Large Print Edition of The Return Now Available

The large print edition of The Return, A Steve Dancy Tale became available in March. Center Point Publishing has released all four Steve Dancy books in large print.  (The Shopkeeper and Leadville are sold out, but used copies are available at Amazon and other booksellers.) As of this writing, The Return has 30 Amazon customer reviews for 4.9 stars. This fourth novel in the series has also received good reviews from Western Writers of America, Bookviews, Examiner.com, and Brandywine. 

Libraries continue to form the core of large-print business, but these library-bound editions also make terrific gifts. Books as gifts provide hours of pleasure and an ability to write a personal message on the flyleaf that won't be discarded like most greeting cards. 

Honest westerns ... filled with dishonest characters.

"There is no friend as loyal as a book.” Ernest Hemingway

We’re putting the finishing touches on our new home in Omaha. We bought a 1948 ranch style house that needed major updating.  In our last three homes we've had a library. Not this time. Instead we will a wall of bookshelves in our entry and another in a multipurpose basement. I plan on doing most of my writing on the sun porch.

This is a picture of Sting’s library in London as presented in Book Riot’s article “Libraries of the Rich and Famous.” None of our previous libraries ever looked anything like this. Darn. If I had piles of money, my new home would have a dedicated room for our book collection. It would include a very comfortable chair for me to sit in as I read my Kindle.

Banned authors clobber the banners!

I was unaware that my favorite library once banned a book by my favorite author. In 1885, the Concord Free Public Library banned The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain. You should never slight Mark Twain. He responded immediately to the ban by declaring:

“Apparently, the Concord library has condemned Huck as ‘trash and only suitable for the slums.’ This will sell us another twenty-five thousand copies for sure!”

Too bad Twain is not around to chasten those who still want to condemn Huck. Nowadays, they want to ban the book for using the n-word. Ironic, since his intent was to expose and ridicule racism.

Flavorwire has published 10 Famous Authors’ Funniest Responses to Their Books Being Banned. The moral of the story is to never attack someone who knows how to wield a keyboard. My favorite is Ray Bradbury’s reponse.

“… it is a mad world and it will get madder if we allow the minorities, be they dwarf or giant, orangutan or dolphin, nuclear-head or water-conversationalist, pro-computerologist or Neo-Luddite, simpleton or sage, to interfere with aesthetics. The real world is the playing ground for each and every group, to make or unmake laws. But the tip of the nose of my book or stories or poems is where their rights and my territorial imperatives begin, run and rule. If Mormons do not like my plays, let them write their own. If the Irish hate my Dublin stories, let them rent typewriters. If teachers and grammar school editors find my jawbreaker sentences shatter their mushmild teeth, let them eat stale cake dunked in weak tea of their own ungodly manufacture. ”

Related posts
Best Western Writer of all Time
Mark Twain Tells Us How to Write

Musings about Concord, Massachusetts

Creative Librarians

Libraries that are architectural wonders

Creative Librarians

Book Riot has published a piece on Finding Libraries in Unexpected Places. There are some great pictures and an interesting narrative for each. There are some nifty ideas here that might help libraries remain as a place to check out books—real books, printed on that stuff they call paper. I would hate to see libraries turned into book museums, or internet portals for the digitally deprived. I prefer librarians information savvy rather than technology chauffeurs.

Concord Free Public Library

Boston Public Library

As you can tell, I’m a bit old fashion. I love bookstore and libraries. My favorite libraries are the Boston Public Library and the Concord Free Public Library. I like both of these because there are surprises buried in their stacks—surprises that knowledgeable librarians help you uncover. 

In the Boston Public Library I found a Roger Sherman doctoral thesis by Christopher Collier, the author of Decision in Philadelphia. In Concord, I found a one hundred and sixty year old biography of Roger Sherman. Both finds were invaluable for my research for Tempest at Dawn. Since I was not a resident of Massachusetts, I was further surprised when the Concord Free Public Library issued me a library card on the spot and let me walk out of the building with this valuable book. Free library cards for everyone is a longstanding tradition of this charming bastion of American literary history.

