R.J. Lynch's Blog, page 17

Choosing an extract from a book to upload to Goodreads for prospective readers to take a look at can be difficult. Amazon simply makes the first 10% available, but that is not necessarily the extract that will have the most to say about the book. I pondered on where to start and finish my extract from Sharon Wright: Butterfly for quite a long time before I came up with what follows. A number of my women readers have said how much they enjoy my female characters and I hope that this extract will give some idea why that is. There are not one (Sharon) strong women in Sharon Wright: Butterfly but three, and two of them are featured here. Sara is the car thief escaping from her police pursuers; DI Mary Prutton is the other. Neither of them is particularly nice (the most noticeable thing about Sara is her reluctance to wash either herself or her clothes) but niceness is not something I find necessary in a heroine. Anyway, here’s the extract – I hope you like it.

Sara settled on Chieveley. Leigh Delamere had the tree-sheltered bays that might have hidden her while she executed her plan, but Chievely had something better—it was off the motorway itself, so you could go north or south as well as east or west.

At Junction 13 she turned south on the A34 and immediately left into the service station. She drove to the furthest end of the car park and parked in the row nearest the front. The BMW followed her in and came to a halt five rows behind her.

Sara took the cigarettes, lighter and mobile phone from her denim jacket and slipped them into her handbag. She left the jacket draped over the back of the front passenger seat. “I’m here,” it said. “So my owner’s coming back.”

Two smokers stood just outside the entrance to the buildings. Sara stopped near them and lit a cigarette. She leaned against the pillar, smoking, a young car thief without a care in the world. The two coppers in the BMW pored ostentatiously over a map. Well to Sara’s left, and as far as it could be from the Beemer’s sightlines, a laden Mondeo parked. The driver, a woman of about forty, got out and helped a much older woman out of the passenger seat. Three girls aged from about eight to fifteen emerged from the back seat. They gazed enviously at a busload of teenage girls in school uniform who seemed to be everywhere.

The mother gave the old woman a walking stick and steadied her with one hand. ‘Don’t rush, Samantha,’ Sara heard her say. ‘Grandma needs something to eat and a cup of tea.’

Sara flicked away her cigarette and walked without haste to the Ladies. Inside were three of the schoolgirls in short navy blue skirts, white ankle socks, white blouses with striped ties and navy blue jumpers. Sara approached the most sullen looking one. ‘Excuse me. Would you help me?’

The girl looked at her without comment.

Sara gestured back over her shoulder. ‘There’s a guy out there. Friend of a friend. I hitched a lift with him. He thinks that gives him special rights.’

All three girls’ faces took on the same look of disgust. ‘Bloody men,’ said the sullen one in a strong Black Country accent.

‘I thought I could handle him,’ said Sara. ‘Now I’m not so sure.’

‘What do you want us to do?’

‘Will you make a back for me so I can go out through that window?’

‘Yeah!’ The girls nodded, all traces of sullenness gone.

‘And don’t say anything about it out there?’

‘Course not. That scumbag.’

Sara turned towards the window. As if on an afterthought she turned back, pulling the mobile from her bag. ‘This is his,’ she said.

‘You want us to give it back to him?’

‘Well, you could. But then he’d know I’d done a runner. And he’s been a real creep.’

The sullen girl’s face shone. ‘We could use it!’

‘Why not? It’s got a few quid left on it.’

‘Cool. What if he reports it to the police?’

‘Don’t be seen using it. If it rings, don’t answer. Don’t make any call that lasts so long they can trace where you are. When it stops working, sling it.’

‘Oh. That is so cool.’

‘Where are you going, by the way?’

‘Home. Dudley.’

Sara waited for a middle-aged woman to wash her hands and leave. ‘Now,’ she said. ‘Who’s going to lift me out of here?’

Three willing pairs of hands came forward.

Outside, Sara moved swiftly to the edge of the building and peered round. The BMW hadn’t moved, and neither had its occupants.

