fiction

Unique Selling Point (USP)

/ Neil Bowers / Leave a comment

So, it’s out there.  

My book is running free in the vastness that is KDP. 

Amy Grace: Payne is out there (Kindle, Paperback & Hardback). 

If writing a book is hard (and it can be), marketing is most definitely a struggle on another level.

The cover was/is a deliberate attempt to stand out in thumbnail scanning, the lack of a title on the front and the cropping away of Amy’s face all deliberate too. 

The face – that’s easy, I wanted the reader to let their imagination create a face for Amy.

The lack of a title on the cover – again this was a deliberate attempt to let the image talk to the reader, the overly simplified art my attempt to give free reign to the imagination of the turner of pages – maybe it works, possibly it doesn’t, but that’s why I did what I did. 

Critique only works AFTER the event, first you must do, and only then can you review. 

Maybe I’ve taken the ‘Man in the Arena’ too much to heart… 

Back to the plot.     

To publicise my work, I’m hamstrung on many levels, not least in that I have a small social media presence AND I have zero in the budget to pay for highly skilled marketing folk to assist me.

The answer?

I don’t know. 

I wish I did, but I don’t.

Does my book have a USP that would help it stand out; help it jostle in such a crowded marketplace for attention?

Yes, I think it does, but again how do we let folk know?

Amy IS an interesting character, she has strengths, she has weaknesses, she is flawed, she is human. 

She is gay, do we lead with that? 

I haven’t because (in my mind) it’s just who she is, one facet of her life – it creates situations, but so too does her diminutive stature at 5’2” tall.   

I wrote Amy as a gay character, for no other reason than in my mind as I was typing away it just seemed to be the right thing for her – no political point scoring, no following a trend, no attempting to ride the rainbow, she’s just gay because that’s what she is.

But mostly she’s a young woman in pain, she’s suffering and attempting to come to terms with the events of chapter one. 

Amy is driven, she is singular in her focus to seek a redress, and for this she suffers and she struggles – that’s the story, that’s the tale I’m attempting to tell. 

Trauma isn’t neat, you don’t simply ‘get over it,’ for some it consumes with a ravenous appetite that destroys everything and screams loudly that ONLY vengeance will give it peace – it is a liar.

And then we have the villain, we have Thomas.

He has growth, he seeks redemption after finding love, but his character arc cannot be neat and clean, all Hollywood soft focus, because life just isn’t like that.

Hopefully, the reader (when they appear) will appreciate the human conflict that both Amy and Thomas experience – I hope they do.

The book, for whatever faults it has, is an attempt to be sympathetic to all in the tale, maybe that’s the USP.

So, how do we let the world know, how do we let the reviews and the stars decide the success of my attempt to tell a tall tale?

In a perfect world one of my many unsuccessful attempts to land a ‘literary agent’ would have been successful and skilled assistance would manifest… 

Ah, so many shots fired, and all failing to hit the mark.

So, as we hit week two of the book being available will the opening book of the adventures of Miss Amy Grace be a slow burn?

Will organic word of mouth succeed?

Do I need a gimmick?

Such are the trials and tribulations of a writer such as me.

Hug those you love, hug them for no other reason than right here and right now you can, tell them of the love you have for them, and in a topsy-turvy world do your very best to remain sane! 

Touching the Void…

/ Neil Bowers / Leave a comment

Climb the mountain, acknowledge the enormity of the effort it took to get there, sit on the peak, drink some tea, and then have a good long and hard think about what to do next.

That is me, this is me, here we all are with nowhere else left to go.

The feeling isn’t like While E Coyote eventually catching the Road Runner, but it isn’t too distant a cousin not to be invited to family gatherings.

The act is done, the curtains have swished across the boards and now we occupy that infinitesimally small space, that pause between velvet touching itself and the hoped for gasp and then clap of an appreciative audience (double entendre?).

If only.

I have no idea if my one-man show will sell or indeed if those that attend will like the show, and so the spiral ever tightens – not knowing is insufferable.

 The cover format is incorrect – this will be rectified, but the process is almost becoming a punishment (political satire?).  

The book isn’t perfect – no book ever is.

Imperfect as it is, it does deserve a reader, and the reader truly is a lesser being for not having followed Miss Amy Grace.

