Another week gone and we finally have summer! Dancing outdoors yesterday and again on Sunday. Best enjoy it while it’s here.
Cutting back on blogging and social media has meant more time for enjoying summer. I’ve been dancing indoors and out and was able to skate from Hyde Park to Greenwich last weekend. I even got to meet a friend for a visit to the British Museum on Wednesday. OK, spending the afternoon in windowless rooms was not a particularly summery thing to but we went to see the mummies in the Egyptian galleries for the first time in years. They’re still amazing!
Skaters at Greenwich. (Yes, I’m in there somewhere.)
I’ve also been able to spend more time reading for pleasure – hence the book reviews that I’ve posted here for the last couple of weeks. I hope you’ve enjoyed them and that it may have persuaded some of you to take a look at the books I reviewed. (Click book covers to link to reviews.)
Cutting back on blogging may have reduced my sales a bit but at least it has given me more time to do some writing of my own. I’m still working my way through a first draft of the next James Burke story, which sees him in North America during the War of 1812. It’s a whole New World for me (see what I did there?) and I’m finding it quite hard work. I’m having fun reading myself into the place and period, though.
I hope you’re not missing my posts too much. You shouldn’t be – there’s a whole summer out there for you to enjoy. And I’m still here. If there’s anything you’d like me to write about, or if you have something of your own you would like to share on this blog, get in touch.
There was no blog post last week as I was away in Cambridge so I’m sticking with the idea of short posts with pictures and a bit more about daily life. It means that I get fewer views on my blog but people who do read it seem to like it.
Most of the colleges are closed to the public at this time of year, although we did visit Kings and the chapel there is every bit as amazing as people say.
Although the fan vaulting is what makes the building unique, the amazing 16th century stained glass (which somehow survived Cromwell’s Commissioners) is also special. Those tall windows with their elaborate pictures reminded me of the Sainte Chapelle chapel which I saw on my recent trip following Burke’s adventures in Paris. In fact, King’s College chapel was very influenced by the French royal chapel.
Christ tempted by Satan in one of the windows.
With the colleges closed, we spent a lot of our time in the Fitzwilliam Museum. Founded in 1816, the collection has a lot of Georgian and early 19th century material which is particularly interesting to me, partly because of the stories I’ve written set in this period and partly because of the amount of time I’m spending in Marble Hill House these days. Near the entrance of the Fitzwilliam is this statue of George II who paid for much of Marble Hill.
George II wasn’t the sharpest knife in the drawer and I think the statue catches that.
There’s a lot of 18th-century embroidered upholstery in the museum which, again, caught my eye because of the embroidery in Marble Hill House. You can see an example of embroidered upholstery in the photo below.
I’m interested in who did this embroidering. It seems that they were made by Georgian women with too much time on their hands. They couldn’t be seen doing anything as vulgar as a job, so they really did have a lot of time to fill. You could buy pre-drawn embroidery patterns to stitch, just as you can now, or you could draw your own.
Modern Embroidery Kit
There’s a lot of embroidered upholstery in the Fitzwilliam, which had me wondering if some, at least, were stitched by women for whom it wasn’t a hobby, but a job. I looked for any indication of the people who have produced this work but, presumably because they were mere women, none of them seem to have been credited with their creations.
Henrietta Howard, whose home Marble Hill was, was a great collector of chinoiserie, wildly fashionable in the 18th century. There’s a lot of it in the Fitzwilliam.
Perhaps Lady Suffolk’s enthusiasm for fine china was a reaction against the English earthenware that she must have grown up with. There’s a lot of that in the Fitzwilliam too.
One final exhibit very tenuously linked to Henrietta and then I’ll shut up.
This sculpture is supposed to represent a woman epitomising Reason. (It’s next to a much racier lady representing Love.) Notice the hand touching the face. It’s supposed to imply scholarly or poetic thoughts.
Art historians would have you believe this trope was established in the 17th century, well before this painting of Henrietta Howard was commissioned by Alexander Pope.
My wife, who is not an art historian but likes to check these ‘well-known facts’, looked at over 2,000 portraits in the National Portrait Gallery and found that this ‘hand-to-face’ pose was very rare in the 17th century. It seems to have taken off with Pope who not only commissioned this portrait of Henrietta but had multiple portraits made of himself, many of them in this ‘scholarly’ pose. By 1832, when the sculpture was made, this was a recognised bit of symbolism but it seems likely that Henrietta was the first woman to be shown like this.
