UNDER LUCKY STAR

Last December, Kathleen Novak wrote her first blog for us (I AM ALWAYS WRITING), even though her first novel, Do Not Find Me was not released until the beginning of March. This latest blog has a lot to say about successful marketing and it is charming, funny, unique, and true, and I heartily recommend it to one and all. With that I turn you over to Kathleen:

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"Wake up: You are under lucky star. 

"This is my fortune in the cookie and exactly what I say to myself about Do Not Find Me, my first published novel. I am not, however, simply waiting for good things to happen. Six months before the book’s release I gathered a small group at my house, offered up a great lunch and plenty of prosecco and asked for input on how to launch my book locally. One of the women is a veteran novelist, a complete pro, and she said – throw a party. Make it big. Rent the VFW or any large space and invite everyone, friends, relatives, neighbors, work colleagues, gym buddies, school moms, everyone. Send invitations via mail and have food at the party.

"So that’s what I did. I rented a room on the top floor of our contemporary art museum and sent out a hundred postcard invitations that showed off Lon’s beautiful cover of the book on the front and the invite information with a Kirkus review excerpt on the back. The result was a warm, happy event with about one hundred and twenty-five people, who all seemed to be having a grand time. My dental hygienist was there, my old dad in his fishing hat was there and the couple whose bookstore I managed back in the 1970s were there. It all worked – and I sold seventy books in an hour.

"Around the same time that I invited “advisors” over for input last fall, I started scribbling a plan of what I needed to do month by month, including reaching out to stores I hoped would carry the book and local literary stars I hoped would review it. Using my stash of preview copies from TPP (a most generous and brilliant gift from publisher to writer), I sent out personalized packets. I saw in a web search that Tattered Cover Books in Denver is considered number one among indie booksellers, so I called them and sent a packet. It turns out that they have a high regard for TPP and liked my letter, so they accepted the book. This made me happy and had the added benefit of impressing my high school boyfriend who lives there. Not all outreach yielded results, of course, and I hate rejection as much as anyone, but I do believe it’s important to give these things a try.

"A month before the book release date, I wrote press releases to our two large newspapers here. TPP printed these on their letterhead, Marty signed them and I sent out packets with a personal note to the reviewers. I am a total nobody, so I doubted my book would rise to the top of their stacks, but I was wrong. Both papers published glowing reviews beyond my wildest expectations. (The St. Paul Pioneer Press reviewer essentially said my book was worth reading twice!) And because of those reviews the libraries have overwhelming requests for the book and have had to order more for their shelves.

"The above-mentioned veteran writer (Faith Sullivan, author of Goodnight, Mr. Wodehouse, which was one of the Wall Street Journal’s ten best novels of 2015) also told me to have my friends host small gatherings of people I don’t know, where I may extend my audience, read an excerpt and sell a book or two. I love this idea. My first one will be next weekend, a cocktail party late on Saturday afternoon. So far, I have four other friends who have offered to host such gatherings and two women at the gym an hour ago who thought it a grand idea to host one too.

"I’d like to get a bit of visibility through my efforts and hope that some of these ideas work for others as well. I also want to underscore Victoria Alexander’s recent blog about the Dactyl reviews for literary fiction. I am eager to participate in that ingenious idea and thank her for sharing the opportunity.

"My brother the doctor told me last week that he loves fortune cookies, but never reads the fortunes. Too much hokus pokus. But how about these:

You Will Get The Recognition You Deserve and      

You Have Much Love

"Who would throw those away? Not me. I’m hanging onto them. Just in case I really am UNDER LUCKY STAR."

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I hope you’ve not only enjoyed Kathleen’s blog but that it also raised a unique way of selling books. Do feel free to contact Kathleen directly at knovakhome@comcast.net. I ask, as always, that you post your comments below, and—if you will—send a copy of her blog to all your friends and acquaintances who might find it helpful.

And for those of you awaiting Danner Darcleight’s two part blog, I’ll be postponing that again...this time, it’s cross my heart and not my fingers. I can only say it will be worth the wait.

Marty

WE INTERRUPT THIS PROGRAM...

