Frances Gapper is an accomplished storyteller who has been published widely, and has won several competitions: a glance at the acknowledgments page at the end of In the Wild Wood will give you an idea of some of the journals and collections you could be reading if you also aspire to publish short fiction. I love the connection with nature in In the Wild Wood – seemingly ordinary natural objects or creatures are woven into the narratives throughout the collection like objet trouvé: leaves, insects, spiders, conkers, a fallen oak, seagulls, hummingbirds, honeysuckle, a walnut tree. I also love the sense of the supernatural in the stories. The ghost wife at the beginning, ‘The Society of Lost Souls’, or the spider goddess in ‘Sister Joy and the Spider’. The collection also deals (with gentle humour) with death and dying and with the connections between older and younger generations – in ‘Our Silence’ for instance – and I love the famous author under the tree at the Small Wonder short story festival! Her website is here, where there are several reviews of her work that express how good she is better than I can. I first met Frances almost twenty years ago when I directed an adaptation of one of her stories for a piece of community theatre, and our paths then crossed a few times. Nowadays we know each other on Facebook and – most recently – because we’re both published by Cultured Llama, which makes us stablemates.
At the end of last year, I asked Frances my ten questions about book marketing. Here are her answers.
Can you tell us a bit about you and your work? What are you working on at the moment?
I’ve been writing flash fiction quite intensively over the past few months. My third story collection In the Wild Wood was published in June 2017 by Cultured Llama.
How do you approach marketing your work, on a practical level?
I don’t approach marketing in a professional way, because I don’t think of myself as being a professional writer.
Some creative people treat marketing as if it’s creation’s evil twin. Is there a way of making friends with it?
In a small way, yes – by seeing it as an extension of friendship, e.g. by sending books to friends.
Do you think about marketing before, during, or after writing, or is it ongoing?
Only after writing and then only because I feel I have a duty to my publisher.
How do you tend to market your work?
I don’t blog, but I am on Facebook, and I have my website at: www.francesgapper.co.uk
Would you spend a substantial amount of time on a piece even if you knew you wouldn’t or couldn’t publish and sell it?
Good question. I think no, because that would seem pointless. Unless it’s free writing, or some form of writing exercise.
Do you use any of these for marketing purposes: school visits, workshops, readings, video book trailers, seeking press coverage?
I have done readings, e.g. at Polari and at bookshops.
I once heard someone dismiss a career in book marketing by saying ‘he might as well go and sell fridges’ – is selling books really the same as selling fridges?
No, not at all the same. I imagine it’s much easier to sell a fridge, because a fridge is (arguably) a necessary household item.
There’s a lot of marketing jargon around, such as ‘find your niche’, ‘create a sales funnel’, ‘engage with your audience’, ‘create a platform’. Has that changed since you started writing?
Probably it has, yes, over those many decades. Create a sales funnel – that’s one I hadn’t heard before!
Any examples of book marketing you think worked really well?
I think both V.G. Lee and Kiki Archer run brilliant ongoing marketing campaigns via social media, readings etc. Both these writers use humour as a key tool.