A strong no nonsense female character, flawed, contradictory, obsessively focused on her own plight, always brave, emotionally vulnerable and oh so in need of a loving hug…

And we have Thomas Payne, not a one-dimensional matinee villain twirling his moustache while he ties a woman to the railway tracks…  he grows, he evolves, he becomes so much more than he was on page one.  Redemption exists for all. 

Four hundred or so pages. 

Page turners each and every one.

The first of July cometh and with it our release of the first volume of Amy’s adventures.

Hug those you love, stay safe, and do your very best to remain sane.

Absent friends – if only!

/ Neil Bowers / 1 Comment

It is indeed true that it lingers longer than the smell of cow poo under your fingernails.

Self-doubt jockeys with joyful optimism, and it doesn’t fight fair.

For every passage of majestic prose, it happily points out that clumsy phrase, that overused trope and exhausted cliché.

Bugger.

Getting the cover to my book [Amy Grace: Paye] painted/drawn/created has taken considerably longer than anticipated – art it seems has no concept of time.

What was to be published in February, was then moved to Easter, and now sits somewhere in the broad and vague expanse of 2026/27.

Time hasn’t been idly spent.

A book I’d written, rewritten, given to Beta readers, rewritten, given to a professional editor, rewritten, is again in the very real danger of again being rewritten. 

Not through need, but nerves.

The devil does indeed make tasks for idle hands…

I’m second guessing everything.

Every historic comment (real & imagined) is being overanalysed.

Every negative, no matter how oblique or trivial is now front and centre of my mind.

No art is without fault, or immune from legitimate critique, and trying to please everyone is indeed a fool’s errand.

I’ve filled my time with the Iceni rebellion, with a spy suffering amnesia, and even a few choice pages around the tales of a sorcerer’s apprentice – yet everything pulls back to the plight of a young woman in Egypt.

Amy Grace dominates.

I need to publish and be dammed.

But before I can do that, I need the much-delayed artwork.

Oh, to suffer the problems of the comfortable first world is such a weight…

Hug those you love, tell them you love them, hold them tight, stay safe, and do your absolute best to remain sane!

Smoke me a kipper, I’ll be back for breakfast!

Running On the Spot.

/ Neil Bowers / Leave a comment

It’s not a cliché, but it is a maxim that is heavily abused (probably because it is true) in that “No Plan Survives Contact” – take a bow Karl Bernhard von Moltke. 

Our plan was to publish Valentines Day 2026.

We missed that.

To be fair, it was/and is better that we did.

Editing is emotive for any writer – cutting words so carefully chosen is akin to asking which child you want to sacrifice to ensure that the sun still shines and the crops continue to grow…

Okay, possibly not that hard – but hyperbole is the cornerstone of writing – so we will let that one ride.

Editing came, editing went, and editing was completed.

Next stage.

I’ve always had a cover in mind – the idea has remained a constant throughout all the plot changes, inserts, and deletions. 

I had an artist in mind, I’d seen their work on the WWW, and I was sold.

Labour costs, I was (am) happy to pay.

Art is the expression of emotion, and such a thing is forever susceptible to the whims and fancies of life – point accepted (no need to concede).

My timeline has always been flexible.

Flexible, but not open-ended.

Now I sit nine weeks into the book cover phase with no real decreeable progress made.

Tommorow was the promise, but that was weeks ago.

“Nearly there” is uttered but not delivered.

I am at a complete loss.

Have I been taken for a fool – or am I just drowning in paranoia of my own making?

I don’t have the funds for a relaunch, the are no coins to start this again.

I’d cry, but I don’t know how…

Keep that Serenity Prayer in mind as life moves forward.

Hug those you love – stay sane!

Go Big or Go Home

/ Neil Bowers / Leave a comment

I started writing the first iterations of the Amy Grace adventures many years ago.

Version 1.0 Amy Grace: Khartoum started life sometime around 2015.

The central tale has remained unchanged; the telling has hopefully improved with each review and addition.

I now sit with Amy Grace: Payne (10.1) as the latest version of that original tall tale.

The words we can count, the hours taken to create them, at these we can only hazard a rough guess.

We’ve gone through the full range of emotions, all the highs, and a lot of lows.

Euphoria has shone at the joy of our creation, self-doubt kicked away at my heels and done its very best to try and drag me down.

Yet here we still stand.

We’ve adapted to the feedback from Beta Readers.

Chapter one was rewritten, scenes amended and some deleted.

We’ve had a developmental edit recommend changes – again most of these we’ve incorporated.