After sending out Tori Alexander’s blog on March 28th, I had promised to post a two part blog written by Danner Darcleight, whose powerful prison memoir, Concrete Carnival, will be published by us in September. But there were a series of events that occurred last week, which led to thoughts that I wanted to share with you first.   In a nutshell, this blog concerns survival and success as a publisher of literary fiction, the assumptions we made when starting out, and the reality of what I’ve learned, when it comes to the matter of “which reviews are most important” when it comes to selling books; and the difference between reviews in magazines and newspapers (read by the public) versus reviews published and read by only a small group of publishing “insiders.” And who are these “insiders”? Librarians, publishers abroad, filmmakers and the four pre-publication journals that serve them: Kirkus Reviews, Publishers Weekly, Booklist, and Library Journal, as well as a couple of very successful and widely circulated bloggers, as exemplified by Sheila Deeth (Sheila’s Reviews).

When we started publishing there were lots of newspapers reviewing books. Over the past 37 years, few are left. The New York Times was atop the list back then, both for their Sunday Book Review and their daily weekday reviews (one major review a day from Monday through Friday). Today they are the only major newspaper left who devote time and attention to publishing book reviews.

When I was in my mid-twenties and about to get my M.D. degree from the N.Y.U College of Medicine, I worked at the New York Times as a night intern. Before that, ever since I entered the High School of Music and Art in Manhattan as a 13 year old art student, I was an avid reader of the Times. Later on, when Judy, my wife and I, first started publishing in 1979, we had a major review for Richard Lortz’s novel The Valdepenas, written by the legendary Anatole Broyard, which appeared in the daily Times on Thursday, January 31, 1980. This was a grand beginning, which made me assume that  one needed to have books reviewed  in the weekday  editions of the Times in order to succeed as a publisher. As it turned out, this was also the last full review we ever had, though there have been over 9,000 other books reviewed there in the last 36 years.

Given the fact that we have no grants, no funding other than ourselves and book sales, the question remains how did we ever manage to survive? One answer is to say that this is mysterious and unexplainable: “kismet”—a gift from the universe—and that surely is true. But looking at things analytically one can better understand the building blocks that have fallen into place that have allowed us to continue.

One can talk all they want about how difficult it is to get a review in the New York Times where there is fierce competition for review space. But getting reviews in the pre-pub journals is not a walk in the park either. Last year we were fortunate enough to get two novels reviewed in the Sunday Times Book Review on their Shortlist page—which was much appreciated. But sales of these novels—Margaret Vandenberg’s The Home Front and Tom LeClair’s Lincoln’s Billy—were hardly affected after these reviews appeared. At the same time, we’ve had great success in getting coverage by the pre-publication reviewers, each of our 16 yearly releases being reviewed by at least one of these review sources, and most by several.

This past week we’ve had exceptional reviews for four of our forthcoming 2016 novels, with two reviews in Kirkus: one for Ray Merritt’s Clamour of Crows, and another for Ira Gold’s Debasements of Brooklyn. Publishers Weekly featured a rave review for Charles Davis’ Hitler, Mussolini, and Me, while Booklist gave Chris Knopf’s Back Lash a starred review. These are the reviews that not only increase sales for these titles, promote translation sales (220 right sales abroad since we began), and intrigue filmmakers. All of these enable us to go forward.

There are also other sources of revenue that help our bottom line. Blackstone Audio, a company based in Ashland, Oregon, that publishes unabridged audio books, and Haila Williams, their acquisitions editor based in New York, have acquired at least half of our titles for more than a decade. Three of our novels have been turned into movies and many others are in option. The fact that many of our titles—be they literary mysteries or literary novels—have been finalists or winners of major book awards has also aided book sales—including all the major mystery awards (Hammett Prize, Nero Award, Edgar Award, International Thriller Writers Award, and the Anthony Award). On the literary fiction side we’ve published several finalists or winners for the National Book Award, the Chautauqua Prize, the Lambda Awards,  and both the PEN/Hemingway Award and PEN /Winship Award.  Other authors have received cash prizes from both ForeWord Magazine’s Best

Book of the Year Award and the Dactyl Foundation Literary Fiction Award that were turned over directly to the authors. This does not include local State-wide honors for both mysteries and novelists we’ve published.

