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Humans relate to each other primarily through the sharing of stories. And since that’s true, it means that anybody can write a book. After all, a book is just sharing a collection of thoughts through the story-telling process. While anybody can write a book, however, the publication process can be daunting and confusing. So much goes into publishing a book, whether it’s type-setting, editing, cover design, or marketing, that it can be overwhelming to the author who wants to publish their book. This week, Nick Poe from Tall Pines Publishing, an independent publishing house, joins John on the podcast to talk through everything publishing related. Tune in to also hear them discuss the writing process and how to get started writing your book.
Publish your book:
https://tallpinebooks.com/
Purchase the You Can Mentor book:
You Can Mentor: How to Impact Your Community, Fulfill the Great Commission, and Break Generational Curses
youcanmentor.com
Publish your book:
https://tallpinebooks.com/
Purchase the You Can Mentor book:
You Can Mentor: How to Impact Your Community, Fulfill the Great Commission, and Break Generational Curses
youcanmentor.com
Creators & Guests
What is You Can Mentor: A Christian Mentoring Podcast?
You Can Mentor is a network that equips and encourages mentors and mentoring leaders through resources and relationships to love God, love others, and make disciples in their own community.
We want to hear from you! Send any mentoring questions to hello@youcanmentor.com, and we'll answer them on our podcast. We want to help you become the best possible mentor you can be. Also, if you are a mentoring organization, church, or non-profit, connect with us to join our mentoring network or to be spotlighted on our show.
Please find out more at www.youcanmentor.com or find us on social media. You will find more resources on our website to help equip and encourage mentors. We have downloadable resources, cohort opportunities, and an opportunity to build relationships with other Christian mentoring leaders.
You can mentor is a podcast about the power of building relationships with kids from hard places in the name of Jesus. Every episode will help you overcome common mentoring obstacles
Speaker 2:and give
Speaker 1:you the confidence you need to invest in the lives of others. You can mentor.
Speaker 3:Hey, mentors. Just a reminder about the You Can Mentor book. It's titled You Can Mentor, How to Impact Your Community, Fulfill the Great Commission, and Break Generational Curses. The whole point of this book is to equip and encourage mentors with new tools and ideas on how to make the most of their mentor mentee relationship. If you're a mentor, hey, go pick it up.
Speaker 3:And if you're a mentoring organization, pick some up for all of your mentors. If you would like to order mass copies, like more than 20, send an email to me, zach@youcanmentor.com, and we will get you guys a special price. But go and pick up that book. It's good. You can mentor.
Speaker 4:Welcome. You can mentor listener. It's John here, and I'm really looking forward to this conversation that I'm going to have today with my friend Nick Poe. So Nick works for Tall Pine Books, and I have been very blessed by his services in this organization, as has Zach Garza as well. So we've both both published with and through Talpine.
Speaker 4:So not only are we gonna be able to talk about the benefits of of using Talpine authors out there if you're if you so choose to, but we're gonna take a step back from that and even say, listen, mentors. Here's what I believe. I think that you've got a book in you. And I think that that book needs to get out and you will be blessed by it. And and even more importantly, the world will be.
Speaker 4:Your your mentees will enjoy that. And there are folks who will be encouraged and equipped to be able to go out and do the same. And I have learned really over these last few months that authoring and then sharing that with others really kind of inspires them to do the same. So that's where we're coming from. Without further ado, let me say good morning, Nick.
Speaker 2:Good morning, sir. Pleasure to join you.
Speaker 4:Absolutely. And, Nick, I'm in Waco. Where are you?
Speaker 2:Northern Indiana.
Speaker 4:Okay.
Speaker 2:Flatlands. Just south of Chicago, basically.
Speaker 4:Fantastic. Well, I'm so glad to know you, Nick. We've had some really incredible conversations as I came to you with much ignorance about the process of publishing months ago, and that's why I was just so impressed. I can remember some of our first conversations that we had, and I just thought, you know what? The stuff that you're saying is gold, and mentors need to hear that.
Speaker 4:And those who are wherever they are in the process of writing their book, even just thinking about writing to maybe needing a publisher, they would benefit greatly from your expertise and your perspective. They would feel, as we say, equipped and encouraged to write. So I'm I'm really looking forward to getting into some topics with you this morning.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. It's my favorite topic. It's a critical topic. It's a world changing topic, so I think we've got some ground to cover.
Speaker 4:Absolutely. Okay, Nick. Let me let me maybe drive us this way in our conversation this morning. I wanna set you up a little bit like we're playing tee ball together. Okay?
Speaker 4:So I'm gonna put it up on the tee for you, and I just wanna see if you can maybe get a solid double
Speaker 2:out of this thing. K. That work? So the world.
Speaker 4:There there are there are gonna be those out there. There are listeners. There are folks out there again that I feel like need to be content creators. They have invested in in kids and people's lives for years. They have so much to say, and I want these people to create content.
Speaker 4:And honestly, I don't think there's anything better that you can do than to write a book. Now the issue is that someone's going to think, you know what? Does anybody read books anymore? Why would I even consider creating content that's gonna go on paper? So, Nick, what would you say into that issue there?
