The Mundane: I sent out more books for review

I know, I know … this is getting ridiculous. But I saw that Foreword Magazine offers digital reviews to noteworthy books and couldn’t help but give it a try. I also nailed down a few more additional book reviewers by using Midwest Book Reviews’ links page. This is it for a while, I promise. I’m done. I need a little break. Besides, the next book needs a little more tweaking.

The Awesome #1: Ryan Braun’s drug appeal was overturned

So he won and the Brewers opening day festivities are no longer in doubt. Thank god. Now that we know the drug testing official left Braun’s urine sample in his refrigerator for two days before sending it off to the lab … well, I feel much better about Braun’s innocence.

The Awesome #2: Campusgate!

My novel about a pseudo-scandal centered around evolution being taught in the classroom made it to round two of Amazon’s Breakthrough Novel Award. I’m sitting by my phone now, awaiting the first publication offer. I assume there’s a bidding war going on in New York right now. I’m thinking I’ll settle for a contract around six figures or so and … what? There’s three more rounds?

Oy.

That was supposed to be it. Then Chris Smith had to go and design a great cover. So of course I needed to put out a print edition, which of course meant going around and convincing bookstore owners to actually carry the books.

Then I started sending out copies for reviews. Then I started getting reviews.

Then I said: that’s it. I’m done. Let’s just sit back for a month and see what happens.

Now I’m at it again. I can’t stop. I found this list of book sites and now the gears in the ol’ noggin are moving again. More reviews. More guest posts. Whatever it takes to get this book in people’s hands.

At least I have a hobby, I guess.

In case you’re wondering, you can typically get a few free dollars and change from Google and Bing if you set up an advertising account with them. For Google, it’s usually $75 and for Bing, it’s usually $50. So of course I was more than happy to give them a shot to help promote the book in exchange for free advertising.

Neither were particularly difficult to figure out, although Google’s interface is a little “mathier” (I was told there would be no math) than Bing. I tried both, promoting the book as best I could. Neither has been particularly helpful, either.

I also made a point of putting something together on Goodreads as well. I kept the per-click cost low (10 cents) and did the math (I really do hate math): If 20 people click on the Goodreads ad and only 1 person purchase the book, I would break even.

That would be pretty decent. That seemed doable.

It is not.

Not yet, at least. While I’ve mostly given up on Google and Bing and am now seriously screwing around with the campaigns just for fun, I’m going to give Goodreads some leeway for the time being and see what happens. Maybe this is just one of those things that takes time.

Hey! At least the fourth draft of the new novel is finished. It’s almost time to send it out in a cautiously optimistic sort of way.

Because I worked there. Yes, I was the entertainment editor for two semesters. And I can tell you in all seriousness that I thanked god when someone sent me an email with a story idea. Rob Zombie once sent me a copy of his CD. I reviewed it. A medical marijuana user once sent me a copy of his book. I reviewed it in great length.

And so it peeves me just a little bit when I peruse the student newspaper’s website and I see an article examining the history of TGIF. TGIF, as in “Family Matters” and “Step by Step” and all the other 90′s Friday night sitcoms.

This raises a number of questions:

1. Is an article questioning the end of TGIF really more newsworthy than an article about a former student who’s achieved (minimal) success?

2. Does anyone give a shit about “Dinosaurs”?

3. Should I just kill myself and be done with this?

I’m leaning toward “no” on the last question, if only because I’m curious about some of the reviews coming out in March.

So while we’re waiting, let’s conduct a little experiment:

1. Click here to go to the Amazon page for the book.

2. Scroll down to the Tags Customers Associate With This Product section.

3. Click (“check”) the boxes next to each of the tags.

That’s it. What does this do? Well, if I understand Amazon.com’s search protocol correctly, it should bump the book’s “searchability” a great bit. Regardless, I’ll report the results after a week or so and hopefully we ca learn something from all of this.

Want to do it for my other book, too? The scary medieval/horror/fantasy one? Click here.

Like, for instance, Áine P Massie, who published an interview with me.

Or, for instance, Susan Russo Anderson, who put up a review of the book on her site, Writing Sleuth.

The interview was a lot of fun, and hopefully I’ll be able to put together a guest post on something writing-related. In the meantime, the waiting game is still being played. Books are out. They’re floating in the ether, waiting to be reviewed. They’re making their way through the tubes we call “The Internet” in data streams waiting to be sucked up.

The Fourth Draft

While I play the waiting game, I’m in the process of working through the fourth draft of the new book. The “third draft” is actually something more closely related to Wack-a-mole: basically, I take all of my unused notes and plug them into the novel and then, on the fourth draft, I just sort of smooth everything out.

What they say: “Oh, you have a book out? Congratulations!”

What you say: “Thank you.”

What you think: There’s nothing to “congratulate” if the book doesn’t sell well. Buy a copy, then congratulate me.