Accumulating all these accolades for so many authors has given us great satisfaction, but that is not necessarily reflected in profitability. Profitability is more assured if a writer is published by one of the five major conglomerates (actually, with mergers, I believe they are now down to “four”) who, with their huge advertising budgets and joint ownership with other mass media feed on celebrity and account for 85% of books sales in the U.S.A. A memoir for a star like Amy Schumer, or the formulaic James Patterson, who ”writes” over a dozen books a year (mostly written by well-paid writers) and who was honored at the last National Book Awards ceremony because of his contributions to literature are not books we have any interest in.  (If I sound like Bernie Sanders here, blogging about the way things are, I’d be flattered. But Bernie is on to more serious stuff, trying to change the way things are run and how traditional politics screws a hoodwinked public while enhancing the rich, when all that I’m talking about are books as part of the entertainment industry, which I have no interest in reforming at all).

What I’m talking about is simply “gratefulness;” grateful that we have been able to endure, to sort out from among the 5,000 queries and submissions we receive each year those few books we can present to readers who hunger for quality fiction primarily as opposed to “pulpy fiction,” and that we’ve  been able to do this successfully despite being relatively invisible to the larger public, whose awareness depends on what major media outlets and columnists consider “important news” when it comes to books is a continuing unfolding of  kismet, whether deserved of not.

If one’s passion is fiction (the step-child of publishing, where non-fiction overwhelmingly predominates), and a desire to find and promote artful writers (as opposed to seeking “Best Sellers,”) what we are doing now is as good as it gets.

I love working on behalf of our writers and it is thrilling when one of their books takes off.  And I love my two co-publishers: my wife Judy and Chris Knopf, without whom nothing is possible.

Now comes the “Academy Award Speech,” where every recipient goes on to thank all those who helped them:  I love being surrounded by those exceptional people who work with us here in Sag Harbor: Felix Gonzalez, our warehouse manager; Cathy Suter and Brian Skulnik who share office space alongside me and stay up-to-date with every aspect and detail of keeping things on track and anticipating what we have to do next to keep things moving along, andfeel the same way about those  off campus: Lon Kirschner who reads every manuscript from beginning to end and comes up with astounding book covers, Barbara Anderson who is a copyeditor without peer, Susan Ahlquist who is a remarkable typesetter and the book designer of both our books and those ads we periodically place in Publishers Weekly and Mystery Scene Magazine, and Jeff Aghassi, our film agent out in Los Angeles. I also want to thank some outstanding overseas agents who have been with us for years, are in touch with us regularly, who sell our books abroad, and who we invite to dinner every year at the Frankfurt Book Fair: Jill Hughes who covers Eastern Europe, Franka Zastrow at the Schlück agency in Germany, Lora Fountain in France, Jane Judd in England, Jackie Huang at the Nurnberg Agency in China, Rita Vivian in Italy, and Atsushi Hori at The English Agency in Japan

As Porky Pig used to say when signing off on cartoons that were once shown in movie theaters, “The..the..the..the..the..... that’s all folks!”  And that’s about it.

COMING OVER THE NEXT TWO WEEKS:  the promised blogs from Danner Darcleight.

As always, I welcome your comments.

Marty

WHY I STARTED DACTYL REVIEW AND THE DACTYL FOUNDATION LITERARY FICTION AWARD

As publishers it has been a delight to have published three of Victoria N. Alexander’s novels over a period of two decades:  Smoking Hopes (1996), Naked Singularity (2003), and Locus Amoenus (2015).  Her range, inventiveness, and themes varied greatly and all three books represented different stages in her own life. And with this briefest of introductions, I turn over this blog to Tori who offers a spot-on critique of the way literary fiction is treated in general and what she is doing to improve things.

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“I had been director of the Dactyl Foundation in NYC for some dozen years, organizing art-science collaborations and hosting poetry readings, before it occurred to me that we were doing nothing to support literary fiction. As a literary fiction (LF) novelist myself, I was well aware that these unlikely-to-be-bestsellers could use some support.  But it was not immediately clear to me what I could do to help.  Hosting readings did not work.  Poets tend to turn out for each other and buy each other’s work; they dedicate poems to each other and even write about each other’s poems, but not LF novelists; they are as independent as cats. They keep to themselves, don’t do reviews, fear influence, and reserve their admiration for dead authors.

“I was such a writer, I realized. What could I do to get mavericks, like myself, to form a community?

