Last week, after more than a year of on-and-off work, I emailed the manuscript of my road trip memoir to six friends and family members. The book isn't done, but I needed to get it out of my hands and in front of the eyes of impartial readers. This is a big step for me.
I spent 10 years writing my first book, (C)rock Stories: Million Dollar Tales of Music, Mayhem and Immaturity. I received some feedback during that process, but I was never confident enough to send the finished product out ahead of time to see what people thought. While I'm proud of the book, I know it would've been better if other folks had looked at it before publication.
I self published that book, and I may do the same with my memoir. I'd like to find a publisher, but no matter which way I go, I want the memoir to be the best possible book it can be. I've already received some helpful feedback, and at least one person has read the entire manuscript. I'm anxious to read the comments he emailed.
In the meantime, I'm working on two short stories in a planned series about growing up in Simsbury, Connecticut. I plan to submit one of the stories to my buddy Jim Corrigan, who's soliciting stories for his second anthology. He recently self published the first one, Movable Feasts, which includes one of my stories.
I'm also moving forward with my children's book. As I write this, Staples is salivating over the order I placed online today to get five copies of a mock-up of the book. Once those are in hand, I'll schedule a meeting with the folks at Ward Maps, who are the official licensing agent for the MBTA. For those who don't know, my book is about riding the MBTA's Green Line in Boston. If the book gets accepted, I plan to write at least three other books in that series.
The picture at the top of this entry is one I took with my first camera on a family trip in 1977. I was 12 years old, and loved boogie vans. I shot that beauty in Salt Lake City. I plan to include that photo in my book, along with others such as the van I traveled in, shots of myself and some of the guys I traveled with, and pictures of me before the trip, when I was fat and had a beard.
I hadn't thought much about including photos in the memoir, because I had none from the trip. I'd brought a camera and shot two rolls of film, but when I went to get them developed, I was told they were blank. That was the same camera I'd used to take the van photo up there, I believe. I threw the camera away in disgust.
But upon reading Satan Is Real, the autobiography by Charlie Louvin, and seeing the pictures he included, I realized I could insert pictures into my book that, while they weren't from the trip (with the exception of one or two taken by somebody else), would contribute to the overall product.
Stay tuned for more about the memoir, as I'll know more about how much more work I have to do once I get more feedback.
In the meantime, please to enjoy Fu Manchu:
No comments:
Post a Comment