Publishing is Dead

Robert French in 2003 found himself out of work after nearly 50 years in the computer technology business.

He opened a new WORD document and started to write a story that had been sitting in the back of his mind for months. This project stalled after 30,000 words.

He discovered the Surrey International Writers’ Conference. The conference got him on track and showed him how to market his book.

His first book Junkie was finished in November, 2010 and is now selling.  His second book is ready to be released.

Robert talked about the numerous changes taking place in the publishing business. The move to E-books and online purchase of books has changed the industry.  He predicts that major publishers will start to close down in the near future. With online publishing, authors make more and readers pay less. Book agents and many other parts of the publishing business are changing and many will disappear. Many well known authors are leaving publishing houses and marketing their books online.

Cal Rogan, former rising star detective, fired from the Police Department because of his heroin addiction, wakes up in a squalid alley with blood all over his jacket and no memory of how it got there. It is Saturday, the day on which he has a supervised visit with his seven-year-old daughter Ellie, whom he adores. But then he finds Kevin, his best friend from his old life, dead. His former colleagues tell him that it was suicide but Cal knows Kevin would never kill himself and vows to get justice for him. Cal’s mission takes the reader into the world of the drug-infested streets and the quirky characters who inhabit them, the world of the drug gangs who prey on them and the multi-millionaire criminals who control them.