Academic Publishing

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I had lunch with a friend a couple months back.  He is one of the few people who’s read The Wicker Man (the Devil’s Advocate version).  Not many reviews appeared and no royalties at all have yet followed its publication.  The funny thing is, when I search for reviews I notice that the book is “for sale” on far more websites than copies actually sold (I’m assuming).  You see, one of the best-kept secrets in publishing (both trade and academic) is the number of copies sold.  Publishers are terrified of poachers after their authors, and don’t advertise actual sales figures.  For an author only the royalty statements reveal just how many (or few) copies ever made it to the hands of potential readers.  We’re all adults here; we know that not every book purchased is read.  I do wonder if there has been any interest in this little book at all.

My friend actually went and watched the movie because of my modest little book.  The film The Wicker Man is widely known in certain circles, but it is still a movie with a cult following.  Horror fans know it, of course, with some declaring loudly that it’s not horror.  It gets referenced all the time in more mainstream media.  I occasionally read quirky little books like Your Guide to Not Getting Murdered in a Quaint English Village.  I wasn’t surprised to see The Wicker Man (the movie) referenced there.  As I discuss in the book, it’s even the subject of a Radiohead video for their song “Burn the Witch.”  Beyond a few academics, however, nobody’s really interested.

My friend suggested a topic for a new book for me to write.  I didn’t have the heart to tell him that, barring a teaching post coming my way, I’ve given up writing books for academic presses.  I’m pleased McFarland accepted Sleepy Hollow as American Myth, but the crude cost-benefit analysis that I do tells me writing books for academic presses, without library access, is always a money-losing venture.  Remember those old Guiness Book of World Records paperbacks?  I recall seeing, as a child, the least successful author listed.  Of course I don’t remember his name.  I now know that at least that record hasn’t been broken.  Not officially, but when books cost so much to write… Academic publishers are facing hard times but I don’t see the wisdom in pricing your books so that nobody can afford them, just to scrape in a few university library sales.  Not to sound as mercenary as a Hessian, but what’s in it for me?  Certainly not tenure or groundskeeper Willie’s retirement grease.  I’m not paid like a professor. Right now, though, I’m wondering if maybe I’ve broken that record after all.

Publishing Deportment

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I don’t know if anybody reads this blog for publishing advice (editors are easily edited out, I know!).  But still, here goes.  It pays, in many ways, to research your targeted publisher.  And no matter which publisher you decide to approach, do it professionally.  “Friending” an editor on social media and then asking her/him to consider your book on said media is not professional.  Many publishers don’t allow any kind of business to take place through social media.  Be smart about it—go to a publisher’s website and follow their instructions.  Or email an editor.  At their work email.  Again, many publishers do not allow business to be conducted through private emails.  I may be an outlier editor for trying to build a social platform, but if you want to talk business, please use my work address.

More books are being published now than ever before.  Even small presses are closing submission windows because too many people keep trying to get published.  As someone who’s published a few books, I would urge you to ask yourself: why do I want to publish this?  Is it just because you wrote it?  Then look for a press that publishes that kind of thing.  Be prepared to face some frustration, but homework is never easy.  Is it because you think publishing a book will lead to fame?  Adjust your frame of reference.  The vast majority of authors are, and remain, obscure.  It is possible to make some money in publishing, but most of the time it’s not very much.  If it’s money you’re after, you need to get an agent.  It might seem as difficult to get an agent as it is to get published.  That should tell you something about the possibility of making money from books.

I’m no publishing guru.  Editing’s my day job.  One thing I’ve learned, however, is that publishers like to see that you’ve taken their guidelines seriously.  A quick social media introduction isn’t the same thing as an email that shows someone at least looked you up at work.  And most publishers have descriptions of what they want to receive on their websites.  This applies both to fiction and non.  I get it.  I remember being a kid in high school dreading all that homework—all those books I’d have to haul home day after day.  But that’s the tried and true way to learn something new.  And if you want to get published you do need to learn how to do it.  And just like in high school, deportment counts.