She took her key collection from her bag and walked confidently towards the Mondeo. Less than a minute later, she was out of the car park, under the motorway and heading north on the A4. When she reached Abingdon she turned off through Marcham and Frilford for Witney. There she picked up the A40 and pointed the Mondeo west.

At about the time Sara was passing Burford, two increasingly anxious policemen had left their unmarked BMW and were moving stealthily closer to a Mercedes with a girl’s denim jacket draped over the passenger seat. They were approached by a furious woman. Some distance behind her, a stooped old lady supported by a stick was surrounded by three white-faced girls.

‘Someone’s stolen my car,’ shouted the angry woman.

The two policemen looked at each other.

‘Oh, bloody hell,’ said one.

DI Prutton and DC Wylie returned to the interview room. Wylie pressed the button and dictated the date, time of interview resumption and names of those present.

‘So, Mister Gough,’ said Prutton. ‘Are you ready to tell me the details of your meeting with Jim Cameron at the Shepherd’s Crook pub today?’

Gough blinked. ‘Cameron wasn’t there.’

‘Excuse me?’

‘I said, Cameron wasn’t there. I met Johnny Walker.’

Prutton smiled at Gough. The young constable standing beside the door had never seen anything that chilled the blood quite as much as that smile. The DI took a pack of Marlboro and a lighter from her jacket pocket and passed them across the table to Gough. Gough, who hadn’t smoked for ten years, lit one and nodded his thanks.

‘Who is Johnny Walker?’ asked Prutton.

‘He’s a friend of Jim Cameron.’

‘A friend?’

‘Business associate.’

‘Right hand man?’

Gough nodded.

‘For the tape, please, Mister Gough.’

Gough cleared his throat. ‘Yes.’

‘And the business that these business associates associate for. How would you describe it?’

Gough moved uneasily in his chair.

‘For the benefit of the tape, Mister Gough has made a gesture that can perhaps best be described as a shrug. Let me expand the question, Mister Gough. Would you describe the business activities of James Cameron and Johnny Walker as legitimate or criminal?’

Gough raised his eyes to look into the DI’s face. She was smiling. The bloody woman was smiling at him as she turned him on the spit. He stared at her. Still smiling, she raised her eyebrows in silent interrogation. Gough looked at his feet.

‘Criminal,’ he said. ‘Cameron and Walker are a pair of crooks.’

‘And the matter you met Walker to discuss this morning? Was that a criminal matter?’

Gough nodded.

‘For the tape, please, Mister Gough.’

‘Yes. Yes, for God’s sake. I met him to discuss a criminal matter. All right?’

‘Mister Gough. I feel very bad about allowing you to incriminate yourself without a brief being present to protect your interests. Can I please, for your own sake, urge you to consider asking for the presence here of your lawyer, Mister Owen Thompson?’

Slowly, Gough raised his head. He stared into the face counterfeiting concern opposite him. ‘You pitiless cow,’ he said.

‘For the benefit of the tape, will you please explain your reluctance to be represented by Owen Thompson?’

‘Owen Thompson is Jim Cameron’s lawyer. As you well know.’

‘Are you suggesting Mister Thompson might not represent you as you would wish?’

‘Owen Thompson is as bent as a nine bob note.’

‘I see. Well, can we get you the duty lawyer?’

‘Don’t be ridiculous.’

‘On your own head be it, Mister Gough. If the CPS decides to bring this before a court, I don’t want anyone suggesting you were denied proper representation. Now. The criminal matter you discussed this morning with Johnny Walker. Was Walker speaking on behalf of James Cameron?’

Gough nodded.

‘For the tape, please, Mister Gough.’

‘Yes.’

‘Yes what?’

‘Yes, Walker was speaking on behalf of James Cameron.’

‘I see. Please describe the contents of the conversation. In your own words.’

Gough took another cigarette from Prutton’s pack. ‘Buggy’s dead.’

‘Buggy?’

‘John Wright. Used to fetch and carry for Cameron. He’s dead. Walker says Buggy has the keys to some lock-ups. He stored stolen gear in them.’

‘For Cameron?’

‘Yes. Sort of.’

‘What do you mean, sort of? It was for Cameron or it wasn’t.’

