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Tuesday, December 30, 2014

Look for the silver lining

As I meander away the waning minutes, hours and days of what constitutes my Christmas break, I received an e-mail from Writer's Digest Magazine.

The bad news was that I wasn't selected as a finalist for their annual Self-Publish e-Book Awards. As writers meet with rejection more often than success, this I can take in stride.

The good news, I guess, was the feedback of the judge who read 'The Barricade Diary' (minus the spoilers):

"Brent Cameron has written a fascinating novel that takes a little perseverance for it to get a hold on you... But if the reader perseveres they will be rewarded with a complex and interesting story... There are twists and turns that will keep the reader involved and wanting to turn the page. The writing, the voice, is very much of the time and feels authentic.  It flows nicely and moves the story along at a good pace. The characters are compelling and  the reader will be swept up into their lives."

There were 4 criteria being judged, and my aggregate score on them, on a scale of 5, was 4.2.

No - I'm not going to win, and that's fine.

My 'silver lining' is that my writing may have a place. These kind (and encouraging) words, combined with the equally kind and encouraging words in those Amazon reviews, make me believe that for those willing to give it a chance, there are people who enjoyed the journey.

A very happy and prosperous New Year to one and all!

Tuesday, December 16, 2014

An end to the interlude


And so, after an interlude from this blog, I have returned to posting.

The rule of blogging is to do the exact opposite of what I’ve been doing - to be regularly punctual, pithy and profound. As I am not particularly talented at the latter two, the least I could’ve managed was the former.

To you, my friends, I confess some significant reason for not being diligent in my writing. By way of full disclosure, my activities up to October 27th were directed toward some immediate goal. In the Canadian province of Ontario, where I reside, that was the date when all local governments and municipal level councils were elected. As coincidence would have it, both my wife and I were candidates for office.

While Jodi's run for School Board Trustee was agonizingly close - losing by less than 30 votes - I was elected as a member of council in the Township of Central Frontenac.

This has been something I have contemplated for some time, and it holds a great deal of significance for me.

I grew up in a municipality called Hinchinbrooke Township. It has its own Reeve and Council, fire and roads department. There was a Hinchinbrooke Public School where I first began my education. My grandfather was the grader operator and retired as the head of its roads department after over 20 years of service.

In the late 1990’s, there was a round of amalgamations of local governments in Ontario, and Hinchinbrooke was combined with three other townships to form the Township of Central Frontenac. Last year, the school was closed, and my grandfather has been gone for eight years.

What was once Hinchinbrooke is a district that has two elected representatives, and I’ve been honoured to become one of them. My term gets underway in earnest in 2015 – the year my grandfather would have turned 100 (Given his mother lived to be 103, not that implausible).

So, what does that mean for my writing?

Well, not all that much, really.

My council commitments will take up a lot of time, but my full time job at Queen’s remains in toto.  In addition, my writing time tends to be in the morning – after I arrive on campus but before I start work. Also, my employer closes between Christmas Eve and the New Year. Long story short – I can still write if the words and ideas are there.

Are they though?

Well, yes. Even though I am still pushing to get ‘Barricade Diary’ into a more public distribution, I have other projects in varying stages of development.

One project which I confess I did not plan on taking on was a sequel to ‘The Barricade Diary’. To be honest, I never considered it anything other than a stand-alone work. Of course, I had feedback from readers, and more than one wanted to know if a sequel was in the works.

I took a couple of weeks to figure out whether or not there was a story to tell, and I’m happy to say that there is. I’m still working on the outline, but it didn’t take long for the story to reveal itself.

Still no idea how long it will take to write, but given that ‘Barricade’ took, off and on, over 15 years, I’m guessing it will be quicker – even with my new ‘political career.’

December 16 - 7:36 a.m.



It is 7:36 a.m., a little less than a week before Christmas, and I am the closest I’ve been to a state of zen for a while.

As an employee of a University largely devoid of students between the big day and New Year’s, I am afforded a built in vacation period.

The same goes for my newly acquired duties as a local councillor (by virtue of the Municipal Elections held in Ontario on October 27th), although I expect that phone calls and e-mails regarding the condition of plowed roads will come up at least a couple of times.

Yesterday, with my son's birthday, we have transitioned out of the cake and candles season that, for my family, runs steady from late August to now.

As with my writing, what can I say? It is my guilty pleasure, and I try to fit it in wherever and whenever possible. Still on the quest for the Holy Grail of the unrepresented scribe, and my heart is full of hope. Having said that, my horoscope did say that “it’s smarter to hang onto your current job,” so who knows.

‘Absolom’ was momentarily put aside in favour of two other projects. One is a non-fiction paper for associates in the UK (which I would still like to tinker with), as well as an outline for another novel that I did not anticipate writing until about two months ago. With those dual tasks winding down, I hope that Absolom gets the attention that it deserves. I’m too novice a writer to have a ‘type’ or a ‘style’, but I think that people who read (and hopefully enjoy) ‘Barricade’ will have an affinity for this story as well.

Now it’s 7:48 a.m., and if I hope to snag a Tim Horton’s coffee before the pre-exam phalanx marches in, I better scoot!

Thursday, October 9, 2014

It's just an honour to be nominated...



Okay, so I decided that after a handful of really good reviews in Amazon, I might as well bite the bullet and start shopping ‘Barricade’ around.

By nature, I am not a gambling person. I rarely buy lottery tickets, and have only set foot twice in a casino (First time won about $150, second time lost $20). I’m not opposed to any of it on moral or ethical grounds. I’ve just figured out that I’m more likely to subsidize winners than be one myself.