Learning to Write

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If you’re not famous as a writer, nobody asks you for advice on improving their game.  Part of that is simply having a writer’s outlook.  We all have our own ideas about how it’s done.  I admire the work of Stephen King.  He’s a gifted storyteller and his books often deal with the kinds of things I think about.  I had his book On Writing on my reading list for years.  What finally got me to read it was finding it in a local independent bookstore and wanting to support said venue.  I found it both helpful and a little scary to read.  This is part memoir and part instruction manual by someone who isn’t full of ego, despite his success.  Egoism isn’t uncommon among writers, but King realizes that many people have talent, but not all know how to bring it to any kind of success, no matter how modest.

I really enjoyed reading the memoir parts.  Indeed, I wish I could’ve read them when I was, say, in college.  My own trajectory as a writer might’ve turned out differently.  His instructive sections are also helpful, but the part about finding an agent is hopelessly out of date.  The internet has made doing so both easier and more difficult.  Too many people now flood agents’ offices with pitches that you practically need an agent to get you an agent.  I know this from experience.  Nevertheless, King’s advice generally feels quite solid.  And it’s encouraging to hear of the commonalities we share in our upbringing.  Writers often begin in less-than-ideal situations.  If we can struggle out of them, some can find success in writing while others manage to do it on the side (this isn’t my day job).  But write we do.

As with most of King’s books that I’ve read, this one went fairly quickly.  Not every book that I read makes me feel eager for reading time, but King always does.  In part, at least with On Writing, it’s because I can’t help but wonder if I’m doing this right.  During the course of reading his book, two more rejection letters came for my fiction projects.  Any writer knows that you have to deal with lots and lots of these.  King started earlier, but, like me, he kept his rejection slips.  Eventually I ditched mine because they’re too discouraging.  And I still submit to what has become, since this book was written, a very, very crowded fiction market place.  Still, this is an encouraging book, offering advice from someone who knows what he’s doing.  It’s a shame I waited so long to read it.

Mind the Gap

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One of the general rules for writers is not to engage in too many platforms on social media.  There are a few reasons for this advice, the largest one being time.  Social media can easily become a time sink.  And time on social media is time not spent in writing.  Another reason, also related to time, is that becoming proficient in various platforms takes time.  And again, time spent on social media…  This has been on my mind because when people find me on various media they sometimes (not often) want to engage in discussion.  They often don’t use email.  They want me to join their favorite app or platform, and that’s where conversation breaks down.  I don’t use many platforms.  Those that I do use I do sparingly.  I’m still on Twitter, but I’m trying to move that following to Bluesky.  (I’m glad for followers/friends there!)  And I’m on Facebook, but I only check it once a day.

I don’t do this to be difficult.  I work 9-2-5 and after that I’m too exhausted to learn new platforms.  The first hours of the day (and it starts early for me) are spent writing.  There’s simply no more time for additional platforms.  The largest culprit is Academia.edu.  I suppose that’s because much of my pre-horror work is posted there.  People want to discuss it, but on their terms.  The thing about producing content—whether for this blog or for YouTube—is that it takes time.  And I’m just a working slob.  Those folks you see doing this professionally (there are professional bloggers and vloggers and podcasters) are paid for what they do.  Some of us rely on a full-time job for that.

Most of the people who reach out want me on a chat platform.  I prefer not to chat.  Or text.  Long-form writing has less opportunity for creating misunderstandings.  If you can’t take the time to say what you really mean, thoughtfully, doesn’t that open the door to hastily scrawled, easily misunderstood comments?  Communication breaks down.  I’m very flattered people are discovering my work.  I’ve been at this for decades now.  Like anyone who researches and writes, I’m very happy to learn someone, anyone is interested.  I’ll respond briefly on Facebook, and more fully to a comment on this actual blog.  Email is probably the best way to converse without devolving into mere chat.  I seldom use my phone, so all I humbly request is to meet me where I am.  I’ll get back to you, but I prefer long-form.  Tell me what’s on your mind.

Photo by LUM3N on Unsplash

More Time

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Speaking of time… Time is one of those things that flummoxes me.  A time change, crossing time zones, trying to figure things out on a base-6 system (metric time anyone?).  Confusing.  One thing about time is that we live in it, and so reflecting on it seems a reasonable thing to do.  Brett Bowden does just that in Now Is Not the Time: Inside Our Obsession with the Present.  As an historian, Bowden is experienced at looking back and this brief book is a reflection on why we’re so fixated on now being the most important time ever.  Given recent events, his seems to be a comforting message when looking at the long term of human history, and even longer term of our humble planet’s history.  The present is a blip and the future, at least as far as we know, hasn’t been decided yet.

