Free Audiobook of 99 Jobs to the first responder

99 Jobs: Blood, Sweat, and Houses is now available as an audiobook at the iTunes store or at Audible.com. I've got a free coupon I'll give to the first person to send me an email (joecottonwood at gmail). But, hey, it's worth buying. I read it in my own lovable raspy voice, so it's an authentic experience.

If you want it on CDs (and the sound quality is better that way) I can send you a set of ten CDs, which includes the entire audiobook. For that I'll have to charge $40 to cover the expenses.

The link to the iTunes store is here.
The link to the Audible store is here.
For CDs, shoot me an email.

For Labor Day: 99 Jobs at a penny a job!

To celebrate Labor Day USA, I'm doing a one-week price reduction of 99 Jobs to 99 cents in the e-book editions. That's a penny a job!

Here are the links for
Kindle,
iBook,
Nook,
Kobo,
Smashwords.
Any edition of the e-book will be priced at 99 cents through Labor Day.

If you're in the United Kingdom, you can celebrate Labor Day, too. You'll get the same price reduction at UK Kindle or Nook UK (it may take a few hours -- or days -- for the price reduction to trickle out to all the worldwide servers).

Happy Labor Day everybody.

Another honor -- Kirkus Starred Review!

I was reluctant to submit 99 Jobs to the Kirkus review service because they are reputed to be the grumpy curmudgeons of the book review biz. On the other hand, a good review from them would be an honest honor. And lo and behold, they not only gave it a great review but also a Star! 

For an indie writer, a starred review from Kirkus is a rare and lovely accolade.

Here's what they said:

A general contractor and author looks back on a 35-year career contending with a variety of houses and people—most in disrepair. 

Beginning when the author was just starting out as a novice handyman in the 1970s, this collection of short essays roughly progresses through to the present day, when, despite numerous tumbles off ladders and at least one impaling, Cottonwood is still plying his trade. The many blue-collar jobs that Cottonwood (Clear Heart, 2009, etc.) wonderfully describes in his latest offering may involve worm-gear saws, ladders, lighting fixtures and the like, but they’re really all about people. Some are wealthy, some poor, but all are frail in some way and in need of some proper shoring—that includes the ace carpenter himself. Each vignette confidently stands on its own, whether several pages long or only a few paragraphs. The robust snapshots of the carpenter’s working life toiling in crawl spaces and basements around Southern California over the last four decades consistently play on important themes of mortality, class and personal fulfillment. Elegant entries like “A Working-Class Hippie” and “The Airplane Room” touch on the often ephemeral nature of close human relationships. A vague sense of melancholy pervades much of Cottonwood’s work, even in the midst of relative triumph, such as when Cottonwood receives a check for a job well-done: “This simple act always fascinates me: the transfer of wealth. So casual. So vital. A rich man of immense power, a tradesman with none. What if he refused?” 

Expertly crafted narrative nonfiction that reveals the framework of people’s lives. 

They got it wrong about "Southern California," but I guess from Manhattan anything west of the Hudson River is southern Cal. For the record, it's mostly about the San Francisco Bay Area with stops in upstate New York and St. Louis and Colorado and a bit of Maryland.

You can see the official review at https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/joe-cottonwood/99-jobs/.

99 Jobs -- Best Non-Fiction Book of 2014!

Just announced at the Book Expo America in New York: My book 99 Jobs: Blood, Sweat, and Houses has won the 2014 IRDA First Place as the "Best Non-Fiction of the Year." (IRDA is IndieReader Discovery Award, sponsored by IndieReader.com.) Not "among the best." Not "one of the top five." They called it "THE BEST." First place. The best non-fiction indie book of 2014.

I'm feeling a little proud.

In addition to the honor, the prize includes a free Kindle Paperwhite 3G. I've never had an e-reader, so this will be a new experience for me.

But -- wow. "The best." If you see me smiling, now you know why.

Stamp of Approval from the Industry Giant

The current issue of Publishers Weekly has a review of 99 Jobs. The words they use are:

"a gritty and entertaining memoir"
"colorful characters and situations"
"Cottonwood's prose is lively and his stories often charming. Readers will find it easy to relate to the author and his experiences, which are likely to appeal to anyone who has worked a less-than-perfect job."

I'm delighted. In the main trade magazine of the big publishing industry, a good review by Publishers Weekly is an important stamp of approval for a small indie publisher such as myself.

Mike Rose!