Speaker 2:There's a mass audience of book readers out there. And particularly with the wave of audiobook options that are surfacing, People are consuming books via audio. I think long form podcast has primed people for this. And so there is a big market in readership. Of course, people like scrolling.
Speaker 2:Of course, people like their TV series. Of course, they love a Friday night movie, but these things have not supplanted nor replaced the publishing industry. The publishing industry is still a multibillion dollar industry. And so I wouldn't let your market concerns move you away from writing a book. Not only that, something like 70% of the highest grossing movies in Hollywood are based on books.
Speaker 2:Huge percentages of television series are based on books. This is both fiction books, novels, and things, and nonfiction books, life stories, memoirs, etcetera. So even if people aren't consuming the books directly, there are offshoots and derivatives in other ways that people are consuming the content that's being written. And so books really have a really wide reaching, deep flowing impact in society, in entertainment, in education. And so if your glib, you know, excuse is, well, the market's just not there anymore, I hate to break it to you.
Speaker 2:I'm an insider. The market's there.
Speaker 4:Well, good. And I'm I'm a lot of
Speaker 2:It it is critical because if you're if you're gonna do something, you know, if you're gonna do something that's meaningful and lasting, you wanna make sure there's an audience. And so it's a valid concern, but it's one that can be dismissed fairly easily just by the numbers. Not only that, you're not trying to tackle the global book market. If you write a book that's, you know, for everyone, you're gonna sell that book to no one. Ideally, you wanna write a book to a very niche market of people who go, wow.
Speaker 2:That content right there is exactly what I need. And so I tend to I tend to hold to the value that you should really get a positioning statement in mind when you're writing your book. Make it niche. I am writing x for y. I am writing this book for this audience.
Speaker 2:That shouldn't be broad. It shouldn't be, I'm writing a nonfiction book for human beings.
Speaker 4:Mhmm.
Speaker 2:It should be very specific. It shouldn't even be as broad as, I'm writing an IT book for tech people. It should be, I'm writing a book on why and how we can leverage AI technology for computer programmers in real estate development. Mhmm. Right?
Speaker 2:That's that's a little bit maybe too focused, but you want that focus positioning statement with your book. And so when you're talking about market, who's reading, who's not, the goal is not, I'm gonna market to everyone. It is, let me find my audience and write to them. And for the audience that's listening to this podcast, people who are in a position of who are mentors, who have people under them, you already have the niche audience carved out for you. And, you know, do you want your ideas to be packaged in the words you share over a coffee?
Speaker 2:Well, that's part of it. What if you could package those ideas in a perfect bound book that can be on the shelves of people long after you're gone? That's book writing creates that lasting legacy.
Speaker 4:Amen. Man, for sure. Totally agree with that. So what about the perspective of when it comes to think about the daunting task of of sitting down and writing, however many days it's going to take to say, well, listen. I just don't have the time to write a book because my goodness.
Speaker 4:I mean, what are you talking? 50,000, a 100,000 words? I'm I'm never gonna be able to trudge through all of that. What what do we kinda know or need to think about when it comes to length or really what what it would take to to make something worth publishing?
Speaker 2:Mhmm. Well, number 1, it doesn't have to be as long as you'd think. So a 300 page book might be a 100000 words. You could easily do a book that's 24,000 words, 30,000 words, sometimes less, sometimes more. And it will be a publishable, nice looking book with a decent thickness that can be marketed and sold.
Speaker 2:So when we're talking about writing a book, it doesn't have to be some thick door stopper of a book.
Speaker 4:Mhmm.
Speaker 2:It can be more manageable than that. But there are people who go, look, even if it is 20,000 words, that's still a heck of a lot. You know, I wrote 500 word essays in high school. That's a bunch of essays. And the truth is let let me share sort of a parable that might explain the difficulty of getting started writing.
Speaker 2:There's this story I really like of this lady and her boy. She's an Algonquin Native American in Canada. There was this huge windstorm that blew through and froze people out, man. Like everybody in her village died. And she and her boy kind of escaped and made it into a cave.
Speaker 2:Right? Everybody else is dead. It's early winter, really bad storm. They've got to make it through the winter and they have nothing. No food, no nothing.
Speaker 2:Well, inside of this cave, they found a little cache and there's a little hook and there's a string. She takes a rough flint knife, cuts a piece of flesh off of her thigh, baits the hook with it, goes out and breaks ice, catches a fish. They eat the fish. They use the fish guts to catch more fish. They use that fish.
Speaker 2:You know, the cycle continues all winter and they survive. Spring comes. They're able to travel out and find another tribe and join up. The point of the story is the most difficult and painful part was getting started. It's cutting the flesh off of your thigh.
Speaker 2:It's facing the blank page. It's I feel like I've got no inspiration. I don't know what I have to say. This word document is blank, and it seems like it wants to stay blank. That's the difficulty.