One of the topics Bowden addresses here is the human propensity to claim and name.  We like to name things and when we do, it implies ownership.  Who but an owner gets to decide on a name?  This leads him to reflect on Eurocentrism, as in the naming of objects, such as Mount Everest, that are very far away and in somebody else’s territory.  We name craters on the moon (which we can’t really just pop over to) and even stars and galaxies.  We’re terribly acquisitive rascals, aren’t we?  We do the same with time—dividing it into eras.  Bowden’s discussion of the Anthropocene debate is quite interesting.  It seems we need a name for the time when people really began changing the planet on a global scale, but geological time ought to hush us up, if we stop and think about it.

As Bowden notes, psychologists and life coaches often encourage us to be in the present.  I think what they mean is that we shouldn’t worry unduly about the future.  That’s good advice.   Something Brett reminded me of is that some cultures, such as those of the Bible writers, view people as moving into the future backward.  It’s like riding on a train facing away from the direction of motion.  We can see the past and we can interpret it.  The future, however, we can’t perceive quite so clearly.  As someone who has studied the history of religions, I tend to agree that looking back is often a source of comfort.  It’s also a source of horror—many bad things have happened, many of them intentionally orchestrated by our species.  But it does serve to ground us in the now.  Even if it’s no more important than what went before or than whatever it may be that will come.

Hiding Kirk

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I recently saw—don’t ask where—a U.S. Space Force officer dressed in camouflage.  How fitting for a Trump-era agency.  I should think a Space Force uniform should be all black, maybe with little white dots on it.  Rather like my black lawn furniture that got in the way when I was cleaning my paint sprayer full of white paint.  I often wonder about our love affair with feeling safe.  Perhaps my own phobias have reached such a level that they’ve cancelled each other out.  If I was trying to hide in space, I think I’d try to look small, and dress in black.  Camouflage, which is based on colors found down here, probably wouldn’t do so well for the other planets of our solar system.  Or even the moon, for that matter.  And I personally think I might trust the aliens not to have earth-like issues.  After all, we think it’s okay to let machines think for us.

I grew up quite the sci-fi fan.  I read lots of books in that genre and enjoyed science fiction movies almost as much as my beloved monsters.  I used to watch that show, UFO in the 1970s.  The one with the interceptors with a huge missile on their noses.  I wasn’t really worried about aliens trying to invade.  Perhaps these days I think it might be better than the tedium of daily existence in the 9-2-5 world.  In any case, if we must have a Space Force, ought they not dress for the job?  I’m pretty sure I’ve got some tin foil in the kitchen with which to construct my hat.  Let’s look the part—that’s all I’m saying.

Photo credit: NASA

While all this is going on speculation has been growing about water on Mars.  There’s a good chance we may find it.  (We can always hope that if Elon Musk makes it to the red planet that he will take Donald Trump with him.)  If we are looking for invaders, though, we probably have to go further afield.  That’s alright, dynamic duo, we’ll get along without you.  Perhaps in the interim someone will realize that, dressed in earth green camouflage, our Space Force will surely stand out against the surface of Mars, or wherever they might go.   Unless it’s a planet very much like earth.  That houses intelligent life.  Maybe the beings there feel safe, knowing that their space force—for surely they will have one—is dressed in black.  Or at least, their life really is intelligent.

Personal Publishing

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I recently joined the Greater Lehigh Valley Writers Group.  I haven’t really met any other members yet, although I know one from another local community.  By my reckoning, this is the fourth writers’ group I’ve joined and I do hope it leads to some friendships.  I like talking about writing.  I read Blurred Lines by Scott Christian because he’s a person I recently met and he kindly gave me a copy.  A collection of poems and stories, it’s a small book but a deeply personal one.  I guess that’s one reason that I like talking about writing with other people—it is deeply revealing.  There are those who write as a job, and there are those who write because they must.  This book falls into the latter category.  Some of us are compelled to write down what we experience, whether it be in poetry, fiction, or fact.

