The Con (Part One)

When I was about eight or nine years old, the coolest show on television was The A-Team. If you haven’t ever seen The A-Team, the basic formula for every episode was that four war criminals would roll into town in a black van, build a tank out of a broken-down tractor and some spare oil barrels, and rid the world of evil-doers by setting off bombs and shooting up the place with machine guns. If you remember the show at all, you probably remember it as a vehicle for Mr. T, who played big, bad B.A. Baracus.

All of my friends wanted to be Mr. T. Which was kind of odd, because all of my friends were skinny white kids who weighed about seventy or eighty pounds. Mr. T, by way of contrast, was a muscular African American man with a Mohawk who was prone to saying things like, “I pity the fool!” and “I ain’t getting on no plane.”

He’d say it very gruffly.

It was very intimidating.

Recognizing that there was very little likelihood that I’d ever be Mr. T, I gravitated more toward a character called Face, who was played by Dirk Benedict. Face was a con man. At least, that’s what everyone on the show called him. At the time, though, I didn’t know what that meant, so I asked my mother, and she told me that it was someone who is good at talking and tricking other people into doing things for him or giving him what he wants—usually money. This sounded pretty good to me, and I decided right then and there what I wanted to be when I grew up. (My novel, by the way, is available at Amazon.com and other online retailers.)

The trouble with aspiring to be a con man, I soon found out, was that there were no real opportunities for kids my age to break into the field or to get tips from professionals. Sure, there were movies like The Sting and Paper Moon, but they lacked the firepower of The A Team, so I wasn’t especially interested in them. Ten years later, I went to college and was further disappointed to learn that nobody offered a major in the art of the con. So I did the only thing I really could do given the circumstances, and I became an English major.

I’m guessing there are at least a couple of English majors reading this, so you’ll forgive me if I’m stating the obvious when I say that engaging in that particular field of study provides the perfect proving ground for anyone interested, as I was, in following in the footsteps of my favorite character from the A Team.  People say things to you like, “English? What are you going to do with that?” And you have to be ready with all of the answers that English departments always give to justify what they do: “Well, I could always be a lawyer,” you say. (That’s the one they teach us to say first.) “Or a teacher. Or go into advertising.”

And then, if you’re like me, you make the most ridiculous claim of all.

“Or I could be a writer.”

(Continued tomorrow.)

Finding the Right Small Press

Yesterday, I wrote about the pros and cons of publishing with a small press. If you’ve given the matter some thought and decided that publishing with a small press might be right for you, the next logical question might be how to go about finding a small press that will be interested in publishing your work. Here are a few things that have worked for me:

• READ small press books and find someone who’s publishing the kind of work you write. To get a taste of what’s out there, visit a site like Small Press Reviews.
• Volunteer to help out. Since many small presses operate on limited budgets, many are always looking for people to help get the word out about their books.
• Correspond with small press authors. Talk to them about writing. Ask for advice. Get a dialogue going. Doing so won’t guarantee anything, but it doesn’t hurt to be able to say, “I’m friendly with so-and-so whose books you’ve published and I’ve enjoyed immensely. In fact, he’s helped me out a lot with my novel…” I should note, however, that it’s probably a good idea to get permission from an author before engaging in any name-dropping.
• And, of course, write an awesome book.

The Small Press Experience

I’ve been very fortunate to have several books published by small presses. My first experience working with a small press was with McFarland Publishing, a company based in North Carolina that publishes academic nonfiction with a focus on popular culture. They published the book I wrote with Tom Powers on Doctor Who. Shortly thereafter, another publisher of scholarly texts called Cambria published my book on Don DeLillo.

While I was certainly excited to have both of these books published, my real passion has always been writing fiction, so I was especially pleased when PS Books and then The Permanent Press published my first novel, The Singular Exploits of Wonder Mom and Party Girl. I’m even more pleased to report that The Permanent Press will publish my second novel, The Grievers, next May.

For the most part, my experience with small presses has been extremely positive, but I also know that publishing with a small press isn’t for all writers. Knowing a few things about small presses can help you decide whether or not they’re the right kind of publishers for you to pursue.

Small presses are publishing companies that put out somewhere between one and twenty titles a year and aren’t imprints of larger publishing conglomerates. Most of these presses have small print runs or, with increasing frequency, use print-on-demand or POD technology to produce their books. Frequently, a small press will have a specific focus, like promoting the work of regional authors or exploring specific social issues or themes.

Depending on your point of view, there can be several drawbacks to publishing with a small press. Small presses, for example, frequently can’t afford to pay advances or for other expenses like publicity and marketing. Indeed, small presses might ask you to take care of publicizing your book out of pocket. Likewise, distribution can be a problem; small press books rarely make their way into chain bookstores. Finally, since small presses print so few titles, they can be a difficult market to crack.

Given all of these drawbacks, seeking small press publication might not sound especially enticing. One question I usually encourage writers to ask, however, is a fairly basic one: Why do I write? If the answer has more to do with being part of a community than becoming rich and famous, then seeking a small press to publish your work might be the right move for you.

Because a small press generally has a specific mission or goal, the fact that they choose to publish your book suggests that you share the same goal. What this means in practical terms is that you and your press are in the publishing game for reasons other than selling a lot of books. Yes, you and your publisher would like to sell a lot of books, but you’re writing and they’re publishing for other reasons as well.

Along similar lines, the definition of “success” is usually different for a small press than it is for a large publishing conglomerate. To a small press, a successful book might be one that received excellent reviews and sold a respectable number of copies—“respectable,” of course, being a relative term. To a small press, selling 500 copies of a book might not be so bad—depending, of course, on the press and the numbers of copies of each title they’re accustomed to selling. To a big publishing house, by way of contrast, 500 copies would definitely be the kiss of death.

Another great thing about working with a small press is that you’re usually dealing with “real people” rather than a faceless corporation or a series of interchangeable editors, and you don’t have to use a literary agent as an intermediary. As a result, there are opportunities for real dialogue with the people who are making decisions about your book. For example, if I have a question or concern about one of my books, I can call my publisher and ask. His name is Marty. He’s a great guy. He even invited me and my wife to his house in the Hamptons for a weekend a couple of summers ago.*

So if you’re looking to quit your day job and making a living off your book sales, then publishing with a small press probably isn’t for you. I’m not saying it can’t happen, but the odds aren’t really with you. If, however, you write because you want to be a part of a community and you value the personal attention that an independent publisher can offer, then working with a small press might be the way to go.

*Marty, if you’re reading this, I’d love to visit again sometime.