Nath Jones's Blog - Posts Tagged "literary"
Nope. No title.
Well. Mom came for Easter and said, "Absolutely not!" to the title Acquainted with Squalor.
She then laughed uproariously adding, "That will send 'em running to the shelves!" Meaning, actually, no, no one will buy the book.
I said, "It's Salinger."
She said, "You're you. Pick a line from your own book."
Mother's always had quite a bit of sway, as most Freudians and dutiful daughters can appreciate. So. Mom's rather strong opinion coupled to the fact that the literary editor now suggests going back to How to Cherish the Grief-Stricken has left the collection a bit without form.
With all the eureka phenomenon for which anyone could ever hope, I woke up on the twenty-second thinking Shoot the Diamond would definitely be the answer.
I'd been reading about Annie Oakley, how she could (according to Wikipedia), "repeatedly split a playing card, edge-on, and put several more holes in it before it could touch the ground, while using a .22 caliber rifle, at 90 feet (27 m)."
I'm enough of a piss-poor marksman to know that's amazing.
Isn't it?
So I woke up with that title seared across the landscape of my mind wondering what exactly would happen if you shoot a diamond.
There are no YouTube videos showing what does. What do you think? Would the diamond shatter and scatter, become pulverized glitter reflecting light? Or do you think the bullet glances off, gets deflected, and ricochets?
I have no idea what happens. I certainly don't have the sharpshooter skills to find out. I still love the image and think it's a much better course of action to shoot the diamond than to be at all aggressive with the man who may have offered such an item. Frankly, I thought Shoot the Diamond was a rather anti-materialist, peace-keeping concept.
However. My friend Chris Foresman says absolutely not. No way. No. No. He hates it. Says both How to Cherish the Grief-Stricken AND Acquainted with Squalor are better, though he likes neither.
She then laughed uproariously adding, "That will send 'em running to the shelves!" Meaning, actually, no, no one will buy the book.
I said, "It's Salinger."
She said, "You're you. Pick a line from your own book."
Mother's always had quite a bit of sway, as most Freudians and dutiful daughters can appreciate. So. Mom's rather strong opinion coupled to the fact that the literary editor now suggests going back to How to Cherish the Grief-Stricken has left the collection a bit without form.
With all the eureka phenomenon for which anyone could ever hope, I woke up on the twenty-second thinking Shoot the Diamond would definitely be the answer.
I'd been reading about Annie Oakley, how she could (according to Wikipedia), "repeatedly split a playing card, edge-on, and put several more holes in it before it could touch the ground, while using a .22 caliber rifle, at 90 feet (27 m)."
I'm enough of a piss-poor marksman to know that's amazing.
Isn't it?
So I woke up with that title seared across the landscape of my mind wondering what exactly would happen if you shoot a diamond.
There are no YouTube videos showing what does. What do you think? Would the diamond shatter and scatter, become pulverized glitter reflecting light? Or do you think the bullet glances off, gets deflected, and ricochets?
I have no idea what happens. I certainly don't have the sharpshooter skills to find out. I still love the image and think it's a much better course of action to shoot the diamond than to be at all aggressive with the man who may have offered such an item. Frankly, I thought Shoot the Diamond was a rather anti-materialist, peace-keeping concept.
However. My friend Chris Foresman says absolutely not. No way. No. No. He hates it. Says both How to Cherish the Grief-Stricken AND Acquainted with Squalor are better, though he likes neither.
Progress with the real print edition
Last night I got home from sitting around a fire with some friends and discovered the most satisfying email thread I've had in quite some time.
I've been glad to accept the realities of the digital disruption. I've learned about text markup, reflowable content, and audiobooks. I'm okay with Amazon's bizarre market controls. I don't understand why things are as they are. Yet if this is the game, I'll play it.
But my God. Print is still, I mean--come on. We all want real books.
To that end David McNamara of CloudyOutside has done a beautiful job with the interior layout of a print edition for the On Impulse series.
The covers have been tough. The job has proved a challenge for three or four graphic designers. Finally my friend Chris Foresman was like, "This!" and gave us a kick ass cover for Acquainted with Squalor.
Especially with short story collections we want to flip around, browse. ePubs make that possible to a certain extent. But snooping around in a book on Kindle is a little harder.
Now. Do we have print? Technically yes. A couple Christmases ago, my friend Joe "Call Me Big Joe" Gembala said he needed print copies to give as gifts. Fine. So. Yes, Gin and I put together a PDF. We were able to upload it to CreateSpace for review copies. Yes, I made covers and was able to do some giveaways on here with that edition. But it never felt like a real print book. Partly because readers couldn't order the books from their local bookstores.
