Road Trip! 2014 is the year of Alaska on the Go

Nice shot, yes? Enjoying a summer day at Timberline Lodge in Oregon's Mount Hood Territory.

With the final AKontheGO.com summertime trip in the record books, it's time to start thinking about 2014. This is not entirely unusual, friends, since by Christmas I usually have the coming year all plotted, planned, and reserved. 2014, however, will be a teensy bit different.

We're going on a book tour.

We love road trips. 

Alaska on the Go: Exploring the forty-ninth state with children will be available in better bookstores (or the back of my car) by next spring, and with the boxes o' books comes the inevitable road and/or air tour to sell them. Good thing we like to travel.

University of Alaska Press  will handle the biggie destinations, and a tentative schedule will be released as soon as the final publishing date is announced, but we need your help to fill in a few extra days and places, because, gosh darn it, I hate to waste highway time.

home.comcast.net

Outside of our home state of Alaska, discussions have begun with folks in British Columbia and Alberta, Canada; Seattle, Bellevue, Bellingham, Granite Falls, and Issaquah, Washington; Portland and Bend, Oregon; and Durango, Colorado. Anybody down in California want to meet us, receive a signed copy of the book, and talk Alaska family travel? How about our Southern readers? We'd love to meet you, too!

Maybe a group campout? Book-signing under the stars, now that's something special!

Interested? togoak@gmail.com is the place to find me.

~EK

Today I Feel....

Slightly stupid.

Navigating the 300+ pages (oops, three hundred-plus, according to Chicago style, in which I must now write) of manuscript with comments and edits in just about every line can wreak havoc with one's psyche. My emotional bank account is a bit low today, anyway, and if I didn't need to have my comments about the comments in asap before we leave on vacation, I'd lay this aside until I had myself under control.

Sigh. But I can't, and came to tears about a few secondary queries after I had returned  the manuscript to Production Team. FYI - it's difficult to type when your nose is running.

Added to the stress this week was the unintended replacement of not one, but two hard drives for my trusty Mac, which now has me treating it like a fragile elderly relative that needs medication. "How can I help you, dear? Would you like a nap, now?"

Vacation beings on Friday, a much-needed trip to Central Oregon and the extended family's cabin at beautiful Mount Hood. Certainly both electronics and humans will receive a recharge.

A good one, one that will allow for fresh outlooks and new ideas on the other side.

Copyedits and Coffee

124rf.com

After a month of only obliquely thinking about the book, the manuscript is sitting in my inbox this morning, fresh from the copy editor.

I'm filling up the coffeemaker.

Not that there's a lot to review from the editor, just a lot of looking and watching and double-checking; but I've found over the past month that some information that was accurate in May is not accurate in July, due to the usual switch-ups that occur in the travel industry. New tours, cancelled packages, additional contact information, and with my ear to the ground I've been making mental notes to check and re-check many listings in the book. Add copyedits, and I've got quite a week ahead of me, for sure.

abcnews.go.com

Maybe I better grind some pre-emptive coffee, too.

Thank goodness edits didn't show up, yesterday. I'm struggling to recover from a head cold and cough, the hard drive died in my trusty Mac, and my husband is away fishing for salmon to keep us viable over the winter months.

Today is better. Mostly because my son figured out how to make me coffee. At eight, he's pretty talented, that kid, so I think I'll keep him around.

Next step, the cover. And THAT is going to be a sticky point with me. I want flashy, bold, and bright, full of images that will make potential buyers say "Ahhhhhhlaska!"

But that's next. Today is today, and I better get to it.

joe-ks.com

Right after I make more coffee.

On Summer and Writing

Kayaking Fox Island. Ahhhhlaska.

Pardon the absence, but I've been having summer. Delicious, watermelon-splattered, sunburned, real-deal Summer. Alaska has missed out, these past few years, and we are duly obligated to spend as much time outdoors as possible. My son leaves the breakfast table in a hurry these days, anxious to meet up with the Evergreen Street Biker Gang and another morning of tag, races, and the cheap yard sprinkler I bought on sale last non-summer. Hubster and I spent a weekend at secluded Kenai Fjords Wilderness Lodge near Seward. Life, in a curvy sort of way, is pretty good right now.

Not a bad draft, I think. 

Web Guy came through with a set of spectacular maps that impressed the UA Press production editor, and we met a few weeks ago for a final viewing and the official send-off. According to the "Steps in Process from Proposat to Book" sheet, still hanging above my desk, we are now in the phase of "Manuscript Copyedited." In a few weeks I should be seeing the framework of what will eventually be "Alaska On the Go: Exploring the 49th state with children."

Then, summer weather or no, I'm back at the desk, feverishly reading and reviewing and changing stuff for the final time, and working on a cover.

UnCruise. I do it.

In the meantime, I'm off to southeast Alaska as the host of a Kids in Nature trip with UnCruise Adventures, a small ship cruise line based in Seattle. Seven days in Glacier Bay, Alaska, with no internet, no phone, and no deadlines.

