Kimm Walker: In praise of libraries

Libraries are so much more than dusty old book repositories. When I was housebound with my very young children in a remote village, the mobile library was a lifeline to the outside world. The friendly librarian would bring books especially for me and recommend new authors.

We moved to a larger village when my children were still pre-school age and regular visits to the little local library were a highlight in their week. Money is usually tight for young families and ours was no exception. The library meant we could satisfy our children’s voracious appetite for new stories. The holiday story-telling events were much enjoyed by them and the respite appreciated by me. The reading challenges, complete with prizes, encouraged my boys to keep reading, as they grew older and there was more competition for their time. The library system played no small part in helping them both to become university graduates.

I continue to use the libraries in my area for Internet access, which is unreliable where I live, to borrow books and for some of the many other services on offer. I belong to a readers’ group and a writers’ group, both of which meet and are supported by the library. They also hold many and varied events, such as author readings, workshops, a Christmas celebration and take part in the Arts Festivals in the area. They display and promote books and paintings by local people.

In short, libraries are an integral and vital part of our communities. Without them the gulf between rich and poor would be missing important bridges.

Kimm
http://www.kbwalkerwrites.co.uk/

Kimm Walker: self-publishing a memoir

Self-publishing is NOT an easy or cheap option. It is much, much more difficult than submitting to agents and/or publishers. You must believe in your book and in yourself. It will involve lots of research, hard work, marketing and promotion.

The first and most important thing is to make sure your manuscript is the very best it can be. If you’ve ever watched programmes like Britain’s Got Talent, you will recognise the cringingly awful people who have never preformed for anyone other than their family and friends, people with rose-tinted glasses and selective hearing aids. There are plenty of self-published books like that (most of them piled in the authors’ garages) which give the rest of us a bad name. Seek out as much critical feedback as you can, preferably from other authors and readers who enjoy your particular genre.

A word of warning, not everyone will like your work simply because there isn’t a book out there with universal appeal. But if two or more people point out the same weakness, you ought to at least consider if it can be improved.

Once the content is as good as it can be, don’t stint on professional editing so that it is technically as good as it can be, as well. A book with spelling, punctuation or grammatical errors is off-putting and amateurish. There are skills involved in formatting, which are also important, for example gutters (the white space in the centre) and margins (the white spaces at the outside edge of each page). Some of the vanity and POD producers stint on these to save money and it’s not worth it.

People do judge books by their covers. It can be tempting to choose an ‘off-the-peg’ cover but like off-the-peg fashions they are uninspiring. There are websites from which you can purchase photos, like istockphotos, (mine cost £14) then it isn’t quite so expensive to have a graphic designer put it all together.

Print on demand (pod) is less risky than using a printing company to print in bulk but is more expensive per book. That will mean you will have to charge more money per book to cover your costs. Since you are an unknown author your book will have to be relatively cheap or people won’t want to take a chance on buying it if they can buy a cheaper book written by someone they know they like.

When you factor in your costs to determine what price you will have to charge, don’t forget to include the ‘cut’ the shop will have to take. The bigger stores (Waterstones for ex) will only buy books now from the major distributors who also will need to take a cut. It is still possible to sell directly to independent book shops. I sell most of my books at speaking engagements or workshops. With direct sales you can offer the buyer a discount because there isn’t a shopkeeper to pay.

You will need to think carefully about who your audience might be and what you hope to achieve. If you just want to see your book in print and maybe have a few copies for friends and family, pod companies like Lulu will probably be the simplest and most cost effective option. If you think you might be the next GP Taylor, whose self-published Shadowmancer became a best seller, you will have to have a story which will appeal to millions, be prepared to work extremely hard and have an enormous amount of luck.

My memoir, A Life Less Lost, is available via Amazon.co.uk for £6.99 or from Amazon.com for $9.99.

Kimm

http://www.kbwalkerwrites.co.uk
http://kbwalker-lifelesslost.blogspot.com

Kimm Walker: Special people

You know how sometimes you can look at a sunset and think, if someone tried to paint the sky that colour no one would believe it. My relationship with my husband is a bit like that, it’s too ‘Mills and Boon’ to be real. I met him when I came to Barnsley (I told you it was unbelievable) from Western Michigan University, to do a teaching practice on an exchange programme. We knew in less than two weeks we wanted to be married.

