A Message to the Future

I've resisted trying to do anything clever with the layout of this blog during the last five years, but this evening I thought I'd have a look at some of the new features in Blogger.

That was a big mistake.

In a matter of seconds, I managed to ruin the layout and lose both my links and Bravenet counter stats. I am now working on restoring the blog to its former 2006-style glory, but in the meantime, here is a message to the future from Bertrand Russell:

Last Year in the Book Trade

As far as the book trade is concerned, I think most people would agree that it was the year of the Kindle, with over a million sold per week in December. HarperCollins alone sold 100,000 ebooks on Christmas Day.

This time last year I was firmly in the anti-Kindle camp and wrote several posts extolling the virtues of the printed page over the soulless, grey world of ebooks. But I protested too much and one blogger very astutely commented that I was actually "on the verge of Kindledom".

I finally gave in during March, swayed by the comments made by fellow bloggers and I have to say, I love my Kindle. It's convenient (my nearest proper bookshop is eight miles away), doesn't clutter up my shelves with books I'll never read again and gives me the chance the try sample chapters before I commit to buying the books.

But there's a dark side to all of this. The Kindle also threatens many booksellers with extinction and could make it harder for authors to earn a living wage from their writing, so I'm in the process of rethinking how I buy books. Particularly after this Facebook discussion that took place a couple of days ago (I won't name the author, as she hasn't given me permission to quote):

Reader 1 -Also love my Kindle and am a sucker for an amazon bargain (sorry). Can't beat the personal service of the 7s bookshop though... Is the publishing world doing anything to support authors? Surely no incentive to write (and I'm aware noone is in it for the money) means no wares to sell?

Author - @Reader 1 - 'Is the publishing world doing anything to support authors?' There is a short answer to this. No. Having been an author for ten years and knowing that my books have been appreciated by thousands I am now forced to consider writing a hobby as I could earn more working on a supermarket check out or sweeping the streets. x

Reader 2 - I'm buying ebooks for an average of £5 each. How much of this is going to the author?

Author - @Reader 2 - this is a good question. For the two of my books that have earned out the advance - if you buy it for £5 I believe I may get as much as about 0.20p (but I have to check this) For the two that have not earned out the advance I get nothing. For the 0.99p purchace of Steve's above the author may - if they are lucky and have earned out - get about 0.5p. But I may be exaggerating the payment to the author wildly here. I always encourage my readers to buy their books from bookshops to keep the bookshops open.

Reader 2 - I'm really shocked. I was always under the impression that authors received 10% of the rrp, with the burden of any discounts shouldered by the publisher and retailer. What's the best thing we can do to support writers?

Author - @Reader 2 - no the author gets 10% of whatever the book is sold at... after (and if) the advance is earned out (and it's only earned out by a payment at 10 % of whatever the book is sold at) and then after that the agent takes 15% so if people like Steve buy books at 0.99p ... The best thing you can do to support an author is to buy the book from a bookshop at the price that is on the cover. Likewise on Kindle if you pay full price for the download then the author may eventually get a small payment.

The controversy over the 'agency model' (and you can read a full explanation here if you're interested) will continue to rage in 2012. Like a lot of readers, I like cheap books, but not at the authors' expense.

The other big event of 2011 was the rescue of Waterstone's from the edge of oblivion. For people outside the UK, I should explain that it's Britain's largest specialist chain bookseller and for ten years, was run by a succession of 'retailers' (i.e. people who thought that selling books was no different from selling shoes or CDs) who almost destroyed the business. Waterstone's is now in private ownership, freed from the tyranny of short-termism, with a real bookseller at the helm for the first time in years.

However, although things are now looking more positive, I can't help feeling that it's still too late for Waterstone's and that MD James Daunt is merely a Alexander Kerensky/Shapour Bakhtiar figure, unable to stop the tide of history. I may be wrong. Perhaps James Daunt can cure Waterstone's, but I suspect that palliative care is the most he can provide.

As for the literary highlights of 2011, I'll leave that to the many other bloggers - John Self, Gaskella and company - who are highly accomplished book reviewers. However, I will mention one first novel which, I felt, didn't receive the press attention it deserved - 'Wall of Days' by Alastair Bruce -in spite of being picked by Amazon in its 'Rising Stars' promotion.

If I try to explain the plot I might put you off, so it's probably better to simply include this link to the first few pages. If you like bald, understated prose, like Cormac McCarthy or M. J. Hyland, where devastating truths are hidden beneath mundane recollections, then I can highly recommend this magical novel.

Another reason why Wall of Days struck a chord is that for several years, I'd had a novel brewing in my head that had a very similar beginning. As soon as I began reading the first page, I felt a huge sense of relief that someone had written the novel for me and done a much better job of it. I can now hit the pillow without any more recurring images of grey skies and tussock grass.

Finally, I must mention one other book: Vasily Grossman's 'Life and Fate', which is belatedly being acknowledged as one of the great novels of the 20th century, comparable to War and Peace in its scope and ambition. Although the English translation appeared a few years ago, it wasn't until 2011 that Grossman's epic began to receive the recognition it deserved.

It took me over a month to read Life and Fate, but I would happily read it all over again tomorrow.

Finally, I'd like to wish anyone who reads 'the Age of Uncertainty' a Happy New Year. After a number of challenges and upheavals last year, the blog began to run out of steam towards the end of the year, as I was exhausted by family difficulties and preoccupied with setting up my own bookselling business.

Perhaps, after five years, this blog has reached a natural end. But it's possible that once I have new sources of stock, there will be other stories to tell. I really enjoy sharing the strange fragments of lost lives that seem to come my way and hope that there will be more to come.

We shall see.

A Different Tune

I've just returned from Rye, where I met an old friend for a drink.

