Hot on the press - Tricorn latest release

Just back from a very pleasant photo opportunity at Bishops printers, watched our latest production 'Fratton Locomotive Depot' by Michael Harvey roll off the press with the author:  looking forward to delivery early next week

Exciting News - Our latest book deal!

Looking forward with anticipation to starting work on Uniquely British Behind the Scenes with the Household Cavalry.  HRH The Princess Royal has been confirmed for the book launch on 16th July, to add a Royal flourish and gravitas. Over the next 5 months we will be shooting alongside some noted photographers, many of the Cavalry's commitments up to the Diamond Jubilee and London Olympics - not only behind the scenes but right up front in the firing line at some distinguished events. The book will be ready to pre order very soon, and details will be available on our website ASAP. Great start to 2012!

Telephone Calls from the Dead, Callum E. Cooper

Another great Tricorn title going to press shortly - huge interest already in the U.S. with pre orders rolling in .... watch this space!

Some superb new titles for 2012 - Devine Comedy on second reprint, as is All for the Love of our Lady with Life of Riley for Ray's eyes only.

Plenty of books coming in and out; glad it's such a busy time. Michael Harvey's latest book 'Fratton Locomotive Depot', off to printers this week - really looking forward to this one (see below).

Moving up a gear with our largest commission working with the Household Cavalry, shoots to be confirmed throughout 2012 going into production late March - and just delivered another outstanding Berforts production for a local author. Plus plenty of re orders for our existing authors.

Buy Books 4 Christmas!

Christmas is always a great time to sell books and with our marketing support, our authors are out there doing just that - very successfully.

Hope’s Truth author, Stu Olds has book signings in different Waterstones each weekend before Christmas, as does children’s author John Bannell. He will be introducing his series of Clever Freddie tales to parents, children and grandparents alike; these will be supported by readings and creative activities for the children.

The weekend just gone saw John at the Round Tower’s ‘Love Southsea’ sale where he did a roaring trade; other local Christmas venues for book sales include Southsea Castle, the German Market and the Guildhall Market.

So, best foot forward, get out there and Buy Books 4 Christmas!

Clip from a short film we are  making on the nonsense poetry of Mervyn Peake

Extract from Titus Groan By Mervyn Peake, performed by Stuart Olesker

Portsmouth BookFest 2011 runs between October 17th and November 13th. You can meet more than 20 authors at 17 different Events, held at 10 venues across the city.

Tricorn's Get your Book Published competition

Tricorn Books is launching its Bookfest competition to find the best budding author. The winning text will be published as an eBook, complete with ISBN and will be available via Amazon to buy.

Open for entries from the 19th October, your text only manuscripts might include a collection of short stories, anthology of poems, novel, autobiography or even an academic paper. The competition will close on the last Book Bruch event, hosted by Chaplin Books on 9th November.

‘Book Doctors’, Gail and Dan from Tricorn, will be available to answer your queries and questions, and for free advice and guidance at the Book Bruch on Wednesday 19th October, Guildhall Café, 11am - 1pm. Gail and Dan will be joined by some of their current authors, who are happy to share their experience and will be selling their own titles.

Contact us for further details, or visit us on 19th October at Guildhall Cafe. Looking forward to seeing you there....

www.portsmouthbookfest.co.uk

Excellent 30 min slot on the  Book Show, Portsmouth Live TV, with presenter, Steve Surridge

Foxy author to sign books

DEBUT author, John Bannell, will be at Waterstones bookshop in Alton High Street on Saturday signing copies of his recently launched children's books. Mr Bannell's inspiration for his titles, documenting the adventures of Freddie the Fox, were drawn from his, time working as a gardener at the allotments where the stories take place. Although a certain amount of artistic licence has been employed, each of the Freddie books is based on real events. The six titles are Freddie's Adventures, The Story of the Car Keys, The Wicked Rats and the Horrid Thieves, The Bee Swarm, The Apple Harvest and Freddie Takes Up Gardening! Published by Tricorn Books, they are available individually or as a box set. Following each tale is both a gardening tip and a recipe using the fruit or vegetables that feature in the story. Mr Bannell will be signing copies of his books at Waterstones from lO a.m.

