How Did You Get Published?

The question is one of the most often asked of authors, and I am always inclined to quote the great line from Ernest Hemingway's The Sun Also Rises:

How did you go bankrupt?” Bill asked.

“Two ways,” Mike said. “Gradually and then suddenly.”

That was my own path to publishing a novel: gradual, then sudden.

There's really no science to the process. I've always believed it's a matter of perseverance, talent, and luck (not necessarily in that order). Now fantasy writer Jim C. Hines has created a fascinating survey that backs up many of my preconceptions while throwing cold water on a few others. Hines asked 247 authors a number of questions about the path they took to publishing success. The methodology is admittedly flawed (this is back of the napkin science), but it makes for fascinating reading, whether you're writing your first book or your fifteenth. 

Hat tip: Tess Gerritsen.

Certified Platinum

The Poacher's Son is going to be published in a large-print edition with a library binding by Center Point, a publisher of large-print books. By happy coincidence, Center Point is located just down the road from me in Thorndike, Maine. I'm extremely happy with the cover design Minotaur created for my novel, but I feel like the Center Point cover is equally strong. The large-print version, part of the Platinum Mysteries series, will be published on June 28.

I haven't heard yet whether there will be an iPad version of The Poacher's Son, but given that Macmillan is one of the publishing houses that entered into an agreement with Apple to provide titles for iBooks, I'm assuming that will be the case.

Hopeless Romantic

Another good review today for The Poacher's Son, this one from Romantic Times magazine:

Doiron’s impressive debut is told through the eyes of the suspect’s estranged son. This is a literate tale of revenge, love and loyalty that uses the mysterious Maine woods as both a motive for the crime and a knob for ratcheting up the suspense. Though the prose is sometimes flat-footed, there are plenty of twists and surprises to keep the reader guessing until the very end. ★★★★

Moose Rescue

In The Poacher's Son I try to depict some of the many strange jobs Maine game wardens are asked to perform during the course of their shifts. From today's Portland Press Herald comes this one:

Game wardens in Maine say a moose is back in the woods thanks to some human help it got after it broke through the ice on Moose Pond in the town of Bridgton.

Wardens say the bull moose was spotted about 1,000 feet from shore on Sunday after it had broken through the ice...

[They] were able to put a rope around the neck of the moose and break it a path through the ice to shore.

I could make any number of wisecracks about the moose being rescued from Moose Pond, but I'm not going to.