Robert S. Daley

I ran a promotion through The Fussy Librarian yesterday, and 1567 people downloaded my ebook! I hope to get a few reviews from it. It's just nice knowing that people are reading my work. I've just seen the bestsellers ranking on free ebooks, following my promotion, and my ebook on Amazon.co.uk ranked no.6 in General Humorous Fiction. My ebook ranked no.503 in the whole store.  I think it did quite well!

 In the paperback, one word is missing in the story The Fatphobe and there is a ? missing in the story Trade War. People make mistakes. I have made more than a few in my life. I can live with them. I won't attempt to make the perfect book, it will stand as it is.

I received my proof copy a couple of hours ago and it all looks good. I can't remember the last time I felt such anticipation when opening a package. The launch starts from today and I have already contacted a promo site. I'm going to spend a small amount marketing the book and hope readership grows over time. Tomorrow, my goto guy, Alex, will help me put the book on Facebook and my website. We will then invite all my friends to my Facebook Author page, and hopefully that will be the start of the journey.     

 I've written 40 stories and have compiled a book that I'm happy with. I'm going to self-publish on Kindle Direct Publishing. I've enlisted the help of a formatter, an illustrator and a cover designer and hopefully the book will be on Kindle in ebook and paperback within the next week or two. I'm as nervous and excited as I was when I sneaked into the school kitchens at midnight and gorged on Trudy Turner's birthday cake!

 Over the last few years, I have sporadically donated what I could afford to MIND, the mental health charity. As far as this book is concerned, I will donate 25% of the royalties to the charity. So, by buying this book, my readers will indirectly be bringing some positivity into the lives of people affected by mental illness. 

 One of my stories 'A Turbulent Night' mentions how I have been single for ten years. I have been unlucky certainly. I fancied a bar lady for about a year before I asked her out. She had blue hair and a nose ring. That should have been a clue. Sorry, she said, but I'm mostly gay. Mostly gay! What did that mean? The funny thing was, I still felt I had a chance. The other lady I fell for held a higher position than me. She was bright and cheerful and pretty and generally the sort of person who makes you feel better about yourself. But I was a student working in the same unit as her and I didn't feel I could ask her out for a coffee. So I didn't. That was a huge regret. I got propositioned once by a good friend of mine, but I wanted to preserve our friendship. So, here I am, single at forty-seven. Maybe this book will change things? Maybe, like a prison inmate, I'll get mail from women across the globe, keen to rescue me. Now I'm just day-dreaming!