30 Days of Fika Books: Eleven
We are live!!
As expected, I spent pretty much all day on Friday tinkering and chopping and changing and generally making the newsletter as brilliant as I could. I was really happy with it in the end, and based on what I can tell from the stats, you were too -- though please don't hesitate to get in touch and let me know what you thought!
It was a last minute decision to post sneak preview excerpts of the stories. Originally I was just going to link to the blurbs that introduce the stories, but suddenly giving you an idea of what the chapters will be like felt like the right thing to do. In future, I might link to both, and add a running 'the story so far' section to the blurb, which will be helpful for anyone coming in new or who just forgot what happened last week (which will be me, half the time...)
It's always a teensy bit terrifying putting something out into the world! I've been toying with and then developing this idea for most of this year, so suddenly going from being safe inside my head to out there where people might not like it, is the worst! I'm not even going to pretend that I didn't dither, my finger hovering over the send email now button, for much longer than I care to admit!
Oddly enough though, as soon as something is out there, then I'm absolutely fine with people thinking what they think.
Writers are often advised never to read their reviews, but personally, I love them! Whether it's because I spent the early part of my career screenwriting where you're bombarded with notes from everybody and their dog, I'm fairly adept at taking any thoughts that are helpful and discarding the rest as just somebody's opinion. It might also be because I'm pretty opinionated myself and have been known to deliver passionate diatribes about how awful some Oscar-winners are, I'm comfortable with the idea that not every story is for everyone!
All that said though, I'm really excited about this newsletter, and more than that, the story community that I can see growing around it. It's going to be a long road to build it, but I have a gut feeling I'm onto something -- although no doubt there will be plenty of bumps in the road along the way. I guess it's a kind of if you build it they will come kind of thing, but with less baseball.
And of course it's not the only thing happening around here! Before Again will be released (the existing version becoming Kirsty's Story) on Wednesday 2 November. Days Gone Next will then begin serialising in the newsletter on Monday 7 November. So lots to do to get ready for that! There will be events over those two weeks, both online and around Glasgow and all manner of book launch razzmatazz with giveaways and competitions galore. So stay posted!!
So at half past nine on Monday morning in my first full week of being 'live', I'm feeling excited and determined and a little bit hungry for toast.