So all the way to Cambridge, just to be reminded of our local stately home. It was a fun and interesting trip anyway. I hope you like the pictures.
I’ve been taking part in #HistFicMay where historical fiction authors are invited to answer one question a day about their work. Yesterday’s question was: ‘How do you advertise your book?’
I’d been thinking about blogging about marketing for a while and this question, the day before my weekly blog post, has rather focussed my mind.
I’m self-published, so all the sales efforts for my books are down to me. The bad news is that this takes a ridiculous amount of time and energy. The good news is that (having originally been published by a small press) I know that an indie author will do a better job selling their books themselves than most publishers will do for the vast majority of their writers.
So what do I do?
Let’s start with what I don’t do. I don’t advertise. Historical fiction that isn’t Tudors or Regency Romance is a bit of a niche market. Unless a major publisher takes me up and decides to promote me heavily, I’m never going to sell thousands of books. (That’s why so many writers hold out for publishing deals, hoping against hope that they will be one of the lucky dozen or so that their publisher chooses to put serious money behind.)
About 80% of my sales are on Kindle and most of my books are just £3.99 so any significant advertising campaign is unlikely to pay for itself. I used to work in adverting and an insignificant advertising campaign is simply a waste of money. (Something I’ve confirmed by dipping a toe into Facebook and Amazon adverts.)
Social media
I do make an effort with social media. I post regularly on Twitter (I’m still not calling it X) and I have an author page on Facebook. I have an account on Bluesky too, but, sadly, the platform never really took off.
I don’t expect someone will see a tweet and rush to buy one of my books. I’m hoping that my social media efforts will drive people to my blog. (Well, you’re here, so presumably it works sometimes.) Then, with luck, you might explore my website and buy a book.
The website you’re on right now
I’ve put a fair amount of effort into my website, so I hope it sells the odd book. I’ve trialled selling directly (look at the bottom of my landing page) but so far with zero interest. This is largely my own fault because I’ve downplayed the offer in case it doesn’t work out on a practical level and I end up annoying a lot of readers and maybe losing money. Still, the offer is there so do feel free to take it up.
The main thing I do on the website is blog. I’m pretty religious about blogging every Friday. I enjoy it, which is a good thing because it takes quite a lot of time. Some blog posts get hundreds of viewers (over 450 when I reviewed Ridley Scott’s Napoleon, for example) while others pass almost unnoticed. I’ve looked for patterns so that I can just concentrate on the things that people will read but there honestly don’t seem to be any. It would help if I got feedback from people commenting on my posts, but generally they don’t. I just shout into the void and hope somebody is listening.
Free offers
I do run the odd Kindle giveaway. Many people speak highly of these and they have the advantage they don’t cost anything. The result can be one of my books appearing briefly in the bestseller list except that, given that they are free, I don’t feel that they have genuinely been ‘sold’. I’m not even sure that they have been read. I am certain I am not alone in having books on my Kindle that I picked up because they were free and have never got around to opening.
What I do find depressing is that even when people do read free books, they seem reluctant to review them. Surely that’s the implicit deal between the author and the person they give the free copy to? I do post a line or two on Amazon for every free book that I read unless I really can’t think of something kind to say about it and that’s rare. It would be nice if everybody else took the same approach.
Still, free offers cost nothing and can do no harm, so why not?
The best way to sell
What I have discovered is that the best way to sell a book is to write another one in the series. At the moment, I’m trying to write another adventure for James Burke. Unfortunately, I find myself spending more and more time procrastinating with tweeting and Facebooking and, dare I say it, writing this.
Going forward
I keep saying that I’m going to cut down on my blogging and, reading over what I’ve just written, I think I really have to make an effort to do so. So I will continue to blog on Fridays but maybe not every Friday and the posts might be dug out from years ago when most of you weren’t reading it anyway or may be just some pretty pictures or a few words of wisdom. It’s quite likely that shorter posts will be more appreciated. And I will be cutting down on Twitter. I’m sticking with #HistFicMay until the end of the month but after that I’m going to try to have some tweet-free days each week. I already hardly tweet on weekends and I think I’ll cut out Wednesdays too. That way I might even get a book written.
Tell me I’m wrong
I know that there are people who will say that I’m taking a negative attitude and that I really should make more effort to sell, rather than less. You may be right. I’m happy to be persuaded.
