Book Cover Blues

I submitted the cover of Speedster to the cover contest at Joel Friedlander's website, The Book Designer, last month. I thought I would get some useful feedback, maybe some praise, and possibly some free publicity that would result in a few more sales. Judging by Joel's comments (below) my cover was not nearly so good as I imagined. That got me to thinking that the cover might be part of my problem. It's a well established fact by now that, in spite of the old saw that you can't, readers judge a book by its cover—especially the readers of ebooks. If that cover is confusing, inscrutable, and illegible, as Joel says mine is, it doesn't have much hope of attracting attention.

Jonah Gibson submitted Speedster designed by Jonah Gibson. “I had this photo of an Auburn Boattail Speedster that I took at a car show several years ago. I’d already excised the car and created a poster. When I finished the book, it seemed only natural to use the poster as a cover. It all just kind of fell into place.”


JF: An odd background choice, a car that appears to be flying, and typography that’s inscrutable and in some cases illegible

Legible, scrutable,
grounded, and red.
Is this enough? IDK!

Taking that thought to heart I have redesigned the cover for Speedster. Here is the new one.




I think it's better, at least insofar as it addresses Joel's misgivings about the old one. On the other hand, I clearly don't know a good cover from a mediocre one since I was pretty jazzed about my first effort. Maybe you can tell me how I did by leaving a comment. Or maybe this whole subject just bores you to tears, in which case I apologize for taking up your time and your bandwidth. Either way, if you got this far, thanks for listening.

Buy This Pen

   

I watched The Wolf of Wall Street last night. I thought it was pretty entertaining, and I was thinking, “I sure am glad people like Jordan Belfort are completely bereft of any moral fiber so I can sit in the comfort of my living room and watch them consume huge quantities of drugs, float (and sink) huge boats, and cavort with naked bimbos.” It is satisfying somehow to participate vicariously in their decadence and spiritual bankruptcy without having to endure any consequences myself. The only troubling thing about Belfort's deal is that he didn't have to suffer any consequences either—not real ones at any rate.

If you listen to Belfort lament his life today you will hear him say that he lost everything, that he spent time in prison, that he is reformed to the extent that he is not committing any actual crimes anymore, and that he now gives as much as he receives. Really?

His brokerage firm, Stratton Oakmont, is said to have bilked investors out of $200 Million. Even though Belfort claims that 90% of what they did was legal, and likely it was, there is little doubt that their sales tactics were sleazy and reprehensible. Whatever he thinks he 'lost' was never really his in the first place. He took it from someone else. Just because the people he took it from should have been better informed or exercised more care in their investment strategies does not mean that Belfort earned or deserved the wealth he accumulated before he lost it.

He spent seven or eight years snorting cocaine, popping quaaludes, drinking to excess, and chasing strippers, hookers, and loose women of every ilk. He committed multiple financial crimes and tried to cover it up. He hid his money overseas. He accumulated something north of $100 Million, and yet was sentenced to only 4 years in jail of which he only served 22 months. So time in prison? Negligible and certainly not commensurate with his offenses. Of course Jordan Belfort was rich and white and married to a model when he got caught, so he got a pass. He ratted out his co-conspirators for a reduced sentence. If he'd been a person of color, he would probably still be rotting in a cell, and no one would have made a movie celebrating his immense good fortune.

Reformed? The extent of his rehabilitation is measured by the fact that he is still trading on his notoriety. He made another $100 Million last year teaching people his proven sales techniques—ostensibly the same ones he used to bilk his investors except now he claims that they are ethical. So there's nothing wrong in his mind with the techniques. His only problem was using the techniques to sell stuff that had no value. Now he's using his sales techniques to sell sales techniques. I would argue that these too have no value. Here's why.

In a couple of places in the film we see Leonardo DiCaprio, who plays Belfort, hand someone a pen and tell them to sell it to him. “Sell me this pen,” he says, and they sputter and hem and haw until he takes the pen away and gives it to someone else. “Sell me this pen.”

I kept wondering what I would do if he handed me a pen to sell him. I'm not a natural sales person. I'm not a big talker. I'm not glib or persuasive. In fact I'm uncomfortable with the notion of talking someone into buying something that I know they don't need. I don't think sales people add value.