“From personal experience, I understood that what LF writers need most (in order to get more readers) are sympathetic reviewers and an extended shelf life. Literary fiction needs reviewers who won’t judge the work by the standards of other genres. It needs other literary fiction writers. LF takes time to find its audience. Books aren’t given much time in front of judges and audiences. Those that don’t make it in six months are thereafter ignored.  No one in publishing denies this, and yet there are no awards for the best five-year-old novel, no reviewers interested in what came out last year.

“Literary fiction is not produce; it won’t spoil. It is not trendy, but of an enduring quality. I like the fact that the Permanent Press keeps my titles available in the back-list catalog.  When I signed on with my first novel, in 1996, I took comfort knowing I would not be remaindered, pulped or go out-of-print. What Marty and Judy Shepard do as publishers, I wanted to do as a foundation director, not just offer an initial opportunity for good books but also help keep them in front of audiences.

“I realized, too, that it would be necessary to share the responsibility of judging books in order to form a community would be self-sustaining. So in 2010, Dactyl Foundation launched Dactyl Review, dedicated solely to literary fiction, created for and by literary fiction writers. We publish reviews of only the best novels and short story collections, as judged by other literary fiction writers. Authors support the kind of work they admire by writing reviews and this also helps the reviewers build readerships for their own work. The reviewer’s signature is linked and followed by the title of his/her book that is most similar to the book being reviewed.

“Dactyl Review also offers the $1,000 annual Dactyl Foundation Literary Fiction Award, which differs from most awards in a number of ways. One, the award is not limited to new books. Any literary fiction book by a living author published in any year is eligible for the award. We know that good books are often overlooked the year they come out. Two, we do not accept nominations from authors or publishers for their own books.  Dactyl only accepts nominations from other published literary fiction authors. A book is nominated when another writer reviews it on Dactyl Review (then the author or publisher has to accept the nomination before the book is officially in the running). Three, we do not require the nominated author or the publisher to send in copies. Dactyl Foundation purchases a copy of every book entered. Four, eligible works must be published, but we accept self-published as well as traditionally published. Five, there is no entry fee. Six, nominations can be made at any time. This year, the Dactyl Foundation award winner is Lindsay Hall for Sea of Hooks, which also won the Pen USA Fiction Award. Our open requirements help insure that we get the best entries not just money-backed entries and not just entries that conform to a list of bureaucratic constraints.

“One might think that leaving the judging up to self-designated LF authors and accepting self-published entries would invite a flood of low quality, not very literary, fiction.  This is not what has happened.  We’ve attracted quality reviewers. That’s because reviewing is hard work. We ask our reviewers to support all opinions about the quality of the writing with excerpts. (How often have you read a review of your own book that says things—good and bad—that are not at all true? as if the reviewer had only skimmed your book.) The review has to be very specific, and this seems to scare off lazy reviewers. It also prevents bullshit.  A reviewer cannot claim a writer has a “lyrical style” without backing that claim up with a brief example. Occasionally, we do get writers and publicists, who haven’t bothered to look at our “about us” page, asking us to review their books. I let them know that’s not what we do, and I invite them to review someone else’s book instead.  Predictably, the prima donna author will reply by saying, I don’t do reviews. I don’t have the time. And we are happy to let them leave us alone. 

“Several Permanent Press authors have participated, including Charles Holdefer, Ivan G Goldman, Marc Schuster, Bill Albert (as a reviewee), and Charles Davis. In 2013 Permanent Press author David Schmahmann won the award for his The Double Life of Alfred Buber, reviewed by Holdefer.

“All this may beg the question, What is literary fiction? Definitions vary, but only slightly. Typically, LF is defined as writing that is stylized or poetic, not always literal, connoting more than it denotes. It often treats a social or humanistic theme from an unusual perspective and is often in conversation with literature of the past. It tends to question stereotypes more than confirm them and avoids sentimentality.  Literary Fiction is the non-genre genre, but it can partake in the conventions of a traditional genre, like mystery or romance, doing so with a wry twist, sometimes with a view to subverting or expanding conventions.

“The Dactyl Review offers a little bit of what every literary fiction writer needs. We do need each other because the commercially-driven publishing industry is geared toward economic efficiency, spending the least amount of time on products that most people will buy. LF is for the uncommon reader. I invite my fellow Permanent Press authors to create some good review karma for yourself by reviewing a writer you admire, new or old, known or unknown. Once you have reviewed a couple of books, you can also offer your book to the community for review.  Next time you ask fellow writers to blurb your book, let them know they can turn it into a review and post it on DR. A Dactyl Review which gets to go into the ‘editorial review’ section on Amazon. We are here to help literary fiction writers help each other.”

