a little brighter. Wet Ink, the Australian magazine of New Writing, agreed to review my book since I hold Australian citizenship. The editor, Dominique Wilson, reviewed it herself, and she said:

"This collection exemplifies everything that is best about the short story. With succinctness rarely seen in the work of someone new to fiction, Hershman extracts the very essence of a moment to reveal the poignant fragility of human relationships. ...Extremes of weather is a recurring theme, as is parenthood, but each story is so different from the next that you are tempted to read 'just one more' until you find you have read the whole book in one sitting....Read The White Road and Other Stories. You won't regret it."

Made my day, that has. Silly, of course, that one review can knock me sideways and another can make me grin like an idiot. I wish I could detach a little, but I can't. If anyone knows how, please tell me.

The energy it takes

I hadn't realised until I didn't have any how much energy it actually takes to write fiction. I hadn't noticed until I got to a point where I found it hard to focus on anything for more than a few minutes, how much the writing process requires sharp focus. I always feel energised after being in that writing zone, that place where it's all flowing. It doesn't feel like I am using up energy, it feels as though I am creating energy. But this process obviously needs fully-charged batteries. And mine are definitely depleted!

Or it may be that I should force myself to write, that this might actually have a positive effect. I don't know. It doesn't feel like that. I want to write, but feel an inertia I can't get past right now. I am trying to listen to the signs my body is giving me. I will wait a little bit. See what happens.

In the meantime, I have been critiquing the stories of my students on the workshop I have just begun co-teaching, but sadly won't be able to take the session I was supposed to lead tonight, since I can't actually leave the house. I have sent my comments to my co-teacher for him to read out. I do hope they prove useful. I was really looking forward to it, but it is in another city, a long drive, as well as requiring me to focus for two hours, as well as it being my first time. All too much. My next workshop is in a month. Let's hope I'll make that one.

The good news is that after almost four weeks, The White Road and Other Stories is now back in stock in the UK! Whee! I don't imagine I will be reliving all that chasing-the-clock-radio-up-the-bestseller-list fun and games again, that was then, and now I need things a little calmer. But it's nice to know that there are copies, and with a quote from the lovely New Scientist review on the front, in case anyone wants to get one.

The other good stuff is that in the past few weeks two literary magazines have asked me to submit, coming hot on the heels of Smokelong. Three solicitations is very nice. I know that being solicited certainly doesn't guarantee publication, nothing ever guarantees publication (except good Scotch, perhaps?), but for me this is a milestone, this tells me there has been a shift. Is it because of the book? I don't know. Maybe it's more to do with the book promotion than the book itself, I've spent a lot of time spreading the word and getting my name out and about. Well, I can't second-guess, I am just pleased about this, especially since one of the lit mags, a US publication, I hadn't heard of but really like the sound of, and the other is a UK mag I had submitted to unsuccessfully in the past. Will keep you updated!

Small and very beautiful

I am not going to talk about the war. I am not going to talk about stress and anxiety. I am going to attempt positivity, to spread good karma, better energies, through - of course - beautiful short fiction. And this is very short fiction: the post brought me a jewel this morning, The Binnacle's Firth Annual Ultra-Short Competition edition 2008. This is a literary magazine with a difference: the winners and the finalists in this competition for 150-word short stories and sixteen-line poems are each printed on a small business-card sized card, and the entire pack of 50 or so comes in its own box with a painting (by someone like Rembrandt, I would guess) on the front.

This is a limited edition, mine is number 29 out of 200, and as well as the pack, I received ten copies of my short short story, Thin Ice, which was a finalist in the competition. I was a finalist last year too and I gave out the copies of last year's story to several friends on my birthday. It was a lovely thing to be able to do, and now I have more to give out. This is such a creative and imaginative way of rewarding the winners and finalists, I am just thrilled by it. If you want to receive a beautiful box of short short stories including your own, enter this year's competition, deadline feb 15th.

My virtual book tour is drawing to a close, tomorrow will be the final stop, on Debi Alper's blog. It has been an amazing experience but I am now ready to stop talking about myself and to try and get back to my writing. Of course, this doesn't mean I stop refreshing the Amazon page every hour or checking who has visited The White Road's web site. Of course not! Selling a book requires a lot of work - I almost gave a copy away for free to a friend I bumped into yesterday in a local shop, but luckily she refused and insisted she pay for it. Yes, I need to sell them, I need to accept that. And as I write I just thought of my paternal grandfather, who had his own schmatta (cloth and fabric) business in the East End of London before I was born. Would he have given away his products? I don't think so. I think he would have scolded me for not thinking like a businesswoman. He died when I was seven, I never really knew him, but I like the thought of him watching me now and tutting at my non-commercial behaviour. I'd better try and little harder!


