Self publishing versus vanity publishing

I have now finished the draft of a thriller, yet to be finally named. Like my previous non-fiction book, God's Triangle, it will be self published, or indie published, if you prefer. There was a time not long ago when any self published book was considered a vanity project. Often it was a vanity project, of course, but sometimes it was just a book that was intended for limited distribution.

Things has changed dramatically in recent years. If some established and reputable publisher were to make me an attractive offer, I would consider it. Meantime, my book will already be out in the wide world and on sale, rather than sitting in some publisher's in-tray for months on end. Also, the marketing and everything else about the book will remain totally under my control.

The growth of self-publishing has, inevitably, resulted in a lot of unreadable rubbish being inflicted on the market -- mostly because of authors who arrogantly believe their work to be beyond improvement. Consequently, they publish it without seeking the opinion of potential readers (known as beta readers), let alone allowing their words to be professionally proofed and edited. But that is rapidly changing, not least because of the encouragement and growing power of independent publishing groups such as the Independent Alliance of Authors. This organisation encourages its authors to produce writing of the highest quality by getting their books properly proofed and edited. Some poor books will still slip through the net, but let's face it, there is a lot of literary trash out there that has gone through the traditional vetting and publishing route.

For more on the subject of self-publishing, go to this London Guardian article.

The "evils" of dancing

Religions of many persuasions have had difficulties with dancing -- certainly the sort of dancing in which male and female made physical contact. Some religions have been ambivalent; others has been quite hostile. Even so, I was surprised at the intense animosity to dancing shown by my Gx3 uncle, the Rev. Francis W. Cox, one-time head of the Congregational Church in South Australia when it was still a British colony.

My surprise was because in many ways he was a radical clergyman and someone many decades ahead of his time. For instance, he was a great supporter of Aboriginal culture and did not believe that Australia's Aborigines should be forced to adopt British cultural ways. He also believed that state school education should be entirely secular, even to him opposing religious education classes and the placing of Christian bibles in school.

However, dancing was obviously another matter, as recounted in this extract on Dancing and Other Sins from Geoffrey Haydon Manning's out-of-print book A Colonial Experience - 1938-1910:

The Clergy Intervenes

In 1881 a youth hung himself 'under the influence of fear of detection of his peculations [theft] on his master's property' and it was alleged by Reverend F.W. Cox that 'the departure of this unhappy youth from the paths of rectitude was caused by his frequenting a dancing saloon in the neighbourhood.'  The same gentleman went on to describe some of the places of amusement:

There is in North Adelaide occupied by men said to be of no repute, to which any girls can go free, the young men paying one shilling for admittance... In South Adelaide there is a house open to the lowest type of both sexes and several others are being opened in the city and suburbs.

He concluded a long epistle with a plea:

Of what use are our efforts as ministers of the gospel, as Sunday school teachers, as instructors of the young, if hot-beds of vice are allowed to spring up and flourish among us? The sad story of the [suicidal youth], which made the hearts of many to bleed, is but the natural outcome of such places of unhallowed resort.

Another correspondent, under the pen name of 'Reform', cast aspersions upon the Globe Casino which he accused of being frequented by 'young men of the larrikin tribe', who discussed points as to partners in the dance 'in a most indecent manner.' The proprietor, Arthur F. Mills, took exception to the general tenor of both correspondents and said that 'it was detrimental to my character that such insinuations should be thrown out, as I know for a fact that only respectable young men and women visit our room.'

Further correspondence followed, some defending and others deprecating the existence of such establishments. Upon a careful perusal of the latter I found that they might fairly be divided into two classes - the one objecting to the existence of dancing saloons as inimical to the proper training of the youth of the present generation, and the other protesting more particularly against the gross indecency and the wrongful temptations to young people of both sexes, which were said to arise from the establishment of the saloons.

In what follows it must be understood that I do not attempt to deal in any way with the point raised by the former class of objectors. I do not propose to enter into any controversy as to whether public dancing saloons are not, under any circumstances, injurious to young people. My mission was carried out solely with a view of ascertaining whether there was a truth in the allegations that had already been made as to the improprieties which were supposed to be carried on at the saloons.

