(hardcover version here)

First, a thank you to Redbery Books and the Brick House Cafe in Cable for hosting the recent Spring Book Club dinner in Cable, Wisconsin, where the group discussed Coop and Coop. I get so many kind requests to attend book group meetings, but time, geography and calendar generally prevent it. I never forget, however, how much I rely on the word-of-mouth support I get from groups like this. So, thank you.

I am also frequently asked for a list of questions designed to help guide book group discussions. The Redbery Books group came up with one for Coop and have allowed me to share it. It follows after the break (and includes a ham joke).

Michael Perry regularly performs with his band, The Long Beds, in our area. If you’ve seen him in concert, was he similar to what you’d expect from his writing?

Which of Perry’s books did you enjoy the most? Why?

Perry is asked by his daughter to “Tell me about your child-hood.” Some children roll their eyes when parents start talking about their childhoods. Why was Amy one who asked for such stories? What stories from your childhood you like to share?

What “life lessons” are found in Coop? Do you agree or disagree with them?

How does Coop compare to other memoirs you have read?  Other books about farming and rural life?

Does reading Coop make you more or less inclined to raise animals and grow a garden?

How would you describe Perry’s writing style?

This book was on the bestseller list. How does this book “play” in other parts of the country? What is the appeal beyond the Midwest?

The hardcover title, Coop: A Year of Poultry, Pigs, and Parenting, was changed to Coop: A family, A Farm, and the Pursuit of One Good Egg for the paperback edition. Which do you think fits the book better? Why do you think the publisher changed it?

Have you raised chickens or pigs? Does Perry describe the process accurately?

What is one element from the rural lifestyle of Coop that you would like to bring into your own life?

Would Coop make a good movie?  If Coop were made into a movie, who would play Michael Perry? Anneliese?

Most of us have not lived in one zip code all of our life. Share different communities where you have lived. How does this match Perry’s opinion about different locales?

Have you ever been an EMT or “first responder”? How do you think these experiences have influenced Perry’s writing?

What did Perry do when he had a sick pig? He called the hambulance.

In Coop, Perry describes how his parents took in sixty or so foster children, man of the disabled and some terminally ill. How do you suppose this influenced his own parenting style?

Bev has described Michael Perry’s books as a how-to one being a decent human being. How does Perry’s writing style contribute to this? How is it it doesn’t come off as being boastful?

I love to read.  I love to read even more than I love to write.  Well, wait a minute, that was a tad hasty, I’d say it’s 50/50.  But the preponderance of my reading is tied to something I’m writing.  And when I’m not reading something for purposes of researching or fleshing out a specific writing project, I’m chiseling away at the “life list” of Things I Just Gotta Read Before I Croak and Who Knows When That Might Be.  My office is filled with stacks and stacks of books read and unread and so is my pole barn (and let’s not even discuss my electronic and audiobook devices).

All of these books are a happy problem.

Also a happy problem: The 80-100 days I spend on the road researching writing projects or trying to get my own work out there to a wider audience.  Worth every second when I get to shake hands and thank readers in person.  Plus I have gotten a lot of writing done in the Super 8.

Not a problem at all: The blessed responsibility to spend some time on Dadhood.

What I’m working up to here – I’m a bit of a beat-around-the-bush’er when it comes to saying anything but “yes” – is that the odds of me being able to read or comment on something sent my way are vanishingly slim.  It is not impossible, but it is sitting on Impossible’s couch.  And I don’t take this lightly, because I have had many people – known and not known – offer kind and boostful words in the days since I first got serious about typing.  So what I want you to know is that if you sent me something and I didn’t get to it or write it up somehow somewhere, it wasn’t because I was being snooty or snotty or formed grim opinions, it was simply because I’m working and being my version of Dad, and you should grow neither meek nor thunderous nor should you lose heart but rather press on and write and write, and write some more, and set up talks and signings and read at open mic events and go on book tours if they’re arranged and set up your own if they’re not, and grow your audience one reader at a time, and set up your blog and tend it and write some more and share your work and just don’t stop unless it’s not fun anymore.  That’s what worked for me.  And it’s still fun.  I’m a lucky fool to have fallen on this wagon, and I know it.

This has elicited questions from the reading public. They are not alone. Their very same query was raised previously during the editing process. So perhaps the best way to provide the definitive answer is to share a portion of the original exchange.

It began with an email from my editor’s assistant, Jason:

The proofreader raised two questions for you, which I copied below.  Please do let us know where you stand on these finer points of husbandry.

Thanks,
Jason

The note from the proofreader read:

Cows: In the description of inseminating the cows on p. 65, the author writes, “all things considered, their reaction to having a stranger’s arm elbow-deep up the rectum was positively restrained.”  The proofreader wondered whether, since the cows are being inseminated, “rectum” was correct–should it read “vagina” instead?

I replied with an email of my own:

I can respectfully state from a position of firm authority that “rectum” is correct.  The arm is inserted in that specific orifice in order to perform “rectal palpation,” a discomfiting but functional procedure allowing the inseminator to grasp and manipulate the bovine cervix through the pliable rectal wall in a manner calculated to guide insertion of the insemination pipette through the rings of the cervix and into the uterus.  To sum up, and for future reference: Arm in rectum, pipette in vagina.

