Another school shooting today at a town in Michigan. I published a book, COME SIT BY ME, that searches for the cause of one such (fictional) shooting. You can buy it as a holiday present for a teenager you know. Here are some unsolicited reviews by readers:

"I felt Come Sit By Me was written by a guy for a guy."

--Christina Li, Net Galley

"I think this is an important read because it is such a taboo subject."

--Griff Stevens, Net Galley

"This book is exceptional....These characters are tautly defined and Mr. Hoobler's grasp of their motivations is nothing short of amazing....This is the first novel dealing with school shootings I've been able to read, and it is highly worth reading."

--Mallory Anne-Marie Forbes, Net Galley

"This is definitely a book that will split adults, you'll either love it or you'll hate it. With teens I can see this book being hugely popular, not only does it deal with things that are prevalent to their world but each character, good and bad, is easy to connect with. Combine that with a clear writing style, fast paced plot & some juicy twists and teens will gobble this one up! Highly recommended to all YA teens ages 14 and up, this is a must read! I would also highly recommend this to adults who are interested in getting inside the true psyche of today's American teenager, regardless of what you might find there!"

--Jennifer La Duca, Net Galley

Kiyomizo-dera Temple

These are pictures from the temple Kiyomizo-dera, near Kyoto. Its origins date from 778 A.D. Inside are many images of the deity Kannon, with her 42 arms (some say a thousand). Approaching the temple, one first sees a three-story pagoda, some 31 meters high. The largest feature of the site is a wooden stage where people can view the countryside and the changing leaves of trees all around. The stage is supported by 168 pillars and is constructed of 410 cypress boards. Amazingly, there are no nails in the structure. It's entirely held together by interlocking joists.Two other interesting features are the Otowa waterfall (which we would call a series of falling streams.) A long-handled ladle is provided for those who wish to drink the water, which is said to extend life and fulfill one's wishes,. A spookier feature is a tunnel that descends some stairs to enter. It's pitch dark inside, because it represents the womb of a female bodhisattva, and you emerge on the other side, reborn. (See our book THE RED-HEADED DEMON for Seikei's adventure with a boy mistaken for a bodhisattva.)

Toshugu Shrine

The Toshugu Shrine is one of the most elaborately decorated in Japan, a land that prizes simplicity. Toshugu's twelve buildings encompass the tomb of Tokugawa Ieyasu, the samurai warrior who founded the dynasty that ruled Japan for nearly four centuries. His grandson, the reigning shogun, ordered the unusual shrine to be built. Carvings shown here include an elephant sculpted by a man who had never seen an actual elephant, but only had it described to him.

Toshugu Shrine

This is the Toshugu Shrine, probably the most elaborately decorated building in Japan, a land that prizes simplicity. Its twelve buildings encompass the tomb of Tokugawa Ieyasu, the samurai warrior who established a dynasty that ruled Japan for nearly four centuries, until 1868. Among the carvings are two of an elephant (the brass one and the gray one) that were created by a man who had never seen an elephant, but only had it described to him. You can also see a sleeping cat and the famous three monkeys ("hear no evil, speak no evil, see no evil.")

Japanese actor playing a foreigner

Japanese were fascinated by the strange customs, dress, and even food of the foreigners who arrived in their land. (Tempura was originally a Portuguese dish adapted by Japanese cooks.) This print shows a Japanese actor, Onoe Kikugoro V, playing an Englishman named Spencer who apparently demonstrated a hot-air balloon in Japan.

FIREFLY SQUID OFF THE COAST OF JAPAN

A species of squid called "Firefly Squid" live in the Pacific Ocean off the Japanese coast. Each spring, they draw near to the coast, where they will spawn. They glow in an attempt to attract mates. It is also said that they glow to lure smaller fish that they will feed on. Just as Japanese people enjoy observing the blooming of the cherry trees, so too do they travel to the spawning grounds to view what you see here. After the squid eggs are fertilized and laid, the squid die. Their life span is only a single year, and when the new squid hatch, the cycle begins again.

I'm putting this up in case anybody's still looking at this blog. My main posting site is on the Samurai Detective page at Facebook.
The image I'm posting here is from a "fart scroll." No kidding, that's what the two men on the left are supposed to be doing. Here's an explanation from somebody who runs a blog under the name of Tofugu:
The whole scroll, which is called He-Gassen ("The Fart Battle") is just about people farting. Farting at other people, farting at cats, farting off of horses, farting into bags; just farting everywhere. Why? I couldn't really tell you. I've tried to do some research but, believe it or not, academic literature on Japanese farting is surprisingly few and far between. [...] I did find out enough to know that this isn't the only farting scroll out there in existence – in fact, in the 90s, a collection of fart scrolls sold for $1,500 at the famous Christie's auction house. I am not making this up.