Speaker 2:But if you can rip the band aid off, if you can cut that piece of flesh off, if you can sit there and hammer it out, cover the page with text, ignore your self criticism, pin out your ideas, create outlines. If you can get started, there's a momentum that will build and what feels like pulling teeth, what feels like real difficulty will actually become a joy. You'll be carried by the momentum of your own inspiration. And so get started, face the blank page. I heard one writer say this.
Speaker 2:He said, when I sit down to write, I'm facing my blank page. And he said, I don't have to write when I designate like half an hour in the morning. I don't have to write, but I don't allow myself to do anything else. No phone, no books, no scrolling, no coffee, no anything else, just a blank page. So I don't have to actually start hammering on the keyboard, but I can't promote myself to do anything else.
Speaker 2:And in the midst of that boredom, he finds that they that actually writing is a is a decent outlet.
Speaker 4:That's incredible.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So get started. That's the point.
Speaker 4:No. I I completely agree because I was the same way. I felt like I was walking around with ideas for years and having those conversations. And in fact, Nick, it was interesting. I would have a buddy who maybe just self published something or was a was a published author in in their own right.
Speaker 4:And then I can remember sitting there and hearing from them, listening to them, you know, even asking questions about the process and then kinda sharing that, you you know, that thing that I think a lot of us do, which is to say, you know, I'm either I'm thinking about writing a book or I am writing a book. And Mhmm. And yet we go day to day, year to year, and never really get I mean, we might not even get, you know, words on the page. So I I hear that what you're saying that the need for that practice of just sitting down and putting everything else aside and being available for that. And it is such a wonderful feeling to think.
Speaker 4:You know, I love the process of with Mephibosheth to be able to tell my wife later in the day, you know what? I did a 1,000 pay I did a a 1,000 words today. Like, man, there's a really good feeling about that because that that sense of accomplishment to look back on that word document down at the bottom and see, okay. Well, goodness. We're up to we're up to 15,000 words on this thing.
Speaker 4:Now we're starting to I'm starting to feel a little bit of a substantial weight here in a very good way. Right? And so, yeah, it really is encouraging. But just as you mentioned, you you've gotta start. You know, the best way to start is just to start.
Speaker 4:And Mhmm. And I think that'll that sometimes we can kinda get caught up if we don't have experience in the process of thinking that, you know, we write a page, and what do we do? We go back and we reread that page, and then we might be tempted to edit that page and to say, wait a minute. This is like a sculpture where I just need to be lobbing the clay up onto the pedestal at this point and certainly not cutting away at anything. But, anyway, we're jumping ahead a little bit with that that thought.
Speaker 4:But, again, I think that it is just it's such an interesting paradigm and an interesting activity when it comes to writing content because there are so many pitfalls, and some of so many of them are are going to be mental. And, again, so many battles fought even before we we truly begin the process, which is, as I hear you say, just begin. Just start. And, also Right. Nick, in a conversation that we had had, we had discussed really in terms of length that I I'm just always encouraging people to say, look.
Speaker 4:I don't know if you maybe need to write the next, you know, American novel. You may need to just be thinking about how your mentee needs a week long devotional over maybe a topic that they're struggling with or maybe a book of you know, the the book of the bible that that you wanna kinda walk them through. Maybe I wanna do a little thing a couple of weeks in Philippians. That is a great way to get started of thinking about how to organize text and about how to kinda bring an idea from, from the beginning through the arc and then and then to the end. Right?
Speaker 4:And then to think, just begin there. And that could might that might be some little PDF that you wanna put together, and then you do that enough, and then you really do start kinda creating something with some length. Is that would you say that would be something to get started even if you just start small?
Speaker 2:A 100%. Actually, CS Lewis' book, Mere Christianity, famous apologetic book, It started as just some outlines that he had in a radio program where he had shared his thoughts on 4 different topics in radio broadcast over time, later repurposed that content to create the book, Mere Christianity. So, absolutely, you can take pressing needs, topics that are being asked you're being asked about. You can sort of develop that positioning statement. So I've got a mentee who's, you know, wanting to better their life, but they're in an environment where their parents are rough.
Speaker 2:Right? Their their household situation is bad, and they have specific questions about that. Okay. So you've got your positioning statement. I'm writing about x for y, this specific audience.
Speaker 2:Well, now that you've got that positioning statement, break that up if you can into 5 to 10 subtopics. If you really think about the topic that you're knowledgeable about, you can usually break those topics into 5 to 10 subcategories, offshoots, derivatives, branches, not the main trunk, but offshoots. From there, just write 500 to a 1000 word essays under each topic. Then you've got a book. So you're not facing the blank page with no plan.
Speaker 2:You're facing it with an outline. Here's my main theme. Here's the branches, and I need to hit 500 to a 1000 words under each. Some people aren't as sort of like pedantic about word counts and things. They just kind of write freely.
Speaker 2:That's fine. But for people who are really struggling with analysis paralysis and they're not getting started, I would say find your main topic, break up the subheadings, write essays under each. You can rearrange chapters later. You can build transitions better later to make it all flow together. You can edit later, but at least start there.
Speaker 2:Mhmm. If you just start writing and you're over editing and you're rereading everything you've done a 1000000 times, it's sort of like trying to paint a house that's still being framed in. It just doesn't work. So I would say if you can break up the content categorically, you're gonna make your job a lot easier for sure.
