Happy Birthday the Fox Spirit Skulk
The process of getting up and running took place over May and June last year with the first book going live on the 4th July 2012, but our first blog post went up on the 2nd June 2012, so we were officially a year old yesterday. You should all get yourselves a cake and pop a candle in it to celebrate. I will be.
I spent the birthday doing the 2012/13 year accounts so I thought today I’d give you all a bit of a round up of the year. Lessons learned and a few highlights from the figures, that sort of thing.
I have learned that things do not go to plan. Even if I control every thing perfectly (which I don’t) then there will still be delays and hiccups and more changes to make.
I’ve learned that no matter how many people go through a document and no matter how many times there will always be one or two errors that sneak in. The largest of which was half the final story in Nun & Dragon being missing when the ebook first went live. If anyone who bought it never got the updated download (Kindle were supposed to make this available automatically) then let me know and I will send it to you btw.
I’ve learned that I will always take a bad review personally, even if I can find nothing of truth or merit in what it says. It is a fact that while I am being all cool and telling my authors to shrug it off, I am taking it out on pads or an opponent later. These books are your babies, but I believe in them and love them like my own.
I’ve learned that there are a huge number of amazingly talented people who are willing to be incredibly generous with their time and talent for whatever the budget will allow, just because they like the project, or the people or just feel like it. I believe very strongly that people should be paid for their work, but I am eternally grateful that people are willing to negotiate to help a start up like this get going.
Fox Spirit wouldn’t be anything but an idea without all the people but time and talent into it, submitting, formatting, creating artwork, editing, reviewing, just talking about our books, and so on. Thank you.
I’ve learned there is a much greater appetite for writing and reading short stories than I had imagined.
There are plenty of other things, but those are always at the top of my list.
Now the years figures.
Well Fox Spirit is running at a significant loss at present. That’s ok, I knew it would in the first year or so. The upside is I shouldn’t have to pay any taxes. Happy Days.
In our first year we published nine books. Two Novels, four novellas, one non fiction and two anthologies. We’ve had one guest editor published and two more in the works.
So far the best sellers have been Weird Noir and Pseudopod, level pegging at the end of the financial year and both Weird Noir and Pseudopod have had a small number of sales in Euros as well as £ and $. Nun & Dragon sold the most physical copies.
The anthologies and essays are overall moving faster with the novels and novellas going more slowly. I presume this is due to more people being involved in spreading the word. So folks, help spread the word we have starving authors who need your love. Not to mention starving artists and Editors.
We have had lots of positive reviews and I will update the press page shortly, so if you’ve reviewed something and it’s not up already let me know and I’ll add it. If you’d like to review us also drop me a line on adele@ foxspirit. co.uk
Our second year will be just as busy if not more so. There are three titles waiting in the wings to break into the world any moment a couple of novels committed to, Fox Pockets, more Noir, more Bushy Tales and general mayhem to unleash.
Keep an eye on our submissions page for what we are up to and follow us on twitter @foxspiritbooks or facebook to make sure you don’t miss anything.
