This busy week has seen progress on editing, selling books to the lovely people of Windsor and preparing for the next big day!

After Action Report: WHSmith Windsor

The Saturday just gone saw my seventh book signing within WHSmiths and started with a few complications set to disrupt sales!

Firstly I arrived to find that the event had been double booked, with another author set to join me in the afternoon, plus there was the wedding of a minor member of the royal family just over the road in Windsor Castle, plus a ceremonial march through the Windsor by the Household Cavalry closing half the town down.

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You can tell that’s the Castle right?

In the excellent spot right by the window I did a reasonable trade, but with the other events taking place at what should have been peak sales time I think I missed out a bit. I sold a total of ten books, which turns out is my average so far. Plus in the quiet time I got to know the author I shared a table with and she accepted my invitation to join a little writer’s group I’m a member of. A good day all in all.

The ‘Signing Copies Today’ stickers on the bookmarks worked very well, I could hear people commenting to people they were with and many turned around to come and speak to me once they’d seen the sticker. I even got to give a bookmark to the MP for the town!

This Saturday is another first. It’s time for the stall in the centre of busy Zombie Town, AKA Staines Upon Thames. The weather is setting up to be clear and bright and my preparations for decorating the stall have been in full swing. I might bring some of this decoration into my next WHSmith signing event.

Marketing and Promotion

I’m currently in an active promotion with a load of other ZomPoc / PA authors which is working really well and, along with a USA / UK / Australia Facebook campaign, I’m getting between 5 – 15 new mailing list subscribers per day!

With this in mind I’m putting together some more content for the next newsletter which be going out either next week or shortly after.

Hot of the press is one of the IN THE END reviews from a horror website I submitted the book to. You can check it out below, but I can’t help but give you a spoiler. They loved it, giving me 9/10 stars. The review was balanced, pointing out a few things they didn’t like but I was overwhelmed with the positive response!

Feel free to check it out here.

Before The End Progress

With fifty chapters revised already, I’ve sent them back to the awesome Laura to see if she feels I’ve hit the right tone. I’m very pleased with the new depth the changes have added and I’m working to review the rest of the work to bring it all in line. Hopefully the revisions will be done within a couple of weeks.

Survivor Volume Two

I’ve managed to cram in some more updates to the next volume of survivor, writing content and outlining some more chapters. Here’s what the contents are looking like now.

• What are we preparing for? This is a look at the situations that may arise where the book will come in useful. This chapter will be added to the existing volume (free updates to my mailing list) and head up the combined volumes 1 & 2 which will go on sale.
• Meet Gary – Short Standalone Scene
• Navigation – With and without navigation aids
• Fire – Testing loads of ways of starting a survival fire, some weird, wonderful and resourceful
• Duct Tape or Paracord – A Comparison
• Transport
• Raiding a Supermarket
• Get Home Bag
• Sleeping & Shelter
• First Aid Kit – Version Two – Update to Volume 1
• Preparing your Zombie Survival Plan
• Survival Cooking
• Catching & Cooking Fish
• Catching & Cooking Rabbit
• Pocket Bug Out Kit
• Bug Out Bag Version 2.5
• Glossary of Terms

That’s enough from me for this week. In the coming short few weeks I should be able to start thinking about a publication date for BEFORE THE END with a bit more certainty, including the pre-order go live date to coincide with a cover release and IN THE END special pricing.