Read on Twitter
I'm going to do a tiny thread now about why it's hard to know how much you can get away with self-promotion here, but why it's also necessary in these cold times. Excited?
The thing with books is that they basically have a tiny window to impress, and then 1000 more are published next month and you're not even available in the shops any more if you haven't had a 'strong start'. This has happened to me with 5 out of 6 novels.
Obviously this is especially true in a situation where many bookshops aren't even open, because - hopefully not a spoiler, this - massive great pandemic has wiped out the high street.
Also, even if they do reopen, it'll soon be Christmas, and the books in the window will mostly be the 'gifting market', so either celeb memoirs or 100 Broadly Funny Things About Brexit. After that it's January and your novel is dead till paperback (or, for good).
Now, you don't write a novel hoping for validation or 'big numbers'. You'd be amazed how small reader numbers generally are, in fact. I've likely met more than half of them. But you DO put two years' love into it so it's an empty feeling when it just sort of sinks into quicksand.
...so, if you've got a 'platform' with followers, like this, you are urged to bang on about the book ceaselessly. You acknowledge the need for this but you do feel like a desperate caricature of a person: in Simpsons terms, a hybrid of Krusty and Lionel Hutz.
So I'm going to do a couple of days' flogging of this very personal novel and if you end up putting your fingers in your ears, I think that's absolutely fair because there are many riches on Twitter - have you seen that hole-in-one yet? - but I've sort of got to. THREAD ENDS. x
