Saturday was the first in-person literary event I’ve been involved with since before Covid, and consequently, since I made my move north to live full-time in the Scottish Highlands.

The Kilted Scribblers (gotta love that name!) are a new group, formed by a couple of ladies who live near me (one in the same village), and so I was extremely fortunate that this event was right on my doorstep – 8 miles away, to be precise I actually lived closer to the venue than anyone else!

As a book fair celebrating indie authors, only self published books were allowed, so this was an outing for my novels only.

Here we are, setting up on a lovely, warm sunny morning in the Victoria Hall in Cromarty

I’ve learned at this type of event that wearing eyecatching outfits is the best move, so I dug out my mothballed t-shirt from the London 2012 Olympics. Considering this is an Olympic year, it felt quite appropriate.

Here I am with my wares on display. Another thing I’ve learned is to display books on several different levels – book boxes draped with towels make excellent free stands.

And although I posed for photos behind the table, I spent my time in front of it, to more easily snare, er, engage passers by. I also wore another layer for the warmer part of the day, equally eye-catching, as is my lovely banner.

The bright hair and dragon earrings also do a good job of catching people’s attention!

Now, over the last couple of years I have updated a couple of my covers, but I still had paperback stock with the original covers, and it occured to me this would be a great place to sell them.

Old covers on the left, current covers on the right

The fair was a good day for me. Cromarty (I will do a post on Cormarty next) is a small village at the end of a peninsula, so you have to want to go there. It is a tourist destination, but most visitors were locals, which means a low level of footfall. I’m always pleased if I sell a handful of books, and all things considered, I was chuffed to sell 10 paperback books and do a whole heap of networking with the other authors. I can hope those who bought THE PRINCE’S MAN will go on and order the others in the series, although one smart individual bought all four books at the special offer price for the day.

An interesting point for me was which covers people chose. Without fail, they all chose the current cover of THE PRINCE’S MAN, and the old cover of DESPRITE MEASURES.

I do love that old cover of DM, but it wasn’t selling well on Amazon – the font is hard to read, and that lovely image of Cassie’s bare back falls outside the ‘Zon’s advertising standards, which rules out any naked torsos on adverts.

I am, however, wondering if it’s possible to have the new cover for the ebook, and still keep the old one for the paperback? Anyone have any ideas on that notion?