Put it on the shelf

Not too long ago I was talking to Mr. Marsh about books, and he mentioned to me that it wasn't until more than a year after his book, The Mentalist's Handbook, had been published that he put it on the shelf in his library at home. He said that somehow it just hadn't occurred to him to do it.

I realized that I'd had the same experience with the books I'd published through Dromedary Press, that it had taken me months to help them find their place among all the books that had inspired their creation. (I also realized that I'm just now getting around to sending out copies to some of my closest friends and artistic supporters.)

This sort of hesitation isn't unique to book publishing. The creation of any kind of art involves several stages, and one of the very last stages in any project is our own acceptance of the work as a legitimate part of the milieu. Once mere dreams in our heads, perhaps our work materializes for everyone else long before it does for us.