PRESS RELEASE PRESS RELEASE PRESS RELEASE PRESS RELEASE

Fox rocks for debut author

Children’s books that captivate the interest of not only children but also their parents and grandparents are rare indeed. The feedback in the first month since the Clever Freddie the Mischievous Fox books were published is that they do just that.

Although fictional, the story in each book is based around true events and reflects an extraordinary relationship between a fox and allotment gardeners. The author, John Bannell, who was one of the gardeners, says, “Whenever I saw or heard about the adventures that actually happened, the basis for a story and its title came to mind.”

Behind each of the intriguing tales, there is a gripping story of cleverness, mischief and fun followed by both a gardening tip and a recipe using the fruit or vegetables that feature in the story.

The six beautifully written and illustrated books are “Freddie’s Adventures”, “The Story of the Car Keys”, “The Wicked Rats and the Horrid Thieves”, “The Bee Swarm”, “The Apple Harvest” and “Freddie takes up gardening!”. Published by Tricorn Books, they are available individually (priced at £5.99) or as a box set collection (priced at £25) and can be ordered online through Waterstones, Amazon, WH Smith, Blackwells or Foyles and other retailers.

Nice plug for Portsmouth Plays - from the ubiquitous Claire Sambrook supporting Portsmouth culture and sub culture click here

John Bannell on Portsmouth live, interview by Sally Cronin

A bi-polar approach to book selling

Being a first time published author can be both hugely daunting, and exciting; Sue Pike (‘Thomas Ellis Owen: Shaper of Portsmouth, Father of Southsea’) described it as like giving birth. After the euphoria from your book launch and praise from family and friends subsides comes the most daunting bit of all – selling the book.

For most of us selling is hard, as it is the fear of possible criticism and rejection but this can be the most rewarding phase of all. There is so much fun to be had from reducing that pile of boxes in the corner and getting some money in, and there is no better person to sell the book than its author.

Tricorn does offer sales and distribution, however most of our authors don’t want to hand over total control, or a percentage and do want to sell their own books – after all that is why they chose to self publish, to keep all the profit.

Stuart Olds, a carpenter by trade is bi-polar. His book, Hope’s Truth was 9 years in the making and he finally published it with us a few months ago. We worked with Stuart on a social networking campaign to create awareness in advance of his book launch, which he organised at his local pub on a Saturday afternoon. We got there only 10 minutes after it started and couldn’t get in; there was a queue spilling onto the High Street waiting to buy his book.  It was incredible,;he was happy, the pub was happy and the book buyers were happy.

Again with Stuart, we set up a series of book signings, firstly in our local Waterstones. We produced flyers that Stuart handed out on the streets, designed posters for in store and Stuart had a 4 x 6ft front cover of his book made for in-store promotion.

On book signing day Stuart really got to work. He didn’t sit there with his piles of books and wait; he stood up, walked around, talked to people about what they liked to read and showed them his work, showed them reviews and comments from people he had gathered together. He spoke passionately and informed about the concept. He listened, smiled a lot and had an absolute ball. At the first book signing he sold 55 copies in 4 hours – that is more than the royal wedding book sold in 2 weeks at the same branch. That is £500 he put through Waterstones’ tills that day!  That is remarkable.

Since then, other stores have invited Stuart to do book signings, and at each one he has sold over 50 copies. All the stores want him back pre-Christmas and everyone is very happy.

Stuart is not alone in our band of successful authors. John Bannell (Clever Freddie children’s books) is hugely pro-active in store and in his local community, selling 21 box sets at £25 each in one day; Dean Clark sold his initial print run in the first three months with his energetic approach to getting his book out there.

After all the hard work, time and effort of writing and putting the book together, selling it can be a remarkably uplifting, positive and energising time – certainly for our authors it is the cherry on the icing on the cake!

