The Globe and Mail, Canada’s national newspaper, reviewed TBLP today in its wonderful Books section. My stomach has been in knots since I learned today would be the day. I can breathe again. It’s not bad:

More satire, please, we’re Canadian

D. GRANT BLACK

May 3, 2008

THE BEST LAID PLANS

By Terry Fallis

iUniverse, 257 pages, $21.95

A few years ago, CBC-TV foolishly cancelled Snakes and Ladders, a political dramedy set on Parliament Hill. The appetite for more Canadian political intrigue, especially with a satiric bent, is still there. But where do you find it in novel form?

First-time novelist Terry Fallis knew there was an audience. So he penned The Best Laid Plans and shopped it around to Canada’s publishers, but was not offered a book deal. So the tenacious Fallis self-published his 2007 book of fiction through iUniverse.

Fallis also submitted his own book to the judges of the Stephen Leacock Medal for Humour. And this week, The Best Laid Plans won the $10,000 prize, beating out such A-list authors as Will Ferguson and Douglas Coupland.

This self-published wonder should be a cause for concern for the decision-makers at Canada’s faltering publishing houses about what should be jumping out of their slush piles, into print and on to national market.

The Best Laid Plans is not the best book of political satire I’ve read, but it’s amusing, enlightening - and Canadian. It deftly explores the Machiavellian machinations of Ottawa’s political culture, from the grassroots level in a fictitious federal riding during an election campaign, to the Wizards of Ottawa who operate the levers behind the curtain. This is a great platform to create satire that verges on parody.

Fallis, a former Ottawa backroom player who now runs the Toronto PR firm Thornley Fallis, is all too familiar with how the federal political game is played. The Best Laid Plans is written in first person through the eyes of the main protagonist, Daniel Addison, a 32-year-old former speechwriter to the leader of the Liberal opposition.

It’s immediately clear that Addison is a mouthpiece for Fallis’s own political views and the failings in Canada’s Parliament. This is how he starts his prologue: “I could take no more. With the backroom boys still driving Machiavelli’s motor coach, I was just a helpless, hapless passenger as they tossed the public interest under the wheels yet again. Just to be sure, we stopped, backed up, and rumbled over it once more. It was time to bail out. … On Parliament Hill, the pendulum of power swings between the cynical political operators (CPOs) and the idealist policy wonks (IPWs). It’s a naturally regulating model that inevitably transfers power from one group to another - and back again.”

After finishing his PhD on the side, Addison leaves his speechwriting job for a chance to become a tenured English professor at the University of Ottawa. But he owes one more favour to his Grit overlords: Find a Liberal candidate to run in the upcoming federal election against an entrenched Tory incumbent.

Addison’s lame-duck candidate is Angus McLintock, an indifferent 60-year-old Scots immigrant and professor of mechanical engineering. While the other characters are believably drawn, especially the Liberal leader’s obnoxious executive assistant, I struggled with McLintock, who seemed nothing more than a caricature when he was introduced.

McLintock is The Simpsons’ Groundskeeper Willie with a PhD. His pedantic tendency to correct people on proper English usage is odd since he speaks in a Scots dialect that sounds as if he just stepped out of an 18th-century Robbie Burns poem: “Aye, I cannae argue with you. Feel free to remind me what it feels like to face a rabble like that the next time me confidence clouds me judgment.”

Eventually, I came around, as the character developed into a chess-playing, hovercraft-building political rebel.

That Fallis’s political satire has won the Leacock could signal a sustained return of the go-for-the-jugular social and political satire missing in Canada these days.

D. Grant Black is a Saskatchewan journalist and editor who has considered self-publishing for his satire project.

Phew! I can certainly live with this…

I’m at a loss for words. It’s been quite a day. Thank you all for your support throughout this little journey of mine.

Here’s the news release. Here’s the CBC story. And here’s some video from the actual event.

There’s a whole weekend of celebrations in June. I’m starting to work on my speech already. Time for some sleep… if I can…

I had one of those moments this evening. It felt kind of what I imagine it must feel like for an independent recording artist to be innocently driving to work and then suddenly hearing their own song on the car radio. I took my younger son Ben to a movie and then afterwards, browsed through the massive two story Indigo bookstore next door to the theatre at Yonge and Eglinton here in Toronto. It’s one of my favourite bookstores and I’m in there often. As I usually do, I gravitated towards the “F” section in Fiction. I don’t head there because I expect to find TBLP on the shelves. In fact, the only bookstores that carry my novel are the ones I’ve approached and supplied with copies. But I can’t resist taking a look anyway, often just to see which F authors would be flanking TBLP if it ever made it to their shelves.

Well, when I got to the F’s, my song started up on the car radio. There were ten copies of TBLP (front cover facing out!) right there on the eye-level shelf.

It’s one thing to pop into a bookstore you’ve already supplied with copies of your book and see it there on the shelves. You expect to see it. It’s no real surprise when you do see it, although it is cool. It’s quite another to be browsing in Canada’s major book retailer and with no warning, literally stumble upon your own book sharing the shelves with real F authors. For a moment, I thought I was having a stroke.

I snagged a friendly Indigo employee and asked him to check when these copies arrived, because I certainly had nothing to do with them being in the store. (This is not the same Indigo store location that will be featuring TBLP in February for eight weeks as part of the Publisher’s Choice award.) He checked the system and informed me that they had arrived on January 19th, about a week ago. Who knew! I didn’t.

