Dad, Corky and me at Russet Street House, North Portland in 1947.

Whew!  All 31 chapters are completed.  Now, I am working with Susan Wells, the book designer to coordinate placing the photos in to book and I think that should wrap up in a few days.

Then, Susan will finish the formatting so that I  solicit  printing bids and finally get the manuscript turned into a book!  It would be great to have the bids already, but I can’t get them until I know how many pagers there are going to be, and I don’t know that yet till the formatting is done.

It could make me nostalgic for the old days when a publisher bought the book from an author and handled the printing, publicity, and distribution, but it doesn’t.  I can get the book out now, and in the old days, I am none too sure that a publisher would have picked it up.  I can just imagine a conversation about my story with a prospective publisher’s rep…

“You say the book is about a sports and auto store that started out as a war surplus store in the 50s?”  “Who cares about war surplus stores?”  “And, what is a sports and auto store, any way?”  “And, all this happened in the Pacific Northwest?”  “Don’t you know you need to have a larger base of interested readers?”

“Oh, it would be interesting to sports and outdoor enthusiasts, everywhere?”  “Do they read?”

If my imaginary conversation with a publisher’s rep is at all realistic, can you see why I am so much better off publishing and promoting Growing Up With G.I. Joe’s myself?

At least, that is my story and I am sticking to it, since no publishers are knocking at my door!