Monetary Report: Week 21

Not a bad week. Sold a few books, made a little dough . . . $5.00 to be exact.

So, the total is $737.49.

We're five weeks away from being half way through the year. I hope to be at $750.00 before then.

In other news . . . earlier this year, I submitted a query for my second novel to Casperian Books. As a gesture of good faith, I bought one of their titles. (I had heard good things about them because they'd published a book titled Without Wax which both Josh Maday and Matt Bell had liked).

In any case, I bought a Casperian book by Peter Ohren entitled Motor City Blues. I leaned toward that book because Ohren is from Lansing, and it sounded like the novel would be set in Detroit -- which it was.

Casperian Books passed on reading my novel. Motor City Blues sat on my desk for a long time. In fact, it almost got placed on the book shelf -- which could have meant that it would be years before it would get read, if ever. Then, I thought, no. I have to read this. It's a small press book by a small press writer. People have taken a chance on my little novel, and I needed to do the same for Ohren.

So, I read it. And, I liked it. I finished it in three days (it's only 160 pages). In brief, it follows the life of a reluctant law student at Wayne State as he struggles with drug addiction, his rich girlfriend's lifestyle, his roommates, and his own sense that the world is set up pretty damn unfair for anyone who isn't at the top.

I enjoyed the backdrop of Detroit as the setting, and I thought the drug-influenced scenes were handled well.

I'm not going to go as far as giving stars or listing everything I liked (or the things that I didn't like). I'm just going to say that if you're looking for a quick, entertaining, and mildly thoughtful read, you could do worse than Motor City Blues.

Plus, you'd be helping to support a small press -- which is always an important thing.