I was quite proud of myself.  Country mouse educating the folks in New York city, that whole bit.  But my smug didn’t last long, because with one well-placed deadpan pun, Jason hit the gamewinner:

Great–thanks for the big picture.  I’ll rectify the proofreader.

Population 485: Welcome to “Nobbern!” (We locals call New Auburn “Nobbern” or “Nauburn” or any variant spelling thereof.)

Off Main Street: I draw an empty thought bubble above the author photo.  You can fill in your own saying or — this is frankly more appropriate — simply leave the bubble empty.

Truck: Double Clutch! This phrase will be understood by drivers of a certain age.  Failing that, it is explained in the book.

Coop: Oink-a-doodle-doo! Meant to reflect the inclusion of both pigs and chickens in the book.  Sadly, due to my fitful penmanship, many people think I have written, Dink-a-doodle-doo.

The results are mixed.  People tell me this.  So it goes.

“I got lucky. It’s that simple. I didn’t find an agent, she found me. I started freelancing in the late 1980s. Everything from writing newsletter blurbs to typing up copy for used car radio commercials. Whatever it took.

In the late 1990s I wrote a magazine profile of a novelist. The piece got killed, but unbeknownst to me the novelist recommended his agent track down “this long-haired writer from Wisconsin.” And so she did. A call (or email, I don’t remember) out of the blue one day. My life didn’t change overnight but the pace and quality of gigs definitely picked up.
Now my long hair is long gone, but my agent remains. I am overwhelmed and grateful that she’s out there pitching for me. I don’t call her unless there’s business to be done, but I keep her picture taped to the wall by my desk. I have drawn in a little thought balloon that says, “I wonder if Michael Perry is writing?””

I had a brief association with an agent in the early 1990s that could be charitably characterized as the classic “learning experience.” After paying her retainer and being underwhelmed with her efforts (turned out she was no more of an “insider” than I, and furthermore, submitted at half the pace) I expressed my dissatisfaction. She replied by threatening to sue me for breach of contract. This struck me as uncharitable. Thankfully, one of my pay-the-rent jobs involved writing customer service letters to disgruntled attorneys, and I was able to compose a faux legalese beauty that convinced her to turn me loose and leave me alone.

I just kept writing, cranking things out, pitching stuff on my own and self-publishing several books to sell from the car trunk.

On the upside, there have never been more places or opportunities for your work to be seen.  You can post it on the Web.  You can self-publish.  You don’t need a big gatekeeper to do this anymore.

Of course, if you’re talking about making a living – and that’s what most of us are shooting for – you’re interested in more than just having your work “seen.”  And in that case, the only thing that has ever worked for me is to just keep creating material.  The formats and their delivery will change over time, but the material will still have to come out of someone’s noggin.  I self-published and arranged my own speaking events for years before I ever wound up with a “real” book deal.  I still create all kinds of stuff that will never wind up on the page of a book, just so I have things in reserve.  Of all the speaking engagements I do every year, the vast majority are set up by me, not by my publisher.  My publisher has been terrific in this respect, but I know that if I just rely on the occasional book tour promotion, I’ll likely sink right on out of sight.  I also set up my own events to supplement my income until such time as I write the book that makes Oprah jump up and down on her couch.

Kind of nebulous advice, I know.  I mean, you still have to pound away old-style…send out your query letters, your manuscripts…but keep an eye out for other venues…blogging, readings, recordings, etc.

There is no easy way.  I came to all of this backward.  Just kept writing and flogging my own stuff.  The names and places are different, but this guy’s story is essentially my story

Here’s how I answered the writing question in an email a while back:

I wish I had a quick easy answer for you, but I don’t. I wrote for years and years, pretty much anything from little pieces for the local newspaper to radio commercial scripts for the local used car dealer. A lot of bad poetry. Anything. I went to the library and studied the Writer’s Market to learn about markets and submission guidelines and I started submitting my things and going to open mic readings and reading my poems and essays. I got piles and piles of rejections. Still do. I make a living writing and still get rejections all the time. Just had an editor turn down a piece of mine this morning, and this is an editor who has published me before. I guess the thing that helps me is I’ve always understood that rejection (even nasty rejection) of your work is just part of the deal. You can’t let it deter you. So you write it up and get it out there. As far as how I keep it fun, that one I can’t explain. I get up every day and I want to write. It’s an obsession, nothing less. Some days are good, some aren’t, but I always do some typing. It’s a tough glorious disappointing uplifting thing, this writing. I hope you keep at it.

My friend Frank Bures is often asked how to become a writer, and he provides the following useful links:

• Elizabeth Gilbert: Some thoughts on writing
  http://www.elizabethgilbert.com/writing.htm
• Jeffrey Tayler: Killing Yourself to Make a Living
  http://www.worldhum.com/speakers_corner/item/killing_yourself_to_make_a_living_expeditions_20060907/
• Advice to Travel Writers, by Rolf Potts
  http://www.transitionsabroad.com/publications/magazine/0407/rolf_potts_travel_writing_tips.shtml
• Psychology Today: The Winning Edge, by Peter Doskoch
  http://psychologytoday.com/articles/pto-3910.html
• Travel Writer Profiles:
  http://www.rolfpotts.com/writers/profiles.php
• Transitions Abroad; Travel Writing Portal
  http://www.transitionsabroad.com/listings/travel/travel_writing/index.shtml