A Hard Act - the Origins of a Book
- R.C.Blyth
- Apr 14
- 5 min read
Updated: Apr 12
Newsletter 6. April. 2025
Stay in touch, read behind the scenes, and learn about the writer–author's journey—progress through the art of communication.
Where back stories are revealed - this month - A HARD ACT TO FOLLOW
My latest book was released on 14th April. There is always pleasure in producing something yourself, from creating a plot and a storyline to writing and then making the book yourself in different formats.
The story broadly follows my career as a podiatrist, but it was conceived twenty years ago as 'In the Shadow of Hippocrates'. I sat down and created several versions; should I use the first person or the third person?
A Story About People
It was one thing to tell a story with a chronology. Although this made complete sense, it was important to make this more of a novel than an autobiography. Being privileged to have known many academics, it came down to talking about people and characters embroidered to represent the heart of the tale.
Then, there was factual evidence. Should I use real names or not? After all, they all existed. Then there were the locations. My career took me all over the UK, and it seemed important to focus on one central location and create a few redial bubbles around it.
It would be impossible to fit a career spanning forty years into a book, so I decided to focus on the path to becoming a qualified foot surgeon. This cut down the timeline, although I added an epilogue which provided what happened 12 years after the main storyline finishes.
Original Publication
My book was important to me, and I had taken years to achieve a draft that I felt provided justice for my efforts but as much a profession which today has had a stellar rise. After many deliberations, the title, PODIATRIST ON A MISSION, was agreed upon. I came up with a cover which reflected the man I had been, ironically, a picture taken at the top of the Empire State Building in 1981.
As my career drove the book, should the protagonist be ME—David, or should I be someone else? Should my author’s name be Tollafield or someone else? My editor, Brit Collins, did a brilliant job on developmental editing, crafting my ideas, making them better, and shaping the style. It was my story, but the fine-tuning was great.
The book went out on Amazon KDP in January 2021, but by March, I decided on a change in the prologue. A year on the book cover clearly was not working. A year later I changed the cover to see if that made a difference.
Events that Affect Decisions
The book had some great reviews from many sources, but for some reason, the uptake was disappointing, although I admit I did little advertising of the book. The sales were slow, but they could have been worse.
My primary audience was podiatry, but the book conveyed a story about surgery, which was not. Only 2% of podiatrists are qualified to undertake bone and joint foot surgery, so the audience was even smaller for this branch of podiatry.
My wife found an advert for publisher Austin Macauley. I had tried agents, but none had picked up, so when AM came along after initially rejecting the book, they became excited and wanted the entire manuscript. I have an internal write-up that conveys precisely the message I wanted—a story with a heartfelt theme, comedy and conflict, and sadness for loss.
The book was re-published in March 2024 while I was abroad working on another novel. Whistles and bells sounded, and everything seemed perfect until the penny dropped!
Austen Macauley was a hybrid publisher. As I researched more and became part of a writers's group, the word hybrid was very much a loose term and shunned by my community. I had paid to have my book published on a shared contract, but as the months went by, there was no marketing. Having removed my prized book from Amazon under Busypencilcase Communications, I held the copyright but was stuck. It was a question of hoping the brand of AM would help. It didn't. With even worse sales (allegedly) than I had achieved come December 2024.
When the cards are down
Shit happens, and you just have to deal with it. I reviewed my options and looked at the situation.
Remove myself from Austen Macauley.
Publish 'Mission" back on Amazon.
Re-write the book to bring a different slant.
Create a new title.
Change the cover.
Friends advocated legal action, which was a bad idea given that AM had not done anything illegal. They just preyed on work and used this to make money. It's time to move on and bite the bullet!
I republished Mission under my official name; after all, there was nothing wrong with the book. I had done the editorial work correctly and designed the cover with my designer, so why not? Unfortunately, Amazon could not reassign my ebook version, only the paperback and hardback. Worse still, some nasty organised crime group clone the books. This was something I was acutely aware of, having been down that road before.
Solution to cloning
I bought both books, reviewed them, gave them a bad score and wrote these were cloned and copies with evidence and they were removed.
A Hard Act
I engaged a new editor for the bits I decided to add on making this expand to 93,000 words and have it a colourful epilogue.
The book went through more title thoughts but came out as A HARD ACT TO FOLLOW. I enaged a wonderful cover designers called Adam and we spend several hours discussing the best cover design. Stuart, who is a lovely guy and helpful looked over the add ons. You can read his thoughts in a newsletter post (Newsletter 3).
A Hard Act to Follow, has been re-edited around the fictional character Chris Harwood; okay he's still David, but I have gone back to one of my original ideas; should I use me or another name.
Having published a book of short stories October 2024, I decided to switch to a fictional name - R.C.Blyth. The book is dedicated to the same man, Robert Charles Blyth (1886-1941), my grandfather who I never met. His only surviving daughter, Ann, who now lives in Canada, was proud to give her assent.
I feel as an author I have come full circle, but in the end feel launch day still will make me as pleased to have completed my first major novel. How much is fact and how much fiction, I'll let the reader decide. For now I am looking at an audio version, so watch this space.
A HARD ACT TO FOLLOW is now available from Amazon Books and published by Busypencilcase Communications & Publishing.
Please Note
PODIATRIST ON A MISSION is still available and reviews can be seen on my other webiste - davidtollafieldauthor.com
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