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Malice, released in 1993.

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Snow wrote: "As I read his writing and his frequent rages in his writing, I find myself being afraid of touching the words too much, lest Sheridan give me a 92-year-old beatdown."

Rants and rages are part of the basic Sheridan. It comes with the territory. Wonder if his ex-wives would ratify that observation?

Peacenik Pete was pissed at a certain forum member and talked about bashing his head in. It was just talk though, no heads were harmed.

I don't think Snow would get a beatdown. Sheridan enjoys intellectual dueling more than physical combat. Snow and Sheridan, now there is a movie for ya. Kind of like My Dinner with Andre, but better.

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[Bruce A. Smith]

Er, Snow... we're all Gods, at least in the sense that we all have divine origins, are destined for eternal existence, and are fundamentally unlimited.

The only functional difference between any of us is to what degree we realize this.

Welcome to the club!

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Ah Bruce. We of little faith do appreciate how your presence here balances things. For every physicist, a wizard. For every predictable outcome, an impossible miracle.

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[snowmman]

Okay, this is the first book cover I've every done.
One piece cover (not using the Lulu wizard..used Corel Paintshop Pro) for consistency

The artwork is important to Sheridan I think. I think a friend did it for him for his first release. So kept it.
I managed to get a relatively good resolution image of it..some little scratch marks.

I changed the font to a typewriter font, red. A nod to Sheridan's background as a news reporter.

I chopped down the lengthy back cover text he had. Both to leave some mystery for the reader (don't write a book report) and also just to fit on the 6x9  book.

The picture is the retouched Saudi Arabia picture. Sheridan used that picture, with slightly brown tinting on his first back cover. I tried to make the picture look a little better.

The spine has the title and author's last name. It will be about .9" thick I think.

A lot of exacting requirements about distance from edges, spine width, ISBN size and placement.
I think I met all the requirements.
But then again, we're not all pro.
I can't imagine how all the other books in the world get done, if RMB isn't doing them all.

The attached is a lower resolution jpeg, and not the real size. The real thing is higher resolution (300dpi) png.
I had to package it in a pdf. For some reason the jpg wouldn't post

Sheridan: if you're out there, I hope you like it.

[Bruce A. Smith]

Editing and formatting a manuscript to a 6x9 book is tough. For those contemplating doing such a thing, you can hire Susan of Rose Island Publishing to do it for you for a modest fee. Susan is the gal that Nimi Wrecks and I used on our books. Great results.

[snowmman]

Thanks Bruce.
I think I'm done though.
Going to finish the editor's notes today and order a single print copy to proof.
Then that's it!. I'll look at the epub stuff next.

[Bruce A. Smith]

I trust that you were able to size and fit the ms to the page, with no "widows" and "orphans." In case you are unfamiliar with those terms, they refer to how paragraphs lay on the page. A "widow" is a paragraph whose first line lays by itself at the bottom of the page, cut off from the rest of the paragraph. An orphan is the reverse - a paragraph whose last line lays by itself at the top of the page, all alone...

Microscopically shrinking or expanding the text to fit everything neatly on one page is a skill I have yet to master, and software yet to purchase.

Also, a personal quirk of mine in regard to self-pub'd books is sufficient inner margins on the page. These are the so-called "gutter" margins, and I trust that yours are sizeable. I forget the recommended width, but there are guideline references out there.

Laying in bed this morning, I realized that I ALREADY have a copy of Petey's book, in PDF form due to your generosity many years ago. Thanks you!

[snowmman]

Thanks for the feedback Bruce.
I posted some sample pages in another thread here,
but yes, I followed Lulu's style guide pretty closely.

Font: Times New Roman 12 pt
Paragraphs have no extra blank line spacing, just 0.3" indent
(it was a lot of work getting that consistent...Sheridan seemed to use spaces and tabs at some points to start paragraphs..that's all cleaned up. But paragraphs are where they've always been)

Paragraphs are justified to the right with hyphenated words allowed
Line Spacing: single
Widow/Orphan control is enabled (using Word Office 365)
Margins are
0.61" Top
0.5" Inside
0.3" Gutter
0.6" Bottom
0.5" Outside
Paper is 6"x9"

"Chapters" ..which are really just the headers for the various "essays"...are consistent now..removed unnecessary "Reflections" heading that created subheadings. The headings have a line below them.

There is a Table of Contents at the front, now.

