Ownership of Your Writing

Copyright

The copyright is owned by the author.  It is a good idea to register your book with the Library of Congress.  It costs about $20 and identifies the moment at which copyright begins.  However, copyright actually begins at the moment your book is finished, whether registered or not.

If you think your book will continue to be published after your death, you would want to establish a limited liability company (LLC) ahead of time.  In the LLC you can have other people as "members" such as spouse, children, etc., who would continue receiving income from the publication of your book.  This would keep income from sales of your book out of probate.  It is safer than a trust in some states, particularly in Nevada.  If you have a trust, you can put the LLC in the trust.

Agent

If you have an agent, he/she would get a percentage of your gross or net income from the book.  In fact, the publisher will pay the agent who will take their cut and send you your portion.  The contract you would sign with an agent can also be with your LLC if you prefer.  As long as your book is in print and selling, both you and your agent will be getting money. 

Publishing Rights

The author through the agent sells the book to a publisher for a period of time, say ten years.  If your book goes out of print, the rights return to the author and the agent is out of the loop at that time.

ISBN

Every book you write needs an ISBN  (International Standard Book Number).  For each form your book takes you will also need an ISBN, each is a different product and needs its own number--for each edition in a foreign language, each needs its own ISBN;  a hard copy needs its own, a paperback needs a different one, as does an e-book, audio book, large print edition, and so forth.  At this date of writing, an ISBN costs about $125 for one number, but you can get several numbers so that ten might only cost $25 each.  The Nielsen Company is an ISBN agency for international publications.  The R. R. Bowker Company is an ISBN agency for American publications.  The ISBN indicates the geographical location of your publisher.

Interview on Spirituality -- 2

What are your beliefs regarding a deity?

       I’m not currently comfortable with the word “God” because of its early associations to a male deity.   At the same time, since I was raised a Christian, and adopted that faith as my own when I became an adult, Jesus Christ is the clearest face of God for me.  Recently, a Lenten speaker at the Carmelite Monastery suggested we pray to the God we know and name this God something meaningful.  What has been coming to me of late is, “You are the God who has been with me.  You are the God who understands.  You are the God who loves me.”  I’m using these names for God in prayer and finding it personalizes God for me.

       The God I find reflected in Jesus Christ is a god who loves, forgives, converts and saves. Loving to me means always available with affection and interest and the willingness to be present in a practical way.  Forgiving means fully understanding, seeing my need for healing and meeting me where I most need it.  Conversion to me means the Spirit working within me to move me from limiting modes of being to a more abundant, fulfilling life.  Saving refers to God helping me make that inner shift from ego-centered living to Spirit-centered living.

      In a visionary encounter with Christ while standing in front of a statue of the Sacred Heart of Jesus at the Basilica Sacre Coeur in Paris, he revealed himself to me as thoroughly loving of each human person and having a fullness of compassion and a deep respect toward each one of us.   
     For years, when I have been unable to change an attitude for the better, I have prayed, “Jesus, in your grace and mercy, be born in my attitude of (fill in the blank), and work out your healing, re-creative love in this place.  This prayer is always answered, and when I look back, I can see how a shift has occurred in my mind and heart.

April 2011 Interview on Spirituality -- 1

This month, I was interviewed about my spiritual journey.  Because the interview is somewhat lengthy, I'll post it in four or more segments.  Here's the first:

What does the word “spiritual” mean to you?

       When the word, “spiritual” comes into a conversation, my thoughts turn to the experience of the divine, that which is beyond the five senses.  I have become comfortable with the phrase, “a power greater than myself” to speak of the divine. If I want to be more specific, I use the word, “God.”   At a very basic level, this power is good, loves, and has the intention to evolve, and not just within the God-self, but also in all of creation.  This God is also able to take any evil and bring good out of it.  

How did you get from where you started out to where you are now regarding spirituality and religion?

       As a child, I always had an affinity for religion and spirituality.  I loved Sunday School in my Methodist church, and when I made an adult decision to put my life in Christ’s hands, I experienced an abundant waterfall of God’s love receiving and welcoming me.

       My early years as an adult Christian were a perfect expression of what James Fowler, in his Stages of Faith, calls the “adolescent phase.”  I was very literal in my beliefs, taking the Bible at face value.  I was quite self-righteous, thinking I knew the only full and true expression of faith which was clearly spelled out in the Bible.  This stage lasted from my adult conversion in 1971 until I went to seminary in 1989.

