Somebody's bought trouble!

A week ago or so I was wondering if anyone had actually read The Trouble with Sauce. Obviously someone has as I've just heard from the publishers that they are doing a reprint - already. Officially it was only launched last week, although it was in the shops before that. Kids books do have much smaller print runs that adult books but this is great news and very unexpected. Good grief, this one might actually earn out its advance!

A big thank you to all the Harper Collins reps who clearly did a great job selling it into the book shops!

In good company

A friend tipped me off that The Trouble with Sauce was featured in a window display in Better Read than Dead, the excellent independent bookshop in Newtown. I trundled down on the weekend and was delighted to see the book was front and centre of a display protesting Parallel Importing, quoting the Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd’s ocker line, Fair Shake of the Sauce Bottle asking him to give Australian authors a fair go. For once it seems timing is on my side to release a ‘sauce-themed’ book! It’s relief to see your book on the shelves in a bookshop - it’s a delight to see it in a window - especially when your publisher didn’t pay for it and every other book in the window is certified best-seller. I’ve never been in such great company. So when I said in an early post everyone should run to the shops for the book, I now amend that to run to Better Read than Dead in Newtown!

The First Reading

The first time you read a new work out to an audience is always nerve-wracking. Reading work out is nearest a writer gets to immediate feedback. Faces are less able to come up with something polite to express. It's even more of a worry when you are reading to children as there is no artifice and no attempts to spare your feelings - just raw reaction. So it was with some trepidation that I read out the first chapter of The Trouble with Sauce to Years 5 and 6 of St Charles Primary school in Ryde yesterday.

It was a wet day, which, as any teacher will tell you, spells trouble in school. Prior to the reading the kids had been noisy. It wasn't that they were bored, but whenever I asked a question they answered it to each other rather than to me. To make it worse the teacher librarian kept jumping in to take control and make suggestions. I was seized with panic. Lab Rats is much more obvious in its appeal for reading, there's farting and wild adventure. Suddenly Trouble felt like it was a serious work with no fun. What had I done? Where were the laughs? I began to read and they began to listen. Past the first page and they were still listening. There's always a couple of fidgeters but by and large, the library full of about 100 kids were listening. There were titters and then gasps as the teacher walks into the trap in the classroon and ends up covered in food scraps. It worked. By lunchtime after I'd talked to Years 2,3 and 4, word came down to the library that there were 'loads' of students wanting to buy The Trouble with Sauce. Hurrah! Nobody had brought their money in so I am going back with the stock tomorrow for a sales and signing session. The pic is me with Year 2 who were very well behaved.

Run to the shops!

Technically it's not officially launched until mid Aug, but The Trouble with Sauce has hit the shelves. All up it's taken a year from me pitching the idea to ABC to the book actually being on the shelves. Looking back it seems like a long, long journey, but right now it seems like nothing - from conception to being on the shelves in less time than it takes to gestate an elephant.

I haven't actually seen it on a bookshelf yet but Dymocks online already have it on their website as do Readings bookshops in Melbourne. Dymocks is an advance for me as they didn't stock Lab Rats in Space. Not sure about Angus and Robertson, the other major Australian bookseller.

Physically the book looks great. The little egg head character that got axed from one of the versions of the cover made it to the back cover which I'm delighted about. The inside front pages are also lined like a school book and fun.

All up I'm very happy with it indeed.

I have about 8 school visits lined up over the next few weeks so I'll have to see how it goes down reading wise. When I've told schools about 'my next book' and mentioned the principals gives the students pills, the kids have gasped in shock - exactly as I'd want.