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Okay, so here it is - the final Sex.com book cover. My publisher and I agreed a compromise on the tagline first thing this morning. It will be: “One Domain, Two Men, Twelve Years and the Brutal Battle for the Jewel in the Internet’s Crown.” At one point in the discussion, while discussing the minutiae of one word meaning this or that, we both realised we had got way too involved in the decision, so this is it.

Readers of this blog will see that their suggestion about the woman having her heads behind her head was duly noted and introduced. In fact, the whole woman figure was nearly lost as one *very big* outlet wasn’t so sure about it so a version with a plain “x” was knocked up. That company didn’t get back to confirm a big order though, and we were all so attached to the woman figure that we’ve run with it. What else? Well, several people has told me very recently that Amazon sent out an email saying the book had been delayed. My publisher assures me that this “delay” is a matter of no more than a few days. I don’t know what the deal was. It may have been the legal read of the book, or the copy review, or me being caught up with other work and so being a few days late with my final chapter, who knows, but I have seen the galley proofs so it is very much go.

Tangible trauma

It is an oddly exciting thing to see a finished book cover and a set of galley proofs. Suddenly years or work becomes somehow tangible. I am itching to get that first copy of it in my hands. I hope from that point that everyone likes it and it sells well but the most important part for me is just having it. There were two times during the writing of the book (I have been on it for three years) that I honestly thought it would never happen. I remember taking the decision in, I think, December 2005 that if I didn’t do this I would regret it for the rest of my life. So I took four months off work to concentrate on it. I ate up all my savings - something that more than 15 months later I am only just recovering from - and I wrote it. And then I rewrote it. And then I rewrote it again. In between I made two trips to the US, adding more interviews and more information.

The November 2006 deadline for the book was missed despite me just hitting the August deadline because of the strange economics of the Xmas market, and that added more time and more work and more expense. I swore a few times, I have to admit. So, yes, it is true, writing a book is extremely hard work. I always knew that I would be sick of the sight of it by the time it came out and I thought I had hit that point several times, but the truth of it is that you will keeping taking more. Anyway, everyone can expect me to bug them about getting the book. I am looking forward to reading the first copy and seeing if I made a good job of it.

I am still looking for a US publisher by the way, if anyone knows anyone. There is a very big market for this in the USA.