THE 400 SERIES BY KELI H

A stack of Four Hundred Club books written by author Keli H

With the sequel to The Four Hundred Club slated for release in the next few months, there's a couple of things being done differently to ensure its success... and also, my happiness, since I've been publishing books a while now, and have come to understand that what works for other authors is not what works for me. My journey is going to look different and I want it to feel easier than the years before. For the last few years, as much success as The Four Hundred Club has gained - even becoming an award-winning book - it has felt a lot like beating my head against a brick wall to get sales. Traditional sales tactics exhaust me and, in all honesty, don't work well for me. And let's not forget, my social media conundrum continues - if I choose to delete my social media, which I have a feeling I'll do in the future, then regular self-marketing is going to look different for my books.

The Durban Four Hundred came out in 2019 - the version created by Umsinsi Press - and The Four Hundred Club - taken over by my own publishing house, The KREST House - was released onto the market in 2022. If you want more information on this evolution, you can take a look at the history of The Four Hundred Club. But It's 2025 now. All in all, I've got a good couple of years of experience under my belt. I'm armed with better insight for the sequel to The Four Hundred Club, which is called Splitting an Empire. Here's what's going to be different in Splitting an Empire:

1. The Story Content of Splitting an Empire 

Over the course of the years, I must have given out fifty or more review copies. I've only gotten back about thirty reviews, though the issues around reviewing is something I'm going to address further down. 

The reviews that I really felt held constructive substance - and were not just personal preferences - had two things in common. Firstly, that the character development was absolute *chef's kiss*. What made the book brilliant was the way it was character driven and it was very accurate on a human level. But the second piece of feedback was that there was only character drive, and not enough plot. Readers wanted to see more of a definite storyline. 

So Splitting an Empire has been written with a far stronger focus on plot. The first book was about seven successful millennial adults put into a mansion together to make footage for reality TV. All the characters are glamorous, wealthy, and deeply insecure. The focus was on the millennial plight as the characters dealt with a variety of very specific millennial issues (social media, generational wealth gap, new and old money.) If this sounds intriguing, you can buy a copy of The Four Hundred Club from The KREST House. 

But in Splitting an Empire, the same wealthy characters are dealing with a plot problem. One of them has gotten married to a controlling man who has been cheating on her since the day of their vows. The group of glamorous friends bands together to help one of their own and topple her husband's empire in the process, in a fast-paced story of strategy and outsmarting each other.

 

For my readers who have come to love my work for the distinctive complex characters, you won't be disappointed. I have made sure that the plot of this book is there to enhance the character development, not overpower it. I like to think it's the best of both worlds. I can't wait to get the general feedback on this book.

2. Editing done by The KREST House 

 

The Durban Four Hundred was a very different publishing process. I worked, then, with a company that did a very basic publish of the book. Their edit was just a table of stray spelling and punctuation errors that was handed to me to implement myself - if I wanted to. The layout was done on MS Word and provided to me to make any proofreading changes. The cover was supervised by me, with no input from the publisher. I would say that it was a publisher that worked under my instruction, rather than them guiding me to the end goal of the book. 

The publishing process at my company, The KREST House, is vastly different from a lot of publishers. We have heavy focus on designing a beautiful book that represents us and the author well, and will sell well. We are an art-driven brand. Authors like the author that I once was - who are looking to just get someone to implement their instructions to create the book in their head - don't come to us. The authors who come to us are specifically enlisting us for our expertise and to take them to the goalpost. They come to us for leadership and authority in this industry. 

Having Splitting an Empire published under The KREST House banner is going to be a different experience. It already has been. The book has just come back from my company's editor. It's undergone what we call a first edit. This round of editing focuses on the development of the story - the character believability, a search for plot holes, the structure to ensure good pacing of high and low moments. The editor has gotten into the grit of the story and there is no opportunity for me to dismiss her objective feedback, although there is opportunity for me to discuss the notes where I feel the essence of the story was missed. This time I am not the one in charge of the edit or in a hierarchical position of instructing her. She is the leader and will guide this book to its best potential. I have freedom to engage, but not the liberty to overrun the process. And I already feel that this is making all the difference to the quality of the work. 

