On writing a book

February 2nd, 2007 | Comments (6) | Trackbacks (0) |

Many people know that one of my life goals is to write and publish a book. At present I haven’t a clue what the book would be about, but it remains a goal nevertheless. I am fascinated by the writing and publishing process, and until recently I had only ever met one published author - Tony Jones.

On January 23rd Nordic Choir performed at the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg, and my roommate and I were hosted that evening by the president of the Seminary, Michael Cooper-White. Through the course of the evening I learned that Michael had authored a book entitled On a Wing and a Prayer: Faithful Leadership in the 21st Century and is co-author of a book to be released in April entitled Church Administration: Programs, Process, and Purpose. He was gracious enough to give Mike and I both signed copies of On a Wing and a Prayer for free.

When I asked Michael about some of the ins and outs of writing a book, he mentioned that he had recently penned an article for the Seminary website called “On Writing A Book”. He provides a great summary of the publishing process and finishes up the article by offering this:

Probably no book is ever completely perfect. Next month or ten years from now, someone else will write in the same area a better book. But if one has a sense that a worthy contribution can be offered, why not take a stab and try your hand?

Good point.

But there is a small problem: People just aren’t reading as much as they used to. There are some startling statistics about books. Here are a few worth mentioning:

80% of the United States population wants to write a book.

42% of college graduates never read another book after college(!).

70% of books published do not earn back their advance.

A “successful” fiction book sells 5,000 copies.

A “successful” nonfiction book sells 7,500 copies.

Statistics aside, I still want to write a book. About fourteen months ago I had a dream of writing and recording an album of original music. The dream has been realized, and Dying Stars now available for download on iTunes. I’ve done music. I can do a book.