Self-publishing can be a way of expressing what the publishing industry suppresses.  I once told a group that it’s a little disturbing how much power publishers have in determining what people can read.  I write “can” intentionally.  Only the biggest in the industry have the financial wherewithal to get books into bookstores (where readers congregate like bees on a warm day in October) where they’ll be laid out on tables and priced to move.  Like many others, I began my writing in academia.  It took some time before I realized that academic prices are a deterrent to readers.  Breaking out of that mold is also difficult.  At the same time, publishers have resources to devote to marketing that an individual seldom has time for, or the reach to accomplish.  So it goes.

Another review of Nightmares with the Bible has appeared (this one in Catholic Biblical Quarterly).  While not glowing, it does recommend reading the book, despite the fact that the publisher has no interest in paperbacking the series and it takes a great deal of motivation for even me to spend that much for a book.  Yes, I can understand self-publishing.  It is a writer’s chance to get their voice heard.  Even some famous authors—Mark Twain comes to mind—had to get their start by paying to have their books published.  Some of us write because we can do no other.  We have thoughts and feelings to share.  And I keep joining local writers groups looking for the rare person who will talk to a stranger about that most intimate act we call writing.  Reading such a book is a very personal thing to do.

Them Apples

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Although I’ve had this book as long as I can remember, I’d never read it.  Not the whole way through, until now.  As I kid I read Ray Bradbury when I could.  I’m sure I read a story or two in Golden Apples of the Sun, but I didn’t approach the entire collection.  I was drawn in at this late age by “The Fog Horn.”  This is the story that lay behind The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms, that classic of Harryhausen, the other Ray.  It’s been years since I’ve seen the movie, but the story was on my mind and I kept going.  Some of Bradbury ages well, while other stories, not so much.  The designation of his tales also changes over time.  As Stephen King says in Danse Macabre, Bradbury didn’t so much write science fiction (as the cover of this edition declares), even if the people occasionally get into rockets.

I realized as I read just how much my early writing style was influenced by Bradbury.  My stories were vignettes like these, not as accomplished, of course, but without lots of violence.  And with horror elements.  But it kept coming back to me how Bradbury’s characters, even the time-traveling ones, are stuck in the button-down forties and fifties.  I naturally overlooked this as a child but all these decades later and the strict binaries of, for example, men’s and women’s worlds, comes through on every page.  When women are the main characters, they’re usually not very flatteringly drawn.  The same goes for caricatures of races, although Bradbury is sympathetic he also uses stereotypes.  And many of the stories in this collection are just about everyday events, not a speculative element in sight.  Maybe I did try to read it through as a kid, but lost interest.

Writers struggle against irrelevance.  Those who look to the future sometimes get it right but often don’t.  And some reflect a present that we’d rather not acknowledge.  Of course, when I’m writing fiction I tend not to think in these terms.  The story simply takes you over and you can’t help being a refugee from the year in which you were born.  This is especially evident when Bradbury casts a rosy lens back toward childhood years.  As a child myself I had no idea that Bradbury was a time traveler from the twenties and thirties.  His childhood was nearly over by the time my mother was born.  It was a different world.  Some of his stories managed to transcend time and its for those that I keep reading him.

The Publishing Self

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One of the things I noticed while researching Sleepy Hollow as American Myth was that many resources on the legend were buried in self-published editions of the “book” itself.  And other material about the legend was from self-published sources.  This lack of serious attention was behind my writing of the book.  Clearly the story is an integral part of American Halloween and Halloween is a big business.  Why aren’t mainstream publishers interested?  (I tried several agents but nobody seemed terribly drawn to the project.)  In any case, my thoughts today are about self-publishing.  Some of these self-published books aren’t even listed on Amazon, which is pretty amazing.  I even found one that apparently lacks an ISBN!  The author’s website (the only place it can be purchased) lists it as out of stock.  Self-publishing must require vigilance in order to be a way to make a living.

The profits from self-publishing are likely better than publishing with an academic press.  (Unless, of course, you’re given the rare trade treatment.)  If you’ve ever tried to find a publisher, the urge to self-publish is understandable.  The publishing world tends to be cliquish.  The same names keep coming up time and again.  If you’re friends with one of them, well, you can get in the door.  And mainstream publishing, surprisingly, doesn’t really like new ideas.  Most publishers prefer to keep on acquiring titles in the vein of one of their successes.  “More like this,” you can imagine them saying in their sleep.  New ideas are untested and may flop.  Bestselling authors seldom flop and those who imitate them often get a seat at the table.  The rest are left to self-publishing, or perhaps academic publishing.