Mike Rose is one of my heroes. He is a guru of blue collar values and the author of The Mind at Work, a book that lives up to its description as he "demolishes the long-held notion that people who work with their hands make up a less intelligent class. He shows us waitresses making lightning-fast calculations, carpenters handling complex spatial mathematics, and hairdressers, plumbers, and electricians with their aesthetic and diagnostic acumen." I totally recommend the book. 

So I sent a copy of 99 Jobs to Mike Rose. He responded, and posted this review on Amazon: "This is a delightful book, full of engaging stories about work and working life. It is humane and warmly funny." He used a pseudonym to post the review, but he enthusiastically encouraged me to identify him and use the quote. Then he bought another copy and sent it to a craftsman-friend, who wrote back: "I've only read five paragraphs coming back from the mailbox and I'm already laughing out loud."

". . . a delightful book, full of engaging stories about work and working life. . . humane and warmly funny."
—Mike Rose, author of The Mind at Work.

Word of mouth, plus a couple of Amazon reviews, are my only publicity. A self-published book isn't going to get any help from the big media. You won't see 99 Jobs reviewed in the New York Times. Oprah won't be plugging it (though she might like it).

If you've read 99 Jobs and happen to like it, please tell a friend. Maybe even post a review on Goodreads or Amazon. Help people find it.

A few days ago, the UPS driver delivered a package to my house and said, "Hey! I'm reading your book!" Somebody on the route had bought a copy for him. Made my day. I hope you all have a good one, too.

I'm giving away 9 copies of 99 Jobs

Goodreads Book Giveaway

99 Jobs

by Joe Cottonwood

Giveaway ends December 26, 2013.

See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

Enter to win

On the air

I'm on the radio today, KQED San Francisco, the Perspective show. It will be repeated on Sunday. If you're out of radio range, as most of you are, you can hear me at:
http://www.kqed.org/a/perspectives/R201311270735

It's a two-minute reading of "The Secret Value of Junk," one of the stories in 99 Jobs.

They snapped this photo of me, looking like I just stepped off a construction site.

Oh well. We can't all be glamorous.

Bookmarks, bookmarks, bookmarks...

Maybe all that sawdust from the Kesey lumber went to my brain. I underestimated how much work the bookmarks would require. If you're a carpenter, you're probably familiar with that sinking sensation when you've put in a whole day and accomplished one-fifth of what you expected.

About those Kesey bookmarks: I invited Terry Adams to join me and James Adams (no relation) in the production. Terry is a natural for the job. Terry is the man who rescued Ken Kesey's house from collapse and rebuilt it after a flood. Terry donated the floorboards and water tank lumber. Here's Terry routing "99 Jobs" into some bookmarks:

Terry could only work for a short while because it was his 70th birthday and he was about to spend the day motorcycling, which is more important than anything.

About that routing. It's hard. You're holding a five-pound, vibrating router in one hand while trying to write on a thin piece of wood. Wood grain and worm holes try to redirect the router. And handwriting was always my worst skill in grade school. Here are some that I had to reject:

 
The top bookmark, which seems to say "99 Jabs," is a fir floorboard from the Kesey house. As you can see, worms found those floors to be quite tasty. Maybe it was the chemicals spilled in the kitchen. The bottom bookmark is redwood from the Kesey water tank. My hand simply wandered on that one. I blame the sawdust fumes.

Anyway, we're having fun. I'm sorry about the delay, but hey, that's construction. I should have everything out in the mail by next Monday.

And here's a comment from somebody who saw the wormy bookmarks:

Joe, your wormy floorboards reminded me of an Ogden Nash poem (which I may accidentally misquote):

The Termite
-------------------
Some primal termite knocked on wood,
And tasted it, and found it good.
And that is why your cousin May
Fell through the parlor floor today.

(Quickly) Opinions, please

In less than 24 hours I need to make a final decision on the book cover. Here are two versions:

 

Which do you prefer? Or a combo of the two?

Here's the back cover. I think it's pretty well nailed down, but if you have comments, please let me know. Time's a-wastin'!

Later today I'll join James Adams at his workshop to make more bookmarks. Over the weekend I saw him sharpening knives on a whetstone, and I can testify that he has no fear of cutting edges. To demonstrate how his thumb was healing, he whacked on the bandage with the back of a knife, apparently feeling no pain. At least, no blood spurted out. James is a character. A good one. A pleasure to work with.

Cutting bookmarks

Today we began cutting bookmarks. On a table saw James Adams ripped slivers from a redwood 2x6 that used to be part of Ken Kesey's water tank. The wood is clear heart, vertical grain with mineralization stains (of heaven knows what chemicals). I took some photos as he began.

