One of the hardest things for a self-published author to do is to get their book reviewed. But you need reviews, if only to lend some weight to your Amazon listing and to reassure yourself that self-publishing your book isn’t the biggest mistake you’ve ever made. Book bloggers and other non-professional book sites (i.e. where the reviewers don’t get paid but read and review for love) are your best bets for getting your self-published book reviewed. But how do you get them to do it? How do you approach them? And where do you even find them in the first place?
How to get your book reviewed
(If you’d prefer NOT to get your book reviewed, please see below.)
The first step is to find suitable bloggers who might like to review your book, and there are two ways to do that. The first is to trawl through Futurebook’s extensive book blogger listing. (You can easily add your name, by the way, if you review books on your website or blog.) Make a list of potential reviewers for your book based on genre preferences, etc. The second thing you can do is find 1-3 recently traditionally published books that are similar to yours, e.g. if you read and liked Book X, you might like your Book Y too. Google their name along with the word review. The top results will probably be newspapers and magazines, but keep going. Soon you’ll get to the book bloggers. Add any suitable ones to your potential reviewers list.
The next step is research, and you cannot skip this step. You are asking these people to give up several hours of their life to read and review your book; the least you can do is spend five minutes looking around their site to see if you should even be sending your book to them in the first place. Check their submission guidelines and then follow them. Add the details to your list. If they say they don’t review self-published books, that means they don’t review self-published books. Take heed.
When I wrote Self-Printed just under a year ago, the problem plaguing self-published authors looking to get their book reviewed was what I called The Mean Problem, whereby self-published authors bristled at the idea of “giving books away for free” to reviewers. (Don’t. Even. Get. Me. STARTED.) I think this has changed, thankfully—especially now that e-books are more widely read and so, accepted by book reviewers—but a new problem has taken its place: Thinking People Care Syndrome. By default, nobody gives a rodent’s arse about anyone else’s book. Oh, you wrote a book, did you? WATCH WHILE I DON’T GIVE A RODENT’S ARSE. (This isn’t me saying this to you, but everyone saying it to everyone else.) Writing a book doesn’t equal people wanting to read it (unfortunately), and I think this is a point a lot of self-publishers—and even some traditionally published authors—don’t quite get. It’s probably the biggest realization I’ve had about this whole publishing world since I stuck a self-published toe in it back in 2010. Nobody cares.
Bleak, I know, but once you acknowledge that nobody cares—once you fully understand that that’s your starting-off point—you’ll take a different approach to book-selling. A more effective approach. And then you’ll sell more books. Because a writer who doesn’t understand that nobody cares will send an e-mail that says, “I just published something. If you’d like to review it, let me know.” But if you’re a writer who does understand, the next thing you’ll do is create something that makes me care about your book. This may be an e-mail, or it may be a press release or “sell sheet” in PDF attached to an e-mail, or even a little video. It should be professional, informative and interesting, but also short and to the point.
It should tell me:
- who you are
- what the book is about
- the what/when/where of the book’s publication
- whether I’d be getting an e-book or a paperback
- how to get in contact with you if I want to review it
- something that makes me think, Oooh, I’d like to read that.
I don’t know you and I haven’t read your book (yet?), so my entire impression of you and your work is going to be formed from this e-mail. This is something to keep in mind.
Your e-mail might look something like this, attached to a one-page PDF document filled with relevant and interesting information about you and your book:
To [first name]
I am the author of Mousetrapped: A Year and A Bit in Orlando, Florida, a travel memoir of the eighteen months I spent living in Orlando and working in Walt Disney World. I really enjoyed your review of [SIMILAR BOOK]—I too laughed out loud at the bit [MEMORABLE INCIDENT FROM SIMILAR BOOK]!—and as my book is similar, I thought you might be interested in reading and potentially reviewing it.
I’d be happy to send you a complimentary copy. There is, of course, no obligation to review it; I appreciate that you must get countless books to review and don’t have the time to read and review all of them. I completely understand.
If you are interested in receiving a copy, please forward a postal address and I will mail one to you immediately. Alternatively if you’d like an e-book edition please tell me your preferred format and I will e-mail it to you.
Please see attached document for more information. I’m also available for interview, guest-posting, etc. If there’s anything else I can supply you with—images, more information, links, etc.—please let me know.