To reach Tori you can call her at 845-667-9114, email her at alexander@dactyl.org, or read more about her organization at dactylreview.org. And, needless to say, I welcome your comments here on The Cockeyed Pessimist

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COMING UP NEXT WEEK AND THE WEEK AFTER is a two-part blog from Danner Darcleight entitled An Uncommon Bond. Danner's prison memoir, Concrete Carnival, will be published by us in September (along with Marsilio in Italy and Blackstone Audio in the USA) and will likely be talked about domestically and throughout the world as he is a supremely gifted writer. Darcleight is 39 years old and has already served 17 years of a 25-to-life sentence. In this two-part blog series he discusses his five year relationship with Lily, the woman he married while in prison.

WHAT’S THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN MYSTERIES AND LITERARY FICTION? ARE THEY ACTUALLY TWO SEPARATE GENRES?

In 2010 we published Georgeann Packard’s first novel, Fall Asleep Forgetting, which was very well received. She was a finalist for two separate Lambda Literary Awards: Bisexual Fiction and Lesbian Debut Fiction. Joan Baum reviewed it on National Public Radio, and had this to say about it: “Forget reading some mindless chick lit novel; take this one to the beach instead. It is full of lust, heated sexual encounters and intense emotions that stem from fresh and recharged connections.”

We published her second novel, Paint the Bird, in 2013. It’s a story about Sarah, a lapsed minister in her late sixties and Darby, a painter in his early 70s, who meet accidentally in a restaurant/bar. Kirkus gave it a starred review calling it “From beginning to end, a deeply poetic meditation about life, about trust. About God. About death. Brilliantly imagined and rendered.” Booklist had this to say:  “Packard challenges readers to look closely at their beliefs about death, sexuality, and the constructs of family. Rich descriptions of art and overt sensuality lend beauty to this provocative story of loss and hope.”  Publishers Weekly said “The story reads like a prose poem—emotional significance comes across in the sparsely told daily machinations of the lives of two tenuously connected New Yorkers.” It was also sold to Blackstone Audiobooks.

Overall, Georgeann is constantly and consistently creating new ways of telling new stories and is someone all of us admire. With that I turn this blog over to her.

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“My publisher (and friend) Martin Shepard has more than once encouraged me to write a mystery. They sell and often sell really well. Everyone loves mysteries and the way they both intrigue and entertain. And The Permanent Press publishes a whole lot of really fine ones.

“My literary novels need a harder push, marketing-wise. Even when the reviews are really good, they still have a more limited audience. When I’m selling them myself at a bookstore, winery, or anywhere I can throw down a table, folks read the flap and sometimes frown and politely move on. But some do feel a connection with my characters and lay down a few bucks to find out more.

“So here’s my rationale for still working the literary pen (or pencil as I write my first draft on lined paper with a pencil). It’s also why I usually select, read, and am rewarded by challenging literary novels or even books of poetry.

“A mystery usually involves at least one death and all the questions swirling around that death. The characters utilize curiosity, intelligence, and skill in the unraveling of the tale.

“I would like to suggest that many novels considered strictly literary works, including my two previously published by The Permanent Press (and my third soon to be birthed), also fit the description above.

“In Fall Asleep Forgetting, there is both an attempted suicide and a murder. In my second, Paint the Bird, there is an early death that just won’t disappear. And in the upcoming The Occupation of Zaima, there is an Iraqi-American, Iraq War veteran who cannot cleanse the vision and brutality of many deaths from her memory. There is also another death of a significant character midway through the book.

“Okay. Plenty of chips cashed in. But what about that curiosity, intelligence, and skill? My novels are not whodunits, but the characters who respond to these deaths and even suffer these deaths are enormously curious about grief and the process of dying. My characters have balanced the merits of suicide versus the pointless suffering from incurable disease. They’ve questioned the purpose of life when a death makes their lives feel meaningless and empty. And with considerable skill and mounting experience, they have faced questions we all have or will likely confront. Could they better be called whydunits?