Feel free to respond to this blog and I’ll take all your comments on board. After all, if many of you do reply it will prove that I’m not screaming into the void at all.
Recently, I’ve written about the Williamson Papers and how much I would like to see them get a wider readership. The first book in the trilogy, The White Rajah, costs just £3.99 on Kindle (or you can read it free if you subscribe to Kindle Unlimited).
The White Rajah started life as a story about the real-life James Brooke of Borneo. In the mid-19th century he ruled the country of Sarawak as his own personal fiefdom and was known as the White Rajah. I invented the character of John Williamson (the name of Brooke’s real-life interpreter) as a narrator but eventually I realised that the story was just as much about the fictional Williamson as it was about Brooke. Williamson becomes the moral centre of the story, watching as Brooke’s dream of an innocent Eden meets the reality of the politics of the region and the complexities of colonial rule.
It’s not for everyone but you might find you love it if you give it a go. Committing to £3.99 and, more importantly, a first-person novel written in a mid-19th century voice is a lot to ask of people who have no reason to trust me to tell a good story. (One major publisher turned it down on the grounds that it was too ‘difficult’ for a first novel from an unknown writer and recommended that I start with something more commercial, which is why there are now seven James Burke books.) But I have a suggestion that may make it easier for you.
Years after I wrote The White Rajah, I was invited to add a short story to a collection put together by the Historical Writers’ Association (Victoriana). I wrote a story from the world of The White Rajah, which serves as a lovely introduction to John Williamson’s story. And from 10th to 14th April you can get it absolutely FREE as one of the four stories by different authors that make up Tales of Empire.
So there you are: log into Amazon using THIS LINK between 10 April and 14 April and get a free short introduction to John Williamson and James Brooke. And if you like it, you can buy The White Rajah then.
I’m never quite sure which posts I write are going to attract a lot of interest and which are going to be passed over. Lately, I’ve been writing a lot about India and while my mini essay on the Red Fort got a fair amount of attention, others were less popular. I do post occasionally on the joys, or otherwise, of writing. Again, some of these grab attention (at least by my standards) and some don’t. I think this week might be a good time to write about writing, though. Let’s hope you enjoy it.
Like, I imagine, almost all writers, it’s important to me that people read my books. Books are much more likely to be read if they are part of a series and if people can remember the last one you wrote, so there is pressure to turn out the next one.
I write two book series: Galbraith & Pole, which is Urban Fantasy, and James Burke, which is about the adventures of a British spy in Napoleonic times. I really enjoy writing Galbraith & Pole but, with just three books published, that series is yet to establish itself while the seven James Burke books, though hardly bestsellers, have a growing readership. The last book I published, Monsters in the Mist, was a Galbraith & Pole novel, so I really need to get on and write something about James Burke. The problem is finding a historical incident to write the next book around.
The first six James Burke books
Someone on Twitter has been suggesting for a while that I should send Burke to North America to fight in the War of 1812, so I am now busy reading about that conflict. It’s a scrappy little war, much beloved of re-enactors, partly, I think, because many of the battles were quite small and can be re-fought with the sorts of numbers that a re-enactor regiment may well be able to put into the field. I’m learning about native American tribes, and US militia regiments, and desperate fights in tiny long-lost villages (many now buried under 20th century cities). It’s a new world to me and I’m worried that I may make some terrible historical errors, but I am beginning to feel the outlines of a plot. It’s early days and I may yet fail to pull it together. If I can’t, then at least I’ll have learned a lot about a fairly pointless war, best known in this country because of the British burning down the White House. The Americans love talking about it because it is one of their founding myths and they just gloss over the fact that they didn’t achieve any of their war aims. They did beat the British at New Orleans though, although unbeknownst to both sides, the war was over by then.
Fingers crossed that I can find a story that can make some sort of sense out of so many fascinating but disparate incidents. I warn you now that it might be some time. Meanwhile can I recommend that you try out Galbraith & Pole? Or the Williamson Papers, which (being just a trilogy) will never benefit from the series effect. (I wrote about them last week and it would be lovely if you read them.)
Back to 1812 and the Canadian snows. Enjoy your week.
…..
The picture at the top of the post shows British, Canadian and Mohawk fighters in action at the Battle of Chateauguay in 1813 (by Henri Julien, 1852 – 1908).
I’ve been posting a lot about India over the past few weeks. I think people are getting a bit bored of it by now. (Let me know if I’m wrong. I have several hundred more photos to share.)
