photo: Shaun Bythell

Well, here I am in the Bookshop, Wigtown, at the height of the Wigtown Book Festival, Scotland’s Literary event of the year (and I say that as one who has appeared more than once at the Edinburgh Book Festival). Those red books on the table, in the case and in the basket, are mine. There are one hundred of them in total, though not all of them are in the picture.

When I say they are mine, I do not mean merely that they belong to me, nor that they are copies of a book written by me – though in fact they are – but that I made them in their entirety: they were typeset, printed, sewn and bound by me. They are, if you like, the ultimate in self-publishing.

The book is called The McAvinchey Codex, and purports to have been written by one Auberon ‘Bron’ Dawn, from which the more astute among you might guess that it is a parody of Dan Brown, the American writer.

This is the story of how it came to be made.

[click here for full List of Contents]