IVP - Andy Unedited - April 2010 Archives

Miss Whitebread Was Wrong

“Always make an outline before you start writing.” Isn’t that what your fifth grade teacher told you? Well, I’m sorry to break this to you, but Miss Whitebread was wrong. In my continuing series of Stupid Things You Were Taught in School (see here and here), let me deconstruct this bad boy.

Two Keys to Outstanding Cover Design

It is a truth universally acknowledged that people in possession of a good manuscript must be in want of an outstanding cover. A great cover can make an amazing difference. So can a bad one.

A few years ago I heard Ken Peterson of Tyndale House Publishers offer two simple keys to success—coding and positioning.

Stott's Farewell

John Stott, one of the most influential Christians in the world, retired recently from public ministry. Now he has issued his last book, The Radical Disciple.

In the postscript (titled "Farewell!") Stott offers a last bit of encouragement and exhortation, one that I resonate with myself after a lifetime of loving books:

As I lay down my pen for the last time (literally, since I confess I am not computerized) at the age of eighty-eight, I venture to send this valedictory message to my readers. I am grateful for your encouragement, for many of you have written to me.

Looking ahead, none of us of course knows what the future of printing and publishing may be. But I myself am confident that the future of books is assured and that, though they will be complemented, they will never be altogether replaced. For there is something unique about books. Our favorite books become very precious to us and we even develop with them an almost living and affectionate relationship. Is it an altogether fanciful fact that we handle, stroke and even smell them as tokens of our esteem and affection? I am not referring only to an author’s feeling for what he has written, but to all readers and their library. I have made it a rule not to quote from any book unless I have first handled it. So let me urge you to keep reading, and encourage your relatives and friends to do the same. For this is a much neglected means of grace. . . .

Once again, farewell!

All Writing Is Autobiography

All writing is autobiography.

Fiction. Non-fiction. Quasifictional-semirealistic-self-congratualtory historical narrative. It's all autobiography.

Obviously memoir, journals, travelogues and a lot of bad poetry are autobiographical.

But what about auto-repair manuals?

Books Without Covers

Every few months we get together a whole bunch of us from editorial, marketing, sales, production and design--anyone substantively involved in making or selling a book--to evaluate the releases from a season in the previous year. Once we had a cover designer attending for the first time. In trying to explain to the designer what the meeting was all about, someone said with a wry smile and in a voice everyone could hear, "This is the meeting in which we do judge a book by its cover."