I am, like, ‘Change a lightbulb?’ ‘Where’s the Owner’s Manual?’ said the man. Everyone says their wife does everything. But my wife does everything. Saturday, I was playing with the kids, badminton, and they hit the, uh, bird on the roof and Timmy said, ‘Oh, now we have to wait for Mommy to come home.’ It wasn’t that he knew I wouldn’t climb on the roof but that asking was not even a consideration.
Adventures in Marketing: Week 31
Sold two “Cheesesteak”‘s. One to a guy in my locker room aisle. One to the wife of an ex-officemate at the café. My “Buy Bob’s Books” display also attracted a tall, thin, angular thirty-something woman, in striking lime green tights, black hoodie and black baseball cap, who was further off her rocker than she had initially appeared.
Previously, Renee Blitz, the octogenarian writer of idiosyncratic, profane, semi-punctationless feuilletons, of which Adele and I are great fans but at which most others, including her daughters, roll their eyes, proposed she and I read jointly at the Jewish Seniors Center.
“I don’t think I’m Jewish enough,” I said.
“You’re Jewish enough,” she said.
“if you arrange it,” I said.
This week Renee reported, “They don’t want us.”
“Why not?” I said.
“She didn’t give a reason. She just said, ‘No.'”
“That’s it,” I said. “Tell her I’m converting to Roman Catholicism.”
Readers Respond
“I finished ‘The Schiz.’ I hope the characters weren’t based on real people.”
A fellow at the café.
“Terrific. I think it would make a great graphic novel.”
My good friend Budd.
I tend to evaluate how people respond to my writings. I know this is not fair. I understand it’s hard to come up with responses that satisfy creators. I fuss and fret over responses myself. (Still I noted the café fellow said absolutely nothing which revealed what he thought of my book, and graded him downward accordingly.)
Budd’s response recalled to me that decades earlier, to perhaps the first draft of “The Schiz,” Max Garden, (See “Cheesesteak” p. 14 et seq.) said it reminded him of a comic book. He meant this as a compliment, but I felt my seriousness of purpose and complexity of thought dissed. So while I reacted more dispassionately to Budd’s assessment which, after all had praised the book directly, I noted his implication that it would be better as something else.
Then, later that day, Adele’s brother Gordie called. “The macabre and grotesque scenes and characters,” he said, “reminded me of those EC comics you showed Ken and Joey (His children) the first time we visited. It was like you’d created comic art in words.” Though Gordie, like Max and Budd, had connected “The Schiz” to comics, his comment alone unqualifiedly warmed me.
First was his utilization of the words “grotesque” and “macabre.” Though at first glance denoting less stars than “great” or “terrific,” he had individualized his response, narrowed it and sharpened it in a way to fit my book specifically and, at the same time, linked it to a recognized literary tradition. Flannery O’Connor, Mary Shelley, Poe. (In fact, Wikipedia says, no less than Thomas Mann called the grotesque the “genuine antibourgeoise style.”
Plus, Gordie was saying “The Schiz” satisfied as itself. It was not the equivalent of a comic. It need not become one. It had only incorporated elements of comics, as artists incorporate elements of whatever they come across and are nourished by. And I and loved the idea of having EC as one of my literary influences. At various times, I had heard — and welcomed — “Ernest Hemingway” and “Raymond Chandler” and “Nathanel West”; but EC, which had fallen upon me years before any of these eminent others, had never been cited to or accepted by me, and it suddenly seemed right and simply nice to welcome it aboard and not standing on the pier as I sailed away.
A Poem
I just finished…
…”The Rest is Noise,” a history of 20th century (mostly) “classical” music by Alex Ross.
I never listen to classical music. I especially never listen to 20th century classical music. In Music 1, I could never identify and keep my ear on a theme. I can never follow a jazz improvisation (and I listen to a lot of jazz). I do not know what it means to “improvise on a chord,” let alone “octonic scale” or “natural harmonic series” or “twelve tone rows” or other terms which pop up regularly in Ross’s prose like stones in my soup. But I regularly read his reviews in “The New Yorker,” because I like his style and mind, so when I saw his book on the remainder table, I thought I might learn something.
It proved a worthwhile purchase. If I couldn’t comprehend Ross’s analysis of the music, I benefited from the history and portraits of composers he put forth. If someone engaged me, I created a “station” on Spotify and listened. Schoenberg got me some woman screaming at me in German, who I wasn’t crazy about, but Morton Feldman was calming and Bang the Can great fun
Adventures in Marketing: Week 30
Sold one “Cheesesteak.” To a checker at the supermarket. Andronico’s.
My on-line publicist has generated no additional requests for review copies, but Goodreads notified me that my application to offer 10 copies for free in a lottery has been accepted. Like being able to give them away is something to be complimented.
Undaunted, I e-mailed 11 independent bookstores in-and-around Philadelphia inquiring if they would handle “Cheesesteak” on consignment. The only reply was a form e-mail containing tips for selling rare books and first editions. While all “Cheesesteak”s are first editions and, in a market-penetration sense “rare, this was not my intended plan, so I trashed this response.
I guess the week’s highlight was the young woman, short hair, body piercings, who, noting the book’s title, asked if I was from Philadelphia. (She even knew the “Spruce Hill” in Spruce Hill Press.) A Drexel graduate, computer science, she was visiting, investigating whether to move here. We had a pleasant chat but no sales resulted.