“But don’t worry. I also add enough sex, spiritual ruminations, and obsessions with food to keep it all moving along.

“So maybe the difference between the two forms has to do with the entertainment factor. Maybe that literary gem on your bedside table is not luring you the same way the mystery novel beneath it might be. Maybe your day has been heavy enough already.

“Let me suggest then that you read them both. One for entertaining the mind and soul and the other for entertaining your just-relax-and-read self. And the good news is that there are many, many wonderful books out there that do both. So grab a literary mystery or a mysterious literary novel. Dig in and enjoy.”

Georgeann

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As said before, I hope you will leave comments on this blog. You can also reach Georgeann directly by emailing her at northlite7@optonline.net.

Should you like to read either—or both—of her books let me know (shepard@thepermanentpress.com), and I will happily send the electronic files on to you.

Marty

IN THE COMPANY OF WRITERS

I’m not a sentimental person, and not a natural joiner. It’s a cultural thing. My ancestors were Germans and hard-nosed Anglo-Saxons. We’re reserved by nature. But I do like congenial company, and better yet, a larger community where one is welcomed and mutual support is the norm.

This is what I discovered when I started writing mysteries.

I had no idea. Unlike many in this business, I wrote my first mystery in total isolation. It was only at the moment The Permanent Press accepted my first book that I got my head out of the computer and looked around. My first stop was a New York book store specializing in mysteries, now tragically gone, called The Black Orchid, where I met the inestimable Bonnie Claeson and Joe Guglielmelli, and where I learned about the greater world of mystery readers, writers, publishers, commentators, booksellers, reviewers, and devoted followers.   

Bonnie’s first bit of advice was to go to Bouchercon and hang out at the bar. This was something I knew how to do, so I did. There I met people like Dennis Lehane, Robert Warren, Markus Sakey (who had yet to be published), and Jon Jordan, and had a great time. Everyone was very cordial and free with excellent advice. Better yet, the talk was all about writing, the experience of it, the joys and struggles of the craft. It’s not what I expected, having been fed the Hollywood version of pompous and self-absorbed writers, misanthropes, and self-pitying drunks.

Okay, plenty of drinking was going on, but the mood was all bonhomie and generosity of spirit.

Since then, I’ve gone to plenty of writers conferences and acquired lots of new relationships with writers who are first and foremost decent, thoughtful people. I’ve enjoyed bantering about with quick wits like Brad Parks and Daniel Palmer, and basked in the soulful wisdom of Reed Farrel Coleman and the elegance and generosity of Hank Philippi Ryan.

My partner Marty Shepard calls these people statesmen (and stateswomen) of the literary world. I’d add to the list Lee Child and David Morrell, bestsellers who freely give a tremendous amount of their time helping other writers find success and satisfaction in what is usually a very difficult and lonely pursuit.  

There are plenty of other statespeople among the reviewers and commentators in this unique sub-culture. Jon Jordan (Crimespree) and George Easter (Deadly Pleasures) come to mind. Stephen Campbell at Crime Fiction.FM. They do what they do because they love mysteries, but I suspect the greater love is for the community itself.  

I’m picking out names many would know, but the same spirit pervades in every corner of the mystery world. Permanent Press author Jaden Terrell and I are in a project now with seven others called “Eight Mystery Writers You Should Be Reading Now” initiated by Michael Guillebeau.  None of us are on the bestseller list, and none expect this to be a catapulting event. But rather to just support each other, and do what we can to contribute to something larger than our own personal ambition.  

All professions have their 1% who achieve great success, and the other 99% who labor along because it’s just what they do. The mystery world is no exception. But there is a big difference between doing something you feel you have to, and doing something you want to do. I would have worked just as hard to publish books if the only connection had been between myself and my publishers. But having been welcomed into this larger universe, a benevolent community of the spiritually united, is a gift.

Chris Knopf

BEING IN THE SERVICE OF THE WELL-WRITTEN WORD

After the Denver Broncos won the Super Bowl, I was struck by Peyton Manning’s comment about how fortunate he was to be part of this team. He took no credit for himself, and it made me think about how fortunate I am to be part of a team as well, without whom little would be possible.  

