My new book - Sail with the Tide

Writing is not easy. Any writing is challenging, but writing with a specific purpose is particularly difficult. The most difficult is writing something that will take days, weeks, months, and even years to write.

I have had a good reputation as a writer. I wrote many things over the course of my lifetime and career. Some were written on impulse; some were written as part of some necessary project, and still others were commissioned. In all cases I have been fairly successful. I just did not write enough.

Now that I have time to write, I am embarking on a belated literary career. This is very challenging. Ironically, the most difficult part of this “career” is the publishing part. More in a minute.

I felt a need to write a book about our life with our late son, Joshua. I wanted to chronicle his struggle with drugs and alcohol, his time in prison, and the many, many rehabilitation centers he visited. I wanted to do more than that, however. I wanted to write about the many lessons I (and we, I suppose) learned. Some lessons were learned along the way. Other lessons were realized after the fact. Still others were lessons I wish had been learned that could have had an impact on his life in a more positive way.

I finished the manuscript almost a year ago. I then spent about six months looking for a publisher. The world of publishing has changed dramatically since the advent of the computer era with social media and a vastly different way of publishing books. Very few books are published in a traditional format anymore. Most are published by some version of self-publication. Unfortunately, there are literally thousands of publishing companies, many of which are shady and cannot be trusted. They were difficult for me to weed out.

The company I eventually chose is called Friesen Press. They do have a traditional arm as well, but I have contracted with their self-publishing company. They are Canadian, but have printing operations in Tennessee, England, and Australia.  

The book will be called “Sail with the Tide…a dad’s view of addiction” and will likely be released near the end of 2024. If you knew Joshua, you would probably understand the title. Joshua loved pirates and always admonished people to “Sail with the tide”. It was his way of encouraging folks to take advantage of opportunities and move on and move ahead.

The book speaks a lot about “if only I had known”. This is a reference to the lessons I learned after the fact as well as the things about my son that I had not realized until it was much later, and in fact, too late.

I need you, my friends and readers, to spread the word about this book. Promoting a book is no longer the work of the publisher. It now falls on the author. Authors with a strong social media presence find it easier than those like myself who do not have a great social media footprint and presence. The more I can get people to spread the word, the more likely the book will be successful. I am not trying to make a great deal of money. I want parents (and others) to benefit from the chronicle and lessons before they experience what we did when we lost our son. Thank you in advance for helping. I will talk about this more in the months to come.