Speaker 4:Absolutely. Okay. So just a little bit of a personal experience again with the the text of Mephibosheth. I knew I was so excited to be able to share the story of mentoring between David and and Mephibosheth in 2nd Samuel chapter 9. And then as I noticed in the chapter that precedes that, it really was David's own identity, his purpose, and his community really being spelled out and then thinking, wait a minute.
Speaker 4:These are the exact three topics that David speaks into or or or freely gives of himself to Mephibosheth, thus giving him health and and giving him opportunity to realize these things about himself. And so it made a lot of sense to dovetail into what you're saying for me as one who can kinda take a concept and maybe be a little bit too brainstorming and not not maybe be a a a linear enough thinker to say, well, now I'm seeing this this work as something that I want to be able to share with with the reader of this wonderful chapter from scripture, but then also to talk about what is identity, what is purpose, and what is community. How are these things fleshed out? So then I created 3 chapters per subject. And so it gave me that really the body of the of that book was 9 chapters in that way with an explanation and kinda some riffing on that wonderful chapter with an introduction and then finish it all off with a conclusion.
Speaker 4:And, again, I was at 11 12 chapters in in that way, and I can remember having a conversation with someone who said, you know, a lot of authors that we know who are church leaders, you know what they do? They really just take a sermon series, and then they and then they turn it into a book. And that is such a simple thing and and, like, maybe even so obvious for some, but for me, it was that moment of just saying, oh, yeah. So organization was my kind of Achilles' heel. Right?
Speaker 4:And then thinking, well, wait a minute. If I just thought about this as a series of teaching opportunities that kinda build on each other and then, again, kinda culminate at the end here, then it just makes a lot more sense. And that that really was the key for me personally to think, okay. Now I can kinda see how this thing is is structured and organized in a really, really powerful way.
Speaker 2:It makes things more manageable. It's it's like trying to furnish a house that has no walls, just one big huge warehouse. It's just difficult, man. Compartmentalization really helps to bring structure, order. You have actionables, task lists.
Speaker 2:It helps the research process. It keeps you mindful of the thing you're doing today without being mindful of the topic you're gonna hit in 3 weeks. Because that will you'll hit that topic later. You're not worrying about, well, how do I infuse this idea I have floating in the ether into what I'm writing today? You can categorize it.
Speaker 2:You can go, well, that idea is good. That scripture is good. That principle is good. It has nothing to do with this with this section of the book. So we're just gonna offload it to later.
Speaker 2:And it will really alleviate you mentally. If you're somebody who needs that sort of structure, that order, this will be a massive benefit to you.
Speaker 4:Absolutely.
Speaker 2:Ask you something really quick. Did you learn anything while you were writing your book? Not just like about the publishing process, but while you're writing, were you learning?
Speaker 4:Absolutely. Yes. I learned that, you know, I, Nick, I'm I'm kind of a I'm kind of a what I what I think of myself as is a is like an inspired builder. I really do like to create things, and I'm a creative, but in the sense of creating, an organization, creating logos, creating spaces, and creating programs that will be beneficial for for mentors because I'm at Middleman, we're kind of a group of mentors. And so I don't think that I was as prepared to understand that the process of working through this text was going to be that there were going to be times when I was incredibly, emotionally inspired.
Speaker 4:I was excited about the words that maybe even I would put it this way. Maybe I expected to kinda have that songwriter, you know, when we when we listen to some of our song favorite songwriters, and they'll say something like, I just felt like I was just a conduit, you know, from from the Lord, that saliari kind of situation where, oh, thank you Yeah. That, you know, that I can be used as a vessel. And so I think I expected that the entire process would be that way. And so if I wasn't really feeling like I was writing what the Lord had for me to write, then, you know, whether it be kind of stand sitting there looking at the blinking cursor that's not moving or Mhmm.
Speaker 4:Just feeling like, you know, that those times when I when you're there were times when I was actually writing words and I thought, I am not enjoying this. I don't like what I'm writing. I don't why am I putting this on the page? Right? And maybe it's the transcendence that I really kinda learned, which is to say, I need to be writing during those times when I'm when I'm there, and I feel it just as much as I need to be writing during those times when I'm just feeling like it is just flat.
Speaker 4:You know? And and I'm and my and I am a disgrace to the English language. Right? But that to me was kinda the beauty of it in in saying that and it's almost you know? I mean, I think it's a really easy thing to relate to our faith in that sometimes we have the mountaintop experiences.
Speaker 4:Right? And then we have the times in the valley, and the lord is there, just as much as he is in any other time. And so that that I think coming away from that and just realizing, okay. I I would need to be prepared for that next time as well. It's just realizing that it is about being able to to put words to the page and not necessarily need to be kind of always emotionally engaged or inspired.
Speaker 2:Right. Writing is is like a seed form of the human experience living life. You do have the ups and downs, the peaks, the valley, the good, the bad, the ugly, and everything in between. Something that writers do underestimate and don't realize is like you're communicating here, you do learn as you're writing. Mhmm.