‘Cameron doesn’t steal stuff, for God’s sake. Other people do that.’

‘He’s a fence?’

‘No. Other people do that, too.’

‘Cameron puts up the money?’

‘Cameron provides protection. You want to do anything on this manor, you need Cameron’s permission. Whatever you get, he takes a share.’

‘And what does he give in return?’

‘You don’t get the shit beaten out of you, for a start. And you might get the police kept off your back.’

Prutton leaned forward. ‘Be very careful what you say, Mister Gough. How would Cameron arrange to keep the police off your back?’

‘I really have no idea, Missus Prutton. But I’m sure there are people in this building who could tell you.’ He stared defiantly at her, but it was he who broke first. He looked away, lit another cigarette.

‘Tell me about these lock-ups. How many are there?’

‘Walker doesn’t know. Doesn’t know where they are, either.’

‘How is that possible?’

‘Buggy rented them. Walker gave him the cash every month, and Buggy signed the forms and paid the rent. Anything goes wrong, you can’t connect what’s in the lock-ups to Cameron.’

‘Clever.’

‘But now Buggy’s dead. And Cameron and Walker don’t know where the lock-ups are.’

‘Not so clever.’

‘Guys want to sell what they’ve blagged, see. And they can’t, ‘cos Buggy took it away and stored it for them and now they can’t ask him where it is. And what happens if the rent doesn’t get paid? That’s what Cameron’s worried about. Landlords start opening lock-ups, what are they gonna find? See what I mean?’

‘I do, Jackie, I really do. So what does Walker want you to do about it?’

‘He wants me to see if Shazza knows where the keys and the rent books are.’

‘Shazza?’

‘Sharon Wright. Buggy’s wife. Sharon Levitt before. We grew up together.’

‘Why doesn’t Walker ask her himself?’

‘He gave her a black eye a couple of days ago.’

‘What for?’

‘A warning. I dunno. Stop her talking.’

‘What would she have talked about?’

‘Buggy told her he was going to France to do a job for Cameron. Cameron didn’t want her repeating that.’

‘Was it true?’

‘I have no idea. He told me the same thing. But…Buggy tells you something…it might be true, might not.’

‘And why would Walker think you might have some special power over Sharon Wright?’

Gough looked at her without replying.

‘Is there a special relationship between you and Sharon?’

‘I told you. We grew up together.’

‘And that’s all?’

Gough sighed. ‘No. That isn’t all.’

‘You’ve been intimate with her?’

‘I’ve fu… I’ve slept with her, if that’s what you mean.’

‘Often?’

‘Yes, often.’

‘Before her husband died?’

‘Yes.’

‘And after?’

‘Yes.’

‘Mister Gough, let me get this straight. You were carrying on an affair with John Wright’s wife, and now he’s dead in suspicious circumstances. And you’re still carrying on an affair with his wife.’

‘Now just a minute…’

‘Do you know that’s the commonest motive there is for murder?’

‘You’ve no chance of pinning that on me, so forget it. Buggy died in France. I was here.’

‘Ah, yes. There was some question over that, wasn’t there? No passport has ever been issued to John Wright, but he got to France. Interestingly, with a passport in the name of James Robert Patterson. Can you explain why that passport has your fingerprints on it?’

Gough was jolted upright. ‘I don’t believe…you can’t have…’

‘Want to take a chance on it? You want to lie in the hope that the passport does not have your fingerprints on it?’

Gough stared at her in silence.

‘The passport, Mister Gough. How did it come into John Wright’s possession?’

The silence continued. Then: ‘I got it for him. But if he was murdered, that’s nothing to do with me.’

‘I think we have enough for now.’ She nodded to Wylie, who dictated the time of interview suspension and turned off the tape machine.

‘Now what?’ asked Gough.

‘Now? Now, Jackie, you carry out Johnny Walker’s instructions. You go to Sharon Wright and you exercise whatever wiles you must to get hold of those keys and rent books.’

‘You want me to bring them to you?’

‘That’s right, Jackie.’

