Sunday 27 January 2008

In Which Our Very Own Caroline Gets A Gold Star

Our very own Caroline has done a thing of such fabulousness I can scarcely find the necessary superlatives. First, she's written a book - a wee book, a novella - called Disraeli Avenue. That is the street where the central characters lived in her debut novel, In Search Of Adam. The novella is made up of 32 flashes from the houses in that street. 'Tales of debt, infidelity, love and loss all combine and weave into a mosaic of working class life,' says Caroline.

And second, she has persuaded her publisher, her typesetter and her cover designer to give their services free, so that the book can be published as an e-book for free download to raise money for charity. The charity she has chosen is One In Four, which is run by and for people who have experienced sexual abuse. People will be given the opportunity to make a donation in return for the book. And the project will be launched in February.

So why am I telling you about this and not Caroline herself, you may ask? Yes, of course it's because I'm an interfering old baggage, but that's not the whole story. This has all kicked off in the last few days and Caroline finds herself overwhelmed, snowed under and out of her depth, if you'll forgive the metaphor stew. She mentioned to me in an email that she was failing to find the necessary focus to post about it here, so I offered to do it for her and she said 'yes please'.

Caroline is particularly struggling to work out how best to publicise the project, as she has no PR experience and the charity is very small (it can't even afford the £15 monthly fee for Just Giving, but a blog reader has made a donation to cover that for the time being). So if anyone has any ideas about press contacts, publicity methods, PR or related subjects that could help draw this to as many people's attention as possible, please could you let Caroline know? Either by commenting on this post, or by email to me@carolinesmailes.co.uk.

Caroline announced the project last Wednesday here, and One in Four's website is here.

Thanks everyone!

5 comments:

Sue Guiney said...

Hi,
I'm new to this blogger stuff, but I had a marvelous conversation with Caroline yesterday, thanks to my publisher, bluechrome, who put me in touch with her thinking I could give some advice. I tried my best, and we talked about writing something for the stage, doing an event, all sorts of things that I am now excited about being involved with. But she helped me just as much. Hence, my new blog where I can talk about the writing life, my new novel which will be launched in May, the excitements and frustrations of it all, and where I can meet writers like you. Thanks, Sue

Sue Guiney said...

Hi,
I'm new to this blogger stuff, but I had a marvelous conversation with Caroline yesterday, thanks to my publisher, bluechrome, who put me in touch with her thinking I could give some advice. I tried my best, and we talked about writing something for the stage, doing an event, all sorts of things that I am now excited about being involved with. But she helped me just as much. Hence, my new blog where I can talk about the writing life, my new novel which will be launched in May, the excitements and frustrations of it all, and where I can meet writers like you. Thanks, Sue

Fiona Mackenzie. Writer said...

www.pressbox.co.uk will send out press releases for free and you can upgrade if you wish.

I will certainly add a link from my blog tonight.

Rowan Coleman said...

hi all, amazingly good work Caroline. don't know I might be able to help with contacts and what have you, Will think think think and if you can think of anything I can do for you then e-mail, you have the address.

Caroline said...

Hi all.

I am at the stage now where the press release is being issued by TFProject. I have a copy of it and would like to pass it on to as many press contacts as possible. If anyone has any ... and would be willing to pass on the press release to them, please let me know.

It'll be launched/published Feb 11 and I'm really really trying to make it a success. So any help will be acknowledged and is very much needed.

Thanks Zinnia for posting this.

Caroline x