{"id":5151,"date":"2019-06-11T06:17:44","date_gmt":"2019-06-11T13:17:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/?p=5151"},"modified":"2019-06-11T06:17:46","modified_gmt":"2019-06-11T13:17:46","slug":"lessons-learned-when-you-publish-your-book-revised","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/meditations\/lessons-learned-when-you-publish-your-book-revised\/","title":{"rendered":"Lessons Learned When You Publish Your Book (revised)"},"content":{"rendered":"<!-- wp:themify-builder\/canvas \/-->\n\n\n<p>My new book, <em>The Bonnie and Clyde Files<\/em>, came out almost two months ago. I learned some new lessons about publishing your own book since it&#8217;s release so I thought I would update the list below that appeared in <em>The Gigging Life<\/em>, published in 2016. This book retails for a mere $10 through my web site and I hope you will consider purchasing direct from me and give it to any gigger in your life, meaning those people who take their passions and products straight to the people. We need to support these people and their creative endeavors and I think this book can help them become better giggers. It might also help them preserve their sanity. Go to Nestucca Spit Press&#8217; website (nestuccaspitpress.com) to purchase.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>These are the\nlessons learned: \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>Never\n\texpect anyone you know will read your book.\n\t<\/li><li>Expect\n\tthose same people to expect the book for free.\n\t<\/li><li>Never\n\texpect your family members will read your book.\n\t<\/li><li>Don&#8217;t be\n\tsurprised that people will want your book to fail. \n\t\n\t<\/li><li>Never\n\texpect anyone who emails and wants the book for free will read it\n\tafter you ship the book to them. \n\t\n\t<\/li><li>Never\n\texpect someone who buys your book will actually read it. \n\t\n\t<\/li><li>Expect that\n\tthe one person you think will love the book will hate the book.\n\t<\/li><li>Expect\n\tsomeone to take three sentences out of your book out of context and\n\thate the book because of that. \n\t\n\t<\/li><li>Occasionally\n\texpect that the person who most needs to read your book will read\n\tyour book.\n\t<\/li><li>Never\n\texpect the person to whom you dedicate the book to will read the\n\tbook.\n\t<\/li><li>Read the\n\tstory of how John Steinbeck\u2019s hometown felt about him writing\n\tabout his hometown.\n\t<\/li><li>Never\n\texpect anyone from your hometown will ever read a word of what you\n\twrote about your hometown.\n\t<\/li><li>Expect that\n\tsome people living in a city that you wrote a book about will hate\n\tthe book without ever having read it. \n\t\n\t<\/li><li>Do not\n\tread, under any circumstances, Jack London\u2019s novel <em>Martin Eden<\/em>,\n\tabout a struggling writer who suffers hundreds of literary\n\trejections and humiliations, but then miraculously finds gargantuan\n\tsuccess, only to have it end in tragedy. \n\t\n\t<\/li><li>Read,\n\timmediately after publication of your book, Jack London\u2019s novel\n\t<em>Martin Eden<\/em>, so you can avoid the protagonist\u2019s terrible\n\tfate should your book explode as a commercial success. \n\t\n\t<\/li><li>Never\n\texpect your work colleagues will read your book, even if it\u2019s\n\tabout their world of work.\n\t<\/li><li>If you are\n\ta teacher, never expect your students will read your book, even if\n\tyou give it to them.\n\t<\/li><li>Never\n\texpect someone you are sleeping with will read your book, even if\n\tthat person is in the book.\n\t<\/li><li>Never\n\texpect your book will seduce anyone.\n\t<\/li><li>Never\n\texpect an audience to find your book. Heed Henry Miller\u2019s advice\n\tin <em>Big Sur and The Oranges of Hieronymus Bosch<\/em>:\n<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>\n<em>The most important thing (for a writer)\u2014how to reach the public,\nor better, how to create your own public\u2014still remains to be faced.\nWithout a public it\u2019s a suicide. No matter how small, there has to\nbe an audience. I mean, an appreciative, enthusiastic audience, a\nselective audience. <\/em>\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\n<em>What few young writers realize, it seems to me, is that they must\nfind\u2014create, invent!\u2014the way to reach their readers. It isn\u2019t\nenough to write a good book, a beautiful book, or even a better book\nthan most. It isn\u2019t enough to even write an \u201coriginal\u201d book!\nYou have to gig that book with all your heart in order to gain\ntraction.  <\/em>\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>Never\n\tbecome bitter when a recently published Oregon book you deem\n\tinferior attracts attention and wins awards and your book doesn\u2019t.\n\t<\/li><li>Never allow\n\tyourself to believe that Portland determines the zeitgeist of\n\tliterary matters in Oregon. You can especially believe this if you\n\thave done a show in Roseburg or Siletz or Drain.\n\t<\/li><li>Never\n\texpect help from other published writers on the big labels, although\n\tit has been known to happen. There are a few big name writers out\n\tthere who remember their hard scrabble origins who accidentally\n\tintersect with self-published authors and want to assist. But the\n\tintersection occurs only if the self-published author insinuates\n\thimself into the big-time writing game. It never happens on its own.\n\t<\/li><li>Never wait\n\taround for anything to happen on behalf of your book. It won\u2019t. \n\t\n\t<\/li><li>Always\n\texpect some people will read only the acknowledgments of your book\n\tbecause they hope to read their names. \n\t\n\t<\/li><li>Always\n\texpect the person you most want to read your book will never read\n\tyour book.\n\t<\/li><li>Always\n\texpect to encounter someone who thinks you wrote the book about\n\tthem, even if you wrote it about someone else.\n\t<\/li><li>Always\n\texpect the person you least want to read your book will read your\n\tbook and confront you about its contents. This is called the William\n\tMaxwell axiom, named for the great, but largely unheralded American\n\tnovelist. In his memoir, Maxwell relates the story of writing a\n\tnovel that included a minor character, an illiterate and overbearing\n\tAfrican American maid that he based on a real person from his\n\tSouthern, pre-integration childhood. Decades after the novel\u2019s\n\trelease, he ran into the maid at a grocery story while visiting his\n\thometown. Turns out she wasn\u2019t illiterate after all and had read\n\tthe novel. He awkwardly said \u201chello\u201d and she cut him dead in a\n\tway that he never forgot.\n\t<\/li><li>Always\n\texpect to meet a reader more obsessed with the subject of your\n\tlatest book than you are.\n\t<\/li><li>Never\n\texpect any reviews of your book. You might even consider writing\n\tyour own anonymous ones like Edgar Allen Poe and Walt Whitman did. \n\t\n\t<\/li><li>Expect at\n\tleast one Oregon reviewer who recently moved to Oregon, knows\n\tnothing of Oregon and has never read your book, will review your\n\tOregon book. She probably works for the <em>Portland Mercury <\/em>or\n\t<em>Willamette Week<\/em>, has never set foot on an Oregon ocean beach,\n\tand uses an umbrella. \n\t\n\t<\/li><li>Know this:\n\tif you don\u2019t write about your book after it comes out, probably no\n\tone will else either. \n\t\n\t<\/li><li>Occasionally\n\texpect an author who has had a book published with a major\n\tpublishing house to disdain you upon learning you self-published\n\tyour book.\n\t<\/li><li>Always\n\texpect someone who \u201cLikes\u201d your book on Facebook will never read\n\tit, much less buy it.\n\t<\/li><li>Start\n\twriting another book before the new one comes out.\n\t<\/li><li>Expect for\n\tsomeone to refer to you as an \u201cauthor\u201d so it\u2019s now acceptable\n\tto call yourself an \u201cauthor.\u201d That\u2019s a big step. \n\t\n\t<\/li><li>Make sure\n\tyou have a good massage therapist because you\u2019ll need one after\n\tloading and unloading your books from the printer. \n\t\n\t<\/li><li>Never\n\texpect any other Oregon author or publisher to give a shit that you\n\tprinted your book in Oregon with a family-owned printer and they\n\tgave you the best service in the world. It\u2019s your job to give a\n\tshit because that\u2019s the way you were raised and you will mention\n\tthis when gigging the book. \n\t\n\t<\/li><li>Always\n\texpect someone will love your book.\n\t<\/li><li>Always\n\tdragoon people into reviewing your book for social media and web\n\tsites.\n\t<\/li><li>Always\n\texpect someone to understand your book better than you, the author\n\tof it, does. That happened to me with the rain book and she knows\n\twho she is. We should have ended up together. \n\t\n\t<\/li><li>Occasionally,\n\texpect someone to steal a book from you, and relish that thought.\n\t<\/li><li>Expect to\n\tthe gig the book because no one else will. \n\t\n\t<\/li><li>Expect an\n\tenthusiastic reception about your book from the owners of Oregon\n\tindependent bookstores, if you have demonstrated the ability to work\n\thard promoting your book.