Side note - it feels a little overwhelming to receive a first edit and see all the places where the story must be fixed. Perhaps the length of this blog is my way of avoiding getting back to my computer and getting stuck into rewrites. But it must be done at some point. I've set myself the deadline of next Monday. 

Another note here about what happened to The Durban Four Hundred after it got taken over by KREST. It got taken over in the year 2021. That year the book got rebranded as a KREST book - I rewrote a few parts of it myself and because I am a certified editor, did a brush over myself for copy errors; it got a new cover design; and it got a new ISBN number. The biggest change, of course, was that it was re-titled The Four Hundred Club. The Four Hundred Club sold a few exclusive early copies in 2021. But it was put on the commercial distribution market in 2022. Again, you can read more about this process in my previous post about how The Four Hundred Club came to be. 

 

3. Series title (now the 400 series by Keli H) 

As The Four Hundred Club plodded along its path of success and became the flagship book of The KREST House, the idea for the universe took place. Not just a series - a universe. A collection of books set with the same characters or different characters in the same environment, fashion lines, film and television adaptations, bespoke experiences. I was going to call this universe The Four Hundred Club. 

Unfortunately, we hit a small snag when it came to putting out promo material for Splitting an Empire. It was causing much confusion between The Four Hundred Club the book, The Four Hundred Club the series of books, and Splitting an Empire being referred to as a sequel to The Four Hundred Club book. My editor and the social media manager at The KREST House helped curve this problem by suggesting a new series title for the books. The series, moving forward, will simply be called: the 400 series by Keli H. 

The Four Hundred Club is the first book in the 400 series. And Splitting an Empire is the next book in the 400 series. 

4. Sales of the 400 series by Keli H 

I've made an unconventional decision here. A lot of authors will look at me open-mouthed when I eventually take this information public (I'm still going on the assumption that no one is reading this blog). Here goes. 

In the year 2022 I signed a bookstore distribution contract with what was then one of the biggest distributors in the country - they've petered out a little since then, due to a period of internal collapse. 

The first problem with dealing with a company as big as that, was that the return was not particularly great. Factoring in the outlay costs like distributor listing fees, courier fees for all the transit between warehouses and stores; and sales fees per copy, like commissions and VAT - the 18 - 22% I got back per copy was not worth it. Although The KREST House now works with a distributor who pays us a slightly higher return and waives some of the fees, it is still a lot of calculated planning to make the books profitable. The kind that really ends up detracting from the value of a book because the focus needs to be on making the book cheaply so that it will be profitable even with a small return. My book is worth more than cheap materials and labor. 

The second, and possibly biggest reason, is because of an obvious problem in the distribution chain that no singular party can take accountability for in order to fix it. Along the chain, the books are handled by: the printers, the courier who takes it from the printer to the distributor warehouse, the people at the distributor warehouse, the courier that delivers it to the stores, the staff in the stores, the customers in the stores, the couriers who take it back to the distributor when returns are made (because bookstores are allowed to return copies of books they have bought that don't end up selling off their shelf.) The books are handled by so many people along the chain and handling damage somewhere on this chain is inevitable. When any remaining or unsold books eventually get sent back to me at our publishing company office, they are not in re-usable condition. In 2024 I canceled my contract with the distributor and so the process began of returning The Four Hundred Club books to me. The unsold copies came back in small batches. And every batch was a nightmare to open. The copies were mouldy and damp from warehouse conditions, there were scratches on the cover (The Four Hundred Club is hardcover), there were dirty brown fingerprints over the white pages, and there were dents in the hardcover as if the books had been flung around. As someone who has lavished a lot of attention, care, and money on my books, this broke my heart to see every time I opened a return box. And this is not isolated to my books or the old distributor - even today, working with a distributor that I really enjoy collaborating with - a lot of The KREST House books come back in drastic condition. And the awful thing is, there is not just one party that can take accountability. We can't blame the printers, the couriers, the stores, the customers, the distributors. The damage was likely caused by the whole process put together. 