Tricorn have just published two new children's books, written and illustrated by 7-year old Nigerian girl, Daniella Clinton Dan-Jumbo.

Portsmouth Plays out latest kindle publication by John Stanton and Stuart Olesker

The four plays in this volume tell stories about Portsmouth’s lesser known but fascinating past. You will not find here mention of Nelson, Brunel, Dickens, Kipling, Wells or Conan Doyle – all associated with the Portsmouth story. Instead you will meet 16th century hardened seamen and their blowsy wives, 17th century blasphemers and abusers of authority, a 19th century dockyard worker who challenges the reputation of the ‘great and the good’ and 20th century Pompey girls doing their bit in local corset factories in World War Two. All have stories to tell and here they are, told through two Portsmouth playwrights: John Stanton and Stuart Olesker.

All the plays have been performed very successfully in Portsmouth. It is in response to the many people, who have asked to see the plays published, that we present them in this form.

Another great weekend for sales - Stuart Olds shifted another 50 books at Waterstones Fareham, that's 110 copies in two days for Stu - and John Bannell sold 21 box sets of Freddie Fox at Waterstones Fareham.

The Tour continues with Stuart in Bristol Waterstones on the 18th June and John in Fareham on the 26th June and continues throughout the summer in Alton, Chichester, Bath and Southampton.

Clever Freddie already available in Japan.

Clever Freddie box set's back from the printers - beautiful job from Bairds as always available from Saturday at Waterstones Portsmouth

book signing from 10.30 am until 3pm (Portsmouth, Waterstones, Commercial Road, 4th June) - Also available from Amazon (click here)

Stuart Olds signing copies of Hopes Truth at Waterstone's, 60 copies in 4 hours  - not bad for a first time author, at one point his queue was longer than the checkouts -

Stuart now has agred signing at Waterstones Fareham, Chichester, Alton, Bath and just arranging Bristol

New deal from Tricorn Books, special edition anthologies for writers groups

Writers’ Group Anthology

Compile a collection of literary works from your group

and get them published!

At Tricorn Books  we appreciate how much hard work creative writing is and  it always seems a tragedy to us that more isn’t made  out of all that hard work. So, we came up with the idea of offering Writers’ Groups an opportunity for their members to get published collectively; this way the cost is shared, making it a much more viable project. We would provide a personal service and support, working closely with you to make sure you get  exactly what you want, how you want and when you want. Your text and images will be incorporated into a bespoke design, as  we certainly wouldn’t  offer you any templates or generic devices.

If you would like to find out more please give me a call for an initial chat
or send an email with your queries.

Gail

Celebrate Local History Month!

The aim of the month is to increase awareness of local history, promote history in general to local communities & encourage members of the community to participate.

Tricorn Books have published a range of local history books that includes more recent, and it might be said, more controversial history in “The Life and Death of the a Sixties Icon” by Celia Clark and Robert Cook, which looks at Brutalist architecture and the Tricorn building in Portsmouth. A biography of Thomas Ellis Owen, “Shaper of Portsmouth, Father of Southsea”, came out last year as a large, originally illustrated and beautifully designed book, with another biography, giving an insight into the life and times of John Pounds, one of Portsmouth’s un-sung heroes and local philanthropist of the 19th century, as an eBook for Kindle – Tricorn’s first eBook.

Current owner of ‘Kennel Holt’, Adam Plummer, has recorded a more personal history of his home in Kent. This account of the family house takes us back to its first owner, Eanberht, kinsman of Coenwulf, King of Mercia 804 – 820 and details changes and ownership of the house, as well as social, economic and cultural developments of the area, through to the present day. This title was produced using traditional hand bound techniques, in keeping with its genre.

Tricorn Books have long been involved with the local community and its rich history in Portsmouth, and take advantage of being in the heart of Old Portsmouth to build up a library of photographic images that look at the past, present and transient nature of the area.  Many of these can be seen on our ‘flickr’ account: http://www.flickr.com/photos/131design/

If you are reading this and have any designs on recording, documenting or creating history, get in touch and we’ll discus how we can make it happen.