I’ve read many self-published books and most of them have led to disappointment.  You see, a book is better if someone reacts against it.  The problem in mainstream publishing is the reaction against is generally a rejection and that means even if you improve you still have to publish yourself.  I was sorely tempted to self-publish a book before Holy Horror.  Having found a publisher for that book somewhat painlessly (the agents weren’t impressed with it either), led me to keep on going.  Nightmares with the Bible and The Wicker Man were both series books, so again, fairly straightforward.  Sleepy Hollow as American Myth followed the track of Holy Horror.  Written not for a series, I tried to find an agent, failed, and again turned to McFarland.  At least they’ll publish it in paperback.  I’m still discovering self-published books on Sleepy Hollow that I missed in the writing of my book.  For all its faults, academic publishing at least generally offers a good bibliography.

Waking Poe

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It’s personal and it’s deep.  My appreciation for Edgar Allan Poe, that is.  I’ve read a few biographies of him over the years, but my engagement with him feels more like that of a boon companion.  Still, I learn a lot from looking at him from different angles.  (And yes, he will be in my forthcoming book.)  Jonathan Elmer’s In Poe’s Wake: Travels in the Graphic and Atmospheric caught my attention but I can’t remember exactly how I heard about it.  This was a case where the back-cover copy won me over, noting as it does, that Poe’s image is everywhere.  Still, I approach things as an historian.  How did this lead to that?  And I must confess that I’m not a great fan of heavily theoretical work (I see plenty of it).  As soon as I see Deleuze, my eyes begin to glaze over.  Do we have to go there again?

All of which is to say Elmer’s book is erudite and, at times, quite academic.  I learned a lot from it, particularly the first two chapters.  Much of the rest of it was a bit too theoretical for my plebeian tastes, but I was still learning as I went.  I hope.  I guess I was thinking it would be more of a history of how Poe ended up, for example, on the cover of Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.  Or how the Baltimore Ravens got their name.  Or even how the Ultima Thule daguerreotype became so ubiquitous.  These may well be impossible questions to answer, even as some of us are fool enough to rush in and try.  In academia, the theoretical is a much safer approach.  It impresses Deans and others in the department.

I occasionally listen to famous people talking about fame.  How it destroys some people and obliterates aspects of others’ lives.  Poe was reasonably well known during his lifetime, but not famous on the level that, say, the internet can instantly make you.  Or even TikTok.  Even back within my lifetime (which, I gather, is about the same as Elmer’s) Poe’s influence has grown dramatically.  His was a household name in my childhood, at least among a certain type of reader.  It wasn’t unusual to find people who’d never heard of him.  I suspect that is also true today, but Poe looms large over October and even the New York Times nods in his direction when the days grow shorter.  Like most writers, Poe isn’t who we think he is.  Elmer’s book does indeed explore his wake, and it is one that continues to cause waves over the centuries.

Victorian Inspiration

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Some stereotypes hold the truth.  Since we couldn’t afford a vacation this summer, we arranged a couple of our versions of “staycations.”  For us that means driving some place a couple hours away, staying in a hotel for a night or two, and exploring a new place for the weekend.  We’ve done that to explore the Lancaster area and a couple of times to the Poconos.  When possible, and affordable, we like to stay in unusual places rather than the typical hotel.  For example, around Lancaster we try to book a caboose at the Red Caboose.  Since those are expensive over the weekend, typically we have to take a vacation day or two to do them before the weekend proper sets in.  On a trip to the Endless Mountains region, we stayed at the Victorian Charm Inn in Towanda.  This is a converted ten-bedroom house from the late Victorian era.  Not a typical hotel, it’s an inspiring place to stay.

What I mean by stereotypes is that such places inspire me to write in their genres.  After staying in the Red Caboose, I typically write fiction about trains.  I’d been on a gothic kick when we stayed at Victorian Charm and indeed, it inspired gothic writing.  Not that we could’ve afforded it, but when we were looking for a house, I really wanted to buy a Victorian.  We looked at a couple but neither one had been well kept up.  I thought they would inspire my writing.  Perhaps it would get old, living in such a house and reading Poe and other Victorian writers, but I wonder if it might have led to more gothic stories.  The fiction I do write tends to draw from my experience of living in various places.  Victorian mansions have a feel to them.