Now? I don't know. We're not there, but we're close. Fairly soon we should have a lovely print edition of all the books in this series. We're going to use IngramSpark so that there will be books people can order on Amazon but also buy from local brick & mortar bookstores.
Anyway, so I got home last night and after years of false starts, of foiled attempts, there was this simple exchange, real progress. Chris's email started with, "I'm using Futura Medium for the cover and spine." Later David replied with, "It looks like we're using Gill Sans Condensed and Fairfield in the interior."
I could still smell the fire.
I've been glad to accept the realities of the digital disruption. I've learned about text markup, reflowable content, and audiobooks. I'm okay with Amazon's bizarre market controls. I don't understand why things are as they are. Yet if this is the game, I'll play it.
But my God. Print is still, I mean--come on. We all want real books.
To that end David McNamara of CloudyOutside has done a beautiful job with the interior layout of a print edition for the On Impulse series.
The covers have been tough. The job has proved a challenge for three or four graphic designers. Finally my friend Chris Foresman was like, "This!" and gave us a kick ass cover for Acquainted with Squalor.
Especially with short story collections we want to flip around, browse. ePubs make that possible to a certain extent. But snooping around in a book on Kindle is a little harder.
Now. Do we have print? Technically yes. A couple Christmases ago, my friend Joe "Call Me Big Joe" Gembala said he needed print copies to give as gifts. Fine. So. Yes, Gin and I put together a PDF. We were able to upload it to CreateSpace for review copies. Yes, I made covers and was able to do some giveaways on here with that edition. But it never felt like a real print book. Partly because readers couldn't order the books from their local bookstores.
Now? I don't know. We're not there, but we're close. Fairly soon we should have a lovely print edition of all the books in this series. We're going to use IngramSpark so that there will be books people can order on Amazon but also buy from local brick & mortar bookstores.
Anyway, so I got home last night and after years of false starts, of foiled attempts, there was this simple exchange, real progress. Chris's email started with, "I'm using Futura Medium for the cover and spine." Later David replied with, "It looks like we're using Gill Sans Condensed and Fairfield in the interior."
I could still smell the fire.
Acquainted with Squalor is finished, except for all the stuff to do
On Friday I bought a shiny little necklace and got a mani/pedi downtown to celebrate the book being finished. I wandered around for four hours, shaking with adrenaline. It was a purely physical reaction to eight years of work. Yesterday, the Tuesday after having completed the thing, I was buffeted by the collection's emotional jet-wash. And now? We move into production.
I don't know, guys. Books are a lot of work. I couldn't possibly recommend writing to anyone who wants to do anything else with their time and attention. Especially not in this era of new publishing. It would be nice to have the physical and emotional release synced up with the actual release of the actual book. At this point, I really do not want to transition into several months of manufacturing.
But I will. It's not a big deal. It will be very nice if the publishing industry does not make any more major shifts in the next year or so. That would help me greatly.
Anyway. You want the list? Here is what needs to be done:
1) I'm reading the book out loud in my apartment, making sure each word is there, is right, is good, is the one I want. I'm smoothing out all the wrinkles. Hopefully I won't introduce any new grammatical errors.
2) Gin (a friend who is good with technical work and stays home with her son) will convert the manuscript to a Smashwords document before she has her second baby.
3) She'll also make a PDF to match the other PDFs for the series. We don't think we'll need a PDF anymore, but we're still making one.
4) I'm submitting the individual stories to literary journals because I was raised on the premise that such things matter.
5) I need to submit the collection to Kirkus Reviews. I had no idea such things matter but they absolutely do. So. Write the check and move on.
6) Chris Foresman will finish the covers for the print edition. We're doing all five books at once.
7) David McNamara will deal with the interior layout of all five books.
8) We're hoping IngramSpark is not impossible to deal with.
9) We're going to release THE WAR IS LANGUAGE, 2000 DECIDUOUS TREES, and LOVE & DARTS in print on IngramSpark. We just want a product that brick and mortar bookstores can shelve, if they so choose.
10) Pull the plug on the CreateSpace editions of those titles on Amazon.
11) Update the author site with the new covers and the one new title.
12) Give review copies of Acquainted with Squalor to people and say, "Can you please put a review of this online when the book gets released?"
13) Okay. Audio. It would be nice to get the audio versions produced so that the Acquainted with Squalor audio book can be available at the time of the release. Mike and Ryan are working on Love & Darts. I'll get them the manuscript for Acquainted with Squalor when Love & Darts is finished.
14) See if any of the literary journals want any of the short stories.
