I’m heading back from my first day at Hay and it’s been a really great experience. My intentions on going there were a bit different than most people on the blog – I’m with a small start-up from Cardiff, Dead Bird Press, and I headed to the festival to try and promote our first novel, ‘The Death of Danny Daggers’, by first-time Welsh author Haydn Wilks.

Trying to promote a new book is challenging and we’ve faced a steep learning curve thus far, but one of the better ideas we came up with was heading to the festival with a stack of flyers and a smile and going out to spread the word to a crowd of thousands who’ve descended upon this beautifully odd little town in Wales bonded by a mutual love of books.

The responses have been fantastic. Few people took a flyer from me today without firing off a few questions about what the book was about, and it’s been really heartening to receive such warm responses. As someone whose done sales jobs in the past, promoting a book at the Hay festival has been a world away from the rejection and avoidance I’m used to receiving when trying to push something new onto the general public.

Other commitments prevent me from coming back to the festival until the weekend, and also scuppered my plans to pay it a visit last Saturday and Sunday, but I intend to *ahem* make hay whilst the sun is (hopefully) shining and enjoy another day or two handing out flyers this weekend. If you see me, come and grab one! And if you’re interested, you can read an extract from the novel we’re promoting over at the author’s website, haydnwilks.com.