piercing book

This post is from my friend Cloud's blog, The Pierced Consumer:

Today’s the day! April 1, 2009 [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="240" caption="The Piercing Bible on Amazon.com"][/caption] The Piercing Bible, by Elayne Angel, is now available for shipping at Amazon! Here is the link: The Piercing Bible on Amazon.com (pic above is copied from there.) This book will be the single greatest resource for piercees and piercers that I know of. Angel is one of the foremost professional piercers in the world, and her knowledge and expertise shine through all of the detailed information contained in the book. I’m proud to say I had a hand in creating the concept for this book, and I know all of you will get a lot out of it. I’ll do a review when I receive it, but it won’t be unbiased. I cannot tell you how excited I am! Just buy it! The Pierced Consumer.

I wanted to reiterate what Cloud said about having a hand in creating the concept for the book. She did more than that. In fact, the book is dedicated to her!

I'm SO excited! Guess what I've got? Finally: a copy of The Piercing Bible. For the first time, I've been able to see, hold, and read a finished copy of the book--just like the one you'll get when you place an order. It looks GREAT! The format looks a little bigger than I imagined it, and the color on the cover is tinged with a tad of purple (though I'll admit that I lobbied for a more punchy purple color). I opened the box and lifted the book--hefted it really, to feel its pleasant and considerable weight. Smiling, I took a look at the front and back covers, then thumbed through the whole thing and heard the sound of the paper, as I took a big whiff of the fresh paper and ink. I did everything but lick the thing; I wanted (needed, even) to experience my book with every possible sense I have. What a delight! I also got another mini pre-review from one of the reviewers:

I received an email from another one of the writers who will be reviewing my book:

Your book is brilliant!  It's the perfect book for ANYONE who wishes to get a piercing and is extremely reassuring, detailed, and authorative....  I can see how much work went into it and it's a wonderful book.

I've heard from several of the writers who will be doing reviews on my book: they've already received their copies of The Piercing Bible in the mail! Meanwhile (here in Mexico) I'm empty handed. I guess the slow mail service is one of the few drawbacks of living here. I'm glad they got their copies already--but frankly--I want one too!

Neil Steinberg, the author of the article mentioned below, told me he might wait until closer to the book's publication date (in May) to run the piece that included my interview. But, it ran today. Here is the link to the article in the Chicago Sun Times. He got most of it right, but made it sound as though I'd done 40,000 genital piercings (rather than piercings overall, which I meant). He also said it would be published "next month" but it won't be on the shelves until May. But you can still pre-order it at a dicount here on Amazon.com.

My publisher, Ten Speed Press, sent me a version of the manuscript called "first pages." This is a hard copy that was formatted by their "interior designer" with the photos, illustrations, sidebars, headers, charts, and so on. It was the first time I'd seen it formatted and it was exciting! Almost all of the editing work I've done has been on the computer. I had the manuscript printed a few times, but always as a Word document; it looked more like a school project than a book. But as soon as I saw this version, I realized The Piercing Bible is definitely closer to becoming a book. I made a bunch o' edits and sent it back. They'll make the changes and then send me a corrected version called "second pages" to edit. I think that is the last round--then it will go to the printer. Finally. I also found myself listed as an author on my publisher's website HERE.

Things are moving right along. This past week has been filled with multiple rounds of passing my manuscript back and forth with my editor. She'd send it back at about 8 pm and want the changes made by the next day! Needless to say I was "burning the midnight oil" to get it all done. But I did it! And it is a feeling of great accomplishment! I'm also working hard with my wonderful illustrator Jennifer! She's fantastic and she is doing all of the drawings from photos of piercings. Collaborating with her is a whole new skill (how do you EXPLAIN where the piercing should go in words?!). I'm really enjoying it and learning a lot, too. I finished up work today by making a list of all of the photos in the book and their captions. I went through to figure out which images are on hand, and which I still need to obtain. There are so many parts to putting this book together! I can't wait to see the finished product. Off to watch the Obama/McCain debate!

Today I finished up my Author Questionnaire from the Publicity & Marketing departments at my publisher, Ten Speed Press.  It turned into a twelve-page document, but they'll definitely know more about me and be better prepared to sell my book now. They'll be putting up some of my answers to their questions in the author's section of their website. I'll post the link to that once they are posted.