The tale of my book manuscript

Many of you know that I am currently trying to get a book published. It has been a long, humbling experience, to say the least. I dreamed up the idea for my book way back in 2001. I was trying to figure out the effect that one of my professors had on me. His name was Jack Newell. That man, along with Claudia Wright back at old Cottonwood High, were the two biggest teaching influences in my life. Jack taught a class in education that used philosophy, religion, literature, and psychology. He introduced me to Emerson and Earl Shorris. But more than that, though, the dude was a story teller and gave us glimpses into his life -- a life that integrated action and scholarship. I found myself gravitating to him and wanting to be like him. I wanted to adopt his (sometime unorthodox) views. I wanted not only to integrate action with scholarship, I wanted to eat lunch where he ate lunch, for crying out loud. I'm not sure the influence was completely for the best. The interesting thing is this: I never chose to want to be like this guy. I just starting imitating. This influence made me want to understand the processes by which we are influenced in this way. How, in short, are we influenced by other human lives?

The idea eventually morphed into my special field examination product, then to my dissertation, and then to a book manuscript. Along the way, I've noticed, and been informed of by others, every problem with the text, major and minor. I've had to make the case that somebody other than me would actually be interested in the book enough to (gasp) pay money for it. I spent hours trying to craft the proposal and the manuscript to be both literarily sophisticated, scholarly sound, and commercially viable. But I, more than anyone else, know that beneath the makeup of the finished product there are a few warts here and there. I've not been surprised, then, to receive various polite letters saying that the manuscript was not a good fit for publishing house X.

Finally, though, it appears that the book may actually get off the ground. I received some very positive feedback from a respectable academic press. The book was called "a pleasure to read," "clear and often elegant," "fascinating and ever-timely," and an achievement that "demonstrates good control of the sources in supple and straightforward fashion." So, I'm not really sure how to feel. On the one hand, I feel excited that this little piece of me, my little child, will finally see the light of day. On the other hand, I'm worried that when people actually read it, they will see just a little brat covered with warts -- a kid only a mother could love. Darn that Jack.

Bryan