With this object I paid several visits to those saloons that were open to the public, and also attempted, but unsuccessfully, to gain admission to one or two which, if reports were true, were merely dancing brothels. As to the latter I have little to say. At one place I was refused admission and at the other, although I and my companion from the detective office, knocked a great many times, no notice was taken.

The room was lighted and the sound of music and of pattering feet showed, however, that dancing was going on within. There were no two opinions as to the desirability of closing places such as these. They were undoubtedly the cause of great evil. As to the women who attended these places, it could not be imagined that any of them were pure. Leaving those unsalutary places of resort I proceeded to visit the public dancing saloons - they were three in number.

I have since been told by a Baptist friend that some Baptist church halls in Australia had sloping floors so that they could not be used for dancing. She also told me that some Baptists in South Australia were once censored for attending an official ball to mark a visit by a member of the British royal family.

The Rev. Cox died in 1904 long before the invention of television, so I can only imagine what his reaction might have been if he had witnessed the deliberately-erotic and provocative performances on BBC's Strictly Come Dancing or its overseas franchised version Dancing with the Stars.

Finally an old joke: A conservative clergyman is preparing a young couple for their marriage and gets onto the subject of s-e-x. "One thing I should warn you against," he said. "Do not ever engage in love-making while in the standing position as this could lead to dancing."

A political ambition thankfully unattained - UPDATED

The publicity about the Netflix remake of the political thriller "House of Cards reminded how much I enjoyed the original BBC series featuring my fine actor namesake, Ian Richardson. I was working at BBC Television Centre at the time and much of his fanmail came to my office without any indication whether it was for me or the actor until it was opened. I would forward the fanmail to the other Ian and we exchanged several friendly letters, although we never met.

Not ever having received fanmail in my own right (why the hell not?) I found some of the other Ian's mail amusing. My favourite was this one from a young man in Kent who thought Ian's character -- the evil, manipulated Francis Urquhart -- was a man to be admired:

"Ever since I was eleven years old I have been interested in Politics. The Character you play, Prime Minister Francis Urquhart, is I feel is quite excellent. I want to become Prime Minister when I grow up and it is your character that has given me added inspiration to go for my goal. I would be very greatful [sic] and most happy if you would perhaps send me your Autograph or perhaps a signed Photograph of yourself. I really admire you Mr Richardson as Francis Urquhart."

I have Googled the writer of the letter and I am happy to report that, so far at least, he has failed in his ambition to become a politician, let alone Prime Minister. Indeed, I can find no trace of him at all. He seems to have remained in well-deserved obscurity.

LATER ADDITION: After writing this post I was reminded that there was one other particularly amusing fanmail letter for Ian. It was from an American with the surname Urquhart and suggesting that he was probably related to Francis Urquhart. He seemed to be under the impression that the House of Cards was a documentary, rather than a work of total fiction.

An above-Everage honour

Strewth! I'm a Dame Edna favourite!

Just before Christmas, I posted a fairly routine tweet about Dame Edna Everage appearing on BBC Radio Four's Today Programme. Now, after all this time, I get this message (see below). Can there be any greater honour for an Australian?

Top of Form

Back in the Dim Dark Ages (the 1970s) I used to freelance as the London correspondent for Australia's TV Week magazine. I got to know Barry Humphries a bit before he became seriously famous outside Australia. Sometimes when I would ring him, "Edna" would answer the phone and tell me that "Mr Humphries is busy just at the moment, but he will call you back as soon as he is free" -- and he would, returning the call as himself. 

We would sometimes chat about his Private Eye strip, The Adventures of Barry McKenzie, and make up deliberately-crude Aussie sayings. One of these, I remember, was "Go stick your head up a dead bear's bum". 

On one occasion, at a social function in London, Barry/Edna agreed to do a radio interview (for 3AW, Melbourne, I think) and the only quiet place we could find was the men's toilet. Fortunately, no-one burst in on us during the interview, as there would have been a lot of explaining to do.

