How Much Lower Can This Whole Thing Sink?

I gave it a few months – it was late 2020 when I first approached the CEO of an Australian bookstore chain. I knew he wouldn’t get to it in a hurry so was prepared to prod him gently over the next long while, a phone call here, an email there, etc, until I’d finally made enough of a pest of myself to convince him to look at Falling and make a decision about whether he’d stock it in his shops. As a nationwide chain it would have been a pretty big coup, and certainly a bigger step that Falling has taken so far.

But it was quite prophetic that I began the blog post in which I detailed that plan by saying Falling was officially a failure. It not only hadn’t sold any copies, I couldn’t even give it away. As far as I know, not even the few people who have accepted free copies have read it. So trying to convince a bookshop chain to take it on didn’t just seem like the least bad idea to have about it, it felt like the only idea I had left.

So I called him the other week to remind him about it again and he was still quite amenable to the idea, suggesting I send him some additional material and promising he’d have a look. I sent the media kit, a high res version of the cover and a link to the ebook versions and crossed my fingers.

So a few days later when he emailed to say he wasn’t interested, it wasn’t completely unexpected – it had always been a long shot. But being the only idea I have left to give this any chance of success, there was a distinct feeling of it being the last straw, the straw that breaks the camel’s back and any other farm animal foodstuff-related metaphors you can think of. But there was an icing on the cake – he said he ‘didn’t like the cover at all’.

And look, before I go on, I know everything’s subjective. You can’t please everybody (not even bookstore chain CEOs) and I’m thick skinned enough as a creative worker with a few decades under my belt to know not to take it personally. Once you’re mature enough to look past your initial emotional reaction to artistic criticism you understand that every comment or criticism contributes to your growth as an artist, either by making you realise a deficiency you couldn’t see or by galvanising your belief in what you’ve already done.

But after the idea to approach him had felt like the last dying breath of something already on longtime life support and writing in the last post of this blog about how much work I put into the cover and how proud of it I was, it’s hard not to feel a bit persecuted by the universe.

All of which is making me wonder if a self destructive substance abuse habit, some kind of physical self-maiming like Vincent van Gogh or just shooting myself in the head like Ernest Hemingway might be a viable career strategy (probably not – van Gogh and Hemingway already had followings).

Ultimately I probably won’t give up. I’ll probably have some other idea. (I’ll also probably spend the rest of my life under the delusion that there’s some value in this whole project).

Just… the constant kicks to the balls get a bit much when you’ve been trying in some form or another for 30 years, you know?