After cutting the long slivers into 8" pieces, I sanded their edges and then commenced engraving "99 Jobs" into the individual bookmarks. James, meanwhile, began cutting slivers from other pieces of lumber. I was hunched over the trim router, engraving "99 Jobs" freehand over and over, when James suddenly cursed and put his thumb into his mouth. Guiding a piece of wood, he'd run the pad of his thumb over the saw blade. The blade was set to protrude about 1/4" above the top of the piece he was cutting, so he sliced a 1/4" gash into his thumb.

Immediately I helped wrap it in gauze and tape. His wife drove him to the Palo Alto Clinic, where he is right now as I write this (the accident happened about an hour ago).

James is one of the best woodworkers I know. He says this is the worst accident he's ever had in his shop. He's careful, and he has a lifetime of experience. Yet it happened.

There are spatters of blood on the table saw. Red stains in the partially sawed wood. No, I won't be including that lumber among the bookmarks—to which we will return in a few days, I hope.

Be careful out there.

Progress Report

The editing is nearly complete. We're down to the teeny-weeny style issues such as discussing whether "a blond woman" or "a blonde woman" is better usage (both are allowed). (And if you're wondering, we're going with "blonde.")

I'm aiming for an official publication date of November 15 but hope to be sending out Kickstarter reward copies earlier than that.

Meanwhile, I obsess over the book cover. Thank you everybody for all the feedback. What became apparent is that nobody liked the white background. Many people liked the black background because, as they say, it makes the tool belt "pop out," and people seem to have a fondness for old tool belts. It reminds them of their boyfriend or their grandfather or of their own hardscrabble days. The great thing about the black background is that it still works as a thumbnail, which is important when you're selling books on the internet. As a full size 6x9" book, though, the solid black is not so good – it needs texture.

The most votes, however, went for the siding as background. I've been struggling with that. The siding tends to diminish the impact of the tool belt. Then today it occurred to me that instead of lightening the siding, I'd try darkening it. Wow! Now I've got siding, plus the tool belt pops out. Here's how it looks at this stage:

And as a thumbnail:

I'm on the radio again. Mostly it's about one of the biggest and saddest jobs in my life (which will be in the book), taking care of my older brother as his health and his house are collapsing around him – and as I am investigated for elder abuse. For the rest of this week, you can hear it here:
http://www.neighborhoodradio.info/shows/porch-talk

My 28 minutes of fame

The editing is nearly complete. My editor, Susan Walker, combines a sympathetic attitude with a persnickety eye for detail. We have the same goal: we want every word in 99 Jobs to be absolutely right.

I was interviewed by a radio show called Porch Talk about 99 Jobs and other topics including a few of my songs.  It's a 28 minute show: http://www.neighborhoodradio.info/archived-broadcasts?af=porchtalk130915.mp3

Meanwhile I've been working on the cover design. Any opinions?  Let me know.

Kickstarter: the Grand Finale

Wow. Kickstarter is more than funds. It's a community.

From the messages I've received, and the pledges that have followed, I feel a community gathering around this book — from all over the planet. It's a community that cares about physical work in all its human aspects, from touching a life to nailing your thumb: what's funny, what's hard, what's uplifting, what's sad.

A warm and hearty thank you to everybody who pledged. Beyond giving me the funds, you've given me the spirit to create 99 Jobs. Now I must dive into the final bookmaking process: the assembly, the last edits, the design, the printing and distribution.

My bookmark-making partner, James Adams, just got married on September 4 and will be away for a few days of well-deserved play. When he returns, we will create several hundred bookmarks to give out as rewards. We just might create a few extra bookmarks, if anybody missed the deadline.

It looks like the special edition of More Jobs will be limited to 21 copies unless another order mysteriously appears in my inbox — sometimes my email takes a slow and circuitous route.

As for 99 Jobs, I hope to print hundreds of copies for the first run.  And if the gods keep smiling, I'll print more.

I'll keep you posted.

Kickstarter, Week Four: Labor Day

Happy Labor Day, folks. My Kickstarter fundraiser has reached its minimum goal of $3999 and is still climbing, with four more days to run.  I wanted the project to wrap around Labor Day for obvious reasons. 99 Jobs is about labor.

You all are wonderful. You've given me the backing — and the confidence — to launch 99 Jobs. I'm gratified that many of you remember my previous books and are eager for a new one. I'm delighted that some of you are discovering me for the first time. I'm thrilled at your world-wide distribution. You have pledged from Romania, China, Italy, England, Netherlands, Canada, Maine, New Jersey, Georgia, Montana, Kansas, Arizona, Hawaii, and of course from La Honda, the center of my world.

