The Book is OUT!

Once upon a time, on a dark and stormy night, it was the best of times and the worst of times... and a new book was born.

Actually, that’s the punchline to this blog. The beginning goes like this:

A long time ago, in a home office far, far away, a young (young!) man sat hunched over a typewriter (yeah, that long ago), anxiously attempting to coax the keys into generating something readable, non-sucky, and worthy of public viewing.

What followed was a succession of bona vide books that ranged from children’s stories to techno-thrillers to mysteries. These were actual, hard copy, buy-at-the-bookstore, hold-in-your-hand, paper-pages-that-turn books.

And what followed this burst of prolificity (points for vocab), creativity, and financial windfall was an extended period of... crickets. While the young writer continued frantically coaxing the keys, (soon on an R2D2-style Mac, eventually on a Powerbook) literally churning out literature, the manuscripts piled up and he grew older and older, waiting for the contract that would propel him into the realm of John Grisham, Tom Clancy, James Patterson, et al.

But nay. (Nay?). Nay! That contract did not materialize. And the crickets crescendoed, as crickets are known to do. Thus, said writer continued to plow through the words, heaping paragraph upon paragraph, chapter upon chapter, while working day jobs and – here’s the thing – not getting any book deals.

Fast forward along the time/space continuum to today. As you may have guessed, I am that once-young but now decidedly dirt-old, nigh unto ancient writer. And it is my latest book that is out. I bit the bullet and finally went the self-publishing route.

Note regarding the title of this blog: The Book... is a bit of a misnomer. It is A Book. A novella (aka a novel that never quite grew into its shoes). While I really like this book and am proud to offer it up, it is a test case. I wanted to format and load something as a trial balloon, and work out all the kinks (believe me, it’s definitely a kinky process) before launching The Book, which is a novel I plan to release this summer.

The novella in question is called Trash Barrel Stew. It’s about a guy who lives in a small town in the Hill Country of Texas. In the opening moments, he steps off the curb on the way home from work and gets hit by a car. From the confines of his hospital bed, he looks back over his life with a mixture of nostalgia and regret.

If I managed to correctly follow the many (M-A-N-Y) directions to make this happen (a huge “if”), the book should now be available for Kindle and as a real book on Amazon. Check it out. Even if you don’t drop $2.99 for the download (it’s free for Kindle Unlimited), or $5.99 for the paperback, please take a look, peruse the preview, read a sample, and let me know about any issues you encounter. And please (PLEEZE!) spread the word. Share this blog and tell everyone you see – friends, family, and complete strangers – that there’s a book on Amazon that you haven’t read, but that might be pretty good. Maybe.

The End (...not really)