Thank you for your time,
[Your name]
If you’ve done your job, you’ll have sent me something that makes me think:
- you’re a professional
- who has written an interesting, potentially good book
- that I want to read because you’ve done your research on me.
Therefore I’ll e-mail you back to say, “Yes—send me this book!” and then I’ll read it and like it and review it, and your job will be done. Mission accomplished. Repeat as required. And well done you.
How NOT to get your book reviewed
The first step is to find book bloggers who don’t read books on the same planet as yours, let alone in the same genre, and bloggers who don’t review books at all. At least half of your potential reviewer list should be made up of these non-book-reviewing bloggers, and everyone on it should say somewhere on their website that they never read or review self-published books. That’s, like, the most important bit. Throw in a few self-published authors as well. I mean, why not? When Patricia Cornwell has a new book out the first thing she does is offer a copy to Karin Slaughter, right?
Don’t visit any of the sites or blogs on your list. You don’t need to, because this is your book we’re talking about. So what if it’s chick-lit and the site is called CrimeSpreeBooks.com? Once they hear about the plot (twenty-something fish out of water with man troubles catalogues her wardrobe and hangs out with her ditzy best friend; giggles ensue), they’ll forget all about serial killers, Scandinavia and grisly body parts and read nothing but you forever more.
Also, don’t bother with those yawn-inducing “Contact” forms or collecting the bloggers’ actual e-mail addresses from the submission information on their sites. That’s just a gigantic waste of time. BOR-ing. Instead, use this handy shortcut:
- Take the domain of the website, e.g. http://www.INeverReviewBooksLikeYours.com, and cut out the “www.”
- Replace it with “info@”.
- Send your e-mail to that address, i.e. info@INeverReviewBooksLikeYours.com.
- If you get a failure notice, try “admin@” instead. One of them is bound to work, right?
So now you have a long list of people who don’t read books like yours—many of whom also don’t review books at all—and e-mail addresses for them that may or may not work, and if they do work, aren’t anything to do with the way they’ve asked you to contact them as per the instructions on their site. The next thing to do is to send out a mass e-mail to all of them that does one or more of the following things:
- annoys
- gets the Delete button clicked
- gets the Spam button clicked
- gets the Block Recipient feature enabled
- incites anger and/or frustrated pencil-snapping
- inspires the recipient to write an extremely sarcastic blog post about reviews
- gives the recipient the impression that you think giving them a copy of your book is bestowing upon them a beautiful gift, and not that them reading and reviewing your book is them doing you an immeasurable favor. (Mucho bonus points for doing this.)
How can you achieve this? Well, I’m glad you asked! To make absolutely sure that you make your reviewer experience all of the above, remember to:
- Ignore all the review-related information on the blogger’s site, e.g. submission guidelines, preferred genres, etc. If you’ve followed my instructions thus far, you’ve already done this. Well done you! Earn bonus points by including a blatant lie about having researched their site, e.g. “I know you love science-fiction” when there is not one mention of science-fiction anywhere on the blogger’s site, Twitter, Facebook, etc.
- Omit any information about your book. Just put a link to your website instead, man. That way you get a hit too. And bonus points will be awarded for not activating the link; it’s even better if the recipient has to manually copy and paste the URL into their browser’s address bar. Oh YEAH.
- Use CC instead of BCC, so every single one of the 391 people you sent the e-mail to can see everyone else’s e-mail addresses. Who doesn’t love that?
- Include an ultimatum. If you do one thing to not get your book reviewed, make it this. Ultimatums can be one or more combinations of the following book review ultimatum categories: Schedule Ultimatums (“Only accept a copy if you are in a position to post your review between March 4th and April 10th…”), Content Ultimatums (“I ask that you only post your review if it’s a positive one…” or “You can’t mention the misspelling on the cover in your review…”) and Action Ultimatums (“I propose a review exchange. I’ll send you a copy of my book and you send me a copy of yours. Once your positive review of my book appears on Smashwords, I’ll read and review yours [Ed. note: ??!?!?!?!???!?!?!?!?!?!?!??!?!?!?! Another ed. note: I actually got an e-mail that said this.]. Here’s an inactive link to my website where you can find out more…”).