It didn’t make any sense to anyone. The dinner ladies at the college were furious that one of their favourites would choose an American when there were so many English ‘Roses’ available (there was a ratio of 12 boys to 500 girls at the college). Our lecturers were terrified they’d be held responsible in some way. And my dad… well, he wrote more letters in those few months than at any other time in his life! The government wasn’t impressed, either, they deported me.

However, in true romance fashion, love prevailed and we’ll celebrate 33 years of marriage on New Year’s Eve. He’s helped me to understand what it is to be British and to see American culture from a different perspective. I think it’s given my writer’s voice an interesting edge.

I’d love to know what others think. If you read my memoir, A Life Less Lost, I hope you’ll let me know.

Visit http://kbwalker-lifelesslost.blogspot.com

Kimm Walker: 'A Life Less Lost' - a memoir

‘You should consider carefully how you wish to spend what time you might have left with James.’

When a mother faces the ultimate threat - the suffering and potential loss of her child - every human resource kicks in, including her faith. A Life Less Lost charts the author’s journey through white coats, misdiagnoses, endless appointments and more. KB Walker connects stories from her American childhood to the traumas that face her very English family to explain the hope that helps her hold her life together.

Here's an excerpt:

Prologue

Wednesday 29 October 1980

‘Gmmn.’ The sound of my own groan is enough to shove me through the bits of dream and sleep fog into wakefulness. Yuck, I’m wet. I’ve wet the bed!

I hurry into our tiny bathroom, disgusted and alarmed. The last time I wet a bed was pre-memory. I don’t understand what’s happening. I’ve been unwell all weekend, achy and weary, but that can’t be it. My first antenatal class will be tonight. The baby isn’t due for six and a half more weeks. I’m frightened.

‘Howard,’ I call from the toilet, ‘something’s wrong. I’ve wet the bed and can’t stop weeing.’

‘You mucky cow,’ he says. The bed creaks. ‘It’s not even six o’clock.’ I hear his head flop back down onto the pillow.

‘Could you phone the hospital to find out what we should do?’ I ask.

‘I’m not going to tell someone my wife can’t stop weeing!’

I dribble down our narrow stone stairs and phone myself.

‘It sounds like your waters have broken,’ the nurse tells me. ‘An ambulance is on the way.’

My repentant husband is suddenly wide awake and rushing about like any new father in a television sit-com. I dress and run a comb through my wild hair. I’m still leaking.
It takes ages for the ambulance to arrive. We live in an old cottage, in a remote village, on the edge of the hospital’s catchment area. The driver suggests Howard lead the way because of his knowledge of the winding country lanes.

Howard speeds off then has to stop and wait for the ambulance, which won’t travel much faster than 30 miles an hour for fear of hastening the arrival of the baby. I waddle into the hospital and the soggy seat of my maternity dress slaps against the back of my legs. I feel like a child that’s had an accident in class. The doctor examines me and says I’m not in labour and it could be another week but I will have to stay in hospital. He sends Howard off to work.

They’re very busy in the maternity ward so I’m put in a bare, little side room on my own. The muscles across my huge bump may not be contracting but I’m struggling with excruciating back pain. I alternate between worrying about the baby and the fact that I don’t know how to relax yet. We’re supposed to learn that at antenatal class, tonight.

I try to think about how much I’ve loved being pregnant, couldn’t wait to ‘show’. Howard and I were both keen that we did everything to help our baby have a good start in life. Neither of us smoked anyway but we cut out alcohol and Howard encouraged me to drink plenty of milk and eat spinach and liver (which I hate).

All the way through my pregnancy I felt I was a month further along than my dates or the doctor indicated. Ultrasound was relatively new and not standard practice. The signposts I read about in the baby books appeared to happen earlier than they should. But you assume doctors know best.

To squash down my rising fear and pain, I try to recall funny things that happened. Like the fact that a couple of my older colleagues at work guessed I was pregnant before I did, when I went off tea and coffee. At least my cravings weren’t too bizarre, family sized tins of rice pudding usually satisfied.

Howard looked younger than his twenty four years, probably due to good health and his golden curls. I remember how upset he was, one day, whilst in the local sandwich shop near where he worked. The woman on the till had asked him when the baby was due and the customer behind almost dropped her shopping.

‘How old are you? she squeaked.

‘Well, how old do you think I am?’ he replied, quite unprepared for her revelation that she thought he was only fifteen.

I found it hilarious and assured him he would be very grateful when he was forty-five and looked thirty-five.

James survived and, for £6.99, this inspiring memoir is available from kbwalkerwrites@yahoo.co.uk and from Amazon.co.uk and Amazon.com.