‘An End of Beginnings’ was published on 1st June 2016.

Finally, after 5 years of writing, editing and researching what to do with it, I have self-published this novel.

All the learning about how to publish the book with the best chance of success was new to me. I’ve learnt a lot about producing physical copies, cover design, editing and marketing.

I found getting to grips with marketing the hardest thing to learn – I know I made a mistake this time around and the book probably won’t sell many copies at first, but I’m hoping to correct that when I publish ‘Dead Snow’ in 2017.

The marketing resources I found particularly useful include the following:

• “Reader Magnets” by Nick Stephenson
• “Email Marketing Demystified” by Matthew Paulson
• “Book Launch Marketing” by Theodore Roach
• “Self-Publishing on Createspace” by Dr Andy Williams
• “Beyond the Page” by Andrew Purdum”

The following Facebook groups:
• ‘Fiction Writers’, ‘Aspiring Authors’,
• ‘Self-Publishing and Book Marketing’,
• ‘Indie Science Fiction Writers’, ‘Pat’s First Kindle Book’

• and Dan Dynneson’s “The Best-Selling Fiction Podcast”
… the mistakes I made with launching ‘An End of Beginnings’ are all my own – the advice from these people was very good!

However, I am very proud of what I have achieved with this book. Sometimes you have to take a chance and have a go, even when you know it won’t be perfect. That’s a very hands-on way of quickly learning. A couple of years ago I was lucky to listen to a talk by Jim Lawless on self-motivation and entrepreneurialism that he calls ‘Taming Tigers’ (see jimlawless.com for more information). Jim really inspired me to get on with turning this story into a published novel and 3 pieces of his advice resonated strongly:

       • Act boldly today – time is limited,
       • Head in the direction of where you want to arrive, every day,
      • There is no safety in numbers.

My thanks to all those inspirational writers, influencers and advisors who helped me to think this book through to reality!