Serendipity sells our book

We thought we knew our book’s audience. Serendipity came later.

We launched Abecedarium Anomalous at an independent bookstore, authors signing party: celebration of animated reading, harp playing, tasty treats, selling a carton of 30 books.

We designed our bookmark business card and brochure mailed to family, friends, business associates. Orders were encouraging—one, two, three or more signed books—reordering continues. One friend bought more than a carton, another ordered nine as gifts, yet another ordered five to be sent to Canada and Australia.

We contacted professionals to hire for marketing, distribution and representation. The initial print run was 1,500 and we could go back to press as demand grew. We learned the print run had to be at least 10,000 to attract anyone’s interest.

The softcover studio edition of Abecedarium Anomalous: Alphabet Book Irregular came out of earlier writing projects, gallery shows, and a postcard line featuring childhood drawings. It sold in an art book fair at The Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington D.C.

Years later we redesigned the book with new photographs. We’d learned about ISBN numbers, read books about publishing, formed our company, joined the Bay Area Independent Publishers Association and the then Publishers Marketing Association, taken the Stanford Professional Publishing Course, attended conferences and seminars, listened to many independent publishers sharing our passion for the tactile pleasures of the printed book.

Abecedarium Anomalous is a black-and-white art book printed on elegant stock: black duotones as rich as the original photographs, pen-and-ink drawings, alliterative verse teasing the imagination and word definitions of child perspective. It ignites creativity, invites us to be silly in a playfully inventive parent/child gallery right out of tomorrow.

My son’s first employer, I paid him book royalties and for each word definition, illuminated alphabet letter and Picasso-esque drawing he’d produced between ages six and twelve. He earned enough to buy a dirt bike.

The book was expensive to manufacture. With money saved from my publications editor day job, we worked with designers and typographers and printers, and now could design on a Macintosh computer instead of doing pasteup by hand—such a miracle!

This book has earned awards—Writers Notes Art Category book award with embossed gold foil seal for the cover—Best Children’s Book [all black ink] by the Bay Area Independent Publishers Association—a quotable critique from a Benjamin Franklin Awards judge—and praise from many readers including the renowned Ray Bradbury: “You have written what I would call an edible feast.”

Its secondary audience is a serendipitous surprise: grandparents, teachers, parents reading it with children! The vocabulary is adult, yet parents at book signings explain that their youngsters can already say and spell “supercalifragilistic-expealidocious.”

Response to Abecedarium Anomalous continues to delight. Our former tax accountant in California and new one in Nevada each boought a book—the dermatologist’s assistant and gynecologist each bought a book—the radiation doctor and assistant each bought a book—the owner and employee of a frame shop each bought a book—two real estate agents bought a total of 40 for client gifts.

People met while traveling buy the book, including a store clerk in California, passengers on an Alaska cruise and a Canadian Rockies tour, a woman in Hawaii while waiting for the airport shuttle.

The new pet sitter fell in love with the book, bought six. A friend bought 12 for school library memorials. More than a carton sold to high school classmates, many copies at a fiftieth year reunion.

The book is selling in a gift boutique that orders at wholesale, and a hair stylist sells the book in her salon—local reps receive sales commissions.

We sell at a discount, and most of the books are signed. The signed copies are appearing on the Internet—some above retail!

Here’s the newest serendipity. Publishers Weekly arrived with another copy stuck to it addressed to a local public library. When we gave them their copy along with the bookmark business card and explained I was an author/publisher, we were invited to sell at their book fair—how cool is that!

Of course we would like Abecedarium Anomalous to come out from under the radar—yet watching it travel in the universe of adventurous readers is exciting and satisfying. We may soon launch a second book based on teaching the publishing process to elementary and middle school students for 10 years. It relies on Abecedarium Anomalous as a creative resource and is titled Limited Edition A to Z: How to Produce Your Own Book. Its audience: teachers and homeschooler parents.

A third book is almost ready: Dust Bunnies On Parade—e-mail us for information, roothbooks@earthlink.net.

Abecedarium Anomalous was accepted for the Premium Book Company special-sales catalog used by reps nationwide selling in quantity to non-bookstore outlets—wish us luck! When the books are gone, we might not go back to press. This is your chance to order while stock remains—contact us for discount information at roothbooks@earthlink.net.