Hello Friends,

I’m psyched! Book review group Literary Titan has awarded my psychological thriller novel Headcase Book 1: Shock and Denial a gold medal for its “original content, unique characters, and innovative plot that supports a fresh theme.”

Getting attention as a new author is very difficult. According to Publisher’s Weekly, in 2018, the total number of self-published titles in America was 1.68 million (print and eBooks). That number doesn’t include traditionally published releases. If my inner-CFO did his math right, that is over 4,600 titles released every day!

Book contests like Literary Titan help new authors get discovered. And competition is fierce, especially in the suspense and thriller categories. Competing with amazing writers such as Lee Child, David Baldacci, Harlan Coben, and fresh sensation Alex Michaelides is no easy feat. Combined with the limited time people have to read, an author’s message has to be compelling. And that’s before you tackle the mystery of figuring out the search algorithms in Amazon and Google.

Outside of clicking on an advertisement, the two primary ways most people choose a book to read are reviews and recommendations. Therefore, when you spend a few minutes on a review, it is really a big deal. Every review helps a new author like me compete against publishers with massive budgets to lavish on sponsored ad campaigns.

Recommendations are important too. If you like a book, please share it on your social media. A quick post showing the cover and an audio file or text about what you liked and why you are recommending can help an author and also get you some appreciation from your friends who are looking for a good book (it also helps to add a link to the author’s website or Amazon page).

When I first created Headcase, I wrote it as a TV show (teleplay) and submitted it to several contests. The pathway for many unrepresented writers to a TV show is to submit to contests, win, get an agent, who then gets you a pitch meeting with a network, and then sit back as the network gushes and writes you a big check. That’s the dream, anyway.

My early submissions didn’t win. And since I’d also paid for the feedback, I took to heart the harsh notes from the judges reviewing my script. They ripped it to shreds, deservedly so. Although hard to swallow, it felt kind of familiar. After a while, I realized it was just like Judo practice and getting repeatedly thrown by the same opponent. You get thrown, then get up. You go at it again and again until they can’t throw you anymore. Eventually, you are the one doing the throwing.

The same thing goes for writing. As Ernest Hemingway said, “The only kind of writing is rewriting.”

I went back to the drawing board on Headcase and rewrote large sections of the script. With each contest I submitted to, the story got better and better. The script won four contests in Toronto, London, Los Angeles, and Hollywood and was a finalist in five others. This gave me the confidence that Headcase was going in the right direction.

Heading into 2020, I retired from my CFO position at the company I’d co-founded to focus on writing full time and made a trip to Los Angeles to pitch my script. But two weeks later, the pandemic hit. Overnight, the entire industry seemed to have been put on hold. I wrote six more episodes from March to June, but in September 2020, I decided life was too crazy in New York. Taking advantage of a temporary residence program called the Welcome Stamp, I moved to Barbados.

Working from my beach house on the south coast of Barbados, I started having second thoughts about cracking Hollywood. While talking to an agent in November 2020, I told them I was thinking of converting Headcase from a TV series to a novel. She thought this was a viable option. And since I already had so much material, how hard could it be?

Very hard, as it turns out, but that is the subject for another day.

So, after nearly a year of reworking Headcase as a novel, and with the help of my editors Ben Obler and Jill Tomlin, Headcase Book 1: Shock and Denial was released to the public in March 2022. The published version was 8.6, meaning that for each update, there were 8 changes that were so significant to the story and characters that it warranted a different version. And the .6 of the 8.6 signified that there were extensive changes to grammar, spelling, or wordsmithing that did not change the story but added clarity and professionalism.

After the release date, I faced another steep learning curve in trying to understand how people hear about new books. I did some public book readings, which were a lot of fun. And the self-promoting social media thing, which honestly, I feel awkward about. I also submitted the book to Literary Titan for their contest.

I was so thrilled to hear I’d won. Not so much because of the award, but because it showed I could successfully translate the story from a script into a novel. I also received so much positive feedback from readers that I featured many quotes on my website. Besides the award, Literary Titan also gave Headcase a 5-Star review and ran an interview with me.

With that literary award under my belt, I feel confident about submitting to more literary contests. Again, it’s not really about the awards for me. I’ve had success in business, winning three CFO of The Year Awards and making the list of Inc. 5000 fastest growing companies seven years in a row. So, it’s not about the award so much as the credibility they confer. This credibility is crucial in breaking through the noise of the millions of books published each year.

Awards like Literary Titan’s get me in front of readers I might not reach, and that is my goal. Although I am proud of my book and I love my characters and story, mostly, I want to share my story with the world. I’m also hoping to raise awareness of mental health, and especially mental health in sports.

The theme of Headcase is that if we don’t discover and tackle our demons, they will destroy us. It doesn’t matter if you’re rich and famous or a pro athlete. We all have our traumas, and we need to dig deep, get dirty, and find out what they are, and then get help. Like Michael Phelps says in his HBO documentary, Weight of Gold, “It’s okay to NOT be okay!”

So I hope you’ll help me spread the word about Headcase. Please recommend it, and if you’ve read the book, and submitted a review, thank you so very much! If you haven’t had a chance, please submit an honest review on my Amazon page. If it wasn’t 5 stars for you, that’s okay. It helps to have constructive criticism so I can make Book 2 even better.

Thank you,

Chris K. Jones

headcase@chriskjones.com

If you are not sure on how to leave a review, here are two articles on how to write a book review. One is a YouTube video from Reedsy and the other an article from The Huffington Post:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IhYF3v3zTeo

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/tips-for-writing-amazon-r_b_6959118