Speaker 2:You discover things about your time. I I have told I tell people many times, writing is not merely a way to communicate what you believe. It's a way to figure out what you believe. It's the ultimate clarifier. I am one of the weird ones who tends to believe that you actually can't fully know or become to terms with what you believe about a certain topic until or unless you write about it.
Speaker 2:It's in the process of writing that thought becomes clarified, that research becomes distilled, that opinions become sort of take the shape of truth and are no longer you get rid of the waste and you hold fast to the truth. Writing is a slow process that really clarifies what you believe about a certain topic. And so, look, there's been topics, you know, writers have said there's topics where, you know, for decades, I thought, oh, I know all about that. Then you sit down to actually flesh it out on paper. And in the slow process of writing ideas with intentionality, and it's not just verbal vomit, it's not just repeating maxims that you've heard, In that process, you really clarify your stances, your positions, your core values on any given topic.
Speaker 2:So as an author, I would say, don't come to the keyboard thinking, this is just a way for me to get my ideas out there. It's a way for you to refine your ideas, and that's a beautiful thing.
Speaker 4:Man. Dual purpose. That is some gold there, Nick. That's exactly right. And I you know, it's interesting.
Speaker 4:There I don't have it as an as an FAQ here or as a tea statement, but you know what? It sounds like you just answered the question of, what about, hey. I'm not I'm no expert about this. Like, you know, how can I justify myself in talking about that topic or that that situation? You're saying that's the that's probably the best way to keep yourself from writing about anything is to say that I'm not qualified to write about it.
Speaker 4:And you're saying, no. It's the process of writing that gives you that confidence, and and you research. And case in point right now, I'm kind of working on a text over fear, and it's such a huge situate it's such a it's such a huge topic to talk about. And yet I can I resound with what you're saying because I know that the process of writing about that, this look at worldly fear versus godly fear is it's really going to be in itself the lesson for me as opposed to me feeling like I need to create it and then put it on to the page? It's going to kinda be formed within the process of enjoying the process of writing.
Speaker 4:So incredible.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. Okay.
Speaker 4:I I wanna
Speaker 2:You'll surprise yourself sometimes as you're writing. You'll surprise yourself with what you say and what comes out.
Speaker 4:Yeah. Yeah. For sure.
Speaker 2:No. Actually, I agree with that.
Speaker 4:Okay. Nick, you know, even we were talking with someone you're working an author that you're working with right now who just has a very impactful story about family loss, and so something that people need to hear and something that people can be incredibly encouraged by. But I want to speak into the situation of writing, being a very personal activity and idea for so many. And so now, you know, we're dealing with matters of vulnerability and, and, and again, like, there's just the fear of, hey, if I put this out in the world, you know, how am I going to deal with that? And and that's a whole thing in itself, but I really, what I wanted to talk about was community in writing.
Speaker 4:My experience was not only did I have you as a as a really great confidant and someone, you know, who knows the the biz and knows the process and and really made it familiar and interesting for me. But I also got to invite friends into the process of publishing, whether it be a graphic designer who I really enjoyed working with, who helped come up with what the cover was going to look like and and typesetting and fonts and that kind of stuff to a very good friend who's an editor who I trusted to be able to say, hey, will you read over this thing and do as good a job as you can at making sure that I don't sound like I have no idea what I'm talking about, but also that I can retain my voice in this as well. Yeah. And I think maybe this is one of the hardest things to find, to find a few buddies who can be readers for you, who will actually sit down, trudge through this thing, not only for editing, but, you know, for for anything else when you just say, look. Will you just read through this and and let me know if you find kind of a if you if you hit a snag or if you just feel like this, this, or that, whatever.
Speaker 4:You know? Let me know from your from your perspective what you think about that. So, Nick, just tell me about, like, that this idea. How how can a listener kinda be encouraged to invite their community into the process of of what it means to to put a book out in the world?
Speaker 2:Sure. It is a collaborative effort, and it should be. It should be a tapestry of your relationships and expertise nearby that you can pull on to help make this a really, really good not just experience for the reader, but a good product overall. We've got a Methodist pastor that just did a book with us, and he's probably a good case study in this because he he writes this Christmas devotional. He's he's well ahead of schedule, so he'll have it ready for Christmas.
Speaker 2:And he used one of his, like, lead worshipers to or worship leaders rather to put together a song sheet that goes with each devotional incorporating QR codes linking to this basically worship material that his church has put together led by someone else. He's incorporated devotionals from a couple different people. He has a photograph that someone took, I think a family member of this lineage thing that he's using for the front cover. He's he's had a proofreader go through and edit the book. We're taking care of typesetting and piecing together design.
Speaker 2:And so in his case, and in a lot in the case of a lot of our authors, people are pulling on their community to help fine tune the book. Someone listening to this might say, well, I don't really I don't have photography from someone I know that I wanna use for the cover, or I don't know a proofreader. I need to use a tall pine proofreader or whatever. One of the most consistent things that authors do is they do get feedback on the writing itself from friends, like you mentioned. If you're gonna go about that, let me give you a piece of advice.