Polish polish polish… rinse and repeat.

At some point, now that I’ve firmly taken the decision to self-publish, I’m going to have to do just that.

Its not poor reviews, or indeed any negative reactions that I fear, it’s the NOT offering the very absolute most polished version of this tale to the world that worries me so…

If I fall flat on my face, then so be it, but let it not be due to poor preparation and presentation.

Titivate, titivate.

At what point do I have to just let go?

Statistics tell us that a debut novel (self-published) will sell between 100 – 250 copies.

If I continue with third party assistance (editing/formatting/cover) I will need to sell 400 to break even.

The odds are NOT in my favour.

Bugger.

Bugger, bugger, bugger.

Procrastination is indeed killing me.

Amy Grace: Payne WILL hit the world April 2026.

I will pay for a cover – it was always the plan; copy edit as best I can and then set Amy free into the big, crowded world of KDP published novels.

Maybe she’ll thrive, maybe the world wants to read the tale of a flawed heroine, who gets knocked down, but rises back to her feat every time.

Stay safe, hug those you love.

22 Pages

/ Neil Bowers / Leave a comment

It sounds like it should be the title to a noir thriller, but it’s not. 

In this case we are referring to the developmental edit for my book “Amy Grace: Payne”, twenty-two pages of notes, observations, suggestions and support.

Like all writers my book has been through the Beta Reader stage more times than you can shake a stick, and to be fair to all involved the feedback has been honest – supportive, at times critical, but always helpful.

The opening chapter has been completely rewritten. 

It was a near universal comment that it just didn’t hit the right note.  Not the subject matter, but the scenario that preceded it. 

Big boy pants, rewrite – success.

Of all the parts of the book, chapter one ‘Arrival’ was the one that has been fussed over the most. 

To be fair, the balance of 130,000 words stands or indeed falls on the first 1800.

Time and place, main character, inciting incident – hook to keep them reading – that’s a lot of pressure for 10-pages to deliver.  But they do.  Indeed, they do. 

My concession to the reader has been the insertion of 430 words to explain historic context and Celtic folklore – hopefully this will aid and not deter the reader.

Scenes have been deleted in their entirety – where I’d used cruelty to indeed illustrate cruelty, I’ve now pulled back, toned it down – such passages now only to be available in the inevitable ‘collectors edition’ (LOL).

I’ve chopped a few linking scenes, trimmed back any hint of repetition and now hopefully the new version reads smoother for the reader.

I struggle with dialogue, not because I dislike it, but because (IMHO) there is a danger that it slows down the narrative and becomes unnecessary art house indulgent distraction. 

So, in places summaries of the discussion are mentioned and not verbatim copies written. 

Maybe it works, hopefully it works…

I have two main characters – Protagonist Amy Grace & Antagonist Thomas Payne. 

At certain points they are both going in the same direction (the book is a chase movie) and I switch between them as the plot proceeds.

A critique given is that switching POV could confuse the reader – and on that one I am still deliberating.

If one is happy, the other sad, switching POV in the same chapter I hope illustrates the difference. 

One is partying, the other drowning in despair… 

As stated, I’m still looking as to how I can ride both horses – compare and contrast AND keep the POV singular. 

It is taking me longer than I anticipated, but the notes as provided were what was needed. 

And if I may I’d like to give a heartfelt shout out to (and recommendation for) Black Thoughts Editorial Services. 

It’s been a long journey thus far, but it’s one I’d take again in a heartbeat.

Hug those you love, tell them, stay safe, and do your very best to remain sane!

Short Stories and Shorter Attention Spans

/ Neil Bowers / Leave a comment

It’s a truth, that some writers, like steam trains, take more than a few yards to really get going.

I’ve tried my hand at short stories, tales under 10,000 words, and failed at EVERY attempt.

The Sorcerer’s Apprentice – this was my best attempt at a short story.  I got a beginning middle and end down all under the magic number. 

The story ended because we’d killed the characters – it was tragic, it was also beautiful.  And then I thought to myself ‘what happens next,’ ‘what if the end is only the beginning,’ and again what was once so promising is now somewhere in its early thirties…

Not that all is indeed lost, I have once (yes just once) managed the keep the word count under 2,000 to describe A Working Man (a door-to-door psycho killer) – the joy that is Flash Fiction. 

However, one swallow does not a summer make. 

Point of all this?