       In seminary, I discovered that good Christian theologians had different interpretations of the Bible, and realized God more loving and mysterious than I had ever imagined possible.  Long illness also changed my charismatic faith in healing.  Many people prayed for me, but I remained ill.  I couldn’t understand why God was allowing this and came to see that my own choices were the much of the reason I was ill. Spiritual direction offered by Sr. Joan of the Carmelites, followed by other spiritual directors, helped me to get in touch with God within myself.  When I was turned down by the Carmelites, after wanting to join them as a monastic contemplative, my beliefs hemorrhaged away, and all that was left was an intuition of God as Mystery.  Teaching religious studies at the University of Nevada Reno, and needing to delve into other religions, broadened and deepened my faith, especially through the teachings of Huston Smith who taught religion at MIT and Berkeley.

       Today that intuition of God as Mystery has deepened so that I have few specific beliefs, but do have a strong sense of oneness with God and desire to grow in love for God.

Working with a Literary Agent

Here are a few things to consider if you want to work with a literary agent.

First, the agent may ask for exclusive rights to work with you.  If this is a requirement, it is important that you ask for something in return.  It is recommended that you ask for the agent to read your book within the next two weeks.  If they haven't called you back at that time, call them and remind them of their commitment.

Second, it is essential to get a written contract.  It is important to have someone well versed in publishing contracts to review it for you.  One writer found assistance through the Chicago Writer's Union, a sub-division of the United Auto Workers of all things

After the agent has read your book, ask what they liked.  You may wish to strengthen this part of the book.

If the agent asks you to pay for professional editing, it is best to wait for a commitment from a publisher. Costs can be significant to have someone edit your book, so wait until you know it's publishable.

Some things to consider:  It takes one to one and a half years to get a book through a publisher.  A standard fee for an agent is 15% for books published in the U.S., and 20% if published out of the country or if the book is made into a film.

A Mystical Moment

An Excerpt from my Spiritual Will

Value:  Take time to smell the roses along the way.  A contemplative way of living makes for a fullness of life.  To notice hundreds of geese winging their way south over your head as you open the gate to your daughter’s home is a moment to pause and delight in.  To stand in the street and marvel at a rainbow over the valley is to touch the wonder of life.  To feed the birds and watch the squirrels hiding food away for the winter is to join in the dance of life.  To notice your hair blowing past your face as the weeping willow branches sway is to enter into the oneness of all things.  To renew yourself, take walks where you pay special attention to your senses:  What am I smelling, seeing, hearing, tasting, and feeling?  Even a few days of this at 15 minutes or more will open life up to you.

Illustration from My Life:  Twelve days into the thirty days of silence, light, sound and fragrances swallowed me up.  These sensory companions separated me from the noisy comings and goings of other retreatants.  I was making my Ignatian retreat to integrate my experience of a sudden recovery of health after a very long eighteen years of illness.  On this twelfth day, I felt alone, clothed in luminous air as I softly moved toward the lower-level doors.  Once in the garden, and thankfully no one else being present, I paused to breathe in the heavy scent of eucalyptus, the underlying fragrance of pines, and to listen to the unfamiliar bird calls some fifty feet in the air above my head.  Just up ahead stood an ancient willow and along the path tall fragrant grasses wet with the morning fog.  My skin felt cool and damp as I paused to drink in my experience.  “Tuning up the senses” is what my spiritual director called it…being fully present to what is.  How long I stood there pondering the gently moving fronds of the willow and the swaying of the tender grasses only God knows.  But at one point a slight breeze caught some strands of my hair, longer in those days, and brushed them against my face painting me into the scene and making me one with the nature around me,…not separate from the tree… not separate from the grasses… not separate from the breeze. Before this moment I was a human being; and after, I was something more.  And by grace, when I re-entered the retreat house, those who had been distractions to my silence, were transformed into something more too, all of them filled with the same light and wonder and love that had swallowed me. 