Bookstores are great, used bookstores are fun and great, but libraries are indispensable because they come equipped with tour guides called librarians. I sure hope the digitization of books doesn't cost us this valuable resource.

Related Posts
Will libraries end up as museums? 
Musings about Concord, Massachusetts
Libraries that are architectural wonders
I just gave away over 300 books

Center Point Will Publish The Latest Steve Dancy Tale

I returned from my trip to Nebraska to find a publishing contract from Center Point for The Return, A Steve Dancy Tale. They’re a great group of people, so I signed and posted the contract immediately. My understanding is that Center Point has the large print version of The Return slotted for the first quarter of 2014. (Trade paperback and ebook formats will be available this summer.)

I’m thrilled that Center Point will have published all four of the Steve Dancy novels. It also pleases me that the first three books have earned past their advances. That probably explains why Center Point bought the large print rights to The Return sight unseen. That’s a compliment I feel really good about.

Related Post:

The Future of Large Print

Get a Spine!

The spine is the most undervalued aspect of book design. This is especially true today, when so many indie-books only publish electronically. Writers are doing themselves a disservice by restricting the market for their books. Granted, the majority of my sales are eBooks, but I also sell a respectable number of print books. I do well with libraries, and despite not pursuing bookstores, I've found my novels carried in the big chains and independent stores. Additionally, some readers who prefer electronic books still look to see if there is a print version to strengthen their purchase decision. My recommendation is that authors insist on a printed version. 

If a print format is produced, then a book becomes a three-dimensional object and must have a back cover and spine. The spine is the most important.

Unless you’re a bestselling author, your books will not be stacked on tables at the front of the store, so only the spine will be seen when your book is on a shelf. The same is true for a library. If you want to sell your next book to a library, people must find and check-out your previous books. So pay attention to the spine. Getting sales is tough enough without your book disappearing in a maze of other books screaming for attention.

Libraries That Are Architectural Wonders

Matador contributing editor Sarah Park has “curated” two galleries of fascinating libraries around the world. These links will take you to some interesting buildings dedicated to the written word.

Amazing libraries around the world

15 super unique libraries around the world

Boston Public Library

I’ve used the Boston Public Library to illustrate this post because I spent untold hours in this room. Actually, I found my greatest treasure in the basement of this building. I was researching Tempest at Dawn and discovered Christopher Collier’s doctoral thesis on Roger Sherman. Collier is the coauthor of Decision in Philadelphia, among other books. I was able to speak to him on the phone, and he had no idea that his thesis had been preserved on microfiche or that it was retained by the Boston Public Library. Since information on Sherman was relatively rare, it was fortuitous to find this academic profile about the architect of the Great Compromise at the Constitutional Convention.

Since I’m writing about my time in Massachusetts, there were two other libraries that had an impact on my writing— the Concord Free Public Library and the Boston Athenæum. One is public and home to great literary traditions and the other is one of the oldest private libraries and cultural institutions in the country. I suggest Sarah Park do a third gallery of libraries dedicated to unique institutions in the United States.

Boston  Athenæum

Concord Free Public Library

Getting More People into the Library

Students at the Miami Ad School have come up with an innovative way to draw more people into libraries. Using smartphone standards that allow the transfer of data by bringing devices close to each other, the project proposes that subway riders could download book samples underground during a commute. An app would then tell them where they could check out the book at a library branch. Good idea. 

Yesterday, I asked if libraries would become museums. Not if they adopt innovative ways to encourage reading and membership.

Vimeow video on the concept.

Here’s an idea I had. Why not conduct a contest between two teams of NYU students. They will be given an assignment to research one specific subject. The first team would be restricted to the Internet, while the second team could only use the resources—including real, live, breathing librarians— of the New York Public Library. Someone rich (that would not be me) would put up a prize of a few thousand dollars. The research results would be judged by NYU professors and college librarians for thoroughness and accuracy. I believe the NYPL team would win today. But if we made this an annual contest, I'm not as sure about future results. 

John Allen Paulos once said, "The Internet is the world's largest library.  It's just that all the books are on the floor." Let's see if some bright college students can sort them out.