This morning I’ve sent manuscripts of my new book Tony Evans Walks on Water to Amazon for publishing in paperback and e-book* formats. There is always a rider that it takes up to three days for books to appear on Amazon for sale and there is the possibility that an error may be found during the publishing process, but, touching wood, the book should be able to be bought from the weekend at the latest.
Actually, I’ve just received confirmation that the e book is now available at
Apologies are due on a couple on a couple of fronts. First, the fact that publication is happening over two months later than planned – I won’t bore you with the details, but this was entirely due to problems with Amazon’s Kindle Create software. It wasn’t any different to the version I used a couple of years ago when writing my previous book Real Madrid and All That, but, this time, there were all sorts of glitches with it which made arriving at a version fit for publication something of a hit and miss affair – I was on the brink of giving up on publication before Christmas when, more by luck than judgement it seemed, I finally managed to get an acceptable version last weekend.
The perfectionist in me would have liked more time to work on two or three minor matters that would have made the book look better and it could have done with another proof read really, but then that Christmas deadline would have been missed.
The second apology is for the poor quality of the cover of the paperback version especially. I was determined to use a colour photo from the season in question and, given that we’re talking about nearly fifty years ago here, there were very few colour photos available and the ones that were are not of the quality that modern software is tailored to deal with.
The next thing I should do is provide a breakdown of what the book is about. It’s a review of a City campaign from the seventies in the same format as Real Madrid and All That which covered the 70/71 season. The format is, once again, a game by game diary of the season (1975/76) with occasional dips into the wider world of mid seventies south Wales and the UK, often looked at from the perspective of someone who was in his late teens at the time.
While City were trying to win an immediate return to the Second Division following their relegation in 1975, Wales were enjoying their most successful time since the 1958 World Cup in Sweden, hence there are chapters covering international football as well.
Although my intention is to get some copies of the paperback book to the ground for sale on matchdays, it will only be available from Amazon for now. The paperback version of Tony Evans Walks on Water costs £11 and the electronic version is £8 – I’ll mention that I’ll get just over a quarter of the price of every hardback book sold in royalties, but well over a half of the cost of the e book, however, you are, of course, free to purchase whatever version is more comfortable for you!
Finally, a thank you to all of you who have supported this blog financially down the years as Real Madrid and All That and Tony Evans Walks on Water would not have been written without your generosity.
Thanks Paul. Going Away for Christmas so I’ve just downloaded it for Christmas reading. Really looking foirward to seeing the memories coming back as 75/6 was the first ‘good’ season I can remember. I was too young to fully appreciate 70/71 and it was a never end run of relegation struggles until the inevitable in 74/5 so this is the first season I can fondly look back on.
Thanks Paul.
Mammoth effort for you. Well done.
Just purchased from Amazon as a Christmas treat to myself.
Looking forward to reading it over the break.
Fingers crossed for a win this afternoon as well.
Thanks again for all your work with this blog for the last 12 months.
Wishing you a Happy Christmas and to all others on this site.
Cheers
Thanks all for your comments. Thanks to Huw and Mark for ordering the book, I hope you both enjoy it.
Dai, your mention of Don Readies brought a reminder about my pet theory concerning his Leeds team – if they’d cut out all of the gamesmanship and generally dodgy behaviour (on and, allegedly, off the pitch), they would have been much more successful, because, for the best part of a decade, they were the best side in the country. Wasn’t the deep lying centre forward tactic called “the Revie plan” in the fifties? Agree with you about Kane – if England had an out and out goalscorer like a Lineker or Greaves, then he would be great in the deep lying role, because he has ability in that position that has surprised me for one, but they don’t, so he’s got to be up there as the finisher.
BJA, I hope your story is true – it deserves to be. I had a look on Google, but couldn’t come up with anything – there were a couple of Griffiths’ I found who played for the Welsh Amateur team in the fifties, but they all seemed to be north Wales based. Agreed about Morocco, their success must be down in part at least to the man who should be Wales manager in my view – Osian Roberts.
Finally, to repeat comething Huw said, a very Merry Christmas to all MAYA readers and contributors.