Adventures in Marketing: Week 29
Sold two copies of “The Schiz,” one to a friend who’d missed the launch party and one to an attorney from my law practice past who lives down the peninsula. Sold a “Cheesesteak” to a fellow who sought my counsel on his nanny’s brother’s workers’ comp case.
The (presumably) mass e-mailing from my on-line publicist to reviewers hither and yon has resulted in a single request for “Cheesesteak.” (Actually a request for TWO copies.) This is not encouraging. On the other hand, it means I will be giving away fewer freebies. Is this it? I asked the publicist. Or should I expect more requests to trickle in? This question has not been answered.
However, my publicist has also recommended I give 10 copies away at Goodreads in a “lottery.” This, she says, will draw attention to my work and increase my name recognition. I was willing, but it required several tips from her before I could convince Goodreads “Cheesesteak” even existed.
In semi-related news, I have submitted my Introduction (or Afterword) to “Cumming,” Aaron Lange’s forthcoming collection of scurrilous anti-Trump illustrations. They are a hoot and getting my own rocks off was such a blast that I look forward to displaying the comic besides my own books in the café.
I have even offered to take on local distribution, as a sideline to my publishing empire. I mean if this won’t sell in Berkeley…
Berkablanca
When the light is right, sitting in a Berkeley café, I can feel like a mini-Rick with many mini-llsas arriving.
Like yesterday, I was on-line ordering a just-discounted book by L, whom I had met in that very café, when in walked my recently retired lawyer-friend M. He bought a “Schiz” and while we were catching up — books, movies, gyms — since our last lunch, N, who had worked with M but had not seen him in 30 years, recognized his voice.
N had recently sold his law practice in Stockton and was traveling around the world with O, a Danish woman, while trying to decide where to live. They were in town for a three week at the Nyingma Institute to be followed by two weeks at Spirit Rock. I did not press my books on them since they seemed to be traveling light. (On the other hand, if all you have on the agenda is silence…)
While M, N and O were discussing the infelicities imposed by the homeless in Berkeley and immigrants in Copenhagen and I was completing my purchase of L’s book, P, a writer/illustrator of children’s book, offered me a Jodi Picault novel she had come across while cleaning out her shelves. I don’t read Jodi Picault myself, but I thought — correctly — Adele would like it. As I pocketed it, Q stepped away from the coffee bar. We had recently become acquainted when he’d bought a book and I’d learned he had given up architecture to independently study physics.
As it happened, at breakfast I had just read in the NYRB about “locality” and “spooky action” and if (and How) everything was connected and it had occurred to me, especially since recent events had turned me against politics, I might benefit from taking up physics myself, even though when I had tried to read “The Cosmic Code” — about the time M and N had last spoken — I had not gotten past The Heisenberg Principle.
Well, Adele said, when I recounted this story, you’re much smarter now.
Adventures in Marketing: Week 28
I.
Sold three copies of “The Schiz” and one of “Cheesesteak.” The first went to two guys and a gal I knew at the French. The last went to someone I didn’t.
II.Tom?” she said.
She had me confused with an (even) more celebrated author who came there. He always wears a watch cap and I wore one that morning. She had wanted to compare knee replacements with him. (Hers had gone well; his hadn’t.) There, I couldn’t help her, but I could have done heart surgery.
Then she saw my cap said “West Philadelphia.” She had lived there in the ’60s, three blocks from my family, while her now ex- was in med school.
“Wanna buy a book?” I said.
II.
The big opportunity I missed was the 50th anniversary party we attended. Philadelphians past and present were there, but I had left my “Buy Bob’s Books” and my wares at home.
I was proud of the discretion I had shown but…
III.
I showed more initiative by placing both books in a store on consignment. One copy of each. 60/me;40/them split. They will display them 60 days and if any sell, take more.
So if you are in Pegasus on Solano Ave….
IV.
After much mulling I took the plunge on this outfit that promises to get your book reviewed. Think of us, they say, as your personal (cheap) publicist. They will pitch a personally-tailored-to-your-book promo to thousands.
I do not doubt they will find reviewers. One of these places even found me. (“Due to your interest in Cold War espionage…”) But do reviews by people you have never heard of sell books by authors you have never heard of?
I am not so sure.
Adventures in Marketing: Week 27
I.
Sold two copies of “The Schiz.” One went to a woman in my high school class. One was to the woman at the health club whom it had reminded of Nathanel West. She intended it as a Christmas present for a nephew, whom she believed would like it.
“He’s a professor of philosophy…,” she explained.
Ah, I thought, always eager to gain insight into who might constitute my audience.
“…and he’s six-foot-six…,” she continued.
Hmmm, I thought.
“…and he collects typewriters.”
“Which book of mine did you want, exactly?” I said.
II.
People have continued to express regrets about missing the launch party. One had his conversational French class. One had an HOA meeting. One arrived after everyone had left. Too late, Milo suggested my reply should be, “Sorry you couldn’t attend. But copies remain. How many would you like?”
III.
Sometimes when I sit in the café with my “Buy Bob’s Books” sign beside my wares, I feel like a small shopkeeper looking hopefully out the door while potential customers walk by with no one stepping in.