criminal
 CRIMINAL by Smith & Lady (book is 6″ x 9″) - foto by smith lady slapped an excellent cover on CRIMINAL and had a private copy printed by LuLu.com press so we could sit with it in our laps and proofread it one last time. folk are curious how 2 people can write 1 person’s autobiography. it’s easy. when lady moved in, i started telling her my stories. she wrote them down. when i ran down, she’d sit down with her laptop and say “tell me a story.” when that ran down, she started interviewing me. then she took all that and added in all the non-fiction pieces i’d written over the years. she took this amorphous mess and restructured it into a more or less chronological order. then she passed it to me to edit. i handed my version back to her. each pass she’d change stuff, add stuff, delete stuff, move stuff - as would i. it’s all my story, but some is my words, some my words rewritten by her, some her words, some her words rewritten by me. hard to say who’s what at this point. then she turned it into a manuscript, slapped an absolutely excellent cover on it, and printed us off a 352 page 110,000 word copy to make final adjustments to. right now i’m on our 18th edit pass. i’ll give it back to her for edit #19, and then we start looking for a top tier publisher. it’s my life, my story, our words, her order and flow, and our book. if it weren’t for her, the book wouldn’t be. if it weren’t for my life, there’d be no story to tell. this is a real collaboration, and a splendiferous partnership. believe we have the real goods here, with a chance to go all the way. how weird life is. and now, a word from our sponsor - 2 more america poems for this 4th of july season. ~ ~ ~ Original Cinema Small signs of logic pool to larger sockets, Autumn snap cracks cross Add in : This bad boy business nuzzles Liberty’s filthy whore Profit ~ ~ ~ Our Public Servants  4th of july 2008 cleveland - foto by smith |
MadM wrote:
Love the book cover!
Lulu is also always an option if (perish the thought) no agent/ publisher action.
Know a few book artist types doing that…
Posted on 07-Jul-08 at 4:37 pm | Permalink
Hilary wrote:
Amazing cover and cool story of how you collaborate. Also love the patriotic cleveland photo. I thought of you two a lot today as I found an abandoned construction site just covered with debris that would make all sorts of great art. I brought a little pile home. I think I’m going to call it “a different kind of riches.”
A culture with so much cast off waste material you can make art and sometimes a living from salvaging it.
Speaking of garbage and the environment, if you can manage it it while you’re here, go see the movie Wall. E. I can hardly explain how amazing it is. It’s animated by Disney/Pixar but it’s still pure genius. It works on so many levels my brain is still rebounding back on itself. It’s a post-apocalypse earth with one robot on it, Wall. E, whose function is compacting trash. No people are left on earth and I’m not going to tell you anymore, but it’s hilariously done. Scathing criticism of American culture and our unsustainable lifestyle and marketing. And the amazing genius is even with an anti=corporate monopoly, eqth-killing message, they can still market tons of Wall. E toys and products back to us and we’ll still buy them. Well I hope I’ve sold you on it. Take care, comrades!
Posted on 07-Jul-08 at 11:30 pm | Permalink
Hilary wrote:
Arg, typos. anti-corporate, earth-killing.
Posted on 07-Jul-08 at 11:32 pm | Permalink