Pufferfish (fugu) display created by a sushi chef

Here's an interview a radio programmer did with us about our book, THE MONSTERS: MARY SHELLEY AND THE CURSE OF FRANKENSTEIN.
Next year, by the way, is the 200th anniversary of the publication of Frankenstein.
http://historyradio.org/2017/12/02/mary-shelley-a-genius-in-her-mothers-shadow/

"Come Sit by Me"

Popular children's book author Lemony Snicket, writing in the NY Times, says:
"Want Teenage Boys to Read? Easy. Give Them Books About Sex."

Actually, my YA novel "Come Sit By Me" has some sex in it, but it's also about the world as seen through the eyes of a real teen-age boy. A teen-age girl who reviewed it said,

"I felt Come Sit By Me was written by a guy for a guy."
--Christina Li, Net Galley

Give it a try.

Group Biographies

https://qz.com/747119/an-obscure-history-book-is-now-sold-out-because-elon-musk-is-reading-it/

Elon Musk, ceo of Tesla Motors, announced that he was reading a book called Twelve Against the Gods, which is a group biography of historical figures, such as Alexander the Great, Columbus, and Casanova. The book is out of print, but online price for it on Amazon.com jumped to $99. Previously, it was about $6. This is EXACTLY the kind of book our ex-agent told us never sells. (group biographies) We published a series of eight such bios, all linked to a certain country or geographical area. They too are out of print, but maybe we can interest some publisher in returning them to print. Look for French Portraits, Italian Portraits, South American Portraits, Japanese, Chinese, Russian, African, and Italian Portraits. Good reading!

The Silence of the Publisher

Well, I found an agent to represent my book THE JAIL ROBBER. (Check previous posts for synopsis.) The last adult nonfiction book my wife and I wrote, THE CRIMES OF PARIS, had a clause in the contract (standard) requiring us to submit our next nonfiction book for adults to them. So the agent did that. It was hard finding someone to send it to, because our previous editor there was fired, and his assistant disappeared. So the agent finally did find someone with a pulse and submitted the proposal. Heard nothing for five weeks, so he called and emailed. No response. Aren't publishers wonderful?
This is the same publisher whose sub rights person tried to talk the editor at Vanity Fair out of buying the serial rights to our last book. We heard that first from the VF editor, and then the sub rights person at the publisher of THE CRIMES OF PARIS admitted it was true. Her excuse? "I thought it was a different book."
Lesson for ordinary writers: Unless you publish under the name James Patterson, don't bother publishing at Little, Brown.

Japanese Battle Helmet

We were in the Walters Museum in Baltimore, where our daughter is the curator of ancient American Art. They have many great things on exhibit. We saw this Japanese battle helmet, which was unlike any we've seen before. Never saw one with axes for decoration.
http://art.thewalters.org/detail/33679/helmet-with-phoenix-and-battle-axe-ornaments/
http://art.thewalters.org/detail/33679/helmet-with-phoenix-and-battle-axe-ornaments/

When was the last time that an article on punctuation made the front page of the NY Times? Well, in this case, the lack of an "Oxford comma" cost a company in Maine millions of dollars. What's an Oxford comma? If you have a sequence of three or more things, then in a, b, and c the comma after b is the Oxford comma. Some people, you see, would punctuate it like this: a, b and c. Well, a contract dispute between a trucking company and its employees cost the company several million dollars because it had to pay some truckers extra retirement money because they were included in its retirement plan. They wouldn't have been included had the Oxford comma been used. So remember: always write a, b, and c.

Looking on my previous posts for something new to write about, I found an old post I put up here in November. As you may recall (or if you just read it), I got a rejection from a publisher on the grounds that the idea I sent him was not new enough. So I immediately sent him a proposal for a book on a topic that I positively know hasn't been written about for nearly a hundred years. In case you're interested, it concerns the man who was regarded as New York City's top lawyer in the 1920s. He was known as "the Jail Robber," for his ability to keep his clients out of jail. One of his clients was Nicky Arnstein, who was the husband of Fanny Brice, the person whose life story was the subject of the musical play and movie Funny Girl. In Funny Girl, Nicky goes to jail for getting caught up in some scheme that he shouldn't have. Of course, he's really a good guy.
The truth is completely different. Nicky was accused of being a "mastermind" of a complex scheme to steal more than $5 million worth of stocks and bonds, and implicated in murdering one of the messengers who carried the stocks. How the Jail Robber took his case to the Supreme Court, and established a new legal precedent, is only one of the cases in my proposed book.
Well, the long and short of it is that I never heard from the publisher. Nothing at all, which is par for the course in the publishing world today, even though it's easier than ever just to send somebody a quick email saying you're not interested. So be prepared to be ignored if you're trying to sell a book. That's my tip for today.

