Birds Dive

Tuesday came and went and I must say, the distractions of everyday life, which may have covertly acted to distract an otherwise pinnacle moment of my life, almost prevented me from noticing that Into the Everything was finally released.

That isn't to say I was unaware that my book would be published, nor that it was now possible that this important venture could potentially make it into the hands of dear readers, just that, well, it was quiet. Like all thunderstorms, the ensuing calm is somehow more silent.

But here it is, born to the world. And I'm a proud papa. Amy, my publisher, presented me with the cute slim volume in baby blue and purple pastels, with my mug on the back, and inside, were words words words that I uttered a ways back. They live between covers and give me a sort of nostalgic and ethereal joy. In my bedroom, 50 copies tower like sentries, waiting to be exposed.

I don't know if this is the beginning of my writing career or the only glimmer of it, but I do know that as of right now, a part of me has been donated to a part of the world. And that, my friends, tickles.

Punkin House: Into the Everything : Jeff Mark Available Today

Punkin House: Into the Everything : Jeff Mark Available Today: "Happy release day to our friend Jeff Mark!!! Today his book, Into the Everything, is finally available after months and months of formatti..."

Things Fall Together

It's astonishing how a process takes shape. Three years ago I sat down to write Into the Everything in a chaotic whirlwind of eight months that produced the first, imperfect, and roughly double-the-size draft. The manuscript went though an editing process that lasted two years before I sent query letters for potential publication.

After hooking up with Punkin House, there was the obligatory months of artwork, formatting, and further editing; but I am content to say, that it is finally over. Today, I signed off on what I hope to be the finished, error-free manuscript that will go to print this monday for the release on the 22nd. I feel winded, proud, and perhaps mostly, relieved. For a book that I started three years ago, I feel ready to finally put it to rest, while the world experiences it for the first time. It's strange to feel so distant from it. I am not the same person who penned it, nor am I the same writer. I have gone on to write other manuscripts, novels, poems, etc. Looking back on this book, I feel a wonderful sort of nostalgia and fondness for the person that I was, ignorant and arrogant and ready to take on such a grand tribulation to become...a novelist.

I don't make any assumptions that the book will be read too far beyond my circle of friends. But I am inspired by Larry in Somerset Maugham's The Razor's Edge, who wrote a novel based on his "loaf"ing and wandering throughout the world, published it, and sent it only to his friends, who he desired to have read and love him through his words.

I'm okay with that.