Besides my co-publishers, Judy Shepard and Chris Knopf, our staff here in the office, Cathy Suter and Brian Skulnik who take care of all sorts of matters administrative and keeping The Permanent Press web-site up-to-date, and to Felix Gonzales who keeps up with orders, shipping and returns, and off campus personnel: Barbara Anderson who does copy-editing, Susan Ahlquist who does our typesetting (and reminds me to keep up-to date on scheduling), and finally to Lon Kirschner, our cover artist. Not only are all of them incredibly talented, but also they are a joy to work with. The same holds true for our foreign agents, most of whom have been with us for a decade or two, and their success selling translation rights abroad (if you want to see their names they are listed on the last page of  The Permanent Press’s electronic catalog). Without all of them as teammates, we would be hard placed to succeed as well as we have.

Of course, we could never succeed without our writers, who keep writing because the process is most important to them, though the income they receive seldom matches the hours and hours and hours they put into their work, nor do reviews necessarily follow, nor the acclaim they would wish for. Other creators who follow their muse, be they actors, painters, sculptors, musicians, and dancers face the same conditions, as do we as publishers.

But the thrill for us is discovering talented writers and publishing their books. Winning awards for their work is flattering and holds hope for more future success for these authors. We know that we can give voice to exceptional, if often relatively unknown novelists, in an age that finds people reading less and less, twittering more and more, and watching television at the end of a hard day rather than reading quality fiction. Every time good things happen for one of the 16 yearly books that we’ve been publishing since starting out in 1978, it gives us joy. How fortunate we are to find that we can keep going forward, working at something we love: being in the service of the well written word. 

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Judy and I are off to Virgin Gorda for two weeks, returning on the 25th of February. In the interim Chris Knopf might be posting a blog or two. But, fate wiling, there will be more coming from me on May 2nd. 

AGAINST PROFUNDITY

Ira Gold is a man few words. His description of himself on the dust jacket of his first novel, Debasements of Brooklyn is this: “IRA GOLD writes all the time and publishes occasionally.”

Is he also shy? Or modest? Or mysterious? Or all of these things? I can’t say for sure, but the back cover of his most unusual and funny mystery, due out in June, and already sold to Blackstone Audiobooks, depicts a man with sunglasses rendering him unidentifiable. Furthermore the major characters in this story—Howie and Ariel—both hide their thoughts and personalities from one another.

And who are these people? Howie’s father had warned him: “You can’t ride two horses with one ass.” But here he was, living a double life—one racketeering with his crew and the other sitting in cafes reading Penguin classics. To fit in, Howie hides his intellectual interests from his gangster friends, but they still suspect something is not right about him. He will also disguise his interests and personality from Ariel, a young woman he encounters in a coffee shop who seems demure and bookish, but likes her men rough and her sex rougher.

With this introduction I turn it over to Ira.

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“Once a certain degree of insight has been reached …all men talk, when talk they must, the same tripe.”—Samuel Beckett, Murphey

My kid, nine years old, H, called me from Florida, early, before noon, on Sunday. He was visiting his grandmother, my ersatz mother-in-law. In a wavering tearful voice he claims, “I miss you Dad.”

This takes me by surprise. I serve, no doubt, a function in the boy’s life. But every Christmas he goes to Boca Raton for a week. He’s accompanied by my partner, R, his primary-by-a-lot emotional support, and is usually happy as a mussel in wine-sauce. He swims and eats horrific Florida food. His grandmother dotes on her only grandchild, plies him with gifts and imparts the Boca sensibility that more-is-better, and more-than-your-neighbor-is-best. I don’t know what to make of his crying on the phone. “Did something happen that upset you?”

“No.”
Stumped, “So what’s up?”
“I don’t know,” he sobs.

My heart breaks. His voice on the phone is high and wavering and inevitably reminds me of my ex-wife’s voice. “Listen H, are you depressed?”

He hesitates but then says, “Maybe.”

“I’m impressed, babe. My first depression didn’t hit until I was eleven.”

He doesn’t know what to make of this.

“You’re a prodigy. The heavy weight of existence crushed you before you reached double digits.”
By now he’s baffled enough to stop crying. He also likes to hear that he’s made me proud. I press the advantage. “Were you able to get out of bed this morning?”