I'll continue to take pre-orders for 99 Jobs via Kickstarter through September 5. Each pre-ordered book will be personally signed by me — and inscribed any way that you wish. Your name (or a name of your choice — spouse, grandparent, lover) will be included on the Construction Crew List at the end of the book, if you have chosen that reward level. And each pre-ordered book will include one or more bookmarks made of vintage lumber, if you have chosen that reward level.

So far (morning, Sept 2), twenty people have reached the More Jobs reward level (besides the seventeen shown on the web page, three more have pledged at that level but couldn't make the reward button work — some kind of Kickstarter glitch). In the next five days, perhaps a few more will arrive. It will be a very limited, very special edition. An edition I'll be proud of.

But there's a problem. I was planning the More Jobs reward to be a small supplement of about a dozen stories. Now I find that there are simply too many I'd like to include — like, about a hundred. In addition to the ones I've already mentioned in the previous update, I could choose:

• The drug dealer in condo #2.
• A boy who was never born, now almost eighteen years old.
• Hillbillies in a mansion.
• An angel of death.
• Delivering babies … and a stove.
• A psychologist who tries to psyche me out of a payment.
• A decorator who has radioactive sex.
• More, more, more.

I don't know how many will make the final cut. With the help you've provided I can hire my crackerjack editor, who won't allow any substandard material, to help winnow the list to maybe twenty of the highest quality. The rest will have to wait for a sequel.

As for the 99 Jobs, they are already the very best. I'm buffing and polishing, nearly ready to launch. It's a product of labor. And love.

Thanks, everybody, for your warm and enthusiastic support.

Note: about the photo.  Why does it look like I'll be hammering screws?  Well, it happens sometimes.  It's in the book...

Kickstarter, Week Three: More Jobs

Nine days to go, and I'm at 85%. Thank you, everybody.  We just might make it.  If you haven't already pledged, you can help here.  Please?

Of the 89 backers (so far) of this project, 46 are first-timers on Kickstarter. I'm delighted to have brought so many newcomers. I hope you stick around and find more undertakings to support. I'm a newbie myself, but in the first month I've already made donations (mostly very small) to eight other kickstarts. The web site is dangerously addictive.

When Kickstarter suggested that I should include a premium reward, I decided to include one at the $99 level: a special limited edition to be called MORE JOBS which will include about a dozen additional adventures. I have about 300 stories to choose from—and more that I will write. Right now I'm trying to decide among:

• A Superior Court judge who lives outside the law.  
• Falling through the ceiling into a woman's shower—while she is showering.
• A bandit who steals a fortune, lives in squalor, and is betrayed by a cat.
• "The Mongrel" — a dog who could outwit a Nobel prizewinner.
• The poet whose hand was (perhaps) eaten by a tiger.
• A Stanford Hospital surgeon smoking marijuana while conducting a family meeting with his missionary wife and teenage son—all undressed in a hot tub—while I'm installing lights.
• Working for a toxic couple—young woman, older man—shortly before the young woman is murdered.
• An illegal immigrant from China who wins the heart of a town—but not quite everybody in town.
• Selling shovels to miners in the second great California Gold Rush.
• The libidinous woman—a client offering benefits—who happens to own a mortuary.
• The policemen who hold me at gunpoint and slam me against my truck—for burglary.
• The skinny-dipping Congressman and his skinny-dipping wife. 
• The rabbi whose new, improved lighting reveals erotic figures in his furniture.
• Desperately trying to maintain my demented, dying brother in his dilapidated house—and being investigated for Elder Abuse. 

Or I could include the tale of the incompetent blue jay who needs the help of a carpenter (me) to build his nest—or the time I was hosed by a less-than-satisfied client—or the sugar daddy who uses shopping as foreplay… So many jobs, so little time.

Kickstarter, Week Two: Birthday edition

Today is my 66th birthday.  I'm aiming for 99 years on this planet, so I've got a ways to go.

Today also marks two weeks of Kickstarter campaigning.  I've raised 63% of my goal, so there's a ways to go on that project, too.

I'm adding a new reward level.  What the heck, it might be fun.  For a pledge of $499 I will give a one hour reading to you and assembled guests at your house — or restaurant, bar, church, library, football arena…  I've been giving monthly readings, mostly at the bar of our local restaurant, for the last three years.  We call it Lit Night.  The beer and wine make for an appreciative, relaxed audience.  Let me bring the experience to you and your friends.  (You must be within a reasonable distance of La Honda — that is, the San Francisco Bay area or Santa Cruz or a boat on the Pacific Ocean within a half mile of shore.  There are limits to how far I can drive.  Or swim.)