- Insult the reviewer. If there’s one thing book bloggers lurve, it’s authors who are happy to send them stacks of shiny books until they post a negative review of their work. After that, it’s all “Oh my god you are SO unprofessional” and “I’m going to bitch about you on every forum I can find” and “Then I’m going to send all my, ahem, fans (read: friends) your way so they can leave bitchy comments about you on your site” and “Who are you, anyway? I bet you’re a failed writer who can barely contain her jealousy that I have a book for sale.” Yep. And the only kind of author they love even more is the kind that makes a pre-emptive strike against such behavior. Get in this category by saying something like, “Before I send you my book, I want to make sure that in return I’ll get a balanced and fair review where, if something is not to your liking, you’ll quantify why. Perhaps you could send me some samples of your previous reviews so I can check that you’re up to the task…?”
- Tell them your mother loved it. So simple, but oh so effective.
- Pretend you are not the author but the author’s Proper Publicist-Type even though the e-mail is clearly from your personal account and slips into the first person before the end of the message. A classic technique, this.
- Don’t even bother pretending that you’re after a review. I mean, why would you want a review? They’re for losers. You want sales. So say something like, “My book is for sale now on [insert link]” and then just leave it at that. For a truly annoying touch, add some hollow humility like, “I don’t expect you to buy it, but I’m going to send you this e-mail about how to buy it just in case. I mean, I know you don’t know me and we’ve never been in contact before and you only got this e-mail because I noticed you had a dot-com domain name and so chances are you have an info@ e-mail address but hey, this is my book we’re talking about. Trust me: you’re gonna want to read this baby.”
Therefore if you don’t want to get your book reviewed, your e-mail will look more like this:
To Blogger
I’m a fancy pants book publicist from a fancy pants book publicists’ office. I’m contacting you today in the hope that you actually have this e-mail address and because I know you’ll be interested in reading [GENERIC TITLE], a stunning debut by [AUTHOR'S NAME] that’s available now on Amazon for $1.99. I’m fairly certain of this because of your blog header. (Yes, I know your blog header is actually nothing to do with the subject matter of this book, but just go with it.) Go to http://www.generictitle.com now to find out more because that’s all the information I’m going to give you and this e-mail isn’t attached to anything except what is sure to be one of the biggest sellers of 2012. As Person With The Same Last Name as the Author has said of it, “You typed this whole thing? Like, yourself? Wow! I’m impressed.”
As I’m sure you’re aware self-published authors don’t have a lot of money and as a self-published author yourself, I know you’d appreciate me asking you to appreciate this and perhaps buy the book instead of getting a FREE copy of it…? I mean, come on. You’d probably spend double the price on a cup of coffee, am I right? Anyway if you must take money out of my—I mean, the author’s—pocket, I can send you an e-book with your name on every page so if you pass it on and it ends up on one of those piracy sites, I’ll know it was you. Yeah, I know what you book blogger types are like! I wasn’t born yesterday. Thus before I send you anything, I’m going to need a guarantee that you’ll post a review of it. Perhaps you could scribble a quick contract and send it to me, signed and notarized, along with your passport? I promise I’ll send it back after my (positive!) review goes live.
Oh, and I—we— need you to do this review thing ASAP. Like, yesterday. I got bills, y’know?
I’m also gonna need assurances that you’ll accompany my review with links to my blog, site, Twitter feed, Facebook profile, Flickr albums and Goodreads page, and that you won’t use any photos of me in which my left side predominantly features.
That’s what’s up.
LATERS,
The Auth—I mean, The Author’s Fancy Pants Publicist
And so, to recap:
- If you give me a copy of your book to review and I read and review it, it is me who is doing you a favor.
- Book bloggers specify what kind of books they like to review on their websites. Read this information. If it’s not there, a quick flick through a list of their existing reviews will help you determine whether or not your book is for them.
- By default, nobody cares about anybody else’s book. Your job is to get me—and everyone else—to care.
- If you’ve self-published a book, that doesn’t mean that other self-published authors will want to read it. It doesn’t work that way.
- I won’t leave your e-mail to go looking for information about your book, so don’t ask me to.
- Sending an e-mail that’s trying to sell something to someone you don’t know is called spam. Sending spam could get your e-mail account blocked and deactivated.
- Putting me on a mailing list without my consent will not get me to buy your book. It will only get me to report you to your e-mail provider for abuse. This extends to lists of e-mail addresses you made yourself and then sent mass mailings to, not just “formal” mailing lists. If you haven’t communicated with the person before, you shouldn’t be sending them mass anything.