What they say: “Wow, you must be making a lot of money. What are you still doing here at (job)?”

What you say: “He he he! Guess I just like workin’ here!”

What you think: I’m not making money. More importantly, here in the United States we’re incapable of getting together and creating a universal health care program like every other developed nation. So no, even if I was making money, the prospects of quitting (job) are dim.

What they say: “Really good job.”

What you say: “Mmm-hmm.”

What you think: How would you know if you don’t read it? What if one of the chapters in the book is a treatise on how to subjugate and destroy a race of people who I believe are inferior? Then you would feel pretty bad.

What they say: “That’s interesting. Maybe I’ll check it out.”

What you say: “Sure. Just let me know. Seriously, I take copies everywhere I go. They’re in my car, littering my desk, in my computer satchel. Really!”

What you think: Oh dear god this is almost a sale. Don’t screw this up. This guy/gal’s on the hook and just needs to be reeled in oh please oh please oh please oh please …

Don’t get me wrong–March should still be a good month for the book, provided a couple reviewers stick with it and put up a review. A lot of hard copies were sent out, too, and who knows how long those site are backed up?

So what I’ve been doing in my free time is writing. I had the amazing opportunity while working part-time at Starbucks to have met a psychologist who worked with schizophrenics during the 70′s and 80′s, and even published a few papers on his successes. I’m going to fictionalize that story. I told him, too, and he didn’t mind, so the whole “permission” thing is out of the way from the start.

I started researching. And we’re not talking topical research, either. We’re talking Jim Shepard-style research, the kind that makes your eyes bleed after awhile.

When I finished the first draft, I printed it out. I let it sit for a week (right around X-Mas time) and sent out some more copies of the book to various reviewers. Then I sat down and started editing the new book.

It’s got a good feel so far. A really good feel.

Here’s the review in its entirety:

Brosky’s darkly witty stories describe the major and mundane problems facing ordinary Midwesterners.

The young and youngish, mostly male, characters in Brosky’s stories find their personal, self-devised method for dealing with the world challenged by what life throws their way. The protagonist of “Deer Tales” impulsively stakes a major decision—whether to move back to his hometown or stay in the city and pursue a career as an artist—on his success at playing a deer-hunting video game in the lobby bar of a Holiday Inn, only to find that he’s terrible at it. The phone hacker in “The Phreaks” wins a hacking challenge by whistling payphone tones to trick the computer system—“Nines was in his own world, with his eyes closed, running his fingers along every naked space of Ma Bell’s back, treating her the way a really good guy does to a woman he knows he doesn’t deserve”—only to see a lesser hacker make off with the girl he likes due to superior social skills. In the best stories, Brosky exploits this disconnect with a sharp eye for detail and a fine sense of absurdity that’s both darkly funny and subtly tragic, as when one of the Four Horsemen pulls up to a Wisconsin coffee bar for a double shot of espresso in “Apocolypse Wow!” The preconceptions the story’s characters have about the End Times, whether credulous or skeptical, fail to prepare them for the grimly underwhelming, almost bureaucratic nature of the disaster they face. The polite, apologetic Horseman doesn’t have many answers to give the anxious baristas, just weary resignation, a presence that wilts vegetation and a golden scale he has no idea what to do with. Occasionally, Brosky’s satirical style gets the better of his storytelling, leading to flat characters like the cartoonishly oblivious Christian aid worker in Darfur, dropped into the middle of a realistically brutal view of the crisis there in “On the Tenth Day I Kept It Down.” More often, though, he gets the balance right.

These stories about often-overlooked characters find sharp observations on the indignities of modern life.

Let’s just sit and reflect on this. This right here could be the climax of the story. Now, I don’t know if this’ll help sell any copies of the book or anything. But still … it’s pretty nice. Take your victories where you can get em–that’s what I’ve learned while promoting this book. Savor each victory.

Side note: You can download a sample chapter of the book on Amazon for free for the next few days. Here’s a link. The story is called “Altered Beast.”

They probably don’t see me in this way anymore, but that’s OK. They still did a little write-up of the book, and I really appreciate it. You can read it here.

I’ll also do a guest post for Susan Russo Anderson’s newest literary blog, Writing Sleuth, very soon. She’ll have an updated review of the book available as well.

Other Odds and Ends

I found another reply to my all-out email blitz in the ol’ SPAM box. The blogger is too overwhelmed to receive another book.

I really want to drop a line to Shawn Edwards of FOX-TV and see if he’ll say something nice about the book. He’s so positive.

I’m adding famous author names in the TAGS section to see if it draws in more visitors. First I will trick them, and then they will be mine. It’s how I got my girlfriend.

Update: Spriteby’s Bokhylle might review the book in the near-future … more fallout from last week’s Blitz.