Since it became available for pre-order, several people have purchased my upcoming book, “Stone Motel – Memoirs of a Cajun Boy” (expected delivery April 2020 from the University Press of Mississippi). To be quite uncharacteristically sincere about it, I am humbled and grateful, and more than a bit fixed in a state of suspended belief.

Part of the writing experience necessarily includes the selling experience. I’ve been a salesman before: first, as a kid renting rooms at the Stone Motel, then as a teen-aged cashier at the National supermarket in the old Amy Shopping Center in Eunice, La., then when I was an LSU student, as a cashier at an ECOL filling station in Baton Rouge, and then more formally, as the head of advertising for The Eunice News – where I wrote, designed, and sold ads for three years.

And of course, the lion’s share of my career in public relations has involved the “selling” of ideas (in my case, about healthcare and medicine, law, business, refugee resettlement, early childhood poverty research, and now, the value that immigrants can bring to America, if given a level playing field).

So I should know a thing or two about selling – you’d think. And you’d be right, mostly. What is hard for me is selling myself. That doesn’t come as easily to me as selling stuff for others. This, I understand, is a common phenomenon among people of certain professions.

Momma, in her beauty shop, “Eliza’s,” was a whiz at making all her customers’ coifs look great. BUT, she was really bad at doing the same for herself. She had the worst hair in town (it was naturally thick and a beautiful shade of pecan auburn, but she spent zero time to bring out its amazingness – she was just too busy for that.)

ANYWAY, to get this book sold, I MUST MUST MUST get over my bashfulness about self-promotion (setting up this website was the first step in that direction) and SELL you (and a few thousand of my closest friends) on this book. I will be doing that over the next few months within these posts of course – hopefully without scaring you away from the meat-and-potatoes of the blog: Louisiana (and other) food, memories, and my current experiences as a New Yorker.

In today’s post I hope to clear up any confusion about how the buying process works. First, no matter where you buy it, it will benefit both the publisher and me. (The publisher gets most of the loot – I get a wee percentage of each book sold).

So, you can buy it directly from the publisher, University Press of Mississippi, or from Amazon, or Barnes and Noble, or IndieBound.org. That said, I’ve been asked if I have a preference as to where to pre-purchase. The answer is: I do. I would buy the book directly from the publisher. You won’t get a discount for doing that, but the publisher isn’t the middle-man, so they get to keep more of the sale. And the publisher (U. Press of Miss.) is a nonprofit organization, unlike all the other sellers. Simple as that. And of course, once the book lives in its physical form in April 2020, you will be able to buy it in places where books are sold.

Now get pre-buying! I have a new chalet in Switzerland to furnish (LOLZ)! (Oh, and THANK YOU!!!)

C’est tout!

M

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