Part of the reason for writing is just that, having finally made it to the sub-continent, I was blown away by it and wanted to share some of my experiences. Another reason, though, is the hope that you might be drawn in to want to read more of my writing about India, but this time looking at my historical novels. I’ve mentioned a few times that my personal favourite of my books is Cawnpore, a story set during the events of 1857, usually referred to in England as the Indian Mutiny. It’s one of a trilogy of books that looks again at the glory days of the British Empire and asks if they were as glorious as many people like to think. They’re far from revisionist history and they are full of excitement and battles, love and betrayal. But they are, I hope, a bit more nuanced than a lot of novels set in the Age of Empire.
I knew when I wrote them that they would never have the commercial appeal of my books about James Burke, cheerfully putting the damn French in their place half a century or so earlier. But it has always saddened me that, though they’ve had some lovely reviews, the Williamson Papers (as the trilogy is called) have ever had the readership I like to think they deserve. So here is an unashamed plug for the books. They are each just £3.99 on Kindle, so you can buy the whole series for less than £12. That’s got to be exceptional value for money.
The Williamson Papers
[NB There are major spoilers here, so don’t read on if you don’t want any idea of how things end.]
The first book of the Williamson Papers is The White Rajah. It introduces us to John Williamson, a young man who runs away from farming life in Devon to go to sea in search of adventure. He finds it when he becomes the companion of James Brooke, the first White Rajah of Sarawak.
James Brooke is an amazing figure. (I’ve written about his real-life history HERE.) Brooke arrives in Sarawak (in Borneo) in 1839 and is made ruler by Muda Hassim, the Bendahara of Brunei. He starts with nothing but the most liberal and humane of intentions, yet goes on to preside over a massacre so terrible that it leads to protests half a world away in London. It’s a fascinating story of how the high ideals of some Europeans produced such terrible outcomes when applied to other peoples’ countries.
WHY READ IT? It’s got pirates and headhunters and battles and loads of excitement. This is the background for a story about a good man who ends up doing terrible things and how this affects the man who loves him. There’s a lesson for today in the story about good and evil in the mid-19th century.
In Cawnpore, Williamson leaves Borneo, unable to live with what he has seen. He sails for India and takes up a post with the East India Company. He is sent to Cawnpore, where he finds himself at the centre of the events that will lead to the siege of the city and a massacre of Europeans unprecedented during colonial rule in the subcontinent. As with The White Rajah, the background to the story is closely based on real historical events. Williamson, ever the outsider, flits between the Indian and European camps, passing himself off as an Indian amongst the sepoys (something that we know Europeans managed to do during the Mutiny). Again, Williamson struggles to reconcile his own liberal principles and the realities of colonial life. This time it is the Europeans who are (in Cawnpore, at least) on the losing side. Williamson becomes one of a handful of people to survive the siege and its bloody aftermath. The experience marks him, though. He has watched his Indian friends massacre women and children without mercy and then been rescued by European soldiers who strike back with awful savagery. Once again he turns his back on a European colony, this time to return to England, where he hopes at last to find peace.
WHY READ IT? The siege of Cawnpore is one of those bits of colonial history that we have decided to forget about but it’s an amazing story – even if nobody involved comes out of it looking good. This lets you top up your historical knowledge and enjoy a good read at the same time. And I can’t help thinking that if more people had known anything about the history of the region, some recent foreign policy adventures might have been given a bit more thought.
Although Cawnpore is my personal favourite, some people prefer Back Home, which brings the cycle back to England. It’s on a much smaller scale than the others, with most of the action set in London’s Seven Dials, but it features the same themes. Williamson finds a country he hardly recognises. Industrialisation at home and military expansion abroad have made Britain into a dynamic political and economic power that dominates the world. Yet Williamson finds the same divide between the poor and the rich that he saw in the Far East. A friend from his youth has tried to escape his poverty by entering a life of crime in the slums of London. Faced with threats of war with France and concern about Communist terrorists, the government needs to smash a foreign plot – and if they can’t find a real foreign plot, they’re quite happy to invent one. Williamson’s friend is caught in the machinations of a Secret Service determined to prove him an enemy agent and, in his attempts to help him escape, Williamson is once again caught between the machinations of the powerful and the resistance of the powerless.
Back Home ends with Williamson back in Devon where he started out in The White Rajah. But will he finally find happiness there?