Writing is mostly a matter of discipline, rather than inspiration.  All writers, I suspect, crave inspiration.  I know that I do.  When I awoke to a thunderstorm in a Victorian mansion I experienced something that had never happened to me before in real life.  It made me wonder what it would’ve been like to have been able to live in such a place.  The cracked plaster, the faded elegance.  The nooks and alcoves.  An honest-to-goodness fainting couch.  And who knows?  Perhaps a ghost or two.  Our house was built in the Victorian Era, but by those of much more modest means.  It is an inspirational place to write, but it’s also the place associated with work.  That’s why, in stereotypical behavior, we need to get away on the occasional staycation.

Unique?

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Is it embarrassing, or simply confirmation?  It used to be considered embarrassing to show up at an event dressed identically to someone else, if it wasn’t intentional.  It was considered, in some way, a slight on your personal expression.  This happened to me while still commuting when another employee and I had worn a very similar shirt for an event at work.  (He was more embarrassed than I was, for the record.)  What often feels more embarrassing to me is when I notice something I’ve never seen anybody else write about, get it all written up, and then discover that someone posted something similar on the internet someplace.  It has happened more than once—indeed, many times.  I feel embarrassed for not having known about the observation, no matter in how an obscure virtual a corner it was kept.

Perhaps these are just growing pains for the terminally curious.  Some of us constantly observe things we find curious, and start to connect the dots.  Someone else might’ve gone over this conundrum before, the way you pick up a waiting room magazine only to find the crossword puzzle already done.  What gives me hope in such circumstances are twofold facts: that someone else has spotted this confirms my observations, and that my interpretation is different from theirs.  My great fear, however, is that someone might think I’ve plagiarized.  This is a mortal sin for academics.  I would simply note that many of us read lots of stuff without noting where, and that I would remember if I intentionally lifted an idea from something somebody else pointed out.

I’m sure there are many examples of this on this blog.  Apart from posts that reflect an experience unique to yours truly, that is.  It’s getting tricky to say anything that hasn’t been said.  A recent newsworthy event occurred that called for comment from someone with my background.  By the time I’d scrawled a first sentence about it, others had written, and posted, full articles conveying what I would’ve had to say about the thing.  Embarrassing.  It has also made publishing much harder.  Even small, independent publishers in the non-academic sector only consider books sent from agents.  And agents are nothing if not aloof.  Too many submissions from too many wannabes.  Is there anything unusual, remarkable, here at all?  I’d say it’s my perspective.  Others can string words together.  Others can even buy the same cheap shirt that I purchase.  But they don’t see it from my angle.  Of that I’m certain.  Ask anybody else who’s made a similar observation.  They’ll confirm it.

Book Stages

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There are stages to it.  Writing a book, I mean.  One stage, for me, is realizing that you’re writing one.  I started work on Sleepy Hollow as American Myth years ago, without realizing it.  That was followed by the stage of comprehending that I had a book idea and intentionally writing it.  I suspect that, in the throes of The Wicker Man, I thought “I should do a similar book on Sleepy Hollow.”  Devils Advocates, which is an excellent series, however, feeling the strain on academic presses, was moving to hardcover-first releases (the kiss of death).  I started writing the book anyway, hoping that maybe it might find trade interest.  It is still possible that an agent is out there who would’ve moved it in that direction, but I wanted the book out before Lindsey Beer’s movie gets released.  After the book is drafted, the next stage: find a publisher. (Unless you have an agent.)

Since this is my sixth book, I felt confident (a strange, foreign feeling for me) that I could locate a publisher.  I’d done it five times before.  McFarland did a nice job with Holy Horror, but what sold me is that they dropped the price on it.  Many academic publishers continue to raise prices each year, so if you don’t buy a book right away you’ll end up paying a lot for this muffler.  The next stage is waiting to see what the cover will look like.  That wait is over.  Here it is, the cover of Sleepy Hollow as American Myth:

(Feel free to share widely, get everyone all excited!)  I’m currently in the waiting stage.  Waiting for proofs.  Of course, I’ve been working on my next couple of books as well.  You can’t just sit around, otherwise these tomes will never get written.  I haven’t decided which one will cross the finish line first.  If I had an agent they’d be able to tell me which might be more marketable, but since I work alone I’m left to my own devices.  I am bound and determined that the next book will go to a trade press.  I’m trying hard to scrub any whiff of academia from it.  In the meantime, however, I’m enjoying looking at the cover for my current book.  There aren’t a ton of nonfiction books out there on “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.”  In fact, as nonfiction I know of only one other.  This isn’t what we in the biz call “a crowded bookshelf.”  I’m doing all the pre-publication promo that I can.  I’d be grateful for any shares or likes at this stage.

