cblj_backup | (no subject)

Holy wow, you guys.

cassie_lee dropped me a comment yesterday to inform me that her house burned down but, and this is why she told me, her copy of Nameless survived.

I was focusing more on "Your HOUSE BURNED DOWN?" but she seems to be taking it with as good a humour as one can muster about these things. Everyone got out okay, and she has family nearby who are helping them out. She shared the news video with me, which is horrific and so sad, and then this morning sent me photos. (Having trouble direct-linking to that -- search "house fire" and choose the second story that comes up.)

This is her after having pulled Nameless from the wreckage.

This is Nameless, with a bit of fire blistering on the spine but otherwise whole.

My book is magic. I mean, I know theoretically what happens: books that are tightly packed together don't burn because there's no air between the pages to feed the fire. It's still stunning to see.

Not to make her house burning down ALL ABOUT ME or anything, but I had a very odd reaction to it, aside from the concern for her. My book is a story but it's out there spawning more stories, like people taking it on airplanes and meeting other people who've read it, and people reading it on breaks from their jobs or reading it to each other, and more than one person has written to tell me about their own experiences with suicide and how I treated it in the book. But this really whacked me between the eyes with a sense of "so this is part of what being published is": this person is standing in the wreckage of their home and holding up my book for me to see, because something I made survived a fire and she's happy about it.

That's amazing. I'm blown away.

Traditional publishing is a huge empire and that's grand and I'm glad it's there, but I think this is a powerful argument for access to self-publishing and someone to offer the tools for talented writers to use it. I made this, which I couldn't have done without a press like lulu.com, and it's got a life of its own now.

cassie_lee, if you need anything, you let us know. You want a new copy of Nameless, drop me a line, it's on the house. I'm going to print out those photos and put them on my wall.

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Just in case you don't see the other comment amid the rush:

You are totally local to my family (my dad's whole side of the family lives in Winmalee and its surrounds - Robin Rd, Wallaby Ave).

My mother lives outside Penrith, and is a librarian, who I can organise to fix your copy of Nameless for FREE, and probably a fair number of your other salvaged books that need TLC.

I'm in the Hunter Valley, but I can organise and co-ordinate it, or even do the picking up and dropping off next time I'm in Sydney. Hell, I'll probably help her with repairs. I've had a fair amount of practice, and I haven't had a chance to use my skills for years.

Comment back, and I will set it up.

That is so incredibly nice! I would love if some of my books could be repaired instead of replaced, since the binding is the main problem on a few of them. I'm not sure which ones need it yet, we put everything in our garage to go through later, but even if only Nameless is done I would be so grateful! :)

I'll ring mum this evening and sort it out with her. She should be able to assess which ones can be repaired, and work out how to do it. In some cases, it probably won't be a 'pretty' fix, but you'll be able to read the books again without them falling apart in your hands.

(My mum is teacher librarian of a primary school, so any repairs she does tend to be for sturdiness, not for aesthetics. The benefit of that will be that she'll probably be able to save some books that other restorers would say are beyond hope.)

Thank you so much, I would happy just to read them again. I can always buy others if I want a pretty book shelf :p

Just got off the phone with my mother, and her exact words: "Sounds like a good excuse to sit down and watch a few movies!"

If it works for you, not this weekend, but next, we can come down south, organise to collect the books from you, and mum, my partner and I can have a working bee fixing them up as well as we can.

Mum's one question was: Are they wet? Because that's going to change the plan of attack as to how we fix them, and how long it takes.

Also, any idea roughly how many there are?

Hiya,

iamshadow's partner here.
If you aren't going to have a chance to go through your books and all by that weekend then don't stress about it. We can come down at any time.
I'm sure you have a lot to get sorted in the next couple of weeks. We don't want to put any unneeded pressure on you.

We're going to start going through things again on Saturday, so I guess I'll be able to tell you a lot more then. There's only a few I think that I'm really worried about, others are replaceable. There's just some I can't part with.