‘What do I tell Walker?’

‘I’ll tell you that nearer the time, Jackie.’

‘He’ll kill me.’

‘You’ll have to stay on my good side, won’t you? Give me the will to stop him.’

‘Is that enough, guv?’, Wylie asked when Gough had reluctantly departed.

‘Nothing like enough, I’m afraid. We’ve got Gough for procuring a false passport. Everything else is Gough’s word against someone else’s. But we do have Gough, constable. Let that tape out and he’s a goner. I have Jackie Gough in the palm of my hand. He’s my snout till the end of time. If I tell him to lick me clean after I’ve taken my morning dump, he’ll get down on his knees and stick out his tongue.’

She moved close to Wylie and stared into his eyes. ‘I like that in a man.’

Wylie stood by the reception desk and watched DI Mary Prutton walk across the car park towards her little MG. ‘Interesting woman,’ he said to the desk sergeant.

‘Out of your league,’ said the sergeant. ‘Forget about it. Whatever you’re thinking.’

‘Is she real, do you think? Does she mean the stuff she says?’

DS Milton had come silently up behind him. ‘More experienced men than you have wondered that,’ she said.

I bought this book in W H Smith at Manchester Airport before a three week trip to Saudi Arabia and South Africa. I didn’t much like the cover but I do like historical crime fiction, the book had a “Buy one, get one half price” sticker and I had already picked up Maddaddam by Margaret Atwood which I knew I would enjoy (and I did). I finished The Devil in the Marshalsea half an hour ago sitting on the terrace at the Southern Sun Montecasino in Johannesburg on a warm and sunny Spring Saturday morning, glad that I had not been put off by the cover.

While I was reading it and thinking about a review I wavered—three stars? Four? Five? Three stars means: “It’s a good book and I enjoyed it”—but it was more than that. Five stars? Well, almost—but the characters, though convincing, never really emerge on the page into three rounded dimensions. I settled on 4½ stars and rounded down to four.

The historical research is excellent, the background is so fully realised that you can smell the stench, feel the fear, taste the food and get drunk on the punch. It’s well paced. The secret, when it is finally unlocked, convinces. Motivations are believable. Antonia Hodgson is a very good writer; when she masters rounded characterisation (and she will—I hope by her next book, which nothing save death can prevent me from reading) she will take her place among our finest historical authors.

When you get to my age it’s inevitable that you sometimes wonder: If I get there, what will Heaven be like? Well, now I know. Heaven will be like Sunday lunch at Punchinello’s at The Southern Sun Montecasino in Johannesburg.

And, if it isn’t, I think I don’t want to go there.

No-one gave Sharon a chance. Except Sharon.

In Sharon’s deprived childhood, Buggy was Top Cat—the one everyone went in fear of. Buggy ruled the roost and Buggy’s girlfriend could be the Number One female. So she married him. But Buggy as an adult is no more than a messenger boy and the men who call on his services treat him—and therefore her—with contempt. She’d been the one with the brains and she has to watch the more cautious girls who knew what Sharon’s mother had never taught her climb the ladder out of the dump they all grew up in.

Then Buggy’s incompetence lands him in trouble with not one but two contract killers, one British and one American. Trouble for Buggy means trouble for Sharon. In desperate circumstances, desperate remedies prevail and Sharon persuades the young graduate who thinks she loves him to steal £400,000 from a gangster who is never likely to forgive and forget.

She takes the train to Paris to collect the money. But who is that watching her from the end of the carriage? And is she wise to flick the hem of her miniskirt at him?

Sharon White: Butterfly is available now for kindle and will be out in paperback before the end of the year.

No-one gave Sharon a chance. Except Sharon.

In Sharon’s deprived childhood, Buggy was Top Cat—the one everyone went in fear of. Buggy ruled the roost and Buggy’s girlfriend could be the Number One female. So she married him. But Buggy as an adult is no more than a messenger boy and the men who call on his services treat him—and therefore her—with contempt. She’d been the one with the brains and she has to watch the more cautious girls who knew what Sharon’s mother had never taught her climb the ladder out of the dump they all grew up in.

