BLOG 5

It’s quite surreal when your dreams come true. After so many years of working on The Fifth Bullet, to see it in print and have other people enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it, is such a euphoric feeling.

Every year, I said ‘this is the year I’m going to do it.’ But each time, life events took over or I found I needed to re-write or tweak some more, and it never happened. But 2024 is the year I can finally say I DID IT!

I would like to make this blog a bit of a dedication blog, because there are a few people who helped to make it all possible.

Firstly to the Creative Minds Writers group run by the author NV Peacock. Their advice and recommendations for improvement were invaluable. Especially Maira and Martin P who did an absolutely fantastic job as Beta Readers. Secondly to the friends and family who read the book and gave honest feedback (Mr Cooke, Angie, Lyn, Margaret, Martin B). And thirdly to all the amazing freelancers that helped to bring this lifetime dream to fruition:

• Olivia for the amazing book cover for The Fifth Bullet, who also designed my social media banners, bookmarks, leaflets and logo. @oliviaprodesign

• Charlotte who as an independent Beta Reader that did not know me or my work but who completely understood my characters and gave some extremely helpful advice for last minute improvements. @cwcharlotte

• Shah who did a brilliant type-setting job to format the inside of my book. @shah_nawaz17

• Melissa who designed this awesome website, capturing my branding and bringing the site to life. @melissa_tom

I really cannot say thank you enough. For someone who has been a collector of words all her life, I’m struggling to find enough words of gratitude that portray how thankful I am! They’ll never know how much this means to me.

I found all the freelancers on Fiverr. To anyone out there who would like to self-publish, but are feeling daunted by the prospect of having to do the formatting or design the perfect front cover, or like me and have no website building experience whatsoever…I thoroughly recommend finding freelancers that can do it for you. Look closely at the reviews, and try to stick to at least level 1 or level 2 sellers, this way you know they’ve had a set amount of sales and are a trusted seller. But there are plenty to choose from and they all have remarkable skills to share with you.