15) THEN, pick a release date for Acquainted with Squalor
16) Set it up for release on IngramSpark
17) Set it up for release on Kindle
18) Set it up for release on Smashwords.
19) Decide whether it may be best to just use Smashwords and skip the direct-to-KDP option. The Smashwords sales summaries really are nicer.
20) Feiyr? Bother with it? Maybe.
21) Send the collection out to other pre-release reviewers. Book bloggers and all that.
22) Do a pre-release giveaway on Goodreads.
23) Do a pre-release giveaway on LibraryThing
24) Take a few long-shots.
25) Allow three months to pass without wigging out.
26) Release~!!!
27--- This blog post sucks. I'm over it.
I don't know, guys. Books are a lot of work. I couldn't possibly recommend writing to anyone who wants to do anything else with their time and attention. Especially not in this era of new publishing. It would be nice to have the physical and emotional release synced up with the actual release of the actual book. At this point, I really do not want to transition into several months of manufacturing.
But I will. It's not a big deal. It will be very nice if the publishing industry does not make any more major shifts in the next year or so. That would help me greatly.
Anyway. You want the list? Here is what needs to be done:
1) I'm reading the book out loud in my apartment, making sure each word is there, is right, is good, is the one I want. I'm smoothing out all the wrinkles. Hopefully I won't introduce any new grammatical errors.
2) Gin (a friend who is good with technical work and stays home with her son) will convert the manuscript to a Smashwords document before she has her second baby.
3) She'll also make a PDF to match the other PDFs for the series. We don't think we'll need a PDF anymore, but we're still making one.
4) I'm submitting the individual stories to literary journals because I was raised on the premise that such things matter.
5) I need to submit the collection to Kirkus Reviews. I had no idea such things matter but they absolutely do. So. Write the check and move on.
6) Chris Foresman will finish the covers for the print edition. We're doing all five books at once.
7) David McNamara will deal with the interior layout of all five books.
8) We're hoping IngramSpark is not impossible to deal with.
9) We're going to release THE WAR IS LANGUAGE, 2000 DECIDUOUS TREES, and LOVE & DARTS in print on IngramSpark. We just want a product that brick and mortar bookstores can shelve, if they so choose.
10) Pull the plug on the CreateSpace editions of those titles on Amazon.
11) Update the author site with the new covers and the one new title.
12) Give review copies of Acquainted with Squalor to people and say, "Can you please put a review of this online when the book gets released?"
13) Okay. Audio. It would be nice to get the audio versions produced so that the Acquainted with Squalor audio book can be available at the time of the release. Mike and Ryan are working on Love & Darts. I'll get them the manuscript for Acquainted with Squalor when Love & Darts is finished.
14) See if any of the literary journals want any of the short stories.
15) THEN, pick a release date for Acquainted with Squalor
16) Set it up for release on IngramSpark
17) Set it up for release on Kindle
18) Set it up for release on Smashwords.
19) Decide whether it may be best to just use Smashwords and skip the direct-to-KDP option. The Smashwords sales summaries really are nicer.
20) Feiyr? Bother with it? Maybe.
21) Send the collection out to other pre-release reviewers. Book bloggers and all that.
22) Do a pre-release giveaway on Goodreads.
23) Do a pre-release giveaway on LibraryThing
24) Take a few long-shots.
25) Allow three months to pass without wigging out.
26) Release~!!!
27--- This blog post sucks. I'm over it.
Pre-order Acquainted with Squalor for 4/6/2015
Looks like the collection will probably be ready fairly soon. The literary journals are getting back to me about the individual short stories in Acquainted with Squalor. I uploaded the manuscript to Smashwords today and also sent some emails to reviewers.
We're looking pretty good for an April release.
We're looking pretty good for an April release.
A New Collection of Notes Is Out!
Hello!
Remember LOVE & DARTS going to be the number one bestseller on Kindle? That was the most fun hour of my life. It's been an amazing journey to work on this collection. The On Impulse series of short story collections really looks at storytelling overall: why do we have that impulse to share with one another? For whatever reason, we do! LOVE & DARTS is that good middle if you're looking for a place to start the series. The pieces are about five to ten pages long, easy to read when you get into bed at night and keep the collection handy on your bedside table. Love & Darts: Stories
Remember LOVE & DARTS going to be the number one bestseller on Kindle? That was the most fun hour of my life. It's been an amazing journey to work on this collection. The On Impulse series of short story collections really looks at storytelling overall: why do we have that impulse to share with one another? For whatever reason, we do! LOVE & DARTS is that good middle if you're looking for a place to start the series. The pieces are about five to ten pages long, easy to read when you get into bed at night and keep the collection handy on your bedside table. Love & Darts: Stories
