Using the solar panel at Laggan changed the dynamics of working there as long as you could see the sky occasionally. Unfortunately, that happened less and less as time went by. I could write, but only using paper or one of the power-miser devices I have. As soon as I needed the laptop, things would start to fall apart if the weather was against me. And yes, the weather was against me. It was quite astonishing to open the door day after day to another bout of rain.

Writers have their rituals and I am of the type who can work long hours for months at a time as long as the spell is not broken. The frustration of not being able to work on something so close to the end is maddening. Even so, I did enjoy being there and particularly meeting the steady trickle of intrepid walkers exploring the coast.

As winter brings shorter days, the chance of using the laptop falls with each week. For this reason, I am striking out in my van/car to tour Scotland. I will load up with books and spread them far and wide in many of my favourite places. By embracing the limitations of light I will use the time better to complete The Honesty Project. At the end of this process I will be in a position to publish Book Two and close to completing the first draft of Three.

I’m looking forward to this phase as I have no idea what lies ahead. I like that.

Resurfacing after a marathon writing session.

The Journal is out to readers and Book Three is well under way. Writing from Laggan is both a priviledge and a challenge. On one hand, I get the freedom to work and on the other, I get to meet lots of wonderful people. With no roads to this spot, you really have to want to be here and so the attitude of those you meet is one of enthusiasm and positivity.

After changing my phone, I find the stray signal coming across the sea from Bute a little weak. The connection is unreliable and this means that I end up sucking the battery dry every time I’m on the Net.

While this gives me an excuse to just write, I know it needs fixed. For that reason I’ve just ordered a new solar panel. I just wish there was a rain-powered energy device… all my power problems would be over!

It should be up and running in a couple of weeks.

In the meantime, if anyone with a Kindle wishes to read a pre-publication version of The Journal and is willing to give honest feedback, please mail me and I’ll happily send you your very own copy.

Glasgow is such a cool place. I spent most of yesterday in and around my old university, leaving books on the streets for people to pick up. Around 350 were taken and, if popular opinion of students and young people are to be believed, they will disappear without a trace. I would not have done such a crazy thing if I believed that.

If we were to swallow the image handed to us by common view, the young will pay for nothing unless you watch them closely. They are drugged-up, violent layabouts who think the world owes them a living.

It’s easy to take a few stories from around the country and apply the ‘lesson’ to everyone in the room. The truth is that students today have to try harder than we did way back then. They do not have the support we took for granted and competition is beyond belief. This makes them sharper. They are connected and switched-on. My bet is that many will ‘get it’ and respond to what I’m trying to do.

It’s the biggest gamble of my life. We shall see.

It’s bad enough when you forget the milk but over the past few days I’ve been playing book-mule, hauling a box of sixty at a time on my back. I took this photo yesterday. The rainbow’s end was better than gold – a cup of tea and a decompressed back. If only I’d brought the milk.

I reached another landmark yesterday, too. 400 payments exactly. A huge thank you to everyone. All those honest people. It’s quite humbling.

And ‘they’ said I was mad… (Well, OK, maybe just a bit).

Principle proven, I am in the mood for another experiment. I can play it safe and build Dreamwords’ readership steadily over a number of years or take an enormous sink-or-swim risk.

Now, where’s that coin?

Now I’ve got some kind of handle on what works and what doesn’t, I’ve gone into writing mode to take advantage of the quiet winter to come. With an almost 30% rate from Lanark and Arran, I should concentrate on trying to learn from that. With 7,500 copies to go, if I can get anywhere close to that result, the project will be an astonishing success. The thing is that being a quiet island, I won’t shift many books in the cold months. Given the honesty of the people here and the fact that many love the book, I am happy to compromise.

This means that I can write at the same time as I slowly spread the word to let more potential readers know about the project.

Book Three is now underway and I’m loving it!