Elementary School Part 1

Because there is little time to give to this kind of thing, I'm posting brief pieces of my autobiography at a time for you to read.  Any comments are welcome.  Today I'm starting with some memories of elementary school days.
Here goes:

Elementary School Grades 1-4

            School recesses introduced me to delights of all kinds, some discomfort, and more discipline surprises.  The front yard of our first-through-fourth-grade school, was good old dirt and gravel.  It was perfect for using a stick to outline the rooms of our houses in which we played together.  One would be the mother, one the father, the others would be the children.  Being a parent allowed me to order everyone about, and although I seldom played that role, I could enjoy it when it was my turn.  Part of “keeping house” was to get a small branch from an evergreen bush and sweep the dirt until there were no rocks showing.  I remember having a sense of determination and delight in whipping that little broom back and forth over the outlined space until another game was announced by one of the more dominant girls.

            We might play hide and seek, or “Mother may I?”, or even jacks with its onesies, twosies, and so on.  But the most fun was playing cowboys and horses.  All the girls wore dresses to school, and each dress had a tie belt in the back.  When untied, these belts, one on either side of the dress, made perfect reins, and each boy would select a girl, grab her sashes and boy and girl would race through the grass at the back of the school yelling at the top of their lungs. Larry Taylor, my cursing instructor, and I were always Roy Rogers and Trigger. It was exhilarating to gallop and prance and race for all we were worth.  However, when I arrived home with one or the other piece of belt in my hand, my frazzled mother, home with a baby and toddler, would heave a sigh of disgust and let me hear about my lack of respect for the clothes on my back. 

            During one particularly heated game of hide and seek, I went charging up the school stairs to the “free” wall, and for some reason collided head on with it and knocked myself out.  I woke up in the time-out room with a woman pressing a cold, dinner-knife blade against the great lump on my forehead, which of course did nothing to help, but only intensified my pain.  I can only assume she thought the coldness would help reduce the swelling.  Perhaps this was the beginning of my disillusionment with institutions.  Of course I heard about my stupid behavior when I got home, “What were you thinking?”, a really intelligent question that parents are prone to ask.

            “Mother may I?” was a common game, a must in which to participate, but Susan, the very tall girl in my class, one most likely to take the lead,  could pack a whollop that made you think twice about playing.  There was a landing outside the side door of the school with stairs up to it and back down.  Susan would stand on the landing, and each of us would line up at the bottom of the stairs.  Susan would give directives, such as “Hop on one foot.”  The next victim would perform the stated function, and if she remembered first to say, “Mother may I?” Susan would command her to the landing with “You’re my child, get home!” land a painful spank to the rear, the girl ran disappearing quickly down the other side returning to the end of the line for another go at it.  If the expected words were not uttered, the shamed fool was sent around to the back of the line without the spank.  Who was the real fool?

Twenty-six Mule Deer

My sweetheart, Lee, and I have a "gentleman's ranch" in Doyle, California.  A gentleman's ranch is about 40 acres or less.  We've got the 40 acres. About 2/3 of it burned last July, but the house and shop were saved.  Anyway, as I drove up to the turn off for the ranch, I saw some mule deer in their light, tan coats nibbling the new, spring growth.  They weren't in the least concerned that I was driving in, and only looked up and went back to eating.  Gandi, my six-year old Maltese, and I got out of the car, Lee came to meet us, and only then did the deer slowly begin to depart.  We were amazed to count twenty-six of them, many only six months old, trotting across the property to get to the hills above us.  They could jump a four-foot fence from a standing position, and when they got across the road to the barbed wire fence, some went over it, some crawled through it, and some were young enough and limber enough to crawl under the lowest wire.  What a joy to watch as they disappeared over the hill toward the setting sun.

A spiritual (or ethical) will

One of the assignments in my current writing class is to do a spiritual will.  What is one you may ask?  Simply put, its information about you that you'd like to leave others for their enjoyment after you're gone.  Here is a list of topics you may want to include in a spiritual will:

1) Start with a greeting which includes who this will is for, such as, "Dear kids," or "My darling wife," etc.; 

2) Put in a section called "statement of values and beliefs."  Reflect on the values you've lived by and what gave your life meaning, then set them down in this section.

3)  Write about your meaningful life experiences, e.g., who had the biggest influence on your life?, what event changed your life?, what lessons did you learn from experience?, etc.

4)  Share memories that include those you are writing to, include how you feel about the people you are writing to.

5) End with heart-felt parting words.  Include gratitude for your loved ones, ask forgiveness if necessary, etc.

For more information on this subject, read "Ethical Wills, Putting your Values on Paper," by Barry Baines, M.D.

In case you're wondering if I'm about to pass from this life, no, I'm not.  It is just a class assignment, okay.