“Yes.”
“Oh. Well, that’s a sign you’re not clinically depressed.”
Maybe sensing my disappointment, he quickly adds, “But then I went back to bed.”
“Really? Are you calling me from bed?”
“I’m in the bedroom,” he assures, then, more softly, “but not in bed.”
“That’s okay. Do you feel like doing anything?”
“No.”

So this requires quick paternal type thinking. These events shrieked for profundity, a deep teaching moment. “Do you remember The Odyssey? Odysseus travels everywhere, even to hell. He fights, he has Goddesses for girlfriends and pokes out his enemy’s eye like a real-life Three Stooger.”

The kid, I am happy to say, is familiar with the Homeric epics, due to a comic book I had bought him two years before. “Yes.”

“Well, do you know that about a hundred years ago a writer named Joyce rewrote the story and set it in Ireland and changed the main character’s name to Leopold Bloom?”
“No.”

Not surprising since the comic book for Ulysses hadn’t come out. “And do you know what his heroic act was?”

“No.”
“He got out of bed. Today, it takes all a man’s courage to put on his pants. After nearly three thousand years of religion and philosophy, we have not come up with a single legitimate answer to the question why bother?”

I stopped. I imagined the boy on the other end. Dark blond, moppish hair. Brown eyes. Cheeks as round and white as cue balls. He looked up to me just as if I were not going through the motions of fatherhood. He often listened as if I were explaining useful things such as a P.E. ratio or the meaning of a pitcher’s E.R.A.

“Why get out of bed? What is the point of all this going to sleep and waking up?”
“I have to go to school.”
“Why?”
“Are you doing the double talk thing?”
“No. A little. That usually cheers you up. What you had here was an attack of consciousness, maybe your first. Hopefully, you will not make a full recovery.”

“Really?” His voice wavered on the verge of breaking down. “I don’t like this feeling.”

“You’ll get used to it. If things go well you’ll wonder why time passes so quickly and pleasure fades like a dream. If not, life will bewilder you with its nightmarish quality. It will make you nauseous like a roller coaster that’s not guaranteed to stay on the tracks. The masters speak of absurdity and dread.”

I thought things were going well. Here I spoke naturally, not too obscurely while managing to include my deepest insight. I expected H to contemplate further and ask more questions.

Instead, his mother gets on. “I don’t know what’s going on. He’s never acted like this.”
“Don’t worry. I put things in context for him.”
“He’s locked himself in the bathroom. Let me find out what he’s doing in there.”
“Okay. Call me later.”

So I hung up, glad that instead of opening a 529 for his college education we were putting all our spare cash into a therapy fund. He will have access to his inner life if it destroys him.

I looked forward to talking to him again. I had prepared all my life to pass on the philosophical wisdom of the ages, and I was ready to talk Plato, Epicurus, Aquinas, Kant, Kierkegaard, Bergson, Sartre, Singer. While waiting, I re-read some of Primo Levi’s Survival at Auschwitz, the chapter entitled “The Gray Zone.” When he called back, I’d be ready.

And he did, about two hours later. “Dad, Dad.”
“What? What happened?”
“I’m flying a kite. I’m on the beach flying a kite. And this man showed me how to do tricks. And I’m really good at it. The wind is great. And I can run really fast. I wish you were here. It’s so much fun.”
“That’s great, kid.” I didn’t let him hear my dejection. “And you’re feeling good?”
“When I get back to New York you have to get me a kite.”
“Okay.”

And then he gave the phone to R. She said, “Yeah, I offered to get him a kite and take him to the beach. You should really be here to see this. The wind is high and he’s staring up at the sky as he lets out the string and pulls the kite this way and that. He’s just joyful.”

“Did he mention anything about what we were talking about?”
“No. Why? What did you tell him?”
“Just some jokes.”

So there it is. As literary writers, we like to think what sets us apart from the commercial junk is that we have deep thoughts, hard won through living and studying. We pride ourselves that we dive into those motivating issues that swim below the surface. But good fiction shows people flying kites in all weathers. Whatever meaning there might be must be extracted from that.

*         *         *

As usual, I hope you will leave comments on this blog. You can also reach Ira directly by emailing him at ira.gold@touro.edu or contact me at shepard@thepermanentpress.com.

I also make the same offer I  made last week: if you want an electronic file of Debasements of Brooklyn, I will happily send it on to you.

We have several possibilities for next week’s blog, and at this moment I can’t say anything more about it.


Marty