Zhou Youguang, the man who developed the pinyin system of writing for China, died yesterday. He was 111. His obituary mentions that he published 10 books after he turned 100. Encouragement!

Incidentally, in my last post I mentioned sending a proposal to a publisher. He never responded, despite the fact that email makes it easy to send a stock rejection to writers' proposals. Agents frequently do this too. Does that indicate anything about the contempt they have for writers? I think so.

One of the many things that irritates me about the publishing world is that agents invariably tell you that when you prepare a proposal for a nonfiction book, you must include the titles of at least three recently published books that are similar to the one you're proposing. When I first saw this, some years ago now, I assumed it was to reassure publishers that your idea was original. But I soon learned that the opposite was the case: publishers are as insecure as a herd of sheep--or at least agents think they are. They want to be assured that other publishers have found your topic suitable enough to take the risk of publishing it.
So the other day I was pleased to get a rejection from a publisher to whom I'd sent a proposal. (As you probably know, it's extremely difficult to find a publisher who will even consider direct submissions from that lowest of creatures, the writer. Publishers want to be assured that some person calling himself or herself an agent has already approved of the work.)
Anyway this publisher replied quickly and praised the idea, but said he was turning it down because "there's not enough here that's new."
Wow. So I immediately sent him a proposal for a biography I've been working on for some time, but about which I knew that one of the my former agents would tell me, "Nobody has ever heard of this person." That's another rule: you can't write about anything that readers are likely to find unusual or different.
So we'll see what the publisher's reply is to this.

Saw a news report that scientists writing in the Journal Social Science and Medicine report that people who read books LIVE LONGER. People who read up to 3 1/2 hours a week were 17 percent less likely to die over a 12-year period than those who didn't read books. And those who read more than 3 1/2 hours a week were 23 percent less likely to die. So get off the Internet and pick up a book! Especially one that we wrote.

OK, so I found out that Blogspot has a word limit, and I reached it. But to continue...

You're supposed to be CREATING the material. (We artists like to feel we're creating, even if it's half a cent per word.) So I would strongly doubt I could churn out 3,000 words an hour.

No matter, because if you've read the preceding blog entry, you have probably already realized that the secret of making money in publishing is to provide services to those drudges, writers. I already knew it was more profitable to be an agent than I writer, but this now convinces me that writers truly are on the bottom of the publishing food chain. So there you are. Good luck.

I finally figured out how to make money in publishing, and I'm going to share it. I received an unsolicited email today offering me various publishing services for $15 each. Here's a sampling:

d) I can post an "author spotlight" for your book on a highly popular blog.

e) I can add 30 likes to your positive reviews on Goodreads. All likes come from unique accounts and multiple IPs.

f) I can add your book to 35 - 40 popular listopia lists by voting for them. All votes come from unique accounts and multiple IPs.
g) Do you have a free ebook in PDF format you want to share with the world? I can distribute your free PDF to 15 TOP QUALITY websites. These websites rank high in search engines and are considered to be authority sites for PDF sharing.
h) My BESTSELLER SO FAR: I will rate your book with as many stars you want on Goodreads, post 1 honest review, mark your book as 'read', become your fan and add your book to the listopia list of your choice.

 That's $15 apiece for those "services," OK? So for all 5 would be $75. He offers a discount if you want all of his services.

Now, then. Compare that with an ad I saw on Craigslist. I often check to see what kinds of gigs they're offering writers, since as you may know, I am a writer.
The ad is seeking people to write erotica for a "new publishing company," not named. They will send you an outline of what you're supposed to write--apparently just a chapter or two, since other writers will be working on other parts of the book. I guess they want to publish as quickly as possible, so why not have many people work on the books?
Anyway, here's the kicker: they're offering $.005 cents a word. That's half a cent per word. They say that rate is "as per Amazon that's the market rate now." I didn't know Amazon published market rates for working writers, but maybe I missed it. Now this "new publishing company" says you should be able to write 3,000 words per hour, and if you do the math that's a rate of $15 an hour. I think I'm a pretty fast typist, but I don't think I type that fast, and remember you're supposed to be CREATING