Then Buggy’s incompetence lands him in trouble with not one but two contract killers, one British and one American. Trouble for Buggy means trouble for Sharon. In desperate circumstances, desperate remedies prevail and Sharon persuades the young graduate who thinks she loves him to steal £400,000 from a gangster who is never likely to forgive and forget.

She takes the train to Paris to collect the money. But who is that watching her from the end of the carriage? And is she wise to flick the hem of her miniskirt at him?

Sharon White: Butterfly? is available now for kindle and will be out in paperback before the end of the year.

Mark Twain said that “nothing so liberalizes a man and expands the kindly instincts that nature put in him as travel and contact with many kinds of people.” I wish it were true. In fact, travel causes friction because so many people go to new places determined to explain to Johnny Foreigner what he is doing wrong. If you’re a missionary, carry on (but don’t expect sympathy when your head is boiling in a pot). If you’re interested in selling something, keep your mouth shut. The values and ideas you grew up taking for granted are not shared by everyone. I know you think the advantages of Western-style democracy, equality between the sexes and advancement on merit alone are so obvious that all you have to do is explain how they work and people will fall over themselves to get these glories for their own societies. You may be astonished that so many of the people you meet don’t agree. You’re there to win orders, not arguments, so leave politics alone (and that goes double for religion).

The International Sales Handbook by John Lynch will be published by Mandrill Press on 1st November 2014 in paperback and for Kindle. It’s a practical handbook by a man with forty years experience of selling to every continent except Antarctica. It tells would-be exporters: This is what you do; this is how you do it; this is why you do it that way; and this is what can go wrong if you don’t. You can pre-order the Kindle version here; for more information on the paperback email [email protected] and ask to be put on the mailing list for our newsletter.

I wrote about staying safe here and here. The second post finished with this: That reference to the Corinthia reminds me of a whole bunch of advice that first time travellers to these places need to be aware of but that would make this a very long post so I’ll split it—Part 3 of International Sales—Let’s be careful out there will appear here tomorrow. So here it is—Part 3.

One thing I haven’t mentioned in either of my posts so far, though it’s covered in The International Sales Handbook, is private security. I’ll point out the obvious: this costs money (though in my experience it’s less expensive than you might imagine) and there’s no point in going down that road unless there is a real possibility that you could land a big sale at a good margin. Before we get into that, then, here is some advice you shouldn’t need a private security firm to tell you:

Don’t draw attention to yourself. Don’t travel in a top of the range Mercedes, BMW or 4×4 if there’s a reliable and less high profile car available. At the very least, you risk being the victim of carjackers and there’s no knowing where that might end.
If you see a lot of people gathering, especially if they’re almost all men, find somewhere else to be.
If you’re a Moslem then of course you will want to go to the mosque on Fridays. If you’re not a Moslem and you’re in a country that’s experiencing a high level of antipathy towards non-Islamic countries, I suggest that on Fridays you stay as far as possible from any mosque.
Be careful with your mobile phone. Most of them have cameras and even if yours doesn’t the other guy may not know that. All you’re doing may be talking to someone or sending a text message but if someone is doing what s/he shouldn’t and thinks you’re photographing or filming the action you could be in trouble. Don’t be a hero; don’t record the activity for the benefit of the police (or even just to place on YouTube to show how brave you are) because you could end up a dead hero. Leave the phone in your pocket, look the other way and get out of there fast.
Always make sure somebody knows where you are and what time you expect to get where you’re going. If things are really turbulent, arrange to send regular text messages confirming where you are and that all is okay (but see (4) above).
When you’re back in your hotel room, don’t abandon the security mindset. Keep the chain on the door and leave it on when you answer a knock until you’re satisfied that the call is legitimate. If you hear gunshots, don’t investigate and remember that bullets can go through a door, so don’t be in front of it. (If it gets really frightening, the bathroom can be the safest place).

