Estelle Asmodelle

Archive for the ‘Novel Writing’ Category

Two US publishers are interested in the book – but the issue there is – it will be marketing to a US market – where are all the business minded Australian publishers.

It is still early days with these new publishers but it looks promising.

Many seem to be interested in Sex Business more than Anaesthetic Dream – which is very strange – perhaps it’s the title.

The publishing world in this economic time, especially within Australia, is one of complete apathy and short-sightedness.

Rockpool publishing in Sydney, loved the book and took a real interest in publishing. However, with the down turn in the economy, they are not publishing anything right now.

While this is a great insight, that an Australian publisher liked the book, will continue to seek an international publisher overseas.

I have sent three sample chapters to three publishers, one wasn’t interested in the story, while the other two were but there were concerns that the book may not be sellable.

Clearly, a book about a transsexual, which has sex, crime, show business and other elements has the makings of a good seller. If not a best seller.
Perhaps their reluctance is not about sell-ability but rather, how to market the book. Perhaps looking to a publisher in the United States may be a better option. In any case I’ll continue seeking a publisher both here and overseas until I find the right one.

The problem with Australian publishers is that they usually do small print runs, 5,000 to start with and so on, while in the United States, it’s more like 20,000 and upward.

Additionally, there is always self publishing: originally considered failure as a writer, yet some great books have been self published, such as The Celestine Prophecy

Wikipedia have an interesting page about Self Publishing that is worth reading:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self_publishing

It certainly is worth thinking about, with websites as a marketing device and also Amazon, distribution is not so difficult and the best part is that a writer gets to keep most of the money, instead of a mere 5% that publishers would normally provide.

The novel: Anaesthetic Dream has now been completed. In all, there are 576 pages of text, in the form of 22 chapters.

The chapters are complete and a final read through is in progess to ensure that there are no typos or gramatical errors. Additionally, I am preparing the photograph pages to go with the 22 chapters.

All in all, with the table of contents, photo pages, and forward the book will be approximately 600 pages. Quite a large book on anyone’s standard.

Hopefully it will go to the publishers quite soon.

To read more about the book visit the website: Anaesthetic Dream

A quote that I removed from the book, is as follows, but it seems a shame not to publish it somewhere, for there is something reassuring about it:

Medical science is a progressive thing; it’s the sum total of our knowledge applied to our human existence. In the back of an old diary I’d written an anonymous quote that seemed appropriate: “When science finally reaches the summit of human experience it will only verify that religion had been there all the time.”

Chapter 20 of Anaesthetic Dream deals with definitions, among other things, and one definition I have issue with is the word Transgender. Please read this segment from Chapter 20:

” Many people incorrectly refer to pre-operative and post-operative transsexuals as transgender. The word was becoming more popular but I never liked it for several reasons. Mainly because it is non-specific as many people who simply feel they have both male and female psychological components often identify as transgender. Also gender is often seen as a psychological aspect, while sex is the physical manifestation. Perhaps before a person becomes transsexual they are transgender, but certainly not afterwards.”

See more about the novel here: www.anaestheticdream.com

Chapter 20 of Anaesthetic Dream (see www.anaestheticdream.com ) is 60% done, in terms of content it has been the most difficult chapter in the book, for it covered controversial issues, and one in particular is:

A quote from the book is:

“On further reading I discovered a complication of pregnancy, which rarely occurs but in some case had lead to a successful birth: Ectopic Pregnancy. It is when the fertilized ovum is implanted, by accident, into a different organ other than a uterus. There has been cervical, ovarian, tubal (Fallopian tube) and abdominal ectopic pregnancies.”

I have prepared a schedule for the completion of Anaesthetic Dream, as I get so side tracked with work, (working as a designer and in sales with my company Ellenet) and painting and playing music.

The schedule is to have the manuscript ready for publishing by Christmas this year – 2007. That sounds like a long way to go, but consider it is the 6th rewrite of a book that has taken many years to write and was originally 780 pages and is now down to 500 pages, and I am on page 210. So there is much to do.

Heres hoping that soon – it will all come together.

It has been quite a long process rewriting this book. Origianlly it was 700 pages long, and then went through 3 intital rewrites to come down to 500 pages, and now in the final rewrite it is down to 470 pages.

These pages are A4 double spaced and with small paragraphs in the normal format. All in all there would be 780,000 words, so it is medium sized novel.

Just finished chapter 9 a little while ago and now almost completed chapter 10 of the final – that is half way through. The book has been listed on various pages in Wikipedia in relation to Transsexualism, Sex Change Surgery and a few other subjects, as pre-launch effort to spike interest. See the pages below for details:

TRANSEXUALISM – Small reference made to me but the book link as been removed.
SEX REASSIGNMENT SURGERY – Link at the end of the article

Also on my website – www.anaestheticdream.com – there is now 4 pages of Excerpts from the book – as a teaser to promote the eventual release of this novel – in 2007.

Usually I am most private about my past history, but releasing a bio on myself has prompted an entry about me in the online edition of Wikipedia – although it may come as quite a shock to many, but anyway I have allowed the following entry:

ASMODELLE ON WIKIPEDIA

I see my past as irrelevant – but because of my auto-biographical novel ANAESTHETIC DREAM it seems important to reveal more details that today seem like past history.

Some may find it all a bit confusing while others may be intrigued – in any case it is the subject of my first book and there is so much more to tell. I guess you will just have to wait for the print release. Hopefully in late 2006 or early 2007.

Penguin Books orginally expressed interest in the work but I am not sure who will publish it now as the rewrite has, in my opinion, made it a far better book, yet it has changed since the original draft and Penguin’s attitude is currently unknown.

There has been interest by other publishers, Bantam and also Butterfly books, but that was sometime ago. It has been a work in progress, just like my life in fact.

I look forward to being able to say; “it is done”.