Bio of My Book

The gem of an idea from my brother Charlie sparked an inspiration to write my first published book. I was in the muddle of finding a publisher for my first novel, when Charlie, who had read most of my writings, suggested I might want to compile my "weird stories" into a book.

I figured that putting together a collection of stories might be a worthwhile interruption of my novel project. So I began looking through my files and collecting stories.

When I determined I had enough to fill a slim volume, I began to edit and tweak the stories I'd selected, all with a certain quality of weird-and-oddness; I also selected a few photographs to add interest. After researching how other writers had compiled short story collections, I arranged and organized my pages in MS Word. I decided the title story should be "Night in Alcatraz" because it might attract readers' attention.

Thus began my book, "Night in Alcatraz: And Other Uncanny Tales."

I contracted with my good friend Sheila to format my book to print on Createspace. She not only put her formatting know-how to work, she also looked at the stories, suggested some edits, and advised how the pages should look. We tried out several type fonts to determine which would provide easy reading and best accommodate the spaces needed for the stories, photographs, and section divisions. We discussed headers, footnotes, italics, and more.

After at least 12 pdf files back and forth, with corrections, changes, and new ideas, the book was ready to upload to Createspace. Sheila was my guardian angel, introducing me to Createspace and their publishing procedures.

Soon I received my first print copy proof in the mail (with a temporary cover Sheila and I created from the Createspace site.) After a few revisions and another pdf file or two, my book was ready for a second proof. It looked great, but I wanted a cover that would carry the title well.

"Alcatraz" needed a photo of that island prison in San Francisco Bay. I had a nice one taken by my daughter Nancy when we visited the site in 2015. For my specially-designed cover with photo, I needed a special designer--my friend Pati, a retired designer and editor for a large publisher. She might also call herself a "font geek" as she knows type fonts, literally backward and forward, and has an eye for how type should look and how it expresses ideas and emotions. So Pati was my go-to girl!

The back cover design was a big question. What should be there--photos, story excerpts, promotions, my bio? I wanted to publicize my writers' group's annual journal publication. Eventually, Sheila, Pati, and I decided on a clean, neat back cover advertising the Writers' Mill Journal and my bio--both brief, with my photo.

Pati worked her design magic, her struggles with formats, dimensions, and other factors unwitnessed by me. Until one day--voila--she unveiled the beautiful cover that now graces my book!

The final proof--with my new cover--arrived from Createspace, and I approved it. After Pati's OK, "Night in Alcatraz: And Other Uncanny Tales" is now available in print and Kindle from Amazon, and in print online at Barnes & Noble, possibly other sources.

Now my book is out there. I like how it looks-- the midnight blue color with nice white type that shows up well even on thumbprints, Nancy's great photo, and my name floating in San Francisco Bay.

What's nice about sharing stories is that stories generate stories. Readers bring their own experience to the page and recall their own stories and memories, some perhaps long forgotten until. . .