At least that’s what I read in the Rough Guide to Blogging the other day. And it sent one of those uncomfortable shivers through me, thinking how months back I set out to record how an author can turn into a small publisher….and then got so distracted being that publisher I never found time to write anything down.

Now the temptation is to record an essay of book-length proportions, as I try and describe what the last few months have been like. And bore even myself!!!

So here’s it in that condensed book style – along with a promise to myself to do better next time:

• decide I need to test the market since the whole point of publishing is to sell the books, so send flyers out to all the vets in Avon (the first county on the database) and get six advance orders, proving to myself there is a market for a short book on pet bereavement
• now the books are – apparently – sitting just outside Felixstowe as it is too stormy for that tedious boat from china to land
• the books turn up six days before Christmas; not much point starting the publicity campaign now
• new year, new resolve…except I’m a bit distracted by the idea of publishing some beautiful blank affirmation cards as an alternative to the scrappy bits of card I’ve been using. Affirmations are a big part of my own timetable and what I teach in my Heal your Life workshops. So the book marketing has to wait while I get heavily involved in selecting images, deciding how many I can afford to print etc
• then I get the bright idea of putting affirmations on fridge magnets where they are right under people’s noses; more distractions
• am beginning to realise that it is the creative bit of running small books that really turns me on, and these bits of insight into what makes us tick are like gold
• nevertheless, by the end of january there is nothing more to distract me so, finally,  off go the press releases, review copies, and I even find the courage to pick up the phone
• there is no quick fix when it comes to marketing; but every time someone reacts with recognition – the sort that says “You are right, we all know people whose pets are like their children and this book is exactly what they need to help them see they are not crazy to be mourning and missing an animal” – I am fired up enough to make another call
• best of all, one of those early Avon vets phones for fresh stock; they may have only had 3 first time round and 10 on their second order but that means they’ve found them useful – and somewhere in the UK’s smallest county the book has helped a couple of people cope with bereavement. That’s good enough for me.