My book publishing blog, with murder mysteries woven through it.
If this is your first visit, be sure to start with “1. Let’s do it!”
This post is coming soon! If you’ve made it to this point – hang in there with me!
Jess Brallier is th author of nearly 40 titles for both adults and children, Brallier writes about stuff like hot dogs, Albert Einstein, Portuguese bats, pessimists, and rogue alphabet letters.
A native of Ligonier, Pennsylvania, Jess is a graduate of the University of Pittsburgh (B.A.) and Boston University (M.S.). He and his wife, Sally Chabert, reside in West Hollywood, CA. Their two grown children are the greatest.
It sucks to be the marketing guy at a publishing house. I could never do enough, always being yelled at about books published two years ago, a week ago, next week and six months out. Editors, sales reps, agents, authors, the mailroom, always yelling at me. “These plans are embarrassing! I worked a lifetime on…
Randy was a one-person shop, except for a paid internship he annually offered to a lucky graduate of the Columbia University Publishing Course. Randy’s internship was a deep dive into subsidiary rights, the global network demanded of it, and a lawyer-like understanding of contracts. Of the largest eight book publishers today, six of them have…
A couple of years after Rich’s headline-stealing resignation from the Washington Times, he gave up on journalism for good. Done. Enough. Over. He had covered Three Mile Island, the U.S. Supreme Court, Strom Thurmond, and the Reagan White House (he nearly fell out of the press helicopter—seriously—as it followed Reagan’s helicopter out of London and…
I signed off yesterday, saying “I’m thinking about what’s good in life, just in case.” After all, there’s something about seeing my supposedly alive favorite author’s grave, and that author’s gay editor’s husband making whoopee with that author’s wife (or might she be a widow?). Confusing!!! So, onto what’s good in life — my children….
Around 1978, I discovered Robert Parker’s Spenser books. He had me by the 800th word of The Godwulf Manuscript. He stayed my favorite author for 30 years (a large chunk of my life) until he suddenly died, writing at his desk, in his Cambridge (MA) home, in 2010. Spenser was a Boston-based private eye who…
I walked back to the bookstore with Police Chief Jim. He entered slowly. I didn’t go in. I stood outside, near my vomit. Jim came back out after a few minutes. “This one,” he said, “is out of my league. I just called the state police.” Another Ligonier police car arrived. Police tape went up. An…