If you haven’t been in a high risk country you probably think the above warnings are exaggerated—and maybe they are, but these things do happen. We shouldn’t get it out of proportion, though. In my forties I wore a comb-over for a while and then I looked in the mirror and gave myself a talking to. “You look ridiculous. You’re bald. Accept it.” So I went to a barber and said, ‘Number 2 clipper all over. Take it all off.’ When it was done I was almost afraid to leave the shop. Everyone would be staring at me and pointing. And you know what? Nobody even glanced at me. (And the baldy jokes stopped. Completely). It’s like that in places like Iraq and Libya. You get off the plane and you imagine you stand out like a sore thumb—that everyone is looking at you—and they’re not. Just follow the basics and you’ll be fine.

There are times, though, when following the basics isn’t quite enough. So: private security. If potential sales justify the cost, a number of companies offer this; Google Private Security followed by the name of the country you’re thinking of visiting and you’ll see a list. You really want one that’s staffed on the ground by ex-military people because they have experience of staying safe in places where people might want to kidnap and/or kill them, but don’t be fooled by expressions of gung-ho military adventure. You’re looking to get in, make the sale and get out again; you’re not there to act out some kind of Sylvester Stallone dream. I’ve used this kind of security escort in both Libya and Iraq in recent months and in neither case were the people armed—if they had been I’d have chosen someone else. Mostly, your meetings will take place in the city you’re staying in and what you need will be:

Up-to-the-minute security appraisal so that you know if you need to postpone a meeting and your driver knows if he needs to take a different route
A trained and approved driver to take you where you’re going, wait for you and bring you back
A tracker in the car and another on your person
An operations room from which the location of your tracker can be monitored and with which you and your driver can stay in touch

I’m looking right now at a quote from a reputable firm I’ve used before in Libya; for a four day visit including 3 nights B&B in a five star hotel (they do this a lot so they get better rates than I possibly could), meeting me off the plane and taking me to the hotel and then taking me back there at the end of the visit and making sure I was checked in and had passed through to the departure lounge the cost of all of that would amount to about £3,000 (say $5,000). I don’t think that’s unreasonable. If I plan to leave Tripoli (which I do, because I have some sites to survey 100 km from the capital) they will give me an embedded consultant (i.e. an ex-Army, probably ex-SAS man following a little way behind in another car with a driver of his own) taking the cost up to about £5,000 (say $8,000). Once again, that seems very reasonable to me.

These three articles have probably left some readers terrified. Don’t be. I’ve always emerged unscathed and the chances are you will, too. And the rewards can be significant. High risk countries know that they’re high risk and they know that your competitors don’t go there. The salesperson who does is made enormously welcome and gets the business.

The International Sales Handbook by John Lynch will be published by Mandrill Press on 1st November 2014 in paperback and for Kindle. It’s a practical handbook by a man with forty years experience of selling to every continent except Antarctica. It tells would-be exporters: This is what you do; this is how you do it; this is why you do it that way; and this is what can go wrong if you don’t. You can pre-order the Kindle version here; for more information on the paperback email and ask to be put on the mailing list for our newsletter.

So, following on from yesterday’s post about my visit to Iraq next month, how do you stay safe on a trip like that? What are the rules?

First, remember something I said in a previous post: the thing you most have to fear is wrong place, wrong time. Most of the people you meet will not wish you harm—but some will. And, since we’re talking about things to remember, also take on board that the inclination to trust people is normal but unwise. More often than not when someone is kidnapped (or just murdered where s/he stands), the person behind it is someone they know. You don’t want to believe that someone you’ve come to think of as a friend would betray you. I don’t want to believe it. No-one wants to believe it. Nevertheless, hold the idea in your head because if you walk into a trap there’s a better than 50/50 chance that a “friend” led you there.

Let’s not get this out of proportion. There are people in kidnap-prone countries in the Middle East and Africa who I’ve known for years and I regard as good friends. But that customer you’ve had for twelve months, who swore he’d keep you safe when you visited? You don’t really know him yet—you can’t. He’s probably fine. He probably has no intention of selling you to Al Qaeda. He probably hasn’t been told that if he doesn’t hand you over they’ll take his daughter. Probably. You’ve got a family back home—is “probably” good enough?