In the past few weeks, I’ve been working on a number of experiments. I had to be patient because results from the festival would determine which experiment would take priority going forward. It is astonishing that payments from Laggan are still coming in. Last week I received money from two people who each picked up a copy from there on different days in May! With that in mind, it is always possible that the Edinburgh phase might suddenly take off. Over 300 people have now paid and the project is still on track, but payments from the festival are slower than I’d hoped for. The project is still on target simply because Laggan was so successful that it could withstand a downturn.

The takeaway lesson is one that any businessman could have told me – targeting is all. As I write, there is almost a factor of ten between the rate from Laggan and Edinburgh. This is a blow because I had hoped to use Edinburgh as a model to speed up distribution. The signs are that if I repeated such a scatter-gun give-away in other cities, the project would soon be in jeopardy.

With such a fabulous return, it seems obvious that I should stick with Arran but, with winter on its way, there will be no-one passing the cottage for months. With Laggan at its core, I will be able to build on the success there but only starting in the spring. It is tempting to switch to writing-mode, get book two out and continue building the series by working on the draft of book three. That is the sensible thing to do and my preferred route. The story is burning in my head and I want to get it out there.

The other option is to figure out a way to match the targeting associated with Laggan that can also scale and is not seasonal. I’m in the middle of preparing the ground for such an experiment and pretty excited by it because it has the potential to positively impact someone else’s life. Before I can try it however, I have to perform some due diligence. That is my task for this week.

Taking initial steps on Facebook to spread the word. First job is to get 25 people to ‘Like’ the Dreamwords fan page. If you are a member of that social organ and wish to help me, you can find the page here:

Dreamwords Community Page

The aim is twofold:

To find 7,500 people in the UK who want a copy of The Honesty Edition

and

To spread the word about the project and the eBook honesty version on my site

I don’t have any doubt that it’s going to be tough, but here goes…

One of the sites I visit daily posted an article I’d written about The Honesty Edition. Really pleased to see it on such a cool site – Teleread

Things have been so busy lately that I’m finding it difficult to get into Laggan. Normally this would not be an issue, but I’m dying to see for myself the results of the Honesty Box I left there. I posted in an earlier entry that many people had left money as they took a book from outside the cottage. Five of them emailed me to say that the box was unprotected and full of cash. A friend emptied it for me and then left, returning about two weeks later to find the books gone and another stash of cash lying in an otherwise large empty toy-box. He emptied it again and put the spoils inside the cottage. It appears that when all the books were taken, the cash was left on its own outside the cottage – probably for well over a week. When my friend arrived there, there were almost 30 people having lunch on the grass outside and I suspect that hundreds had passed in that period. And yet no one touched the money. To be clear – this is a large, brightly coloured container capable of holding 110 books. I put it at the intersection of paths so that no one could miss it and slapped a sign on the lid declaring that it was an HONESTY BOX and that people should open it.

Isn’t that cool? Thank you, all.

Much as I wanted to go to the Eden Festival, I was just too late. Next year!

I’m writing an article for one of my favourite sites – teleread. I’ve already posted the relevant details to the newsletter but this will be the first time on the open web. I’ve benefited from other authors posting information in the past and so I’m keen to repay that openness by doing the same – passing it forward, so to speak.

I have two ideas for the next phase and I will talk about them once I settle on which is the priority. Have a good weekend.

Paul

The festival was successful on so many levels that it would be easy to forget that the ultimate test is yet to come and I truly have no idea what will happen. I remain hopeful and extremely positive but will not rely on the success or failure of one part of the project to dictate the whole. So, as my fingernails take a hammering, I work on the next phase. I have a number of ideas but the favoured one at the moment is to go to the Eden Festival near Dumfries to pass out some more books at the weekend. I only found out about it yesterday from an artist in Edinburgh so it might be too late. I’m working on it.

In the meantime, a young lady (Valeria) from the National Library of Scotland posted a cool entry on the NLS blog. Thanks, Valeria.