Authorial Notes
The first person I ever met who had written a book was my father's good friend from college, Jon Guttman. Jon wrote for a slew of military themed magazines and for many years was the editor of Military History magazine, with his columns appearing in many of its sister publications. I read one of his naval histories, which as I recall we found at Powell's Books when we were in PDX for my first wedding. Since then he's written many more. In particular he has leveraged the time he spent in the 1970s and 1980s interviewing WWI fighter pilots into many books on planes of that era.
The second person I met who had written a book, not counting those of my college professors who'd written their own textbooks, was my friend Eric Meyer, who wrote books on CSS for O'Reilly, which was a really big deal for CS nerds.
The third person I met who had written a book was Catherynne M. Valente (catvalente), who had just published The Orphan's Tales when I met her at theferrett and zoethe's house and has since published many more novels.
From there, things got out of hand. At Cat's wedding I met Amal El-Mohtar (tithenai) and Kyle Cassidy (kylecassidy), who each had books of their own. I found out that a woman from my synagogue back home had written some books. Ferrett got his own novels published. My coworker Glenn wrote a book about presenting. bart_calendar has at least two. I'm 100% sure that I'm not remembering everybody who should be on this list, and even without those folks I may know almost as many people who have published books as who have released albums, which given my 20+ years at a radio station is saying something.
And this entire list doesn't in any way count the many, many people I know who have published in academia, at least two of whom that I'm aware of have published actual books, not just published research. I also know some people who've published short stories and poems.
This leads to questions:
- Do I just happen to know a lot of creative people?
- Is it easy enough to publish a book that everybody knows a few authors?
- More egotistically, what is it about me that attracts authors?
Ok, so clearly that last one isn't valid. I'd guess that the first question is the most accurate, but who knows? Maybe you all know a bunch of authors too.
As I finished this up, I realized it would have been a great precursor to announcing that I'd published a book, but nope. I've never had any particular inclinations in that direction. You'll have to settle for almost 18 years of journaling.
EDITS
- A long ago radio colleague named Dan Kerr wrote Derelict Paradise.
- My coworker Powers has written at least two books that I've held in my hands - one short story collection and one novel.
- My radio colleague Rich Lowe wrote a book about the early days of reggae based on extensive interviews of The Matador: Lloyd Daley.
The second person I met who had written a book, not counting those of my college professors who'd written their own textbooks, was my friend Eric Meyer, who wrote books on CSS for O'Reilly, which was a really big deal for CS nerds.
The third person I met who had written a book was Catherynne M. Valente (catvalente), who had just published The Orphan's Tales when I met her at theferrett and zoethe's house and has since published many more novels.
From there, things got out of hand. At Cat's wedding I met Amal El-Mohtar (tithenai) and Kyle Cassidy (kylecassidy), who each had books of their own. I found out that a woman from my synagogue back home had written some books. Ferrett got his own novels published. My coworker Glenn wrote a book about presenting. bart_calendar has at least two. I'm 100% sure that I'm not remembering everybody who should be on this list, and even without those folks I may know almost as many people who have published books as who have released albums, which given my 20+ years at a radio station is saying something.
And this entire list doesn't in any way count the many, many people I know who have published in academia, at least two of whom that I'm aware of have published actual books, not just published research. I also know some people who've published short stories and poems.
This leads to questions:
- Do I just happen to know a lot of creative people?
- Is it easy enough to publish a book that everybody knows a few authors?
- More egotistically, what is it about me that attracts authors?
Ok, so clearly that last one isn't valid. I'd guess that the first question is the most accurate, but who knows? Maybe you all know a bunch of authors too.
As I finished this up, I realized it would have been a great precursor to announcing that I'd published a book, but nope. I've never had any particular inclinations in that direction. You'll have to settle for almost 18 years of journaling.
EDITS
- A long ago radio colleague named Dan Kerr wrote Derelict Paradise.
- My coworker Powers has written at least two books that I've held in my hands - one short story collection and one novel.
- My radio colleague Rich Lowe wrote a book about the early days of reggae based on extensive interviews of The Matador: Lloyd Daley.