Musicians give house concerts.  Why not writers?   A house reading.

Here's the audience at a recent Lit Night:

Click here for the link to my Kickstarter campaign.

Kickstarter, Week One: Blue Collar Writing

After one week, the 99 Jobs kickstart has reached 34% of the goal.  Thank you for pledging.  If you haven't, please do.  Every little pledge helps.  By pledging, you can pre-order a copy of the book -- and give me the advance funds to pay for the book production.

I'm tickled pink that the Kickstarter web site has highlighted 99 Jobs as a "Staff Pick," which gives it prominent placement on the display page (and means they personally like it.)

I'm getting wonderful emails from folks who've seen the 99 Jobs campaign and are attracted to the idea of "blue collar writing," a term several people have used.  I'd be proud to bear that name.  One colorful woman in Ohio whose father runs a tow truck company sent me a long email detailing the strange clients she's met, sometimes at the point of a 12 gauge shotgun.  I suggested she write a book.  She says she will.

I've got 3 weeks to raise the remaining $2611 -- or I get nothing.  Those are the Kickstarter rules: you make your fundraising goal, or else all the pledge money goes back to the donors.

I've received pledges from Shanghai, Great Britain, and the Netherlands.  Fans of blue collar writing from all over the planet...

And here we go!

It's up and running:

Please, friends, help me out: spread the word to your circle of friends and companions and co-workers and even to your worst enemies (I can use their donations, too). The Kickstarter web page is here.

The goal is to raise $3999 so that I can publish a paperback book called 99 Jobs.  Production costs (editor, designer, printer) will be $8000, so I'm asking for half that. The other half will come out of my retirement savings.  Heck, I never really expected to retire anyway.  If enough people pre-order the book through Kickstarter, I'll know it's worth the investment.

You can pre-order an e-book for a $5 donation or a paperback for $20.  For a little extra donation, there are extra rewards: your name on the Construction Crew list, handmade wooden bookmarks. For a $99 donation, you'll get a special limited edition of More Jobs, of which only 99 copies will be printed—ever.  Or for $999, I'll come to your home and repair your toilet—and deliver the book face-to-face wearing my tool belt.

99 Jobs will be 99 "tool belt stories" about living in the construction zone.  Repairing homes, I meet people—the zany and the sober, the poor and the insanely rich. You can meet them, too, from professional clowns to Nobel prize winners, from con men to software zillionaires.  I’d like to share my own story as well.

The jobs range from changing light bulbs to rebuilding entire houses, with stops along the way as plumber, electrician, and remover of romantic woodpeckers. I’ve been showered by sewage, smoked by exploding gas, impaled like a vampire by a wooden stake. Some clients flirt—or something beyond flirtation.  Once I tried to kill a man. I’ve been cheated. I’ve had embarrassingly intimate relations with tools. I like good hard work though I’ve done some bad work, too. Along the way I’ve built a family—my own—and seen how a construction crew is like another temporary family, happy or Tolstoyan, loving or dysfunctional.

Wooden Bookmarks: the Ken Kesey edition

I make my home in La Honda, California.  My friend, the poet Terry Adams, also makes his home in La Honda. Terry's home is the cabin where Ken Kesey hung out with the Merry Pranksters and the Hells Angels, where Kesey conceived of the Acid Tests, and from which Kesey launched the bus "Further."  Terry bought the cabin directly from Kesey after the place had been neglected, abandoned, vandalized, and—the final insult—flooded by the rampaging La Honda Creek, which knocked the cabin off its foundation and filled it with mud.

With a respect bordering on reverence, Terry rebuilt the cabin, maintaining as much of the original structure (and psychedelic interior paint) as possible.

Some of the original boards had lost their structural integrity and couldn't be re-used in the cabin. Sliced, though, they make a great bookmark.  With the help of James Adams (no relation to Terry), here are some  samples.

I've got lumber from Ken Kesey's original floor and from his old water tank.  Who knows what kinds of Kool-Aid splashed onto the floorboards to be absorbed into the wood fibers?  And as for what was in that water tank, I can only speculate.

Warning: if you receive one of these bookmarks, DO NOT CUT IT INTO TABS AND INGEST.  I am not responsible if you feel a sudden urge to rip off your clothes and paint your body with paisley designs.

The tabs—er, bookmarks—will be offered as incentive rewards in my upcoming 99 Jobs  Kickstarter campaign.