Twelve years ago he was living around the corner from my flat in Twickenham, earning a fortune in business publishing, but hating every minute of his working day. Then one day he decided he'd had enough, sold his flat for £120,000 and bought another on the Kent coast for £60,000, using the balance to pay off his mortgage.

He's never had a 'proper' job since, and seems much happier for it.

Last year he was invited to audition for a French punk-folk band (he is a violinist) and phoned to book a seat as a foot passenger on a cross-channel ferry. "I'm sorry," he was told, "but we don't accept foot passengers any more, only people with vehicles. You'll have to pay the car rate, which is £60".

My friend slammed the phone down in disgust, lit a cigarette and fumed. Then he had an idea and redialled the number:

"You said I had to pay for a vehicle. If I came by bicycle, how much would that cost?"

"£10".

Two weeks later, my friend was the sole cyclist in a slowly moving queue of cars and lorries at Dover's docks, congratulating himself for his moral victory over mindless bureaucracy. The band were apparently waiting for him in Calais, so he decided to spend the hour-long crossing relaxing in the bar.

With five minutes left until the ferry docked, my friend made his way down to the vehicle hold and unchained his bicycle. Soon, he could hear the sound of chains moving and ramps descending, followed by the hissing of hydraulic brakes as the lorries began to edge forward. He quickly phoned one of the band members to find out where he needed to go.

"'Allo Graham. You muss follow le traffique and take ze second exit on the left. Yes? We are 500 metres away".

Graham followed their directions faithfully, making sure that he took the correct exit and found himself cycling up a rather steep ramp, which left him feeling a little breathless. To his relief, the ramp became flatter and seemed to be joining a proper road, then suddenly: WOOSSSHHHHH!

A powerful gust of wind almost knocked him off his bike and to Graham's horror, he found himself on a motorway being buffeted by a succession of fast-moving lorries. There didn't seem any way to get off the motorway. Terrified, he stood on the edge of the slow lane, wondering what to do next.

Suddenly, Graham's phone rang: "'Allo Graham. Eet is me again. Do NOT take ze second exit! Comprenez-vous? It is the WRONG exit!"

After a farcical (and very dangerous) half hour spent trying to leave the motorway, Graham eventually found the band and began what turned out to be a very alcoholic weekend. He now plays gigs with them on both sides of the channel.

It's strange how people's lives can change so much, in ways that we could never predict.

In the late 1990s, Graham seemed to have it all. He was earning at least four times as much as me and always seemed to be getting promoted. Evenings were often spent in smart restaurants, dining with the leading lights of international banking, or at the Strangers' Bar at the House of Commons, getting gossip from drunken MPs.

Occasionally Graham would say how depressed he was by the ease of his ascent. He'd never been particularly interested in business publishing and couldn't understand why people at the highest levels accepted him as one of their own. Success bought financial rewards and status, but also increasing levels of stress, boredom and frustration.

I don't know what finally pushed Graham to suddenly hand his notice in and he'd never expressed any interest in visiting Kent, let alone living there, but within the space of a few months he completely transformed his life.

Today, Graham plays the fiddle at folk festivals and private functions, earning just enough to pay the bills and enjoy the occasional trip to India. He lives quite frugally but is completely debt-free and doesn't miss his old life at all.

I'm sure that Graham's example partly gave me the courage and inspiration to change my life. Unlike Graham, I've never had to face the same temptations (although I was made a very attractive offer earlier this year), but it was still hard to take a leap into the unknown.

After saying goodbye to Graham, I sat on the train and looked at BBC News. In a piece about people who died in 2011, I saw these particularly apposite quotes by Steve Jobs:

"Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything - all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure - these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important.

Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma - which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice."

I know it's easy to make statements like that when you're the billionaire CEO of a corporation (I'm not sure what the Chinese sweatshop workers who make many of Apple's products would say), but I agree with the sentiments.

I think that next year will be all about putting these ideas into practice.

The Age of Uncertainty

This evening, as we were driving home in the dark after returning a van to a slightly menacing industrial estate, my wife turned to me and said, 'You haven't done your blog for ages.'

This came as a shock. Obviously I knew that I hadn't written any posts for over a month - the longest gap in five years of blogging - but I had no idea that my wife was aware of this. She used to claim that she never read my blog, as she was far too busy being an übermother to fritter her time away on such trifles.

I hadn't intended to stop blogging, but it seemed a rather self-indulgent thing to do while I was trying to establish an internet business. Also, I couldn't think of anything to say. However, after receiving several kind emails from people who have wondered if things are okay, I thought I'd write this brief post.

I've now been self-employed for 11 weeks and, although it hasn't been a particularly easy time, I feel liberated in so many ways. Steerforth Books didn't get off to a rip-roaring start, but thanks to the kindness and generosity of a fellow blogger (I won't embarrass them here, but I am eternally grateful), it received a huge boost and the business no longer feels like a pipe dream.

I've no idea what the future holds. I've swapped the dependable, but soul-destroying, certainty of my last job for something that makes emotional sense, but may lead to financial ruin. Have I made a terrible mistake?

All I know is that the worst decisions I've ever made have all been rational ones that appeared to make perfect sense, whilst the best ones have been inspired by childhood fantasies, daydreaming, gut instincts and my adolescent sense of right and wrong. In the last two months, I feel that I have become me again, after years in exile.

Perhaps this is my mid-life crisis. All of the elements are there: an aging parent, a child entering adolescence and the sense of having possibly passed the halfway point. Some men respond by dying their hair that weird, chestnut colour and sleeping with someone in their 20s. My ambitions are hopefully less ridiculous.

I apologise for the solemn nature of this post. I have just been to Sainsbury's in Newhaven and it always has that effect on me. I've no idea why.