The Latest Book

Oh my god!  I think my brain is dead.  But I did it – our latest book hit the printer on Friday morning, and now I just have to sit back, drink vodka, and wait for the proofs…

Though I’m always convinced everything will fuck up in some horrible way, so I tend to sit at work with my head on my desk making wounded animal sounds until the proofs arrive.  And, so far, they’ve only been wrong once (with three books).  So that’s good.  Right?  I don’t know.

It’s a mad rush to get everything to the distributor by March 9th.  Will I?  I don’t know.  I have no idea what’s happening.  About three years ago I closed my eyes, held my breath, and then jumped into the pit that leads to Pellucidar.

Though the pre-orders for this latest title are encouraging (they’ve outstripped the preorders for all the previous books), I have a sort of hopeless, helpless, haunted, hunted feeling about all of this.  Publishing is kind of like giving every homeless child on the planet $1000…and then expecting it to change their lives for the better from that point onward.

I’ve come to think of it as an addiction.  It’s ruined me financially, and it’ll take me years to dig out of this hole, and yet I’m thinking about ways to manage the next book.

That’s…insane.  But if I know it’s insane then it isn’t.  Right?

Anyway, save me from living in a converted Dumpster and pre-order the book today!  And pre-order it online, not at a bookstore.  I’ll get to that later.  If I can find that 10 page article I wrote complaining about how bookstores are the enemy of publishing, authors, writing, creativity, and the Human race.  I wrote that on the bus home while stuck in snow-bound traffic, then drunkenly typed it in, then saved it with a stupid filename.  Since I do that often, it’s a matter of digging through all the stupid filenames I have on my computer.  Or is it on my flashdrive?  Or my work computer?  Who am I?!

(If you hate buying shit online, then come to the party on April 5th and buy the book directly from me. Which is a better option anyway.)

Oh!  And I posted the entire introduction to the new edition today.

Also — somebody bring me some more vodka.