I gave some general rules for keeping yourself safe in that same earlier post. Here is some more specific advice on countries like Iraq, Syria and Libya. First, don’t go there without Kidnap and Ransom insurance. In fact in the case of Iraq you won’t get a visa unless you can produce evidence that you have such insurance and that is unfortunate because it means that everyone will know you’re insured and some people won’t see a human being when they look at you—they’ll see a walking ATM. Leaving that aside, you do need it in any place where kidnapping is happening with any regularity. The British government and the American government both refuse to pay ransoms to kidnappers on the grounds that doing so would feed the beast. I understand that. In fact, I support it. I also understand, though, that it tends to be British and American hostages who are picked out for beheadings because the terrorists expect to sell other nationalities back to their own countries. So while I support my government’s refusal to pay a ransom on my behalf, I make sure I have the insurance to do so myself. When I set off I leave the policy with someone who will know when I’m not where I’m supposed to be and will ring the necessary phone number.

Make sure the amount you’re insured for is enough. Whoever is negotiating to get you back won’t get far unless they can offer at least $1 million and twice that is probably better. And if you really do have a family at home then, while you’re arranging Kidnap and Ransom insurance, make sure you have plenty of life cover as well because even when you’re insured and have experts negotiating to get you back it may not turn out well.

I said we shouldn’t get this out of proportion and we shouldn’t. I’ve been doing this for years and I’m okay. I lived in Libya during the Six Day War when President Nasser in Egypt and King Hussein of Jordan were broadcasting appeals to people in Moslem countries to kill any British and American citizens they could get their hands on and I’m still alive. In 2013 I was in the Corinthia Hotel when the militia walked in with their Kalashnikovs to kidnap the Prime Minister and nobody touched me. As I say in The International Sales Handbook I’ve survived attempted kidnaps in Nigeria and (surprisingly–you don’t expect it there) Qatar. So, please, don’t let fear of what might happen discourage you from going after the business that is available.

That reference to the Corinthia reminds me of a whole bunch of advice that first time travellers to these places need to be aware of but that would make this a very long post so I’ll split it—Part 3 of International Sales—Let’s be careful out there will appear here tomorrow,

The International Sales Handbook by John Lynch will be published by Mandrill Press on 1st November 2014 in paperback and for Kindle. It’s a practical handbook by a man with forty years experience of selling to every continent except Antarctica. It tells would-be exporters: This is what you do; this is how you do it; this is why you do it that way; and this is what can go wrong if you don’t. You can pre-order the Kindle version here; for more information on the paperback email [email protected] and ask to be put on the mailing list for our newsletter.

I have a busy schedule next month; I’m in Abu Dhabi, Jeddah, Riyadh, Johannesburg and Baghdad. That isn’t as crazy as it may seem—we live in a big world and in The International Sales Handbook I talk about the need to manage your travelling time to get the maximum return:

Air fares are expensive and you need to make the best use of them. Don’t fly to one place, stay two days and then fly home with a view to flying somewhere else a few days later. Try to coordinate visits to a number of countries at the same time. Typical country combinations I have found effective are:

Tanzania to Kenya to South Africa
Dubai to Abu Dhabi (they’re only 100 km apart by road) to Oman
Jeddah to Riyadh to Dammam to Bahrain to Dubai
Japan to Indonesia to Malaysia
Belgium to Denmark to Sweden to Germany (all by road from the UK going out on the shuttle through the Channel Tunnel and coming back by ferry from Hook of Holland to Harwich; there’s a very nice ferry from Sweden to Germany)

 

So on this trip I’ll fly from Manchester to Abu Dhabi (7 hours); then Abu Dhabi to Jeddah (2 hours); Jeddah to Johannesburg (7 hours); a week there and then Johannesburg to Riyadh (7 hours); Riyadh to Baghdad (1½ hours); and then home (6½ hours). It’s a good use of time, given that Manchester to Johannesburg is, at very best, more than ten hours and I don’t have business elsewhere in Africa right now.

