The Launch Party

So, the launch party. It was amazing. I shall be processing it all for weeks because there wasn’t time during it to stop and think about what was happening, it was just necessary to react.
As predicted I did weep – not just once but several times – during the speech I made but nobody seemed to mind. It’s my party and I’ll cry if I want to and all that. One of my friends made a short, wholly unexpected and very moving speech about what being involved with the evolution of Testament had meant to him and his wife and I cried some more. Ho hum.

But millions of thanks to all the friends and family who turned out on a horrible evening to make it one of the most memorable occasions of my life. I felt entirely surrounded by love and good wishes and that is a wonderful place to be.

Thanks also to Will, my editor and Sophie, Macmillan New Writing's publicist, for all their hard work and willingness to talk all evening to people they’ve never met before and, in all likelihood, will never meet again. I really appreciated your help and support guys. Thank you.

Thanks also to Simon of the Big Green Bookshop and his other half, Katie, for coming and proving that bloggers can meet in real life and not explode in a puff of html code!

But the biggest thanks must go to David and Daniel at Goldsboro Books who put on such a fantastic party and made me and all my guests so welcome. If you love books and can get on a train (or if you live in London) you have to go to Goldsboro – it’s like a jeweller’s shop where all the jewels are books. And where the people selling the books aren't snooty like expensive jewellers can be but, instead, share your enthusiasm for books and want you to have them not just to make them some more money but because they know how these books will enrich your life.
Each book at Goldsboro is wrapped in protective plastic film to keep it pristine and this has the effect of making each book shine slightly just like a jewel or semi-precious stone. I arrived early so that, before I started signing stock, I could just browse (we don’t have an independent bookshop in Canterbury and I needed a fix). This was nearly extremely bad for our bank balance but I tried to keep my hands in my pockets and just look. In the event, I confined myself to buying books by my fellow MNW authors Faye L Booth and David Isaak. Going to need yet another bookshelf soon to join the one we put up recently, I can tell…

I was probably still high on adrenalin and excitement when I did an interview with BBC Radio Kent this lunchtime. It all seemed to go amazingly well considering that I’ve never been on the radio before, and that it’s a rather strange experience sitting in a little soundproof room on the local university campus talking into a microphone to somebody you can’t see and hearing what they’re saying to you (and that section of the people of Kent who listen to the station) via headphones. A slightly surreal way to conduct a conversation which is being overheard by thousands but peculiarly enjoyable, none the less.
[If, improbably as it may seem, you are interested in hearing this effort, go to the link above, click on the listen again button and go to the Dominic King show for 11th Jan. I was on either side of 12 noon.]

Anyway, huge thanks to all who made the launch such a success and who bought the book in such quantities that I’m going to have to go back to Goldsboro and sign some more to fill their existing orders!

Launch worries

For a week or so now people have been asking me whether I’m excited about Testament’s launch on Thursday. And, though I have been getting excited, I’ve also been worrying. Worrying that the contingent from Canterbury, who are coming up on a small coach, won’t get there early enough to enjoy the party; worrying that people coming from elsewhere will decide not to come after all and there won’t be anybody there at all until after 7 o’clock; worrying that I’ll disappoint people when they ask me to ‘write something for me’ in the copies of the book that they’ve bought; worrying that we won’t be able to find somewhere for people to eat before we go home… and so on.

But then, yesterday, I spoke to the lovely David at Goldsboro books. None of the above worries went away – except that he did say that Sophie, the publicist at Macmillan New Writing has quite a few people coming - but he was so positive about Testament that it was hard not to think that the launch is going to be fun. Goldsboro books are fantastic supporters of MNW, so the front window is full of copies of Testament and David, who has actually read it, says he's been recommending it to people which would explain why it’s already sold well over a hundred copies in pre-orders. I am gobsmacked. And delighted, of course, but gobsmacked is the primary emotion.Over a hundred people who don’t know me have decided that they want to read Testament and have ordered it.
Of course the whole point of writing and publishing novels is to sell them so that people can read them but – prior to publication - it takes the self-belief of an ego-maniac to really believe that people wholly unconnected with you are going to buy what you have written. So, I am immensely encouraged and not a little bit thrilled by these pre-orders. Granted, they're not going to make me rich, but that was never the point.

The other encouraging thing that happened yesterday was that Simon Key told the world, on the Open a Bookshop What Could Possibly Go Wrong blog that he’s coming to the launch. I am significantly chuffed to be having a bookseller coming. OK, I did shamelessly invite him because I really like what they’re trying to do in Wood Green and I love the blog which he and his partner-in-books Tim write but still…

So, L-day minus two. Tomorrow I am working and my parents arrive so today’s the last writing day until next week as various family are staying over on Friday and into the weekend. Today will be interspersed with vacuuming, bed-making, and sorting out Sainsbury’s but I’m hopeful that the current chapter will at least assume some kind of shape before all that happens or in bits between it happening, if you know what I mean.

We have launch date!

We have a date! Testament is going to be launched at a party at Goldsboro Books on the 10th of January! Totally excited. Other people are talking about what they’re going to wear and are horribly shocked when I confess to no plans whatsoever to buy anything new. Well, I want people to like the book not to be impressed by a new frock/suit/shirt/ripped jeans/whatever.

With that in mind I’ve been doing a bit on MS Publisher, letting friends and family know about the event via an invitation which will go in the Christmas cards. Also going in the Christmas cards is the dreaded Christmas letter, though we always do jokey ones about foible-filled things we’ve done during the year and don’t mention exam results, exotic holidays or other stuff which will inspire people to mutter ‘it’s all very well for them….’ and cross us off the Christmas list.

Meanwhile, my parents are here and we are Christmas shopping (minus Dad who is allergic, in the way only older men can be to shopping) in the packed streets of Canterbury. Today, packed and pouring with rain – definitely not conducive to festive cheer, but hey, who cares?

Off to see the Ultimate Frisbee Freak in his school play tonight. (Great celebrations this week when he passed his driving test!!)

Blogging about reading and writing will recommence on Monday.