A Man Melting: One Month To Go!

I last gave a proper update on the progress of my short story collection towards publication back in August. As of today, it's one month until the official release date.

Dun dun dun.

Since August the book cover has been finalised (with embossing and uv tinted foils it should look better in real life than online -- or at least different), my photographic genius of a brother took my author's photo, I wrote the Acknowledgements section and went through the final proofs of the manuscript.

Sometime around Jan/Feb, the release date got pushed back from May to July for promotional reasons. (What's another two months when you've been waiting two twenty-seven years?).

I also filled out a questionnaire for the Random House promotions team and am now playing a waiting game to see if they get me any interviews etc.

In terms of self-promotion, I've set up a website (craigcliff.com) which doesn't really contain anything new if you've visited this blog, but well, it's called craigcliff.com, which is kinda cool (or kinda conceited, *shrugs*).

I've also set up a page on facebook for A Man Melting (someone will "like" me any minute now), and have done most of the organising for my book launch, which will be on Thursday 1 July here in Wellington (details on craigcliff.com, of course).

And as I've mentioned before, my book is starting to pop up in places online (but of course you can't buy it just yet). To all you early-adopting Kobo owners out there, you'll have to wait beyond July for the eBook version (not many NZ publishers seemed ready for Whitcoulls eBook store), but it may happen one day.

That's the grass on A Man Melting to date. Books are due from the printers the second week of June (egads!). Over the next few weeks I'm going to experiment with mini ice sculptures (kinda like this, but less awesome), to see if they'd work for my book launch. (I suspect it will just provide fodder for self-deprecating blog posts and photos of hilarious failed attempts, but we'll see).

Once the book comes out, the only firm public appearance I have slated is alongside fellow debut short story book-er Tina Makereti, chaired by David Geary, as part of the IIML's Writer's on Mondays. Our session will be 12.15pm, 16 August, Te Papa. Any book festivals, book groups, book reviewers, book bloggers, book-whatever that want a piece of me, leave a comment or email me at thecraigcliff(at)gmail(dot)com.