Speaker 2:Present it to your prereaders and tell them, I have no emotional attachment to this work. It is not my ego. It's not my pride. I you can tear it apart. You can say this section sucks.
Speaker 2:This one's great. This is bad. This needs work. This confused me. Be brutally honest.
Speaker 2:I need you to be honest. I want you to be honest. If it's terrible, please, please tell me. That is gonna yield much better results than going to someone with your work and saying, hey, here's my work. Let me know your thoughts.
Speaker 2:Let me know your thoughts is a precursor to getting a generic compliment. If you go and say, I need you to be brutally honest with me. You're not gonna hurt my feelings. My feelings are not attached to this. You're not gonna hurt my feelings.
Speaker 2:Then you will get honest feedback that you can work with. Mhmm. So it's really an elimination of ego. It's the crushing of pride, and it will help to refine your stuff. I've written stuff before that where I thought, this is as good as I can possibly get it.
Speaker 2:It's as good as I can get it. I don't think there's a word out of place. It makes total sense to me. And I've handed it to my wife, and I've said that, please tear this apart. Mhmm.
Speaker 2:She gladly does. And she shows me things that from her perspective don't make sense. And I'm like, you you're totally right. I can see now why this doesn't make sense. It's that old saying, you can't if you're inside the jar, you can't read your own label.
Speaker 2:Mhmm. We're so close to our work. We can't define it ourselves. So you need that 3rd party involved. So when you say, what's the community process like in book building?
Speaker 2:There's a lot of ways to approach it. 1st and foremost, I would approach it from getting prereaders involved to scan through your work.
Speaker 4:Okay. Yeah. Man, that is a good word. And, again, it kinda goes back on us to say, I wanna be clear to know that this work that I've invested my time in right and and and I've put all of my I've poured my blood, sweat, and tears into this thing, and yet it is not me. It you know, you you can criticize it, and I'm not going to take it as a personal attack on my character.
Speaker 4:Right? Like, that that I think is a very emotionally kinda mature thing to say and know, and and I think really valuable a a a valuable word for those to say, let me make sure that I've got that buffer, that margin, and that knowledge to know that this is not an emotional thing. I'm really gonna take myself out of it. It's for the work of this to be as good as it can be. And and that's really just what the artist does, I think, in general.
Speaker 4:Whether it's a song or whether it's, you know, something that you create on a canvas, we really kind of have to say, hey, I'm not I'm not going to be attacked because I, you know, honestly, with criticism, what I always tell people is I have found that I love me more than anything else out there in the world. And here's what's interesting. I am my own biggest critic. And so Yeah. I always say, if I'm being critical, it's not because I don't like the thing.
Speaker 4:In fact, it's because I like the thing very much because I happen to be my own biggest critic. So criticism is not should not be something that we bought from it all, but instead just to say, look. I want this work to be as good as it can be. And so Mhmm. Just like when it comes to creating a mentoring nonprofit out there, you guys, as you go to build your board, it is not about having as many other yous on this board as possible.
Speaker 4:What you want, you want varying perspective. You want someone with a different eye on something so that they can see your blind spot. You want to trust this person. But at the end of the day, you're going to have a better product. You're going to have a better organization.
Speaker 4:You're gonna have a better book when it comes to having people say things and think things and see things that that you just don't.
Speaker 2:Beautiful.
Speaker 4:Alright. So listen. Now Now let's get a little bit more in the weeds here, Nick, just to say if if I'm this author and, you know, writing the content is not an issue, but, man, I get overwhelmed by the process of publishing, whether it's expense or whether it's, you know, listen. How long do I expect this thing to be? Am I going to, you know, am I gonna sign a deal with someone?
Speaker 4:And lo and behold, I don't even own my content anymore. What, you know, what goes on there? Can you speak into that just a little bit of the the process of publishing and what we what we should be thinking about?
Speaker 2:Sure. There's 2 approaches to publishing books. 1 is traditional, the other is independent. Traditional publishing is what we've known since the printing press was established and publishing houses were created several 100 years ago. That's where I, the author, sell the rights to my book to the publishing house.
Speaker 2:They might pay me a little bit of money upfront called an advance, or they don't pay me anything upfront at all, but I don't pay for publishing. They take care of binding, cover design, typesetting, all of that good stuff. They do a print run. The book sells. I make a small royalty on the back end.
Speaker 2:That's traditional publishing. It's a good way to publish if you can. Problem is the barrier to entry to traditional publishing is very high. Traditional publishers right now are not taking risks on authors. They look for social media following.
Speaker 2:They look for marketability and they piggyback off of it. Whether that's good or bad, we can fight over, but traditional publishing is just difficult to break into. So most authors aren't going to be looking at a handsome deal from Penguin Random House. Instead, they're gonna go with independent publishing. Some call it self publishing or vanity publishing or there's there's a few nomenclatures.