Page numbers are centered at the bottom with no line.
There is a line at the top of each page, with title on the even pages
and author on the odd pages...each 0.6" from the edge

I think I'm going to mail you a free proof copy. you can thumb thru it and PM me anything you see that looks ugly from a writer/book point of view.
I'd like to think that readers and Sheridan mostly, think it's a good looking book...

I was tempted to included a photo or two from Sheridan of his time in Vietnam, but left that out since there were no photos in the original, other than his author photo on the back of the book (From around 1975 to 1977, I think)

[snowmman]

From lulu, their recommendations.
I guess the 0.5" is the normal margin, and 0.3" gutter is added on alternating pages, to either the right or left side, depending on page number...so the "inside" margin gets to be 0.8" (0.5" + 0.3")

Word seems to handle this fine

from lulu:

"Our normal suggestion is for 0.5" (1.27cm) margins all the way around, with an additional 0.3" (0.762cm) added for the gutter. "

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Wish Snow could HEAVILY edit the back cover copy, but that wouldn't be true to Sheridan. It just isn't compelling and seems somewhat dated.

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[snowmman]

yeah, that back cover text is chopped down as it is, from the original, to not give away the whole story at once.
Maybe Sheridan himself can provide an update at some point in time?

I think I will put the complete back cover text on the lulu page, as a guess to Sheridan's wishes.

I was looking at Lulu's pricing. Apparently they set a mininum price based on book costs...So I think the print book will be around $25 (maybe I can discount it to $20). I may not distribute on Amazon, because it seems then the return to the author is even less (than if on Lulu.com).

My plan is to send maybe 4 copies to Sheridan for free. (copies are cheaper for me).

I will start work on the epub, while waiting for the proof copy of the book. That shoud be cheaper, and readable on computers, Kindle, etc.

Here are the last 3 paragraphs of my editor's notes in the book:

My goal was to get Sheridan the wider publication of his work that he desired, and I hope readers will enjoy the result. In the past, Sheridan noted:

    I was stunned to find out that people were reading my book.

Hopefully the same result is achieved here, but in a good way.

I also mention the issue about whether there are additional pages, due to the "Part 1: The Refugee Advisor" in the 1st edition:

There were 339 text pages in the 1st edition. This 2nd edition has 421 text pages. The original copyright by Sheridan on 5/4/01 claimed 680 pages. In various internet posts, Sheridan has claimed 826 pages.

The 1st edition was subtitled "Part 1: The Refugee Advisor" but I have dropped that subtitle. It implied there was additional text, but to my knowledge there is not.

[snowmman]

Every time I get a little demotivated, I find an internet posting where Sheridan motivates me....

Tale of Two Free Countries

The problem is not the Bush Administration. They are there by default. It's the American people. They have their heads buried in the sand, so to speak. I wrote a documented protest novel, The Idiot's Frightful Laughter, of the Vietnam War. I was there throughout most of the war and saw the genocide first hand. Do you think the American people want to know the truth? Not in the least. They want escape novels. Romanticized version of the war by guys like Tom Clancy, where the troops are noble and kind. That's essentially what the editors and literary critics tell me. They don't want to see my novel. They say that my synopsis of the novel is commendable but they are not in the market for grim reality. The American public does not want to know the truth. So who's to blame? Idiots like Bush and Cheney or the average American? You tell me.

~ Sheridan Peterson

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I really wonder if Sheridan has actually written a lot more than is going to be published? The page numbers claimed by the author at various times are all over the map. I asked him once and the answer was too vague to be of value. He did mention wanting to write more. Sailshaw was certain that Sheridan had written but not released a part 2, but  I think Sail was just speculating.

Sheridan claims to have seen US aircraft drop white phosphorus munitions on innocent civilians. I was initially skeptical but found that A1E Skyraiders did drop white phosphorous bombs on suspected enemy targets in South Vietnam. Wikipedia has info: You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login

Every time Sheridan would make a claim that sounded far-fetched, about his remarkable life experiences and his parachuting exploits, research would usually show it was true. Here was a guy whose real experiences were so extraordinary that they sounded like BS, but they were not. His claim to have witnessed the Tiananmen Square massacre seemed really unlikely, but it was confirmed by a third party publication.

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Sheridan wrote: "So who's to blame? Idiots like Bush and Cheney or the average American? You tell me.''

Dated. Lots of kids don't even know who Bush and Cheney were. Wish Sheridan would write an updated intro.

Wonder how he got so left wing? I had high school classmates who fought in Vietnam. Only one of the half dozen or so who returned became anything remotely like Sheridan in his views. Some of them who were politically apathetic later became staunch conservatives.

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