I can deal with that. Oh yes, indeed, I can.

Alaska On the Go - It Went!

The family "peaceful place," important because we do need some peace after all this.

I really, really, REALLY wanted to get the manuscript completed by the time our family hopped aboard an airplane to our former home of Port Angeles, Washington. Since the trip was vacation and not work, it was important to all of us that The Book not impede with fun, and I tried to honor that request by my husband.

As anyone who has ever written a book can tell you, a manuscript becomes an infant, needing constant care and attention to thrive, so being able to launch the words back to the Production Editor at University of Alaska Press was a welcome concept, indeed.

And so I did that via dropbox last week.

Web Guy is making maps that should provide a little bit of orientation to readers, even if they have a GPS and local tourism guide. I have photos all safely tucked away at UA Press.

The coolest part? Seeing the freelance editor adding changed files to our shared dropbox folder, knowing that he/she is creating an actual book out of words that came from my brain. My brain - MINE. The one that is so often scattered with schedules and deadlines and grocery lists and worry for bills to pay.

That's amazing.

Am I too Attached?

There it is. 

I've been staring at my laptop for several hours today, wondering if the end is near. Boxes checked on the University of Alaska Press guidlines sheet, photos and captions sent, individual chapters saved in a new folder.

Wow.

Perhaps I'm ready to send in the manuscript for the final time? I'm as apprehensive about this as I was ushering my son to kindergarten a few years ago. Am I ready? Are you ready? Is Alaska ready?

The psyche vs. intellect duel is an interesting one, and today I feel like the psyche is winning. Writers are always told to "end at the ending" and "quit dragging," but in this case the ending seems to be there, it's just my helicopter parenting of this book that's keeping me from hitting the "send" button.

But I think it might be time.

After two years, I'm sure my husband would say so.

Ready, set......

The Many-Headed Monster

Thanks Manyheadedmonster.wordpress

I like these guys. Part comfort-keeper from my childhood watching "The Muppets," part definition of how I feel, today.

Today the book looks like an algebra equation married to a term paper. My checklist requires a spell-checked MS (manuscript), saved text, in both a single document and one divided by chapters, and the heads. 

Lots and lots of heads. 

Heads, for those of you who don't know (and I didn't before I became a journalist), are the quantifiable divisions of any manuscript. Introductions, chapters, sections, and sub-sections are all heads. In the average manuscript, there are usually two or three, depending upon the subject.

A guidebook, as you can imagine, has a lot. 

So, today has been spent labeling [A], [B], [C], [D]. I'd like to add an additional one for [F]..udge. 

Read, label, count, lose count, re-read, label again; it's an exercise that appears eerily similar to math. 

I hate math. 

But I love this book. 

Perhaps this is all a ploy to keep it that way.

Building a Book!

Cute little sand angel diversion.....so little, this kid was.

I never gave much thought to the mechanics of "building" a book until I became an author. Never will I take for granted the hours of work by lots of people to create the book I reach for on a store or library shelf.

Photographs have to be viewed, sorted, discarded, sorted again, and eventually converted to TIF files with captions and [ ] and .tif and "quotes" in a very particular way before bundling them all up and sending to University of Alaska Press. The guidelines sheet sent to me by Acquisitions Editor is full of scratchy notes and little doodles I made during phone calls. I'm still trying to figure out what some terms mean, and have to break down some sections, word by word.

Maps need to be made, a huge undertaking, and the past few weeks were full of desperate emails and frantic telephone conversations with all sorts of entities before I finally wizened up and emailed my web guy who said, "Sure I can."

Once all boxes on the checklist have been crossed out, everything is shipped up to Fairbanks, where a team of freelancers works in collaboration with the production editor who ultimately becomes my touchstone concering all things draft and galley proof, and eventually, final copy of Alaska On the Go: Exploring the 49th state with children.

I haven't even touched the text itself, yet. That's the easy part.

Who would have thought that 95,000 words would be considered "easy"?


Countdown to deadline: 29 days

Working Through It

Thanks for the kudos, blogosphere friends. This book project certainly has been a community and industry effort. With so many people invested in its success, launching Alaska On the Go: Exploring the 49th State With Children should be easy. Right?

After the glow wore off a bit, and after AK Dad and I had more than a few glasses of wine to celebrate, paperwork started to flow into my inbox with the speed of an Alaska snowstorm. Questions, mostly, about me, about the book, about people I know who might talk about the book, and places that might sell the book; all succinctly disseminated in a collection of University of Alaska Press formatting that I, of course, have already screwed up in my attempt to complete.

One reason I chose to approach UA Press is their desire to engage authors in the publishing process every step of the way, from initial marketing to some level of publicity and selling those books.

Hours and hours later, I'm navigating the process of my life as it stands to be for the next month. As I did while I was actually writing the manuscript, I've carefully (mostly) scripted my days.

