So on Wednesday, whilst brooding over my lack of productivity through the entire house-move kerfuffle, I came up with a perfectly silly idea for a novelty book, or as they are called in the trad publishing trade, ‘non-book’. I told my Gentle Editor, Wendy S. Delmater, the idea. She thought it was amusing enough to put in some effort and try it on a dog. We agreed to confer online Friday afternoon.
So today, beginning at about 12:30 p.m. Frozen North Standard Time, I started furiously typing any old gag that would fit the idea. The beginning and ending were easy. Filling out the middle took a little longer. About 4:00 I began formatting the text in InDesign, and at 7:03 precisely I sent the PDF to my beta reader, the talented and cover-designer-ly Sarah Dimento. She is not a dog, but she does have two cats, and no disapproval being met with from that quarter, I have decided to throw the thing out there and see what happens.
I call it Writer’s Block: An Insider’s Guide.
It begins with ‘This page intentionally left blank’, and goes on from there. If there is a way of not writing books that I have failed to mention in its voluminous pages, I will eat the hat that I haven’t got.
Warning: This book will not tell you how to cure writer’s block. At best, it will give you some of the kind of company that misery loves, and maybe a few laughs. But perhaps that’s enough.
Speaking as someone with plenty of their own first-hand experience, I look forward to reading it! A few laughs would be welcome.
Thanks for the kind words… but see my reply to the comment below.
Even as I type this comment, I am procrastinating some deep thinking on a pivotal plot point that I really should just write out to see where it goes. In other words, by the title of the book, it’s painfully relevant to my current situation. I could use a laugh, so please – by all means publish this.
I shall be publishing it – by editorial order.
Of course, there’s a catch. When it came time to write back-cover copy, guess what happened? I got writer’s block, of course. This, however, should be a short-term thing. A little brainstorming should fix it.
You should work your block about the back cover copy into the back cover copy.