Book One of "The Farside Chronicles" ("The Door") begins with a short anecdote wherein one voice, the inventor, outlines a way to solve the perennial problem of 'where shall I park the car?' using dimensional distortion. The second voice, the other, remains skeptical of the feasibility of the method.
I recall being involved in just such a conversation during the year I spent at Manhattan College as a Physics major. The first voice is that of one John Patrick Celenza, my classmate, and the second voice is mine. The idea John planted decades ago germinated in my mind as a story-line that became, after voluminous re-work, The Farside Chronicles.
In the late 80s or early 90s, personal computers made it possible — no, made it easier — to write and edit material such as books and other treatises. That was probably the start of what has become a publishing revolution on a par with Gutenberg. It became feasible for someone with such an interest to actually write a book and have it published — for a fee, of course. Since childhood, I had been 'a writer', often scribbling in pencil in one of those black-and-white marble-patterned notebooks my latest opus, none of which ever survived long enough to actually meet a typewriter. Now in possession of my very own computer, I could write to my heart's content, saving my output onto 3½" floppy disks and revising whenever it seemed necessary or prudent. My first serious effort beginning soon after I became a PC owner was, naturally, the story that eventually would become "The Door". As with so many such tasks, it progressed fairly quickly to 95% complete, and remained there permanently. Every now and then, I would open the file containing 'the book', reread it, and try to compose an ending that satisfied my heart. Nothing worked. It felt as though I had painted myself into a corner, and I could not even imagine how I might rewrite myself clear of it. I put it aside and moved on other things.
About 2006, I observed that the nature of politics was undergoing a sea-change. Everything about it was becoming much more adversarial and contentious. Where once Nixon and Kennedy could have engaged in a reasoned debate on the issues, then shook hands when it was over, there was no more hand-shaking going on. The major political parties weren't shooting at each other, but they were clearly 'at war'. It seemed to me that we were within a stone's throw of graduating to actual gunfire. I began to write a story about a gruesome school shooting that prompts a call for the repeal of the 2nd amendment, and leads to a second American civil war. In 2011, I self-published "Tipping Point" via Author House, a vanity press headquartered in Indiana.
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It might be useful to know how book publication has changed over the past half-century.
As recently as 1985, an aspiring author would laboriously type (double-spaced) 'the book', often rewriting sections or chapters at the urging of amateur or professional editors, and send (the original or a Xerox copy) to Random House or Alfred Knopf or ...
The book would disappear into the bowels of the publisher's workrooms and would result in one of several outcomes:
- a rejection letter (typically);
- suggestions for changes (sometimes);
- an acceptance letter (rarely).
If accepted, the publisher causes the work to be typeset preparatory to printing, delivers the galley proofs to one or more editors/proofreaders, who make sure the final product is ready for prime time. Then the book is printed, typically in multiples of 10,000 copies, a quite expensive proposition.
If the book sells, royalties will be paid to the successful author and more printing will happen. If the book doesn't sell, the publisher is on the hook for all those costs.
Successful books wind up at Barnes&Noble for $37.95 and everybody is happy. Unsuccessful books wind up at Books-A-Million for $5, $2, or $1, and only Books-A-Million is happy, but not very happy.
That doesn't happen (much) anymore.
These days, an aspiring author may approach a well-known publisher, but these typically are no longer interested in unsolicited manuscripts. Their unspoken rule of business is "Don't call us; we'll call you."
Instead, the author self-publishes by contracting with any of several vanity presses. The services provided by the vanity press are centered around making a manuscript look like a book. They do not care how well-written or poorly-written the manuscript is. They will — for a fee — check spelling, punctuation, and grammar. They are not taking any risk; the author is.
The cover art, the book's body text and illustrations, are sent as computer files to any of several on-demand-publishers, but mostly to Ingram in Tennessee, the world's largest. Ingram is able to produce a book by separately producing the body text and the cover, and assembling the components in the right order. Ingram can produce one book; they can produce 100 books; they can produce 10,000 books, on demand.
So, a prospective book buyer sees a book advertised on Amazon and adds it to their cart. Amazon sends the order to Ingram and pays Ingram the agreed price. Ingram produces a book as ordered, plus a mailing label, the book is boxed and handed over to USPS, FedEx, UPS, or equivalent, and Ingram pays the publisher the agreed price. The publisher keeps their share and pays the author the agreed royalty. It is possible that, for a given book, this never happens.
The cost to get to ink-on-paper is borne entirely by the author. In rare cases, the author's phone will ring and someone from Random House will invite her to come to New York to talk about her next book.
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"Tipping Point" enjoys a small but steady popularity and provides a stream of royalties that is thin enough that it may never pay me back for what it cost to see the book in print. I am, unsurprisingly, reluctant to do it again.
However, seeing "Tipping Point" finally launched took a weight off my shoulders such that I began to entertain the notion of finishing that mothballed book. I re-read it and began to try alternative endings, finally settling on one that completely satisfied me. Unwilling to press on toward publishing it, however, it went back on the shelf, finished at last, but only enough to satisfy my desire to have it done.
It was some time before it occurred to me that I had left that story in such a state that a sequel was possible. I sometimes describe it as 'the book itself whining to me that it was lonely and needed company'. Besides, I was, at that point, semi-retired and a stay-at-home pensioner, Nielsen Media having flushed me with my first-ever layoff. With nothing better to do, I started writing 'book two'. It was as if I could not prevent the words flowing onto the page. Once you have opened the floodgates, as Thomas Sowell once observed, you cannot tell the water where to go. Four months after starting it, "The Town" had taken its final shape. I wrapped a metaphorical ribbon around the two volumes and stowed them both back onto their virtual shelf.
"No, no," they now called to me in chorus. "Not done! Not done! You can't leave the story there!"
I began book three, then contract work interfered with progress as I found myself back in Texas living on 'bachelor status' and working long hours for Bank of America. Eventually, "Farside Colony" joined its sisters on that virtual shelf, whereupon the first two taught the newcomer the theory and practice of wheedling. Thus there is now a fourth book, "Farside Legacy", that effectively ends the chronicles.
The four are available via Kindle Direct Publishing.
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