Little big day: I ‘click off’ on this year’s book. A tough
click to make. The files will be locked in at CreateSpace; no more editing or
proofing allowed; this is now what the book will be. Even though I expect
distribution to be in the low tens, with actual readership well below that, my slightly
anguished response to saying ‘it’s done’ is pretty irrational. Except for me,
this is a virtual non-event.
The book is ‘Little Bird: Small tales and poems.’ I think
more people might read more of these writings than I have produced in previous
books. That is I think people are more inclined to read stories than poems.
Don’t expect your copies right away, although turn around from order to print
to doorstep is little more than a week.
I’m also one of four readers today at an assisted living
facility reading from our individual ‘memoir writings,’ essays selected and essentially
self-published. I was only briefly an active member of this local writing group
and I have a piece in their second collection. Other members are quite active
in trying to promote the book. I still have barely cracked my copy and it’s
been out for a month. I see some chatter on the list serve. Still I am in print
on some public bookshelves.
CreateSpace informed me that I have sold my third copy of
the kid’s book, ‘Sidney Core’s
Secret,’ in October on Amazon. I also got my first official
rejection from a literary agent last week on the same book. So far this is the
only book that I think has a real chance for regular publication, although I’m
not pushing very hard. Although I see kid’s books that are surely worse than
mine when I look, the market remains flooded with good writing.
So I continue to I anticipate that I am years away from
writing a book that someone else will want to publish, if then. One writer, a
KU alum speaking here, who wrote ‘Winter’s Bone,’ which later became a
significant movie, said that he wrote consistently for ten years before he got
noticed, and he had come through the ‘writing program’ (MFA, and so on). My odds
are long.
But I like ‘Little Bird.’ I’ve done some good work here. The
end of the process is a real grind. But much of the writing is very satisfying.
Putting fixed words to floating thoughts is a way of seeing the world. In a
sense, I’m creating meaning for myself, but that’s what I’ve come to believe is
a significant part of the human condition.
Now if anyone else will find worth in my words, that would
be gravy.