Speaker 2:I prefer independent publishing because it's you saying I'm going to package my content, my intellectual property myself in my own way and release it to the world on my own terms. We are an independent publishing house, meaning we partner with authors who write their manuscripts to help take care of all the pieces of the puzzle required to get this book in distribution and out there to the world. So the way we developed the model for our company is we thought, okay, if if you wrote a book and you needed a cover design, you could go find an independent design firm online or on like a it's a gig economy. So you could go on Fiverr and find a cover artist or whatever. And you could hire them to build a cover for your book.
Speaker 2:Then you could go find a typesetter and pay them a fee individually and get them to typeset your book, meaning layout the interior, layout the chapter headings, and so forth. Then you could get an ebook formatter to do an ebook, and you could put all these pieces together independently, separately, paying out separate fees to a bunch of separate people. We thought, at Tall Pine, we're just gonna consolidate the process. So we're going to take all of these independent moving parts and elements. We're going to keep them all in house.
Speaker 2:Editorial, typesetting, cover design, ebook formatting, distribution, ISBNs, all the stuff you need to get your book out there. We'll take care of it, and we'll set fair market prices for each individual element and put together packages for authors where they can show up and say, look through our PDF of all our deliverables. Our pricing is very transparent on there. And they can say, yeah. I need cover design.
Speaker 2:I need typesetting. I don't need editorial. I got that taken care of. And they can sort of build an a la carte menu package, and we engage with them on that level. So, really, we exist to sort of bridge the gap between you writing the last period on your book and getting this thing bound in print in your hand and in distribution to the world.
Speaker 4:I really enjoyed the
Speaker 2:Easier than people would think.
Speaker 4:Oh, yeah. Absolutely. And I wanna speak just kinda personally into that, Nick, because first of all, it was great to be able to work with you and and have a phone conversation with you as opposed to just kinda filling out, you know, formats of a of a box and, like, working with a computer. I knew that it that it wasn't a robot that I was dealing with. I knew there wasn't AI involved, but in fact, having this conversation where I could kind of bring these issues to you and you speak into them in a very clear way was also very beneficial.
Speaker 4:And remembering just the the process of kinda shaping the work was also really important because I had been staring at a Word document for months months months. And then, you know, I print out that. And so now I'm I'm editing again, and I'm I'm reshaping. I'm looking at the page. It was so great for me to be able to to load that work up to talpine and then to then to receive that, you know, that Adobe document back that was typeset, and it was in a new font that was formatted in such a way that it was just a really fresh and new way to look at this work in order to go back through.
Speaker 4:And, again, I know it's pretty specific about it, but just wanna speak into those that are thinking about this process of what it would mean and and kinda where you take it from there. I really appreciated the the knowledge that I could go through that document and I could highlight areas that needed to be edited. And then that that document would be edited for me, and then I could look at it again. And it wasn't like ever kinda having you know, when we think about working with a third party or or, you know, having this relationship, we're we're always kind of afraid of, well, you know, how many times can I really edit? Or is it like I get the first three free, and then I'm gonna be nickel and dimed?
Speaker 2:And I
Speaker 4:know that there was a responsibility as as the author to not kinda come back and say, hey. I'm I've rewritten it altogether. But instead to say, you know, I'm really still in the in the process of shaping this thing and kinda living with it for a while. So I enjoyed the fact that, first of all, that I was going to be able to keep and retain all of that intellectual property, but that it was just so smooth and kinda helpful. And it really kinda took the stress off of the whole situation to not think that, you know, that the clock was ticking in terms or that I would kinda have to continue to to pay for a thing getting done.
Speaker 4:So that was just a joy kinda from from my perspective.
Speaker 2:Excellent. Well, that's that's really what we've gone for. I've had in engagements with other publishing houses and with my own personal work where I felt like I couldn't turn my head during the publishing process. I had no flexibility, no room for movement. Everything was so systematized, which systems are good and you need them in business, but things were so systematized.
Speaker 2:There was a rigidity there that just it was just unsavory. It didn't it didn't sit well with me. So when we built Tallpine, we thought we're gonna create a system where revisions can happen freely on the author end. We'll set up some parameters so that, like you said, people aren't rewriting their entire book after typesetting takes place, or just nitpicking the thing for years on end. But we want people to be able to make changes.
Speaker 2:If there's an issue, an error, a correction, something they wanna say more clearly, we can go back and forth and fine tune this thing until it's right where you want it. And we're going to do that even after you receive the physical proof copy in hand. So the physical proof comes in hand. We've worked with companies before where it's like, once you get the physical proof, you wanna make any changes after that, it's gonna be expensive. For us, we're like, we've kind of realized when you see the book in print physically in your hands, type fit typeset, in body type, paragraph styles, and hyphenation, and all these rules set, your eye is gonna catch things it didn't see before.
Speaker 2:It's usually only a few things by that point in the process, but you're gonna see things that you wanna correct and adjust. No problem. We'll knock it out and take care of it. So we really feel like we're partnering with authors to see a result and not just running through running people through this system with an end goal of let's collect an invoice and send you out the door. It's not like that.
Speaker 2:And because we've had that approach, we have a ton of return clients Sure. Which is something that surprised me. And I, you know, I wanted that, but I wasn't sure how realistic it was. But we have an enormous number of authors who come back over and over again. We've got people who gosh, one guy has done close to 30 titles with us.
