It Was A Dark And Stormy Night...

Article by Mark Jordan, published in RUN Magazine May/June 1991, p. 20.


Why haven't you written that book yet? You have what it takes: ideas and expertise, a good computer and word processor, and a desire to communicate. The answer is simple: it's too difficult to get published. Less than one percent of all book manuscripts submitted ever see the printed page. Getting published takes an extraordinary amount of luck and timing, not to mention writing ability. So, you do what everyone else does: You don't write the book.

That's a pity, because all you really lack is a slight change in your definition of "book." Just add "other media" besides "paper" to the definition, and you're on your way to becoming a published writer.

I'm sure I don't need to tell you what "other media" I'm talking about -- disks! That's right, bookdisks. It's an idea whose time has come. Think about the advantages: guaranteed publication; instant updates; nightly press runs; low overhead; space-efficient storage; cheap mailing; ecologic-soundness; and maybe a way to fame and fortune.

The only investment needed to get started in the publishing business is time and sweat. Begin by typing in and saving BookDisk, the program in Listing 1. It's the interface others will use to read your book, so it will go on each bookdisk you send out.

The program comes to you as a Basic loader, but once you've got it typed, saved and installed, it's a lightning-fast machine language file-reader. Its features include word counting, printing, a bookmark, a file-loader, a handy help screen, and more.

With BookDisk and the book you write, you're two thirds of the way to being a published author. RUN can help with the last leg of the journey  -- getting the word out. In an upcoming issue, we'll publish a listing and brief descriptions of some of the best bookdisks we receive. Free advertising! We'll also market the winning entries on a special bookdisk. All you need to do is write your book and send it in. All? Just write a book?

Okay, so it's a big job. But writing a bookdisk is no different than any other big job: You just break it into smaller tasks and do them one by one. Before you know it, your book will be done. So, let's look at the steps in the process.

Step 1: Typing In BookDisk

As I indicated, your first task is to type in the program in Listing 1 to generate the machine language. As always, use RUN's Checksum program (found on page 61) to detect any typing errors. The Data statements have been installed as easy-to-read-and-type letters, rather than numbers, to make the work less daunting. When finished, save the program on one of your work disks.

Before continuing, you need to find out two important numbers you'll need to type in when you run Listing 1. The first is the ASCII value your word processor uses to designate carriage returns. The second has to do with the way the word processor saves characters. To determine what numbers you need, check the sidebar on page 22.

That done, you need to format a new disk -- your prototype bookdisk. Give it the same name as your book.

You're almost ready to run the source program...but not quite. First, you must move Basic up so the BookDisk machine language can load into the convenient section of memory at the bottom of Basic free RAM. To do so, type POKE44,32:POKE8192,0 and press the RETURN key.

Now, put your work disk back in the drive, reload Listing 1 and run it. If you've done anything wrong up to this point, you'll be stoped. Otherwise, in about two minutes you'll be prompted to type in those two values you looked up earlier.

After that, you'll be prompted to put your publication disk -- the one you just formatted -- in the drive. Do so, and follow the screen prompt by pressing S. The drive will work, saving BookDisk to your new disk. Basic's pointers will be restored, and then you can run the program. However, at this point you'll have no files on your publication disk that you can load. To see BookDisk in action, insert one of your present word processing data disks and run the program.

Write your book on a work disk. Little explanation is required for using BookDisk. The eight function keys, the cursor keys, the BACK-ARROW key and the HOME key are the only ones used. F1 yields a help screen that pretty much tells all. The other function-key options are: F2, load; F3, mark your place; F4, retrieve your place; F5, change the character colors; F6, change the screen color; F7, print; and F8, exit to Basic. CURSOR-UP and -DOWN scroll through the text, while CURSOR-LEFT and -RIGHT jump a whole screen forward or backward. HOME jumps to the top of the text, and BACK-ARROW quits various activities.

Play around with it for a while, then press F8. Once back in Basic, type LIST to see what's there. A single-line program, 10 SYS2061, is written like Basic to let you load and run BookDisk like any other program.

Step 2: Writing Your Book

Where do you begin? First, decide what you're going to write about. Chances are you have an area of expertise or special interest. Maybe that should be your first project. How-to books are the most straightforward kind.