Barry never liked being interviewed as Edna unless dressed in character. However, on this occasion I remember that he was wearing a dinner jacket. I wish I still had that interview, but it was back in the days when 1/4" recording tape was expensive and was bulk erased after being broadcast. However, I still have a copy of one interesting (mostly serious) interview with Barry done in January 1970 before he became seriously famous. 

A mystery solved, but only after a long investigation

I was mystified why my mother, then living in Melbourne, Australia, wasn’t keen to talk about my missionary great aunt Florence “Florrie” Cox, whom we found pictured in this old photograph. My journalistic curiosity set me off on a 10-year investigation that led to my battling the Victorian Supreme Court in Melbourne to gain access to Florrie's divorce files which had been mysteriously and uniquely marked “Closed for all time”.

When the file was eventually shown to me, I discovered that my aunt had a very rare gender condition that had passed unnoticed in an era when the discussion of anything related to sex was considered a total taboo.

An affair by her husband with a fellow missionary caused such scandal that the Australian Baptist Church, with the co-operation of the court, the Freemasons and the media, mounted a hugely-successful cover-up.

My account of the investigation is revealed in God’s Triangle, available here in paperback or Kindle ebook: http://www.godstriangle.com/   

A detective story dilemma

I have a particular problem with marketing and publicising my book God's Triangle. Briefly, the book is a chronological diary of my investigation into why there was such a mystery surrounding the break-up of my missionary Great Aunt Florence "Florrie" Cox's marriage. After a long battle that went all the way to the Supreme Court of Victoria, Melbourne, I discovered both the cause of the marriage breakdown and why the Baptist Church, the press and the Supreme Court colluded in a cover-up. Put simply, it is a true detective story.

The book reveals the cause of the marriage failure, but should potential readers be told this before they buy it? Before you react with "of course not", let me say that I fear I am missing out on a significant number of buyers with an interest and/or involvement in intersex issues by not explaining that Florrie was born with a very rare intersex condition and had no vagina.

When in Australian recently, I did a talk to a genealogy group and decided that I would reveal Florrie's problem -- the first time I had done so at a book talk. Despite this reveal, I sold all my books.

For various reasons not worth recounting, quite a few readers of God's Triangle did know about Florrie's problem beforehand. I asked a selection of them whether this had spoiled their enjoyment of the story. Most said it didn't because they enjoyed reading about it in more detail and because of the story's several other aspects. These included the explanation of how an intelligent and sensible person had been able to reach womanhood without knowing about menstruation or having any real idea how babies were made, how her husband and his second wife had been able to eradicate seven years from their troubled past while rising to become pillars of society, and how the scandal cover-up was organised.

God's Triangle is currently in development in Australia as a feature film and the producers have already decided that the audience should be told about Florrie's problem at an early stage. I think that is the right decision. It should mean that audiences feel emotionally engaged throughout, watching Florrie and her husband struggling to cope with a situation they don't fully understand. We shall see!

Feel free to offer your views, either on this page, or by contacting me by email at books@richardsonmedia.co.uk

If you wish to buy God's Triangle, here are the links for the paperback and the ebook.

Wonthaggi, Australia: fond thoughts of a warm welcome

Although I spent just the first four years of my life in Wonthaggi, I have a tremendous fondness for the former coal mining town in Gippsland, Victoria. It is where my Scottish grandfather, John S. Richardson, a mining engineer, put down his roots after emigrating to Australia following the First World War. I never knew him because he died about two years before I was born, but from all reports, he was an entertaining and talented character with an interesting history. His death was brought about at the very early age of 54 by illnesses he caught when serving with the military in the Middle East. He was buried in the Wonthaggi Cemetery.

My father, also called John S. Richardson, was 10 when he arrived in Wonthaggi and after completing his schooling, he became an apprentice printer and later a reporter with the Wonthaggi Sentinel.

I was recently invited back to Wonthaggi by the local historical society to give a talk about my book, God's Triangle, which is currently being developed as a feature film. I was surprised at the large turnout for the talk, and I had a most enjoyable interaction with the audience. This is how the local newspaper, now called the South Gippsland Sentinel-Times, reported the visit:

And here's a story written about God's Triangle published in the South Gippsland Sentinel-Times of June 20, 2012:

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