Wednesday 9 July 2014

Y'know how sometimes ideas sit in the back of your mind and fester?

Well I've had that for a while now and I've finally done something about it.

One of the novels I have written (almost my favourite) is Advent, but it doesn't sell. This has been bothering me and I finally decided that there were at least two things I could change to help with that (I've already tried changing the blurb at least twice :)):

  • the title
  • the cover

There were also a few parts of the text that had been bothering me and so I have also re-edited the whole thing. One of my male characters is now female, which is the big change. I feel it works better with him becoming a her and I wanted more female characters in the book. I also added in a couple of small things that enrich the background as well as changing the odd paragraph here or there that I thought needed to be reworded. It's nothing huge, but now, I have to admit, I like the book better.

These ideas have been niggling at me for months, so I sat down and kicked myself up the behind to make myself sort everything out. I've spent the last five days working on it.

It's actually a New Adult kind of title with my two main character being early 20s and 18 going on 19 respectively and other characters being older. It mentions sex and definitely has some bloody violence so it's not for the younger end of the readership, but I think it's something older teens will enjoy.

It is now called *drum roll* ...
The Avebury Legacy

It's still in the As, but I think the title now has more to do with the book than it did :). Advent was one of those titles that I was in love with when I chose it, but slowly realised it doesn't convey the right information. It's times like that when a huge publishing team like the big six have with an expert in titles would be really useful ::g::. As I understand it, books don't often reach market with the same title the author thought they were going to have, or at least that was the impression I got on the self-pub workshop I went to.

and here is the new cover:

When you’re a vampire hunter infected with vampirism your life expectancy is short. Nate’s a hunter and Lexie’s a witch and they have less than six months before Lexie’s magic can no longer delay the symptoms and keep them at least partially human. There are legends that the ancient Avebury ritual, originally designed to destroy a powerful vampire, may also hold the key to curing vampiris­m and Nate and Lexie must search across continents to find the four relics from the ceremony. In their way are vampire nuns, a crystal cave, shape changers, a labyrinthine catacomb, mummified monks and even librarians. If the cure is real it could be the advent of a new era in vampire hunting.
Once my editing has been checked I will be re-uploading it everywhere. I'm going to do it under the same entries that are already online so that people who have already purchased it will be able to download the updates where their supplier offers that service (I know Amazon and Smashwords do - no idea about others because I haven't used them). However I am going to make it clear in the blurb that it is a renamed book, not an entirely new one. Don't want anyone getting confused and buying it twice.

There's also a new cover for the prequel short story so that they match :).

5 comments:

  1. Brave to make such big changes! But I hope they work out for you and I'll have to add it to my "to read" list (it never gets shorter, books just get swapped in and out, lol)

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    1. Thank you, I hope they work too :). Good luck with the "to read" list - I know exactly what you mean ... the number of books on my Kindle just keeps going up and up and up daily ::g::

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  2. Good luck with the changes. It's nerve wracking to do that at times, but that's the great thing about being an indie: you can easily do those things and make the book better. (You're also making me feel much better about the reediting I'm doing on a story.)

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    1. Sometimes we just have to bite the bullet don't we :). Good luck with your re-editing.

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  3. I guess make-overs are needed sometimes to make others take notice, or a second glance. I like the cover and all the best in editing, etc. Michelle

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