Trying to get an agent is, in many ways, a lottery play. I say this with no small measure of pessimism. 

Please don’t tell me the odds because I know them by heart:

  •  Chances of a positive reply from an agent – 100:1

  • Chances of a positive reply from an agent asking for a sample – 300:1

  • Chances of a positive reply from an agent asking for the whole manuscript – 400:1 or 500:1
  • Chances of a positive reply from an agent from a top level agency asking for the whole manuscript –  ???? : 1

Okay, so Friday night, my ten year old daughter went to a chaperoned dance at the local Oddfellows Hall. As my better half had handled the first leg, I took the return visit. Nice drive back, listened to very silly music very loud, and pulled into the driveway. No big deal - it's how we roll.

Get out of the van and as I’m heading to the house, I check my Blackberry and the cause of the little red flashing light. It was an e-mail in response to a query I sent that essentially conforms to the very last scenario outlined above.  Request to see the whole thing, and from an agency that I would never have queried if I had let my feelings of inadequacy rule my head. 

Not appropriate for me to name the agent or the firm, but on one writer's blog, they said getting picked up by them would be the equivalent of  "hitting a home run, with the bases loaded, in your first game in the Majors." Yeah, and that doesn't make me anxious in the least!

Am I going to be on the New York Times Bestseller list? Doubt it very much.

Will I get a publishing deal with a big imprint? Not holding my breath.

Will I get taken on as a client? Would be bloody fantastic, but I have absolutely no clue.

Am I feeling like there’s something in my writing? Hell, yeah! It got my foot in the door. The question is whether it gets all of me past it.

I guess it’s like the Oscars – maybe it’s enough just to be nominated.

One thing for sure, it has distracted me from watching for new reviews on Amazon. Like the rest of it, it's been much better than I expected...

Wednesday, September 10, 2014

Tom Petty was right...

The waiting is the hardest part!

At this point, there are literally hundreds of people who downloaded 'Barricade Diary' on Amazon last weekend. Of course, that means nothing, and nothing more is going to happen for one simple reason - no reviews.

The typically twitchy personality wonders if they have fallen prey to some dark and sinister force lurking in a Seattle low rise who arbitrarily decided to prevent people from posting on your book. The logical self interjects by reminding that people have lives, jobs, kids, etc. and the fact that people usually will not finish a 368 page book in less than 5 days, let alone give a forthright answer.

Of course, it does not help when one's e-mail inbox is filled daily with messages about "Powering your Manuscript to the Next Level by taking our $89.00 Webinar" or insights of literary agents that sound like you must perform like a circus animal in order to get a treat.

If this whole writing thing is going to work, I need to get two things straight in my head:

1. Give people time to read, absorb and consider (i.e. Don't pester); and,
2. Agents are about good literature, and not looking for ego massaging. You're just on nerve and interpreting it that way.

Oh, yeah, and a third one. Do your best - it's all you can do - no more, and definitely no less.

And yes, after all is said and done, waiting will still be the hardest part.

Tuesday, September 2, 2014

The 'End of Labour' Day?

So, the book is done - warts and all.

Up on Kindle, and now what?

Well, just when you think the work is done, you realize that you have to actually get people to read this thing you've contrived. Amazing, isn't it. People aren't beating a path to your door (or their Amazon account) to grab it while it's hot.

Oh, how I wish it were the case. I wish I could just fire it out the door and have all of these messages clogging up my inbox. Can we interview you? Can you do a 10 city North American tour?

Okay, so I'm taking it in stride. Ironically, on a holiday styled as 'Labour Day', I face the fact that my work has not ended, but just begun - albeit in a different way. Goodbye, writer (for now), and Hello, Master Marketer!

Anyway, I've done a bit - including listing wherever I can, bending ears and imposing on every interpersonal relationship I have, and doing my 5 free days on KDP Select.

Four days in, and Amazon has 'The Barricade Diary' ranked #9 among free downloads for 'Political Thrillers and Suspense'.

Is there a Booker Prize, or a Giller on the horizon? Seriously doubt it, but it does do one thing - it gives me a small bit of positive reinforcement and encouragement.

Enough to tell me that if my labours have just begun, it will be well worth the effort.

Sunday, August 24, 2014

The world at 3:30 a.m.

The world looks quite different at 3:30 a.m.

First of all, it doesn't look much like anything. As yours truly lives in a rural setting, there are no street lamps, etc to contend with. The closest we get is during a full moon, and the accompanying racket of barking coyotes in the field behind, but je degress.

Long story short - could not sleep. Had to finish what I started.

Went out to the living room, to the iMac, and over the next 90 minutes completed all of the last bits of tinkering required for the good folks at Kindle Direct Publishing to say 'Congrats - we'll let you know when your book is up.'

A few hours later, while at the local fair in Parham, Ontario, the message popped up on my phone that it was up and running.

So - what was it?

It's a novel. 368 pages (or approximately 90,000 words in book trade lingo).

"The Barricade Diary" has been with me, off and on, for over 10 years (More off than on). It sat on a shelf for the longest time, and other projects zipped past. Finally, I bit the bullet and pushed forward.

And so, I put my insomnia to good use.

Actually, that's not totally true. After 5:00, I laid on my couch and watched "BoJack Horseman" on Netflix until I dozed off.

Apologies to my wife for having to wake up to that!

Here's the link to the Amazon listing...enjoy!

amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?tag=kb1-20&url=search-alias%3Ddigital-text&field-keywords= mystery + political%2C+ B00MYZ7XD6