The Space We Take Up On Earth
I guess when it comes down to it, our worth is not always going to be a quantifiable entity.
My trip into Manhattan last week should’ve been one of my ultimate highlights, but I was informed (almost in passing) that Kickass Recovery had pretty dismal sales and I’d likely not be able to get another traditional publishing deal for another nonfiction book. She went on to say, “You’re doing the right thing. Focus on fiction now.”
You might know–and then you may not–that the way it generally works is that if you start with a $10,000 advance, you need to sell close to 10,000 books to recoup that money. Any authors who do not “earn out” (sell enough to reimburse the advance) are on the great nonofficial blacklist of people you should never work with again, to be distributed to all major and minor players in the publishing world.
Maybe I’m being biased, but I don’t think that my book sold poorly because it sucked. I was told by my agent and by the managing editor at the publisher that the book was very well written and informative. And even though I only got a handful of reviews on Amazon, none of them were less than four-star. The book came out the same day as COVID (March 2020) and beyond hitting the pavement and doing store signings and readings, I had no ideas for promotion.
The publisher set me up with interviews at four or five “podcasts.” You might actually call them the cable public access version of podcasts. As I scroll down these various appearances on YouTube, I see 30 views on one, 31 on another and 11 on a third. Again, dismal.
Not that I’m blaming the publisher. It was really my responsibility to get these books sold and I probably did not get out there and push as hard as I should have. Another reason why things may have gone the way they did, is that it was an idea that sounded great on paper, but made no practical sense. Lord knows, I received numerous “I’m not sure how I would position this” rejections from agents and publishers during my period of querying and sweating. “I don’t know how I would position this” is book speak for “there is no demand for this type of book.”
My original objective began with the very logical idea that if Jen Sincero (You Are a Badass) was able to get millions of Gen X ladies out of their complacency and into a life they could be proud of, I could do the same thing with my demographic: those with a year or more of sustained recovery. It was one of those elusive ideas that will either make you look shrewd and courageous or idealistic and foolhardy–depending on the sales figures.
All of this is probably boring the hell out of you, but I bring it up because it has been annoying me to no end. Even days later. First, because I have to sit with the idea that my venture did not turn out financially successful and second, because it brought my two month run of effortless and industrious writing to a screeching halt. This thimbleful of information I received at the Steakhouse.
I am not the superstitious type, though. I am not laboring under the misconception that my flow has been eternally ruined. I know myself well enough to understand that I will be right back in the saddle by next week. You know, after I perseverate so many times on that lunch conversation that the words begin to lose their strength.
It was only this time last week where I gave myself the pep talk that I may have to write four novels over the next three years before I create the one that gets people excited. I was okay with that. There was just something so demoralizing about the cutthroat bean counter mentality of the book world.
For me, it is enough to know that I was an instrumental part in a thousand people making life altering changes. For the publisher, they would have been a lot happier with tens of thousands of people making a lot less significant changes. In fact, as long as they were making change for a $20 bill, it would’ve looked a lot better on my author bio.
I guess when it comes down to it, our worth is not always going to be a quantifiable entity. There are people in this world who, through hard work and persistence, sell a lot of books. I won’t lie, that must be a fantastic feeling. But, if my contribution on this planet is merely to change a few lives in a very significant way, I’ll take it.
It helps me to sleep at night to know I am earning the space that I quietly take up on earth.
Excellent, honest and not at all boring, Billy. Thanks again for my weekend read from you.
Always look forward to reading you on Saturdays. Never boring, always relatable. Much appreciated