Again, I say: my books are worth more than that. So Splitting an Empire will not be put on the distribution circuit and will not be available in bookstores. The only place readers can buy it is through The KREST House, where we can personally oversee the quality and condition of all our stock, ensuring my readers get nothing but a pristine copy. 

5. Book reviews for Keli H 

This is another controversial one to talk about. I really believe in the value of the reviewer community. But Splitting an Empire will not undergo standard review programs for the following reasons. 

The Four Hundred Club has had over fifty free copies given out for review to book influencers. Like any publisher, these copies are given out with very specific instructions about reviewing. Ours is: post a video to your IG story when you recieve the package, post a thorough review to your IG feed when you complete the book, and post a Goodreads review. All these items are to be completed within 6 weeks of reviewing the book. It's quite fair - bookworms are given something for free, and we want to make sure they aren't taking it and doing absolutely nothing with it, just because it's free. But alas, of the fifty free review copies given out, I have recieved only about thirty reviews. There is no escaping the people who will request copies simply because they hear 'free stuff' and then not bother to uphold their end of the agreement. And it's horrible, because I believe book influencers are providing a valuable service to both publishers and readers. But a few bad apples are going to spoil the bunch for publishers - starting with my book. I won't be doing a reviewer campaign anymore.

The other problem with reviewer campaigns is that the book is often requested by people who don't regularly read that genre, have no inherent appreciation for the conventions and style used, or don't understand it because they aren't the target market. Again, this comes back to the notion that people are asking for things because it's free for them, without discernment in what they are taking. The reviews of The Four Hundred Club are very polarising. There are high-rated reviews that have comments in common: 'I liked the character development', 'I liked the character focus and drive', 'I liked the complex writing style'. Then are also lowly-rated complaints in common: 'I expected more plot', 'I don't usually read this genre, but wanted to give it a try and I don't like it', 'The writing style was a lot to get through.' The thing that seperates these reviews is the line between people who actually regularly read contemporary fiction, and those who don't but took a copy out of personal curiosity or personal gratification to experiment. Sorry, but my books are not your lab rats. (You can tell I'm in a bit of a mood this morning. I didn't sleep well last night. I'm writing bullet point 5 on a different day to the all the others.) Anyway, I do understand that there is greater onus on me as a writer to do better vetting on people requesting review copies. Should you be curious about more reader comments on the book, you can take a look at reviews of The Four Hundred Club by Keli H. 

That vetting will certainly happen with Splitting an Empire. I won't be putting out a call for reviewers. I will collate the names of the reviewers who left 1-5 star ratings (because I'm not looking for people who will kiss my cute little bum, so any honest review is fine) and additionally left review comments that demonstrate they have familiarity with character-driven contemporary fiction. They won't be required to leave public reviews of Splitting an Empire if they don't want to. This initiative is simply going to be about getting my book into the hands of people who will get it. Which is far more important to me than following commercial book marketing methods. 

So this brings me to the end. I suppose I should get ready for my day now - it's a slightly cold day today. I can see grey through the crack in the curtains. I'll keep you updated as my Splitting an Empire journey unfolds.

For more articles written by Keli H, the author, visit this blog's home page on keli-h.com

 For more information on the books written by Keli H, including the 400 series, visit books written by Keli H 

Keli H is the award winning author of the 400 series, which includes The Four Hundred Club and Splitting an Empire. The 400 series is high brow contemporary fiction revolving around the lives of wealthy circles. Keli's other works include Creating Literary Art. She is also the founder of The KREST House, a storytelling empire.