- I’m not even a book blogger and yet I found myself with more than enough material to write this post. I CAN’T EVEN IMAGINE the gems actual book bloggers get sent.
Finally, we all know that the majority of submissions agents and editors get are smeared with crazy, unprofessionalism and coffee rings. That’s why we strive to make our own pristine, clean, correctly formatted, in adherence with their submission guidelines and smelling fresh; we want to give a professional impression. Do the same with your book review correspondence. Be professional, target suitable reviewers, don’t be pushy, demanding or frightening, and your book will get reviewed.
Happy reviewer-searching!
(Thought for the day: this blog post is nearly 3,000 words long. My book isn’t finished. Coincidence?)
Public service announcement: By the way, I don’t really review books anymore. A quick look around my site would reveal that (a) the last time I posted a review was August 2011, (b) if I do have time to review something, it’s not self-published books I choose to review and (c) does this look like a book review-centric blog to you? So I don’t really know why I’m even getting e-mails from authors in the first place. Although after this, I’m pretty sure I won’t be getting any.
Was that my evil plan all along? We’ll never know…
[Mysterious Mona Lisa-esque smile]
There’s also The Bookseller’s Twitter Book Trade list for finding reviewers and bloggers:
http://www.thebookseller.com/twitter#Book_Social_Network
I don’t think the two are fully in synch.
Oh, excellent—thank you! Didn’t even know about that one, but it looks very, very useful.
Was just having a little panic attack. I knew I had saved this piece to read at a later date (ok, a very much later date) and for a moment couldn’t find where in my chaotic bookmark system I had filed it.
But then find it I did, and what utter bliss. What a fantastically well written piece, it really made me chuckle as well as being extremely informative. It’s exactly what I needed to get me started on finding reviewers for my recently self-published book (and I’m following the advice to such an extent I’m not going to mention its title in shameless self-promotion, but rest assured there are very few Tottie Limejuices out there).
Seriously, though, an excellent piece which is going to be of use to so many people, not just aspiring authors but the poor bloggers and reviewers who get inundated with absolute codswallop of no possible interest to them.
Thanks for a great piece.
Excellent and very useful post, Thank you Catherine.
Thanks Jan!
Good post Catherine. Do people actually buy books after browsing Amazon? I do. But there are Zillions of books and you can look at every genre, can you?
My book – “here we go”, (it’s a funny book about ‘baling string’) , “not that anybody cares” eh Catherine?), Perhaps I should bribe some reviewer with a free copy or some baling string?
Well, that’s the whole point: to get people to go to your Amazon listing. Then, persuade them to buy the book. Reviews from trusted sources (i.e. NOT customer reviews) can really help.
Love this, Catherine. Just what many indies need to hear — specifically the symptoms of “Thinking People Care Syndrome.” SO very, very true. Framing it not as negativity, but rather as the reality of the situation is spot on. The more grounded in reality an indie author can be, the more focus they have available to do the hard work necessary to meet their goals. *slow clap applause for a fab post*
LOL! Thanks Toni. I’m actually planning a blog post next month dedicated to this whole “nobody cares” default position thing. I think if I’ve learned one lesson in the last two years, it’s that, but I don’t think it’s a negative thing, as you say. It’s more of a challenge, i.e. getting people to care.
Thanks for the excellent post, Catherine. When my book is actually finished I will refer to it!
Ruth
Thanks Ruth!
Reblogged this on NewsLetter and commented:
A very handy list of do’s and don’t's . . .
Thank you!
Brilliant!
Hard truth, but so valuable to have it laid out explicitly – thank you.
Have bookmarked it for future use.
Thanks Alison! I was just going to do the “how not to” bit but I thought that was a bit ranty and not very useful, so I put the positive bit first!
Lovely and oh, so true!
Ha! Thanks Laura.
Three thousand WELL SAID words! Actually, brilliant. Loved it. I’ll be passing it along. Keep up the good work.
Thanks Jamie!
Thanks for this blog entry!! I just signed up on FutureBook as a blogger, so maybe I’ll get some books to review. I’ve been wanting to do something like this for a while now, so this was definitely helpful!
You’re welcome, Sarah!
Great post.
It reminds me of an other one regarding getting a book reviewed. It’s from Robin Sullivan, then publisher of Michael Sullivan for his Ryiria Revelations series.