Word counts aren’t an attempt to dumb down books for the scrolling social media generation, but they are something I struggle with.

I blether.

I add colour.

I love telling the tale, telling all of it in wonderful 4KHD, but in doing so I fall too far outside the accepted norms.

Speculative Fiction/Fantasy is the most forgiving genre – you’re allowed to pad it out to ‘world build,’ but even then, the hard stop is 120,000.

That wouldn’t be too bad if I were writing such, but I’m not.

Thrillers/Commercial Fiction, these bad boys have a limit of 90,000 with a strong preference towards 80,000.

By any estimate I’m quite possibly some 40,000 words over the limit.

It’s not an edit, it’s a cull, a murder of the innocents, a blood letting on a truly barbarous scale that is required – and I’m not the man do to do it.

Some skills I have, some I do not.

What will the editor do?

I don’t know.

He’s been employed; coin has been given.

I’ve had a colourful life thus far, but the nervous tension I feel while my work is away being edited is something new and most definitely unpleasant.

This is my first foray, and they say you always remember your first – learn a lot too.

Our timeline has the next milestone mid-January 2026 – we must wait, we must be patient and we must endure.  Here we stand, we can do no other…

Stay safe, remain sane, hug those you love, tell them too. 

Atychiphobia – Fear of Failure

/ Neil Bowers / Leave a comment

We all to a greater or lesser degree indulge in a version of this phobia – and why wouldn’t we, it keeps us safe. 

We don’t jump from tall buildings, wrestle giants, or speak our mind in public because of this phobia. 

Okay not the best or most relevant examples, but a fear of falling short, of being beaten in public or sounding stupid halts a great many of us from trying – and it shouldn’t (sensible caveats notwithstanding).

We hold back, and then because we’ve lived so long with our passion on hold, we tend to mutter something along the lines of ‘our time has passed’ or ‘oh, well possibly not for us’. 

Life just being itself gets the blame for many a timid soul.

Now I may fail, I may indeed fall with all the grace of a middle-aged man tumbling down the side of a mountain (I tend to do that), or indeed maybe I won’t.

Option B can never come to fruition unless I give it a go

Nobody knows me, I am an anonymous soul in the ether of the web, and any shortcomings will pass without as much of a ripple of acknowledgement – I have no public to please.

So, any embarrassment will only ever be mine to publicise. 

To say I have no fear would be a lie, I do.  But I’m willing to live with it to see just what happens now that I’ve jumped off the diving board. 

In October 2017 I wrote this –

You climb to the top, drag your body up the millions of vertigo inducing steps, to stand looking down at the tiny chlorine filled puddle of water – now what? 

You want to jump, you really do. 

Yet, fear of so many things keeps you firmly away from the edge. 

You swing your arms back and forth, rocking from left foot to right, trying to create momentum to take you forward to the concrete edge, past it, and into the abyss of the known unknown.  

But, despite all the deep breathing, arm swinging, foot swapping, you are as far from the edge as you’ve ever been. 

Friends, confidants, little sayings on calendars, they all tell you to do it, that you’ll be okay – that you should jump.

Ignoring your passion is slow suicide!

Burying your talents in a field for fear of failure – you can recall a parable about that; you are sure you can…

Swinging arms, hopping feet, deep breathing…

You ask for signs, look for totems of assurances from the gods, from karma, the cosmos; then you seek second opinions, validation of the first sign, and the second – maybe you should just make sure, to be sure, after all what if you are wrong, what if you fail?!?! 

Swinging arms, hopping feet, deep breathing…

You know it’s not the critic that counts, that it is all about the doer of the deeds, you love that Roosevelt ‘Man in the Arena’ quote, yet…

If you never jump…  well, you know how that plays out. 

Swinging arms, hopping feet, deep breathing…

You are currently living the foot hopping life – you’ve always been living the left right foot hop. 

So, why do you want to jump, what is it you are looking for, what are you trying to achieve?

It can’t be fame or fortune, they are transient whims so easily lost, if you are to gamble what is it you are trying to win? 

And, despite your lifelong love of words you cannot dig from your lexicon words to articulate the hunger, the need, the primal desire to jump. 

Yet fear is easy to describe, swinging arms, hopping feet, deep breathing…

And then…

You fall forward, legs almost buckling under your weight, the concrete disappears, and the air rushes past your body as you plummet downwards.

But you are not falling, you are flying.  Flying down towards your fear, towards your dream.