\n\t<\/li><li>Never\n\texpect anyone to throw you a party to celebrate the release of your\n\tbook, so always throw one yourself. You may not even need to invite\n\tanyone, excepting of course, the dog. At the party, be sure to never\n\tread longer than 20 minutes to humans and five for the dog.\n\t<\/li><li>Occasionally\n\texpect a reader to complain about the size of your font.\n\t<\/li><li>Throw a\n\tbook release party for yourself because no one else will. \n\t\n\t<\/li><li>Never\n\texpect other writers, artists or musicians in your town to read your\n\tbook, although they will expect you to read their books, buy their\n\tart, and see them perform. \n\t\n\t<\/li><li>Expect\n\tmultiple people in your town who will never read your book to ask or\n\tdemand that you read their works in progress. \n\t\n\t<\/li><li>Always\n\texpect someone will hate your book. (I thought I&#8217;d mention that\n\tagain.)\n\t<\/li><li>Occasionally\n\texpect your book will inspire someone to stalk you.\n\t<\/li><li>Expect to\n\treread your book after it comes out and cringe when you encounter\n\tterrible writing.\n\t<\/li><li>Expect to\n\tmeet a lot of readers, many of them vulnerable, if you write about\n\tyour dog dying.\n\t<\/li><li>Always\n\texpect a jealous writer festering out there who will try to\n\tundermine the success of your book and, perhaps, try to sully or\n\truin your reputation. It\u2019s happened to me several times.\n\t<\/li><li>Always\n\texpect some tyrannical grammar king or queen will point out errors\n\tof usage in your book.\n\t<\/li><li>Never\n\texpect to break even on your book.\n\t<\/li><li>Never\n\texpect \u201cto be discovered\u201d by a major or even minor league\n\tliterary player.\n\t<\/li><li>Expect to\n\tmeet a lot of readers who don\u2019t care who or what corporate entity\n\tpublished your book. They only care about the content of the book.\n\t<\/li><li>Expect to\n\tmeet a lot of entrepreneurs who make things like soap, beer, bread,\n\tjewelry, music and films, who will expect you to give your book to\n\tthem for free, but will not reciprocate.\n\t<\/li><li>Learn to\n\tbarter when trying to sell your book. \n\t\n\t<\/li><li>Never fear\n\tgiving the book away to someone who wants to read it, but can\u2019t\n\tafford to buy it.\n\t<\/li><li>Occasionally\n\texpect to feel motivated to give your book away at sheer random\n\tmoments unrelated to a literary event, like crossing a street in a\n\trainstorm and someone ahead of you is using an umbrella and you have\n\tthe rain book stashed in the pea coat. I do it all the time.\n\t<\/li><li>Never\n\texpect anything but existential rewards when your book comes out.\n\tMake sure you recognize when they occur because sometimes they sneak\n\tup. \n\t\n\t<\/li><li>Never stop\n\twriting because of what does or does not happen when your book comes\n\tout.\n\t<\/li><li>Expect\n\tsometimes to have serious doubts about your talent and agentless,\n\tliterary initiatives, but always remember this: Charlton Heston was\n\ttaken seriously as an actor, Jonathan Franzen was on the cover of\n\t<em>Time<\/em>, Charles Bukowski was rejected a million times, Walt\n\tWhitman self-published <em>Leaves of Grass<\/em>, and George W. Bush\n\twas elected President of the United States exactly one time.\n<\/li><\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>My new book, The Bonnie and Clyde Files, came out almost two months ago. I learned some new lessons about publishing your own book since it&#8217;s release so I thought I would update the list below that appeared in The Gigging Life, published in 2016. This book retails for a mere $10 through my web [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5152,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,28],"tags":[12,1029,6,9],"class_list":["post-5151","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-meditations","category-writing","tag-gigging","tag-literary-gigging","tag-matt-love","tag-nestucca-spit-press","has-post-title","has-post-date","has-post-category","has-post-tag","has-post-comment","has-post-author",""],"builder_content":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5151","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5151"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5151\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5154,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5151\/revisions\/5154"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5152"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5151"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5151"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nestuccaspitpress.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5151"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}