Typically, I write in one-hour blocks, two if I've got a particularly hot deadline. But I write, every single day. I feel guilty if I don't, which may or may not be normal...

Also questionable is the fact I set my alarm to chime for a break, then I get up from my desk and do stuff. What stuff?

Laundry.  

Cooking (that's a damn fine pork shoulder in the oven, right there).

Running with dogs.

I go about the business of living for 30 minutes or so, then set the alarm again and head back to the inner world of wordsmithing.

Repeat.

Occupation: Author.

My thumbs are no longer twiddling.

They are shaking.

A message appeared in my inbox on Tuesday afternoon. The subject line read, "Good news from the University of Alaska Press!"

(I will stop right here and thank the acquisitions editor of UA Press, himself a writer and one who understands the ecstacy/agony of bad news delivered via email).

They want my book.

I wrote a book.

I am an author.

Alaska On the Go: Exploring the 49th State With Children is now a reality, and shall be released in the spring of 2014, just in time for summer tourism season and a fantastic book tour around Alaska and the Pacific Northwest.

I spent more than a few moments last night thinking about the hundreds of people who have supported this project. Tour operators, airlines, railroads, ferries, hotels and cabins, and so, so many other parents - you got us here. We can't wait to see what you think.

Which now has me shaking for a whole different reason.

Thumbs, Twiddling

Lots of things happen when you send a book to the publisher.

The tax receipts get organized.

The house suddenly gets a lot cleaner.

The family dresses up like vegetables and animals and goes running.

The writer's eyes uncross.

However, other, less productive things, tend to happen as well. Anxious moments in front of the computer, double-checking the "sent mail" tab to make sure the manuscript did, in fact, reach its destination. Bordering on obsession, this multiple-times-a-day checking is wearing out my keyboard, and my husband's nerves. Sorry, dear.

There's also a lot of thumb-twiddling. Oh, I have a lot of projects awaiting my attention, some really great ones. But with the Timeline to Publish tacked to the wall directly above my desk, it's hard to ignore the fact that a 95, 000-word book is at this moment being copied and sent to the members of Publishing House's advisory board. Holy crap.

The good news is that I wrote a book. A whole book. I met a great acquisitions editor, who really likes this project and how I framed the combination of ancedotal experience and honest how-to instructions about bringing kids to Alaska.

I heard yesterday at a tourism forecast luncheon that a million people are expected to visit Alaska via cruise ship this summer. Just think how many of them might buy a book about family travel for a grandchild's parent, or rethink the wisdom of leaving said children or grandchildren at home for a lack of information about Alaska and kids. Almost blows the mind.

And re-crosses my eyes.

Get 'er done

Learning how to write a book has almost become more important than actually typing the words. 

I've discovered the value of adding "writing" to a large chunk of my smartphone's calendar, every single day. No meetings, no coffee dates, just "writing." 

Writing, of course, means powering through a solid hour of wordsmithing and critical thinking, then taking a break, usually involving wood chopping, dog-running, or baking. Baking is an excellent respite from writing, I have found. Or, at least, a peace offering to the family for which I have forgotten to provide clean laundry. At any rate, the hour on-hour off system seems comfortable enough. 

The edit process is a fascinatinating journey through my own psyche. Am I really up to this? What if I change things around and it's not the same book, anymore? Oh no, that great idea I had at 4 a.m. - I can't remember what it was! 

I'm aware of every word I add or delete, every descriptive sentence I carefully script, where it goes.  I know about every restaurant, every hotel, every attraction, and I can't help but think I owe future readers more than just a listing of places to go and things to do. 

A careful, thoughtful, process. 

Why 95,000 Words Can't Be Wrong

After weeks of anxious nail-biting, gallons of coffee, and late nights, it has been completed. Alaska On the Go: Exploring the 49th State With Children was pushed northward in November.

This poor blog had been woefully neglected since late September, I admit it. But between bringing one child home from an out-of state school to begin life as a young adult managing autism, and sending another off to second grade, and working on various freelance projects, and the manuscript, everything else got shoved aside.

My calendar was blocked off for three or four or more hours a day, and I lived in fleece pants, Adidas slippers, and my favorite Alaska Brewing Company hoodie. But one day, it was done.

I changed my clothes, drove to meet Editor at our favorite coffee shop, made a few logistical adaptations, said a quick prayer for safe travels, and hit "send."

Refusing to consider the parking ticket I had on my car when I left the University of Alaska campus as a bad omen, I turned up my Brandi Carlile CD and sang the entire way home.

A few encouraging emails later from the acquisitions editor, and my manuscript was on its way to external reviewers; parents who travel and a savvy bunch of people indeed. I hate criticism, who doesn't? But darned if these people liked what I said, save for some great ideas and suggestions I should have probably anticipated anyway.

So here I am again, making some changes, adding some things, and crafting a letter to the publishing house's advisory board.

The best part? A sentence from Acquisitions Editor.

"...I'm attaching our boilerplate contract so you can get a sense of the document."