February 21, 2013

Shelf Unbound: What to Read Next in Independent Publishing

I write in gratitude. My thanks to Margaret Brown, the publisher of Shelf Unbound: What to Read Next in Independent Publishing. Margaret Brown read my novel Who by Fire. She found it worthy and interviewed me in a two-page feature of this fabulous and gorgeous publication.

This journalist, who is a lifetime member of the National Book Critics Circle, has a quarter century of experience in the book publishing and magazine editing worlds and she is re-inventing how we approach magazines while discovering writers who are not coming out of the big six publication houses.

Her questions show how deeply she read the novel that I wrote about in a post on this site that Margaret refers to in her interview:
Margaret Brown

Who by Fire, a novel: What if no one reads it?


Shelf Unbound's February/March issue takes us on journeys from The Odyssey to Stanley Kubrick—and I got in there somehow. 

Those of us who choose to write in the solitude of our attics expect anonymity even when we hope to close the round through publication. I feel lucky when a friend or family member chooses to read me, am deeply humbled by that extraordinary gift of time and, yes, effort. 

So, when a complete stranger does what Margaret did, I must thank her, express my indebtedness and recall how important it is for me to help others who struggle in solitude: The reason I taught for so many years, the reason I have tutored for free, the reason I have worked so often for no compensation, or as with George Washington University, where I taught for more than a decade, with virtually no compensation (something very few if any of my students ever knew) and the reason I continue to do so.

Magaret Brown has now agreed to be my guest on Rare Bird Radio on March 27, 2013. 

You can access all the links to my interviews with poet Dana Gioia; novelist Eduardo Santiago; poet, memoirist and historian Molly Peacock; journalist Michael Johnson (He not only read my novel; he reviewed it); poet Ravi Shankar; poet Sarah C. Harwell; self-published author (some 15 books!) Derek Haines; journalist Jacquie Kubin; NPR's "Voice of the Book" Alan Cheuse, who's been the master of discovering the best of the best, by joining the Goodreads Who by Fire Book Club

Here's the paradox: Rare Bird Radio owns the book club site and the owner's choice has been to say that we'll be discussing my novel, something I've not done on any show so far. That means you don't have to read the novel to join and find all the links to the radio interviews of folks who fascinate.

But Margaret Brown did read my novel and for the rest of my life and breath I will be indebted to her.