PS For those of you who are interested, my book's out of stock in the UK and the US right now, more being printed as we speak (see here for information about where to buy the book). But the damn clock radio is at No 91 in the Amazon UK Bestselling short story list. It's the strong voice, I think. Very powerful stuff.

Not taking it all too seriously

In latest news, my book is currently out of stock in the UK (copies are frantically being printed) and therefore I have slipped to number 15 and been overtaken by that sneaky clock radio in the Amazon Bestselling Short Stories list!

I am actually very grateful to whoever mis-categorized the Sony ICFC318S Clock Radio as a Japanese short story collection because it has meant that I just laugh at the whole thing and can not take seriously whatever this bestselling stuff means. Because otherwise, I might start thinking things about me and about my writing. And I'd rather not. So that's good.

On the subject of laughing and of distraction, I giggled out loud at the comment made by Annie Clarkson, (whose beautiful collection, Winter Hands, I reviewed here) on my previous post that "distraction is the new black". And then I remembered: I had pretty much said this myself, in my post a few months ago entitled "Focus, Insight and Creativity, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Scrabulous". My thesis, backed up by the New Yorker, was something to do with not focussing on what you're trying to do. My blog post ended with a quote:

"If you want to encourage insight, they you've also got to encourage people to relax."

Thanks, Annie, for reminding me about what I, apparently, already knew!

Amazon UK Bestselling Short Story Collections

I just saw this: I am Number 17 on Amazon UK's list of Bestselling Short Story Collections, between Annie Proulx and Roald Dahl. Ok. Hmm. Gosh.

It changes every hour. So this might be my one hour of Amazon Bestsellerness!

One more day

Well, I still haven't got my copy yet, and so I am preparing myself for the fact that tomorrow, the day my book is officially available, I won't actually have it. And that will be ok, right? Yes, it will be fine. As Nik says, nothing can diminish the joy of holding the book for the first time, no matter what day you receive it on. I am busying myself with the website, doing last minute tweaks etc... And not sleeping much. Not really. The heat. The excitement. I would like to sleep. Soon.

My Amazon ranking, which is still a complete mystery, has now strangely lept up to 34,957 from somewhere in the 150,000s. Gosh, if there's so much activity before publication, I can only imagine what will happen tomorrow!

4 days to go... my Amazon ranking is up, and Dr Sara Tancredi is resurrected

4 days to go and I am throwing myself into preparing the Sept issue of The Short Review, which will (most probably) come out next Thursday. I always try each month to mix it up, a bit of this and a bit of that, but, magically, whatever I do, themes seem to appear across all the reviews. It's fascinating, I learn so much from my reviewers' takes on the books, what works for them and what doesn't - and I love reading the author interviews (six in the coming issue), finding out how they put their books together, how it feels to know people are buying them. Yes, I really only set The Short Review up for my own edification and entertainment!

In other news: the Amazon ranking for The White Road shot up from 300,000 or so to 59,326 overnight. What does this mean?? I mean, they're not selling it yet, so how does this work? No idea.

AND.... Dr Sara Tancredi rises from the dead! As I mentioned here a few days ago, I was shocked and appalled when the love interest (the aforementioned Dr Tancredi) in Prison Break was suddenly and cruelly beheaded. I decided then and there to stop watching (I was watching Series Three, a year behind everyone else) and give up. It was done so crudely, it seemed not to fit in with the plot at all. Today, while doing a little Google search (obsessed? moi?), I found this:

'Prison Break' Shocker: Dr. Sara Tancredi Lives!

Thursday, March 27, 2008

Yahoo! Buzz

Last year, Prison Break star Sarah Wayne Callies got into a contract dispute which ended in her character's untimely death. Fans of the television show were outraged, particularly at the way Dr. Sara Tancredi was killed. Early on in season 3, Lincoln was shocked to find Sara's head in a box, courtesy of The Company. She was killed after Lincoln attempted a daring rescue attempt to free her as well as his son, LJ. Well, Prison Break fans, all is not what it seems. TV Guide released a huge story today from columnist Michael Ausiello and Prison Break executive producer Matt Olmstead that says: Dr. Sara is still alive and returning in season 4!

Well. That changes everything. I might have to go back to Series 3 and carry on. You just never know what life is going to throw at you next, eh?