Order takers do. Order takers enable the flow of commerce. They provide a necessary link between makers and users, creation and desire, supply and demand. Sales people on the other hand try to create demand where there is none. They try to inflame desire when there is no real satisfaction. Because I believe this, I suck at sales. But . . . even though I suck at sales, I know how to sell you a pen. I know exactly what to say to Jordan Belfort if he ever hands me a pen and tells me to sell it to him.

I would say this: “I know what you're thinking. Not just that. I know what you think you're thinking as well as what you're really thinking. What you think you're thinking is this—you don't need this pen. This pen is too fancy. It costs too much. This beautiful pen has no more utility than a 19 cent Bic, but it costs 500 times as much. This pen—this particular beautiful, luxurious, expensive fine writing instrument—is a waste of money, and even if you were to buy it, you would probably just lose it.

“But, like I said, that's only what you think you're thinking. None of that has anything to do with the actual pen. All that stuff you think you're thinking has to do with you. What you're really thinking—the thing that really bothers you about buying this pen—is that you don't think you deserve it. You think this pen's too good for you. No, that's not it either, not exactly. You think that you're not good enough for this pen. The emphasis is on you.

“You need to change that way of thinking. You need to embrace the fact that you deserve this pen. You need to believe that you're good enough for it, and you know why? Because it's true. That's why. You are good enough. The only thing preventing you from buying this pen is you. Get out of your own way. Believe in yourself. Liberate your own potential. Be everything you can be. A good place to start would be to buy this pen. You know you want to. Come on. Just do it. Just be you. Just buy this pen.”

Now, I'm pretty sure that that little spiel would get Jordan Belfort's attention. It certainly beats the pants off false starts and hemming and hawing. What I don't know—the pudding where the proof is—would that spiel induce anyone to buy an expensive pen, or is it just a clever thing to say in a room full of people who think they want to excel at sales so they can drive Lamborghinis and sleep with models? You see, even knowing what to say doesn't mean you're not going to suck at sales. 

Living the Calamitous Life

We all rely on personal anecdotal evidence, probably more than is good for us, to develop and fine-tune our respective world views. I am no exception in this. For instance, I have learned, over many years and many events, that whenever I accumulate a little extra money something bad is about to happen. Some essential device is going to break. Someone is going to get sick. Some force of nature is going to wreak havoc with my life or that of someone close to me, and almost always this cataclysmic event is going to end up costing me all the money that I have accumulated.

I am forced to conclude then that all of my problems have their root in too much money because almost all of my problems are solved by parting with the amount of money that would otherwise have been considered surplus. Even more amazing perhaps is that the amount of money that constitutes 'too much' at a given time has diminished over time. When in years gone by I might have had to accumulate several thousand dollars of surplus before some untoward event befell me or my family, now I can look forward to a minor catastrophe if I find an extra $20 under some scraps of paper on my desk.

In fact the powers of the universe are so finely attuned to my fortunes that calamities have begun to queue up in advance of my actually having any spare cash. Currently I have two cars in need of repair, one so that I can sell it for some ready cash and to save money on car insurance. When this happens I can be pretty sure that the other car will require all of that new currency to stay on the road. In addition I have a dog with a dodgy eye and chronic stomach troubles, a home air conditioner that seems to be on its last legs, a computer that takes several hours to reboot, a yard full of fire ant mounds, and a life insurance premium due that I can't afford to pay. That last is a mixed blessing as when the coverage finally lapses I will, for the first time in a decade, be worth more alive than I am dead—or maybe it should be worth even less dead than I am alive.

I am hopeful, given the way things have worked out until now, that all these mishaps waiting to happen will be somehow avoided. My guess is that I will get an infusion of capital that is just sufficient to cover the expenses, but no more. Notwithstanding it will all be gone shortly after it arrives, it's still kind of comforting to know that a massive funding is headed my way. I tell you though, living like this is not for the faint of heart nor those of little faith. Even so, who wouldn't wish it were otherwise? I for one could use a little breathing room.