Category: Book Launch

The Paperback is Ready! I Will Tell the Night Coming Soon!

After much editing and formatting the paperback of I WILL TELL THE NIGHT is finally ready for its upcoming release date of JANUARY 7th, 2025!

I could not find a way to put the paperback up for pre-order. I think this has something to do with changes effecting the printing cost and price. At any rate, it will not be up for pre-order. If you would prefer PRINT, you can order it directly from Amazon on the release date.

The paperback ARC…all 300 pages of it!

The cover you see above is MATTE finish, but after much deliberation I have decided to go with a glossy finish for this cover. I think the gloss will give the artwork a better finish. I haven’t witness this with my own eyes as of yet, but I can sense it. (-;

I WILL TELL THE NIGHT –

Finn Barker escaped his family in Miramichi, New Brunswick, decades ago for the anonymity of Toronto. When he learns of his mother’s impending demise, he decides to make the trip back home to say goodbye. But going back will awaken all the sleeping ghosts Finn’s not quite sure he’s willing to stir. With no time to decide, his split-second decision to jump back in has him driving across the country, with his boyfriend Steven behind the wheel. Along the way, Finn begins to unpack the mess he left behind. There’s the grandmother, MyImogene, he adored, and the twin brother who died of cancer when his own parents would have preferred to lose the other twin. There’s also the huge scandal Finn orchestrated with a teacher that gave him the Dutch courage he needed to flee. It was almost all bad.

Finn makes it in time for goodbyes, but then there’s the still very active strife between him and his father, the funeral, the family, and the secrets that shed new light on the cause of the rift between his parents and his beloved MyImogene. Every family carries secrets. Finn discovers they’re the one thing you can’t escape, no matter how far away you run. Secrets always catch up. Often, it’s death that has a way of bringing them back into the light of day. He was able to make peace with his dying mother, but can Finn make peace with all the rest…or is it time to run away for another thirty years?

PRE-ORDER THE KINDLE VERSION NOW! Read on release day – JANUARY 7, 2025!

Kindle available in all Amazon countries.

Amazon Canada | Amazon USA | Amazon UK

Paperback available on release day from Amazon.

I’m doing this on my own this time, so I would really appreciate shares on social media. Any share will help. Thank you in advance!

And if you’re one of the souls who have already pre-ordered I WILL TELL THE NIGHT, thank you from the bottom of my heart. This was a long labour of love and it’s a story close to my heart. I hope you enjoy it!

MERRY CHRISTMAS AND HAPPY HOLIDAYS!

Have You PRE-ORDERED I WILL TELL THE NIGHT Yet?

Self-publishing is a lot of work! I have been so coddled by the publishers who dealt with my eight previous releases (9?). I know it probably seems odd to not be completely sure how many titles you have out in the world, but that’s me.

Okay, I just went and checked. I WILL TELL THE NIGHT will be my 9th novel. I have three books out that are not novels, too. Two are short stories and one is a short story collection.

Anyway, enough with the digressions. As I was saying, it’s really quite a job to release a book on your own. But I’m almost there. ARCs (advance reading copies) are arriving soon. Once those are approved, I will be ready to go!

I’m absolutely in love with the cover, btw.

The main character, FINN BARKER, is the boy on the cover. The story starts when he is a man of almost-fifty. He discovers his estranged mother is dying and he makes a quick decision that has him speeding from Toronto to New Brunswick in a car with his boyfriend, in the hopes that he makes it in time for a reunion, apologies, and goodbyes.

I WILL TELL THE NIGHT won the hearts of the 2016 Muskoka Novel Marathon panel of judges. They voted the then unfinished novel with the 2016 MUSKOKA NOVEL MARATHON BEST ADULT NOVEL AWARD.

Lori Manson and I, at the 2016 Wrap Party for that year’s Muskoka Novel Marathon. Lori won for Young Adult/Juvenile novel, and I won for Adult.

I thought long and hard before I set about getting this novel ready to publish. It was rejected by a great many publishers. I thought I would be upfront about this. Reader beware, they say. I honestly had so many wonderful (actually mind-blowing) compliments about the story…each and every time I received a response from a publisher on my full request. Each glowing review came with a sentence at the end of the response announcing that they were going to pass (REJECTION), and a few sentences about WHY they were going to pass.

This is a literary novel. The main character is gay. There is no heat level. I don’t think any of the publishers I approached knew where to put this novel on their list. Granted, some probably just didn’t like it. A book doesn’t have to sing to everyone who reads it. But I could tell that some were genuinely perplexed about how to market a book like this. It would seem that the lack of a heat level hurt its chances just as much as a family saga story with a gay lead character did.

Anyway, I really love the story. I recently had a decision to make…let it die, send it to the trunk forever…or bring it to life on my own. I chose the latter. Maybe it’ll find a few readers. Maybe the story will speak to a few of those readers. It spoke to me.

It releases JAN 7th, 2025. I would appreciate all the help I can get on this one. If you feel so inclined, I would love it if you would share the news about my newest novel in your social media feeds. This would REALLY HELP! I’m one person. I have a little bit of a reach, but I’m hoping for word of mouth here. Anything you can do will be appreciated.

THANK YOU SO MUCH!

Pre-Order I WILL TELL THE NIGHT today! I have high hopes for this little engine who thinks it can…

CANADA PRE-ORDER LINK

USA PRE-ORDER LINK

UK PRE-ORDER LINK

SYNOPSIS:

Finn Barker escaped his family in Miramichi, New Brunswick, decades ago for the anonymity of Toronto. When he learns of his mother’s impending demise, he decides to make the trip back home to say goodbye. But going back will awaken all the sleeping ghosts Finn’s not quite sure he’s willing to stir. With no time to decide, his split-second decision to jump back in has him driving across the country, with his boyfriend Steven behind the wheel. Along the way, Finn begins to unpack the mess he left behind. There’s the grandmother, MyImogene, he adored, and the twin brother who died of cancer when his own parents would have preferred to lose the other twin. There’s also the huge scandal Finn orchestrated with a teacher that gave him the Dutch courage he needed to flee. It was almost all bad.

Finn makes it in time for goodbyes, but then there’s the still very active strife between him and his father, the funeral, the family, and the secrets that shed new light on the cause of the rift between his parents and his beloved MyImogene. Every family carries secrets. Finn discovers they’re the one thing you can’t escape, no matter how far away you run. Secrets always catch up. Often, it’s death that has a way of bringing them back into the light of day. He was able to make peace with his dying mother, but can Finn make peace with all the rest…or is it time to run away for another thirty years?

PLEASE HELP SPREAD THE WORD!