(which after that was bought by Orbit, and makes a deserved killing)
http://write2publish.blogspot.com/2011/06/marketing-101-reviews.html
First of all, Jamie Clark Chavez did pass it along. She’s a woman of her word.
Second, before I even read the post, I smiled at the obvious wit found in your credentials–writer, astronaut, skinny… Just looking at your website makes me happy.
Third, you share a wealth of applicable information for a person who’s debuting this spring as a self-published author (or even one who’s not, but I’m the former, and, as you wrote–although not in these words–I care about me).
Exceptional stuff and bookmarked for future reference.
Tom
I’m so glad we’re connected, Tom.
Thanks Tom
Can I just say I LOVE this post?
Stumbled upon it from a FB link, and now have to share. It blows my mind sometimes how entitled to glory some indie authors seem to think they are. Thanks for the reminder that there are plenty of sane ones, too. We just don’t see them because they’re too busy writing good books and blog posts to be walking out in the middle of the street with spam.
You can say you love this post all you want!
Reblogged this on breeanaputtroff and commented:
A great post — if you’re an indie author, take heed.
Wish I had seen this before I learned so much of that stuff the hard way! I am a brand new author, an industry outsider, and a baby boomer, so I’ve got a lot of tide to swim against, but every day, I learn more and more. Loved this piece…spot on.
Thanks JoAnn!
I think you offer some very good advice, and your point that “no one cares” really hits the nail on the head. Even though sales of my (self published) YA fantasy, EON’S DOOR, have been consistently improving, I realized early on that I had to find ways of making readers care about its existence (i.e. give them a reason to spend their hard earned money). First, I made sure I had written a good book. Without a good book, you’re doomed, no matter what else you try. Some excellent reviews by reputable book bloggers have also helped (they’ve been posted along with the book on retail sites like Amazon). But I knew had to go beyond that, I needed to separate myself from the crowd. As a teacher with expertise in curriculum development, I decided (after some advice from a friend) to create a study unit for the book. The unit is free to teachers and can be downloaded from my website; all they have to do is buy the books for their students. Teachers really like good resources–especially free ones. And, since the money to buy books is budgeted to them, they’re happy to spend it if they have a good resource that goes with those books. So far it’s helped boost sales. And made them care.
Very informative; thank you for posting. Not that I have a book that needs to be reviewed (yet) but I do know a number of self published writers who would love to have their work reviewed.
I also want to say that what really struck a chord with me is the Thinking People Care Syndrome point you made. I learned this the hard way in a different situation before and kind of suspected that it applied to most things in life. A suspicion that has since been confirmed, unfortunately. It surprises me that, like you said, many people who seem professional otherwise don’t realize this.
I am a teacher and even though I don’t tell this daily to my students, I did when the occasion(s) arose: Ask nicely for what you want and, most of the time, you will get it.
It is more about assertiveness actually, but the ‘nicely’ part is just as equally powerful.
Thanks so much for this information, very valuable. I published my book with a small independent publisher and do find that the responsibility to create a buzz about and get reviews for my book is mine.
This info you gave for self published books is valid for any author or illustrator who believes in their book.
Thanks again!
This is exactly where I am now. Debut novel published by small press, sending out review copies to the cold world. I think I’ve done a decent email presentation letter and the book looks great. Thanks for the extra addresses. So daunting though, isn’t it?
I think you’re awesome, and I’m going to buy your book “Self-Printed” – because your advice seems sound and even more so, because I like your sense of humor and it promises to be an entertaining read. I was laughing so hard I started to tear up reading your post. Now, I will have to buckle down and follow this advice. I’m someone who loves to write but does not love the necessity of marketing. I keep selling paperbacks but not so much on the eBooks – also I shouldn’t overstate, I mean to say I’ve sold a bit over 100 paperbacks, versus one eBook. I self-published the first one August of last year. I just got on Amazon last month. I’m nervous and I talk too much, nice to meet you.
Reblogged this on Sumiko Saulson and commented:
To my fellow small press and independently published writers: I recommend you read this. Catherine is smart and funny – a rare combination.
Thanks so much! Really appreciate it.
Helpful, sensible AND funny! Glad I found the link on Twitter.
Wow, Michael Moore was right: It’s so much easier to absorb commonsense when it’s funny ^^ I’m going to bookmark this post and refer to it in future~
Definitely a helpful post. I know I’ll look into digital distribution soon, so figuring out how to ask for a review is big help.
