How to Become an Author, in 5 Incredibly Difficult Steps
A while back, I wrote a non-fiction book about the apocalypse. Since publishing the book, the question I get asked the most has to be: "What are you doing in my toolshed?" Second place goes to "Is that my wife's cocktail dress?" The third is- well, let's skip ahead to questions not relating to a highly illegal fetish revolving around forbidden sheds and stolen evening wear. People usually ask me: "How did you get your book published?" Everybody wants to know how the process works, because they think that if they can just get the steps for this secret dance memorized, it's all plaid jackets and grad-student-blowjobs from that point forward. There are a lot of questions and answers for new authors out there on the Internet, but they always seem to skirt the subject in the name of preserving some sort of artistic mystique. As is the case with all nice things, I would like to ruin that tradition. I'll talk to you about the publishing process honestly and unflinchingly, even when it makes the whole thing (and by extension, me) look kind of shitty.
Getting the Attention of a Publisher
Related: 6 Ways Cities Are Getting Into the Attention-Whore Game
Finding a Publishable Idea
Related: 'Ready Or Not': The Stupid, Stubborn Game That Lost Its Publisher
Doing an Assload of Research
Related: 6 Reporters Who Didn’t Do The Research (And Paid The Price)
Editing and Editing and Editing ...
Related: The Simpsons Edited An Episode To Cover Up An Implied Murder
Collecting Your Shitty Money
You can buy Robert's book, Everything is Going to Kill Everybody: The Terrifyingly Real Ways the World Wants You Dead, or follow him on Twitter and Facebook. But you should probably just take the subtle hint all those links were giving you and buy the book: You could be lucky number 20,999!
For more from Robert, check out 5 Disturbing Ways the Human Body Will Evolve in the Future and Revisiting Old-School Text Adventures as a Jaded Modern Gamer.