Finding Readers for Magic Fish Dreaming

Nearly one year since our successful kickstarter and there are now many copies of Magic Fish Dreaming ready to find homes for.   I picked up our full print run Tuesday this week!

Since our launch last October, nearly 300 books have headed out to the public and are now doing their magic; this has been from: kickstarter preorders, library supplier sales, the launch, individual direct orders, and one bookshop appearance.

We have had a review in Reading Time with CBCA (children’s book council), and have sent the book for review to several others and so we should see those in coming months, and I continue to search out more places for reviews.  Sometimes these take a while to hear back from.

In the meantime the truly hard work begins; we strive to reach more schools and libraries, bookshops, and obtain even more reviews, and locate conferences, festivals, potential sellers, and events that will help put the word out about Magic Fish Dreaming.

Last week I received the exciting news about participating in a festival in April(I sent out a query straight after the kickstarter and it took a while to hear back) and in March, I am chatting with libraries and environment centres to see how I might work on something to share the book in their spaces.This is so exciting and can’t wait to share with you the outcomes of these discussions.

I am about to put in some proposals to other places but am on the eagle eye look out for opportunities to share a product our team are very proud of.

Whilst distributing this book, I am polishing up a number of picture book manuscripts with my invaluable writing mentors, a new poetry collection (sequel to Magic Fish Dreaming), writing a novel, and continuing to work as a tutor in the Keystones program for Indigenous students at QUT.  I am not sure if these new works will be self published, or if I can find traditional publishers for them.

I have been totally inspired by the feedback we are receiving from our kickstarter sponsors about the journey of the book.  We have readers from Philippines, Canada, New Zealand, France, Papua New Guinea, and the United States.  We don’t yet regularly distribute in these countries but feel blessed by the response our kickstarter supporters there have given Magic Fish Dreaming and would love for it to continue to reach a  global audience when we work out the best way to do this.

We know the book has made it into Australian libraries and schools in two countries through our kickstarter buddies and we thank them so, so much for the love! Presently I am doing some final edits on our educational materials and notes relating to the book especially for teachers and parents.

An unexpected blessing, was Helene having an artist card with AVANT CARD and it mentioning the poem that inspired it and title of the book and featuring one art work from on it.  This is all over their stands now, and if you find ‘River Song’ do let us know.  We’d love to know where the card appeared.

As a self publisher I have a few more things to work out in this learning by doing especially in the distribution journey, but thank you for following and supporting.

In Australia you can order the book directly from me as well as presently obtain it from bookshops in Brisbane,  Townsville, Kuranda, and the Gold Coast.  If you live in the area of one of the shops best to buy it there as this will save you postage.  Libraries can obtain it from Peter Pal. 

You should know bookshops will often only stock any book for a limited time, 3-6 months, and the sales of the book determine if they purchase more stock and keep it on their shelves longer.

All queries regarding Magic Fish Dreaming can be made to gumbootspearlz@gmail.com