Great post! I review and blog books but I review anything. I just love to read!
thebookwormjustate.wordpress.com
I liked your article. So just to recap . . . you’re saying that reviewers are NOT sitting with their Kindles in their lap waiting for my book to come out? Wow. My friends said that they would be. Bummer. Well, I’m pretty sure once they see the millions of dollars I’m eventually going to make on my book they will feel bad they didn’t jump in on that ground floor opportunity I would have offered them to review it. (Please note: actual book has less run on sentences)
Thanks again.
Wow, your post just helped me immensely, particularly the careful phrasing of the email, the need to thoroughly research motivated reviewers and the sell sheet. Thanks Catherine for saying it truly like it is. I like your style.
This is such a great port! and very informative too. I started working on something and this will help me too look at things whatever road I might take
Catherine – you’ve saved our lives!!! We’ve been inundated with reviews of our books and simply could not figure out how to stop the deluge. Can’t beat them off with rolled up galley proofs. Now we can follow your handy dandy self-help guide on how NOT to get reviewed, put an end to the flood, and get back to writing more books to not review.
Thanks Catherine so much for your informative blogpost! I’ll tell you how it goes and when my self-published book become a best seller and discussed on Oprah, I’ll definitely give you credit!
Seriously, I think you’ve given some great advice. Now time to test it out!
I’m a book reviewer, and I can tell you that I DO care about your indie book, at least if it’s for the Kindle. Perhaps I don’t care in the same way or with the same intensity that you do, though. My website, Indie Kindle Blitz (http://indiekindleblitz.wordpress.com ) offers free and honest reviews on our site to indie kindle authors. We also cross-post to Amazon and Goodreads. I started Indie Kindle Blitz because as an indie author myself, I found it difficult to get free and honest reviews. There’s a great need for this sort of thing.
Hi, Catherine. I followed your link from your 12/01/12 post. You have some amazing advice. Like many of your commenters, I love your “Thinking People Care syndrome.” So good for a writer to remember when she’s setting out to sell her latest novel. (So this is timely for me, and I’m scared to death.) My challenge just became: How can I make sure people DO care about downloading my novel? I’ll be pondering this. Thanks for another great post. I’ve read a lot of your posts, but I love that you’re reposting some things I’ve not seen.
Reblogged this on Tammy J Rizzo and commented:
Still more excellent advice for self-publishing authors, on how to (not) get your book reviewed, again from Catherine, Caffeinated. She’s gone through it all, as a self-publisher, and she really seems to know her stuff.
Your article, “How (Not?) To Get Your Book Reviewed Catherine, Caffeinated”
was in fact truly worth writing a comment on! Simply just
wanted to admit you truly did a remarkable work.
Many thanks ,Mitch
Just dropping in to say that I love your blog and, while today’s comment on the whole Jeff Rivera debacle was my first time commenting, I have read quite a few posts – this one included – at least three times. Thank you so much for being out there and crazy helpful for stressed-out indie newbies like me!
P.S. I am the one blogger I know who actually does automatically care about the book of someone who emails me. Don’t ask me why. I can’t seem to help it. Someone emails me and I just default to feeling so happy and pleased and really hoping my schedule is open and their book sounds semi-interesting so I can say yes, yes, I’ll review it!
I think that’s cool Emily..and congrats on writing YA fiction at such a young age, I think that’s awesome. I would ask you to review my books except they are definitely not YA so they’d probably not be appropriate (which is kind of what Catherine’s blog is saying – don’t bombard the YA blog about your gruesome horror novels). I did follow your blog though. And wish you the best.
Well thanks for dropping by!
I do read adult books sometimes – in fact, I read almost anything – but two things I don’t read are heavily sexual books and horror/thriller. (I did read a thriller series, once, but ended up giving it a bad review and not finishing the third book. Won’t try that again.)
Yes.. most of my books don’t really have any sex to speak of, but they’re all definitely horror/thriller genre. And I agree with you that there is no sense in people reviewing things that they don’t like. I don’t give reviews, but I do interview authors in sci-fi, horror and fantasy genres…
Sorry, I am a complete muppet and posted my comment in the wrong place as I didn’t scroll down far enough to find this correct box! I am going outside into the snow and sub-zero temperatures to whip myself with birch twigs for my stupidity
Why are things so much easier to understand and apply when said with humor by someone who knows what they are talking about! Thanks for this info!