Chlorine smells strong, the water warm, the splash painful, the joy exhilarating, the euphoria of jumping intoxicating.

You are climbing before the water has fallen from your body, jumping again and again, the thrill never diminishing, never changing from one jump to the next.

You don’t need validation, witnesses, scores held on cards above heads – your glory is personal, maybe shared with friends, but held next to a pumping heart, not a cold and timid soul who knows neither victory or defeat!

Love the ones you are with – stay safe and sane!

Of Mice and Men…

/ Neil Bowers / Leave a comment

Yes, it’s a reference to book by the writer of my favourite book of all time “The Grapes of Wrath” but it’s also a nod to that all important missive about counting chickens before they’re hatched.

It was the best of plans; it was simplicity personified – virtually no moving parts or interdependent actions.

And still it failed.

Of mice and men take a bow…

I wanted to publish my book, I want to publish my book, and I need to publish my book – a demon needs to be exorcised.

Pride must come before the fall, but if I don’t try then I’ll never know – and the not knowing is eating me up inside.

My work may fall flat on its face, it may come across as stilted, contrived cliché driven trope heavy nonsense – or indeed it may not.

The pudding only has one proof and that’s in its eating.

I think it has merit – I truly do.

I’m not that naïve as to think garlands will be thrown at my feet and accolades gifted from on high – but I do honestly think that once read my tale of Amy and her woes will be enjoyed.

She has a journey to take the reader on, some ups, some deep downs, some redemption, and some disappointing failure that will challenge.  Some of it will deliver a wry smile, some of it genuine tears of sadness, but each page will be willingly turned to find out what happened next…

That is my dream, that is my goal.

I had a plan.

It was a simple plan.

All it needed was the due backpay to arrive, the money would then pay for an editor, the editor would help me polish my work and then the absolute best version of Amy Grace: Thomas Payne would be released onto the world.

The editor – his time was booked.

It was all going so well.

And then pride tripped, we fell.

The money isn’t there.

What every year had been a (literal) bankable constant this year is still in stasis.

It will arrive, but no one knows when.

The frustration mounts.

By October I’d hoped to be in the final draft/discussing the artwork phase, and I’m not.

A Christmas stocking filler my work will not be.

It’s annoying.

I’m angry.

I’m barking at the moon – but I’m also helpless.

I cannot influence things; I can only stand in the sidelines as some sort of impassive spectator.

Patience will be my virtue, but frustration at this delay will cut deeply.

The project IS delayed, but NOT cancelled.

I have belief, and I hope you share this faith.

She is worth the wait – she truly is.

Amy IS coming.

Stay strong and hug those you love!

Polite Society.

/ Neil Bowers / Leave a comment

Things you do, things indeed you don’t do, and discussing politics it seems is one of those things.

I think we are the poorer for it, especially writers.

Stories are the near obvious vehicle for commentary, for exploring narratives, and yet it seems that this is now a taboo.  Sexuality and relationships are fine – violence never in question, but the ‘P’ word – nope, never never never. 

Where have all the angry young men, those Young Turks, the social commentators, the satirists, and holders of mirrors to society faults failures and darker traits gone? 

What has become of those writers of dystopian social commentary?   

Does the burning of information, the destruction of yesterday’s knowledge in ‘Fahrenheit 451’ still resonate – do we still grimace at the thought of those ‘Firemen’?

Can we see the alienation and inherent loneliness of perpetual self-indulgence in ‘A Brave New World’?  

Is ‘1984’, still the clarion call for freedom and the warning of the abuse of power, is it still read as a horror story and warning to us all – or is it just no longer read, instead reduced to a glib reference?

I’m NOT saying that you must discuss the human condition through a prism of political debate in your writing, but it would be nice if a few more did.

I just feel somewhat adrift from a world that seems to see political discourse as the only social taboo worth obeying.

Is it the fault/failing of social media, is it the fear of a pile on and cancel culture if you mock, deride or merely allow daylight to fall onto modern absurdities?

My woe is for the self-censoring of an art form, an expressive outlet for which any creative restriction is the very antithesis of telling compelling/challenging/interesting stories.

While I weep, while I weep…

Maybe I should tubthump a manifesto novel – maybe I should, maybe I will.

Side profile picture to the world, chin up, hand on lapel, distant and determined look in my eyes…

Hug those you love, stay safe, and try your best to remain sane!