Tuesday, April 8, 2014

Massive increase in numbers of USA readers. Why?

Hey, I am not complaining--I'm just curious. There has been a huge lift in the number of readers from the USA. You are already, by far, my largest audience, so I am perplexed as to what is happening out there!
Keep it up though and hopefully you can be instrumental in helping me to push my book, ROSKILL, now that it is almost ready to be re-launched. ROSKILL has been 'professionally' edited and re-worked, plus 'future-proofed,' to make it more relevant to teenagers and their parents. Some people have called ROSKILL, mildly therapeutic, a lable that I am not totally comfortable with. I say its a damned good read; one that gives a very firm message----'Dad said, Don't do drugs.' But then he ignored his own advice.
www.authorneilcoleman.com  Out soon---watch this space.

Russia playing games---here we go again!

Putin is playing a very dangerous and transparent game. Any sympathy he may have had re his claim that The Crimea was part of Russia has long since worn thin re his latest move is Eastern Ukraine. It seems that no matter what the Ukraine Government does, re quelling the unrest, much of which has probably being fed by Russian agents. If the Ukraine does not ‘stop the unrest,’ Putin will use that as justification to intervene I order to restore order and to ‘protect’ the Russian speaking minority.
Then again, if the Ukraine sends in troops to stop the rioting and criminal behaviour on the part of a vocal and violent Russian-speaking minority, some of who have been arrested and identified as Russian provocateurs, then Putin will use that as reason to ‘invade’ Ukraine. Putin’s cynical response and statements do nothing to lessen the tension in those volatile regions of Eastern Ukraine. It seems that the Ukraine Government is stymied no matter what it does or does not do.
The EU makes noises and NATO pussy-foots it around. The USA calls for ever increasing sanctions, preferring to avoid the military response that they have so often followed, re other regions. Putin is playing this ‘chaos’ for all he can and he knows that if he holds to his present path he will get what he wants.
 It is not quite that simple, Mr Putin. You are approaching a point whereby your ‘games’ put the whole world at risk and between you and the USA; a new Cold War is being revisited upon an unwilling Europe. Your policies are something that we thought had been left firmly in the past. I guess we were wrong. The nuclear clock is beginning to speed up again; this at a time when there are other issues that face the world---terrorism for one. We need a united world community to face that threat. Is what you are doing in Ukraine and possibly other ‘border areas’, contributing to an answer for that vexing issue?

This feels a bit like a gambling issue---is it? Self publishing.

About 4 years ago I embarked on a journey that has been fraught with potholes, ignorance on my part, defiantly naiveté and certainly mounting debts. I started a self-publishing journey with the release of a group of short stories. Right from the beginning there were editing issues and relationship problems with an initial publisher. I learned, got burned and moved on to me next book. That one is now in its third revision and many thousands of dollars later, it is finally nearing a standard, which I am happy to say, is right up there with the books I peruse in bookstores. It has been extensively edited, proofread, re-designed, digitally managed, proofread again and then ‘future proofed,’ and finally going to print, in eBook format and hard-copy. Yes, ROSKILL is about to hit the shelves, of some bookshops, on Amazon, on Kindle and probably at other to be announced venues.
I have learned much on this journey and anyone contemplating going down the road of self-publishing, could well gain from having a bit of a chat. There are so many pitfalls you can avoid. I have learned to be more patient. Getting a book ‘out there,’ in a rush is NOT the way to go. That approach only leads to frustration, further expense and embarrassment as you see the errors, which you did not see when you ‘carefully’ went over the script for the ‘last time.’ NEVER assume that you can do it yourself. Your eyes will not see what those of others do.
I have met some wonderful people on this journey and now I feel I have a ‘team,’ who I can TRUST. Yes, it costs a lot of money, but I have reached the point that if I stopped now, I would be throwing away all that money. It feels like I need to dip into my pocket for one last time and hope that all the work begins to pay off. I have learned of new resources as per job descriptions that I didn’t know existed, like ‘digital designer,’ just to name one. The editing processes are far more complicated than I thought and the addition of good proof-reading (everyone thinks they can do it!) along with publicists are an essential part of getting a book out there.
Now, I wait for the first hard-copies of the new enhanced and much improved ROSKILL to arrive, most of which will go out to distributors and bookshops. The eBook version will be uploaded any day now and hopefully you will download it from my website. Please keep a look out for it and share the link with your friends. It is time for me to try to get back some of the many thousands of dollars that this project has whipped out of my bank-account.
What to do if Roskill gets any traction?—Why---do the same with TALK TO ME and SONS OF ORPHEUS of course. That will be a mission! My website?  www.authorneilcoleman.com  Check it out and let me know once you have downloaded successfully or purchased online. I would love some feedback. Share, share and share again.
Yes, this really does feel like an addiction, but I am sure there are far worse ones!