A good use of time, yes. But is it sensible? Should anyone go to Iraq, given the dangers there right now?

I don’t watch much television but I was a great fan of Hill Street Blues and Sergeant Esterhaus’s catchphrase, Let’s be careful out there, is as embedded in my consciousness as it is in anyone else’s. My business is in export—international sales—and one thing I’ve learned is that, if you want to do business in someone else’s country, you generally have to go there. Sure, Skype and conference calls can reduce the amount of travelling and be a great help in settling minor issues. I have customers thousands of miles away with whom I Skype regularly and it’s helped me and my company to keep the flow of orders coming, reduce misunderstandings and boost the friendships without which sales stagnate—people buy from people and they’re more likely to place orders with someone they have come to know and to get on with. In the end, though, Skype and conference calls aren’t enough; you have to sit across a desk or a dinner table from your customer or prospect, look them in the eye, answer their questions and ask questions of your own if you want to seal the deal with any regularity. In the past year, for all the trouble Iraq has been going through, I have done seven figure business there and I have seven containers due to arrive in Um Qasr any day now. I’ve been promised orders worth twice what I’ve had so far but there was a proviso: “The Minister wants to see you.” For that kind of order, the Minister will get his wish.

Going to Baghdad involves risk. You can’t remove that risk entirely; in tomorrow’s post, I’ll tell you what I do to minimise it. There’s business to be done in the world’s trouble spots. If you want your share, this is information you need to have.

The International Sales Handbook by John Lynch will be published by Mandrill Press on 1st November 2014 in paperback and for Kindle. It’s a practical handbook by a man with forty years experience of selling to every continent except Antarctica. It tells would-be exporters: This is what you do; this is how you do it; this is why you do it that way; and this is what can go wrong if you don’t. You can pre-order the Kindle version here; for more information on the paperback email [email protected] and ask to be put on the mailing list for our newsletter.

When the Bribery Act 2010 came into effect in the UK, we invited a solicitor specialising in this field to give a presentation at our Sales Conference on what we could and could not do. After we’d listened to what she had to say, I asked if I could give an example of what actually happened. This is the example I gave:

“I’m in, let’s say, Alexandria. We have three containers on the docks and our Egyptian customer needs to get them out of there—if he doesn’t start work on his contract soon, he’ll face penalty charges. We walk into the docks office and present the documents that should allow us to clear the goods. The clerk says, ‘These documents are not in order.’ I know, and he knows, that there’s nothing wrong with the documents; I also know that he knows that I know that he knows … etc. I take a US$20 bill from my pocket (I keep a supply of them about me for just this purpose), put it on the counter (keeping my hand on it) and say, ‘I wonder if there’s anything we can do about that?’ The clerk eyes it and then stamps the documents (to say they are all right and the containers can be driven away) and puts them on the counter right beside my hand. I pick up the documents and the $20 disappears into the clerk’s pocket. We leave the office and call the transport company to move the containers to the customer’s yard.”

The lawyer said, “You can no longer do that.”

I’m afraid I laughed.

A tiny minority of Egyptians are quite astonishingly wealthy—the huge majority have nothing. When you meet the Operations Director of an Egyptian customer of significant size, try to remember that his salary probably has the buying power of a power tool rental depot manager in Madrid. You wonder why his salesman is driving a small, old car that’s falling to pieces? Because that’s all he can afford. So how much do you think the clerk on the docks takes home? Most Egyptian workers rely on tips, and that’s how the clerk will regard the $20 he pretty well forced you to give him—as a tip. If they don’t get tips, they may struggle to eat. When I give it to him, am I committing an offence under UK law? Yes, I probably am. I would also, in all likelihood, be offending against the American Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and the OECD Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign Public Officials in International Business Transactions. Do I care? I do not. If handing over that $20 is against the law then Mr Bumble was right—the law is an ass.

The International Sales Handbook by John Lynch will be published by Mandrill Press in paperback and for Kindle on 1st November 2014. You can pre-order the Kindle version here; for more information on the paperback email [email protected] and ask to be put on the mailing list for our newsletter.