Author Douglas Jackson - Forum Chat - Tomorrow 4 pm to 5 pm Saturday 16th August

Doug Jackson, author of Roman Epic Caligula and a YouWriteOn member, will be answering questions on writing and his publishing experiences. Doug received a 6 figure publishing deal from Random House after developing his story on YouWriteOn.com, and his book is currently in book shops everywhere. Doug is also an assistant editor at The Scotsman newspaper.

Everyone is welcome to ask Doug questions. Doug will be answering member questions asked between 4 to 5 pm on Saturday 16th August first. If there is time he will answer other questions posted before then for members who are not available during the live chat. Questions posted before 4pm tomorrow will appear and be asked tomorrow if time allows.

To post a question, click on the Reply to Topic button. To quote another post, for example because you'd like to ask something about it, click 'Reply to Post'.

Caligula - The Story: Rufus begins a new life that will take him from the seedy underworld of the arena to the court of Caligula, the psychopathic and unpredictable Emperor of Rome. Here, he and his friend, the gladiator Cupido, become entangled in a plot to assassinate the young Emperor. Can a slave decide the fate of Rome? View Best Novel Prices

We hope members will enjoy this opportunity to learn about the process a writer goes through from start through to publishing and entering bookstores and, even once a writer has 'made it', what the challenges are with being in a bookstore amongst the other writers. Hopefully as time goes by we will also see a community of published writers sharing experiences and assisting each other in various ways so this is a good opportunity to make contact with Doug and fellow writers.

Everyone is welcome to join in.

Hi Doug,

It's said that authors today have to be prepared to take on more promotional activity than in the past. Could you tell us what involvement you've had in marketing the book? Is your input more, or less, than you'd anticipated?

Lorraine
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Hi! Huge congratulations on the success of your book!

Did you have to do a lot of reworking once you had an HC editor on board? I've heard from an insider that these days agents and publishers look for manuscripts that are more or less perfect rather than committing to working on them with new authors. Does this reflect your own experience?

Thanks!

Hi Doug,

Huge congrats on your success with Caligula. It's a cracking read.

My question is, now that you're a published writer do the demands of your publisher/agent as well as the time constraints of writing a sequel and other books put you under any pressure to "give up the day job" and do writing full time? Presumably balancing writng and your newspaper job has become that bit more difficult now.

Bob

Hi Lorraine, so far it has been less than I expected. I thought there'd be a lot more organised stuff like radio interviews, but just about everything I've done I've actually organised myself, apart from the launch, which Transworld organised with Blackwells and was a great success. I think I've done half a dozen newspaper interviews and one radio interview. Oh, and I've put up quite a few signed copies as prizes which I think is a good way to connect with readers.