Good Timing?

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Timing is important.  I hope I have a sense of it, but it doesn’t always work out the way you hope.  My last book, The Wicker Man, was released on the fiftieth anniversary of that cult film.  A bigger publisher with better reach published their own Wicker Man book that year, and mine garnered no attention.  I decided to turn to Sleepy Hollow instead.  This is a story that has been quite well known since 1820.  Although the Fox television series ran out of steam in 2017, I wrote the book when I did because Lindsey Beer has been tapped to direct a reboot of the Tim Burton film of 1999.  Looking for books on the “Legend of Sleepy Hollow” I found very little.  This is what is known of in the biz as “a gap.”  I decided to try to fill it.  Fandom helps in situations like this.

I’ve been trying to find the Sleepy Hollow fandom and engage with it before Sleepy Hollow as American Myth comes out.  I am confident that there are fans out there.  The tragic collapse of the Fox series didn’t lead to lack of love for the tale.  Indeed, further renditions have continued to appear.  Some have gained considerable attention.  The online fan base, however, seems to be, ah, sleeping.  I’m not sure when the Beer movie is slated for release.  It was announced in several media outlets but now we’ve come to the lull where updates have ceased to surface.  I’m certainly no Hollywood insider and I generally don’t even find out about movies until after they’ve left theaters (unless they’re very big).  I hope the timing is right this time.

It takes a couple years, at least, for me to write a book.  I’ve been working on this Sleepy Hollow project, in some way or other, since before Holy Horror came out in 2018.  I sure hope I got the timing right on this one.  The many trade publishers and agents I approached didn’t think so.  Maybe it’s just that people aren’t curious enough to read a book about Washington Irving’s story.  I try to make the case in my book that it has risen to the level of an American myth.  The story’s known world-wide, but its largest fan base is here in the States.  Had the Fox series been handled a bit better, keeping both people of color and the apocalypse in the foreground, it might’ve run a couple more seasons.  The underlying story’s not quite dead in the grave yet, I hope.  But then, timing hasn’t always been my strong suit.

F.O.C. Darley, from Le Magasin pittoresque, public domain

Not Content

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I write books.  When I want to “create content” I do it on this blog.  (And a few other internet sites.)  These aren’t the same thing.  I find it distressing that publishers are trying to drive us to ebooks where content can easily be changed, as opposed to print books.  The shelves of this room are lined with books and the technology doesn’t exist to come in and change “data” without my knowing it.  Facts are secure in print, right Ilimilku?  I’m not looking forward to a Star Wars future where there’s no paper.  I was born in the last century and, perhaps, I’ll die there too.   You see, when you write a book you have a project in mind that has an endpoint.   It may change and shift as you write, but you know what a book is and that’s what you produce.  It gets shelved and you move on to other things.  (At least I do.)

Content is something different and the creative process behind it also differs.  If I find something wrong after the fact, I go into my past posts and change it.  I’m not afraid of admitting I’m wrong.  The point of this blog is to share ideas with the world, not to write a book.  (Although, I confess that I would not say “no” if someone in publishing wanted a selection of worthwhile posts for a book… just saying.)  It amazes me how publishers have pretty much gone after the money and have forgotten what the creative process is like.  Of course, they’re having to figure out how this whole internet with free content plays into it too.  But still, my book writing uses a different fold in my gray matter than my blog writing does.  All of it feels pretty different from writing fiction too.

These things together adds up to a writing life.  I have a ton of “not for publication” writing.  This is something different again.  I suspect it will never be read by anybody, moldering away on some old hard drive after some AI-induced apocalypse.  I write it for of the same reason, I suspect, that people used to spray-paint “Kilroy was here” on things.  The book of Job, it seems to me, was the preservation of words that someone simply had to write.  We know the framing story is folklore.  But those who have words to carve with iron on lead, or engrave on a stone to last forever.  It’s more, I hope, than just “creating content.”