Rick Goldsmith

Got a big shock today. A nice shock. Visited the local manager of Waterstones in Hereford, a very friendly guy called Billy, to ask about a possible launch event for my novel ‘A More Perfect World’ when it comes out at the end of April this year. He asked me what it was called and my name and I dutifully replied and seconds later lo and behold he’d called it up on the Waterstones database. HOLY WEB-PAGE BATMAN! It had a big page all to itself, ready to be pre-ordered. No cover art yet ( there is still three months to go) but still I gulped. Now this was getting real. All thanks to Nielsen Book database.

Later at home chatting to my family about what we’d all been up to that day I mentioned my visit. Being the complete published novel newbie, I figured Billy had accessed some secret Waterstones catalogue inaccessible to the public but – drum roll – I was so wrong AND THERE IT WAS AGAIN! It’s on Amazon and bookshop.org and other platforms but this is the link I saw: https://www.waterstones.com/book/a-more-perfect-world/rick-goldsmith/9781835742105.

It was fun to see it there and made the whole venture real and very uplifting and just the sort of thing you need to hold on to whenever you’ve been toiling away on a creative endeavour wondering if anyone will like/appreciate/buy/congratulate you on said creative endeavour. It was discombobulating to see the book in the same company, on a web page at least, as Alan Bennett, Richard Osman, Han Kang and Bob Mortimer. A proper Friday treat!

PS: I’ll let you know when launch/signing details are firmed up. Take care ’til next time.