Just a short article this time, but something fairly awesome happened this week. I have signed a contract with the wonderful Bloodhound Books to publish The Red Room. I have a shiny new author bio on their website and everything:

http://www.bloodhoundbooks.com/chris-thomas

Or rather I should say, re-publish. It will be given a new name Enter The Dark and a splendid new cover before they work their magic on it.

In it for the not-so-long haul

I am fairly certain that most self-publishing journeys last slightly longer than the whopping twelve weeks I have enjoyed since publication, but I can confidently say that I took an awful lot out of it and am a million times more clued up in the way of the book world than I was at the start of the year.

It will be a small shame to see the old cover go and hopefully the four boxfuls of paperback that I have in my garage won’t go entirely to waste. My awesome P.R. guru (the wife) has already been making good use of them, dishing them out to book clubs in exchange for reviews once the new one is released. She, for one, will be grateful not to have to harass strangers in Waterstones telling them that her husband has written a book and they should check it out instead of the one they have in their hand.

The friends and family who purchased the original when it was released can now be confident that their error-strewn first draft, which was already semi-collectible once I uploaded the correct version, will now have taken on a rarity value matched only by a 1909 T206 Honus Wagner baseball card. Kind of.

Onwards and upwards

Of course, my earlier articles were predominantly based around self-publishing and sticking it to them lot with book deals. I have a lot of admiration for anyone who makes the effort to write and then put a book of any description out there for people to read and criticise. And the last two and half months, plus six months of preparation beforehand have made me appreciate just how difficult it can be out there for an indie and how much respect anyone who gives it a go deserves.

But, I will be honest, to be able to partner with someone who actually knows what the hell they are doing is just immense, and has actually made me look forward to writing the next book knowing the last one is in good hands.

More updates to follow in due course as we get to closer to (re)publication date.

Thanks for reading.