Love Lose Live:
Divorce is a Rollercoaster

By Mary Banham-Hall, family lawyer and mediator

Published by Focus Mediation (via CreateSpace)

Divorce and separation are among the greatest traumas we can experience. ONS figures reveal that 42% of marriages end in divorce, half of these within ten years. Love Lose Live is a contemporary and informed observation of divorce and family breakdown seen through the eyes of the fictional Bailey family. The thinking, actions and reasoning of the children and adults alike are carefully conveyed, as is the grief felt as the marriage ends and everyone finally moves towards recovery and new lives.

The challenge

The author, a well-known family lawyer and mediator, decided to self-publish her book. She put together a very experienced team of publishing consultants to oversee the production, editing, and marketing.

I quickly realised that the media are very prejudiced against self-published books, the reason being that several hundred thousands of such books are published every year – anyone can be a published author in the digital era!

The solution

Write a press release stressing how the book was highly professionally produced and the author’s own standing in the legal/mediation fields. Moreover, emphasise the relevance of such a book – whose aim is to help couples breaking-up avoid many common pitfalls – in today’s society where a large number of people separate or divorce.

The result

The author was interviewed at length in The Times newspaper (ABC controlled circ. 404K+), the Daily Mail Online (ABC circ. monthly unique browsers 238,566,774 MUVs), and by Woman’s Hour (BBC Radio 4’s leading women’s programme). She also wrote various comment pieces for very popular blogs such as the Huffington Post, and for the legal press including The Law Society Gazette, LexisNexis Family Law blog, and Family Law (Jordan).