The Indigo staffer then asked me if I were the author. When I told him I was, he went straight to the F shelf, pulled down all ten copies and headed to the nearest flat surface. He had me autograph them all and then placed “signed by the author” stickers on each one before displaying eight copies of TBLP on the “New in Trade Paperback” table near the front of the Fiction section. He placed the other two copies back in the F’s, still front cover facing out.

My stroke symptoms abated but I confess I was still tingling when Ben and I paid for the two books I was buying (Will in the World, Stephen Greenblatt’s acclaimed Shakespeare biography, and Jonathan Tropper’s new novel How to Talk to a Widower), and floated out of the store. Well, I was floating, Ben was just walking, holding my hand to keep me grounded…

One of the great benefits of earning the Publisher’s Choice designation through iUniverse is that TBLP will be showcased on a front table at a at least one Indigo store. I’ve now been given the information so I’m dutifully passing it on to you. Starting on February 19th, for two months, TBLP will be on display (and for sale of course!) at the Indigo store on the southeast corner of at Bay and Bloor, in the heart of Toronto’s shopping district. I’ll keep you posted and perhaps even take a photo when it all goes down later in February.

Exactly one year ago tomorrow, after months of futility and frustration with traditional publishing, I signed on with iUniverse to publish The Best Laid Plans. It was not the course I’d hoped to pursue. Like most first-time novelists, I had hoped to find an agent and a mainstream publisher. Alas, like thousands of other rookie writers, good and bad, I was unable to persuade anyone in traditional publishing even to read my manuscript, let alone publish it. So on December 26th, 2006, I took my first steps down the independent publishing route and signed on with iUniverse.

One year later, my novel is widely available online. One year later, TBLP has won the Editor’s Choice and the Publisher’s Choice honours. One year later, my podcast audience is still growing, and by the comments, still loving the story. One year later, I’ve had a successful Toronto launch and my first book signing. One year later, TBLP has aired on Radioropa, a leading European satellite radio network. One year later, every reader review, and the more formal published reviews have been so positive that most days, I tend to walk a few feet off the ground. One year later, more people have bought TBLP than I could ever have dreamed. One year later, the calls for a sequel have pushed me into outline mode for the next Angus/Daniel novel, which, yes, I hope will be published by a mainstream publisher.

But one year later, I couldn’t be happier. Happy New Year…

Stop the Presses!

I was pleasantly surprised to read this news release issued today about TBLP and its Publisher’s Choice designation. As a veteran PR professional, I don’t expect it will generate much, if any, coverage but it sure is nice to have the recognition. Standing by to schedule interviews… just kidding. Thanks to iUniverse for putting out the release. Every little bit helps…

Yesterday was a big day in the life of this humble endeavour. Not only did Amazon list The Best Laid Plans, but later in the afternoon, a box arrived bearing my author copies of the published novel. I opened the box and found 20 trade paperbacks and one hardcover. It’s hard to describe the feeling. My friend and client Joel Frey recently blogged about seeing and holding his newly published book, Two Sides of a Cypress Wall, for the first time. I can relate Joel.

Now we’re really just waiting for the other online retailers to list TBLP and then the heavy sales and marketing effort begins. Many have told me that writing the book is the easy part. Building profile and driving sales is tough slogging.

Well we’re very close now.  I’ve just approved all of the professional proof reader’s corrections and added a few of my own.  I will get to check to see that they have all been implemented properly but beyond that, there can be no more changes made.  We’re heading into production.  By mid September, I should have my author copies in hand.  Stay tuned…

The dog days of summer seem to drag even slower when you’re navigating the labyrinthine publishing process. Everything seems to take a very long time. Here’s where we are in the process, what remains to be done, and some general timelines:
- Production (laying out the pages of the novel - now in process) - another two weeks

- Proofreading (a final professional proofread) - three weeks

- Author proofing (my last chance to review the final copy) - up to two weeks (but I won’t take that long)

- Making corrections - one week

- Final production - two weeks

When this is complete, the novel will immediately be available through the iUniverse online bookstore but it usually takes another three to ten weeks for the book to be listed in the mainstream online book sites including Amazon, Chapters-Indigo, Barnes & Noble, etc.

Put it all together and we’re looking at another ten weeks(!), or early October(!) before the first copies of TBLP will be available at the iUniverse bookstore, and several weeks more for mainstream online availability. I actually don’t yet know when the novel will be on display at an Indigo store, but you’ll know shortly after I do. All I can say is, we’re still in time for the holiday season!
Stay tuned…

Well, even though I really love what Steve Palmer at 76design developed for the cover (see the top right of the blog), it seems I may not be the best judge of such things. The official iUniverse review of my submitted cover is in and it looks like we’re heading back to the drawing board, literally. The design experts at iUniverse made a few interesting observations including:

- the design I submitted was a little “flat;”
- the typography needed some work;
- the juxtaposition of the word “Plans” in the title and the line drawing of the hovercraft plans was too “literal;”
- the overall look and feel didn’t really convey that this is a satirical novel.

Interesting points and not without merit I suppose when their reasoning was clarified for me. So, their design team is going to take a stab at designing a cover that still uses the Parliament Hill photograph in some way. The line drawing of the hovercraft plans may move to the back cover.

I asked that they do their best to preserve the Allan Rock quotation on the front cover, as I think it really helps to add credibility and legitimacy to this self-published novel. As well, while this is a satirical novel, there are serious themes that underlie the fun. Satire yes, slapstick no.

So now we wait for a couple of weeks. I’ll post the result when I receive it.