Speaker 2:Amazing. So it's outrageous. So we really we aim for that. We gun for that. My background is in ministry.
Speaker 2:It's not in business. And so I get the value of nonprofits, local churches, itinerant ministry, and all those things, and what they bring to the table. And so our goal is is partnership rather than just profit.
Speaker 4:The money grab. Yeah. No. For sure. And I I would say also, yeah, that getting that proof in the mail is just, like, the best way to just know that you are it that it is what it should be.
Speaker 4:Right? And and I can remember still having some edits to make once that once I have that page in there, you know, once it was on the physical page. And you could say it's always funny that day that your your proof comes because you can say, hey. I wrote a book, and, like, you're holding the book. Like, you wrote the the one book that exists in the world, and here it is.
Speaker 4:So absolutely. Well, as we kinda land this plane together, Nick, I just wanna maybe talk speak into the the one last issue, and that would be really when it comes down to motivation for for the author to say, well, goodness. Is is it even worth it? I think that you you said something really wise when you just thought about, hey. Look.
Speaker 4:This this book that you create, this text, it may just be for your circle. But guess what? That that will be enough. And so maybe that speaks into a matter of of legacy. I mean, I've even had a conversation, and here I go.
Speaker 4:I'm kind of broadening this out, Nick, as we finish up. But it was just such a really neat thing to have have written this book and then and then had some sales and given books and books away and then having a a very dear friend say, hey. When, you know, when I saw that you did this, it it made me think, you know what? I I really do wanna put something down for my family, like, for my kids, for my grandkids, and and I think we call that legacy writing is what is that right? So maybe just kinda speak into that that final, like, is it is it worth it if it's not going to be something that that is going to sell, you know, a 1000000000 copies?
Speaker 2:I don't think I've ever met an author who wrote a book and regretted it. I've met people who've regretted eating fast food. I've met people who regretted business decisions. I've met people who've regretted, you know, all sorts of things, but people who put their book down and you get it on paper, who get it in print, they're happy they did because it is a matter of legacy. It is a matter of influence.
Speaker 2:Your book is a little profit that you're sending out on your behalf to speak for you. When you're sleeping, when you're napping, when you're on vacation, when you're mowing the grass, people are gonna be consuming your content and you're gonna be communicating without you having to be there. It's an amazing tool in that way. I've known people who said, look, I'm super busy. If I have people who wanna be mentored by me, I don't I just don't have the time for it.
Speaker 2:So if they're serious about being mentored, I'll hand them my book and I'll say, read the book. When you do, get with me and we'll meet. And they use it as a buffer in their schedule to create room to vet out who's serious about real mentorship and who's not. There's a lot of practical uses and very spiritual uses to a book like that. I've got my grandfather, paternal grandfather, my mom's dad, was born in 18/94.
Speaker 2:K. I'm 29 years old. So you do the math there. He was 79 when my mom was born. It was like a state record in Indiana.
Speaker 2:Really interesting life. Very successful in business, was a freemason, ended up getting saved later in life. Just all sorts of wild stuff. But I only know little snippets about him. Very few things about him because he didn't write.
Speaker 2:I would have loved to have even a 20,000 word synopsis of his life written by him. I don't have it. There was a gentleman who played he's born again Christian, who got saved later in life also. He I knew him personally. He played for Ozzy Osbourne, and did he wrote an original national anthem on electric guitar that won awards, and he would play for NFL teams.
Speaker 2:And he's very successful, got saved, had a crazy story. I told him, I said, you need to write your story. You need to write your mentor or your memoir. And he said, well, I'm not that old yet. I'll maybe I could write it later on.
Speaker 2:He was dead within 2 years, unexpectedly. Now everything that his descendants and people want to know about him can be found in a 1 paragraph obituary, when they could be consuming an entire piece that he dictated, that he determined in writing his story. The impact of legacy when it comes to writing is huge. It's monumental, and it will outlive you. I don't know who said it, so maybe I can take credit for it if we can't find an, original an original author.
Speaker 2:But someone said the world is ruled by dead men because dead men wrote books. So get busy.
Speaker 4:Man, for sure. Nick, thank you so much for sitting down with me today. Tallpinebooks.com is where the listener needs to go. Is that right?
Speaker 2:That's right.
Speaker 4:Okay. That's where we're gonna send them. Listener, I hope this has been something that has inspired you. I hope that you feel equipped by some of the practical help that we've discussed today. I hope also that you feel encouraged that there is a book in you, and so and it and the world needs it.
Speaker 4:So get out there, get up early in the morning, and just start writing, and start creating, and know that it can be such a blessing for so many. Nick, I hope you have the best week. And again, thank you so much for sitting down with me today, and I'm looking forward to the next time that we can talk. Because again, I think that there's nothing greater than just being able to invest in someone, and I know that that writing is just such a great way to do that.
Speaker 2:Amen. Thank you so much.
Speaker 4:Listener, we appreciate your heart for mentoring. Thank you for investing in the lives of young people, and we want to remember and to remind you that you can mentor.