However, don't limit yourself to nonfiction. Why shouldn't we Commodore authors crank out some short stores or a novel? You've got approximately 30,000 words available on a single-sided 1541-formatted disk, double that if you flip the disk over and use the back side. A 1581 disk can hold more than 130,000 words, enough space to create on mighty long epic poem.

Space limitations prevent me from giving much advice on the actual writing process. There are hundreds of books and articles on that topic. The important thing would-be authors should remember is that the purpose of all writing is to transmit ideas from the writer's head to the reader's. If you know what you want to say, know your audience, and try to hurdle any natural barriers to communication that appear, you'll have done your job well.

You should write your book in chapters, not only to help break your idea into manageable units and make file-handling easier, but as a favor to your readers. It's a big relief to a reader to see a logical sequence of sections, and loading long files can be almost as annoying as reading them. BookDisk lets you fill up memory with a file, so anything your word processor can handle will work. However, files under 70 blocks (about 3000 words) are best.

Copy-editing, the chore of removing errors of form, may inhibit some would-be writers. The practical solution is to get a word-wise friend to read your bookdisk and make suggestions and corrections. And, of course, if you have a spellchecker, use it. They aren't perfect, but they will catch a bunch of typos and dumb misspellings.

Even with the most careful copy-editing, errors will make their insidious way into the final copy, and readers will write and point them out to you. Paper publishers have to wait until the next printing to correct those errors; you can do it immediately, an advantage of electronic publishing.

Step 3: Printing Your Book

Finally, the day comes when you've written alll the chapters and it's time to put the files on your publication prototype disk. You can place them on the disk in any way you find convenient, with a file copier or by saving them one by one from within your word processor. The important thing is to put them in the order you want them in the table of contents. I'd also highly recommend that you name them with a numerical prefix like this:

  1. Dark and Stormy Nights
  2. Lost at Sea
  3. Johnny's Dream

If your word processor attaches prefixes to filenames and you'd like to remove them, you'll need to use a file utility to rename your files after they're in place on the publication disk. Remember, the limitation of 16 characyters per filename (chapter title) applies to BookDisk.

It's highly advisable to put a publication's data file before or after the other files on your disk. In it include the publication date, the author, the company (invent a name -- mine is Country Road Press), a foreward, a preface, a brief author's biography, and so on.

Include the following copyright information: the word "Copyright," the year of first publication, and your name -- for example, "Copyright 1991 by John Jones." Put this notice in every chapter file on the disk. End the publication data file with the phrases "All Rights Reserved," "Printed in the United States of America" and "First Printing."

This constitutes a valid, if somewhat informal, copyright. To officially register your book, contact the United States Copyright Office, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. 20559, and ask for Form TX. The cost is $10.

Once you've got the publication disk completed, make a backup copy. Now you can use a disk-copy program to make as many copies of your book as you want.

One last point: People do judge books by their covers. It's fine to use inexpensive disks with plain white sleeves for your copies, and it's no problem if you mail them in generic mailers, but use attractive disk labels. You can use your computer and printer to create them, or you can have a local printing firm make some (they're not expensive). On the labels put the title, the copyright info, your name, and a brief set of instructions (such as "Type LOAD "*",8:RUN; press F1 for help). At any rate, please don't send disks with handwritten, scratched out, misaligned labels.

Step 4: Going Public

Your book is written, published and ready to move. Now's the time to send a copy to me, Mark Jordan, in care of RUN Magazine, 80 Elm St., Peterborough, NH 03458. With the disk, please include the following on paper: a 50-word (or less) description of the book and your name, address and phone number. After we've received enough bookdisks, we'll select the best entries and determine the winners in the various categories (see details on page 24). Cash prizes and Commodore equipment and software will be awarded to the winners. In addition, RUN will publish a collection of the winning entries and market them as a special BookDisk.

We'll also do a follow-up article listing and perhaps reviewing the more significant works.

Review? But what if the reviewer doesn't like my bookdisk? That, my friend, is one of the hazards of writing. It's also one of the proofs that you're a bone fide author and publisher. And besides, there's truth in the old saw that any review is a good review.

Inspired? I hope so. The computer industry promised us a paperless society. It's high time to start fulfilling that prophecy. Get typing!