My Name is Angel Cater and I began the Children's Illustration course in early 2005, but a series of tragedies during that year caused me to put my painting and the course on hold. I began 2006 determined to have a better year and in addition to resuming the course, I began illustrating a children’s picture book that I had written called “The Adventures of Sailor Sam”. The star of the book is my very handsome and charismatic tabby cat, Samson. It became very much a family project as the human characters in the book were modelled by my cousins, their sons and other friends. The book was self-published in November 2006 by a POD publisher and proved a big hit at the school where I work and within my locality. Samson, himself, was featured in several local papers. However, I quickly discovered for myself the evils of the vanity press and hit big problems with that publisher. This March was my 40th birthday and I decided to buy a batch of ISBN numbers with money received and Samson became the proud president of ‘Tabby Cat Press’. I republished “The Adventures of Sailor Sam” myself, working with a POD printer. I had to learn a lot of difficult new software and had my book cover rejected 3 times, but it was well worth it when I saw the final product. It looked so much better quality and more professional than the original version. I took the self-publishing route because I wanted total control of how the book looked and especially how the character of Sailor Sam appears. Dorrance Publishing had wanted to publish it (and charge me a huge sum for the privilege which they neglect to mention on their adverts) but do the illustrations themselves which was completely unacceptable to me.
The feedback to the first book was so overwhelming positive and I love that despite having no children myself, I have managed to create a character that children seem to connect with. I spent the wet evenings and weekends of this summer writing and illustrating a second Sailor Sam story, and this time many of the cats living on my street also got in on the act. It was published at the end of October and is again receiving excellent local press. Samson has made a number of public appearances and enjoys the attention. I have put a lot of effort into building my profile on the web and am now receiving modest but steady Amazon sales.
In addition this year, I have signed a contract with Lachesis Publishing for two further picture books featuring a character called ‘Rickie the Raccoon’. The first story is already complete and I am working on the second. I also hope next year to publish one or two more of my own stories and I have many ideas for the future.
Signed and specially inscribed copies of my books can be ordered directly through www.tabbycatpress.com
My Amazon author’s profile can be viewed at Amazon
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