For the record

[desperance]

I wrote 1068 pages of legitimate work in 2006. In rough terms, that's 300,000 words, which breaks down into two novels, one play and a handful of short stories.

Which in simple word-count is more work than I've done in, oh, twenty years or so. And so, of course, I end the year in a more precarious position professionally and financially than I have been in, oh, twenty years or so.

Memo to self: fix this. Write stuff that sells, y'know? Also, write more.

Also, pimp self. Pimp work. Etc.

Yeah, yeah...

Comments

[julesjones]

Meh. Hope your stuff sells better this year.

Question -- do you have any recommendations for whether people read the UK or US edition of one of your books? I know some of my friends do think one edition is a better reflection of their work than the other, even if they're *happy* with both. And it's not always the obvious "UK author prefers the UK edition". :-)

[desperance.livejournal.com]

Actually, this is tricky. There's only one series with alternate UK/US editions, which is the Outremer books - three vols in the UK, divided into six for the US. I would say stick with the UK editions, at the length they were written for - but it was supposed to be four volumes, and at the last minute they made me cram it into three, so the final volume is a bit of a mess, quite frankly, and very long indeed. Coming at it again a couple of years later for the US, I did some heavyweight cutting, and I think it's probably better. So maybe read the US editions, but bear in mind that the volume-breaks are artificial, and each pair is really one book, paced for that greater length?

[julesjones]

Thanks. In that case I'll leave it until I get back to California rather than trying to pick up the UK editions while I'm here. I knew about the books being split in half for the US edition, so I'd planned to buy them in their proper pairs anyway if I went for the US one.

[desperance.livejournal.com]

Cool. Tho' if you'd like 'em signed, I could probably rustle up some fairly tidy copies and post 'em. Whereabouts are you at the moment?

[julesjones]

Ooh, thanks. Ipswich until Monday, and then Corfe Mullen in Dorset for a few days. Will dig out relevant address in the morning. However, I do not have my UK chequebook with me as I wasn't expecting to need it. :-) I'm too tired to look through your website tonight, but if you've got some way of accepting money from a US credit card...

[desperance.livejournal.com]

Hop along to the buying-books page on the website, and we take credit card payments through PayPal; I assume that if you key in a US card to a UK site that wants to charge you sterling, somewhere in the process the appropriate conversion will happen...?

We don't have the US editions of Outremer on the site, but if you just go through the process for the UK ones, I'll send you US copies anyway if I can find six clean ones. If not, I'll send the UK ones. Is that okay?

[julesjones]

Argh! Can't see any way to give it a shipping address different to my Californian billing address...

[desperance.livejournal.com]

Okay, not a problem. I'm the one who sends the books. Just email me the right address - chaz at chazbrenchley dot co dot uk - and I'll get them in the post today.

[desperance.livejournal.com]

PS - d'you want them signed to Jules, or something other...?

[julesjones]

Email just sent...