Working with a Publisher was a Difficult Easy Decision to Make

#295: three reasons why.

Dear reader,

This is me when invited to work with other people.

Individualist. Solo-preneur. Company of one. There are many positive spins to put to the fact that I prefer to work by myself.

I once made the terrible decision to write and draw a graphic novel by myself, and it took me 10 months and it destroyed my back and shoulders for another 3 months. I would never do that again, but I am glad I did. When I was day-tripping as an engineering student, I was also moonlighting as a writer and cartoonist. I made hundreds of webcomics, wrote hundreds of short stories. Every idea, at its inception, felt like the best one yet. Some of them did well. Very few did as well as I had hoped. My creativity is a journey inside my mind, and I enjoy this exploration of self. It is my foolish way of doing things. So it goes.

But when Quarto approached me to write a book, I recognized the chance to work differently. And I leapt at it. In today’s post, three reasons why.

The SneakyArt Post is a newsletter of secretly drawn art of the world. Every week, I share the latest pages from my sketchbook and the best ideas from my journey as an artist and writer.

My book - Make (Sneaky) Art - releases next month.

#1 A book can go places I cannot by myself

I visited the MoMA in New York with Samantha Dion Baker a couple of years ago. At the gift-shop afterward, we found one of her books, as well as Every Person in New York by my personal hero and inspiration, Jason Polan. How lovely it would be, I thought, to have my own book here too!

Making a book with other people, i.e. a traditionally published book, is your best (and only?) shot at occupying the bookshelves of your favourite bookstores and museums.

I was excited to write Make (Sneaky) Art because I want to go back to the MoMA one day and see it on the shelf, next to my good friend Sam and my hero the late Jason Polan. Fingers crossed!

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At the MoMA that day, I wondered about the people who had come all the way to look at Starry Night. Thinking aloud led me to the word ‘aura’ in the context of Walter Benjamin’s essay, The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction. My education continued with these books - The Shock of the New, The Story of Art without Men, Lonely City, and Ways of Seeing.

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#2 The chance to understand how publishing works

Making books is my long-term plan. Some of them will be books of art, some will have more writing. I intend to do this forever (and am so glad to have you on this journey with me). But before I was a writer, I was always a reader. Working with a publisher gave me the opportunity to see how a book gets made.

I learned SO MUCH. Writing a book is a marathon, and you cannot run a marathon without a plan. You cannot run a marathon with only enthusiasm and bursts of energy. (Unfortunately, this is how I work.) Writing Make (Sneaky) Art helped me understand how to set deadlines around long-haul projects, to separate writing from editing, and to appreciate the downtime when others were reading and processing my submissions. All of the time, active and inactive, played a role in how the book turned out. I learned about the many processes that go into making a book, and I learned to enjoy each one.

👀 Take a sneak-peek at some of my favourite pages in Make (Sneaky) Art.

In-studio meditation with brown ink and white posca marker.

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#3 The privilege of working with professional editors and book-marketers

Because how precious is the opportunity to have experienced readers give you professional feedback on your words?

I had so many questions. How does this lesson read to someone unable to draw the human figure? Does this page work for someone randomly picking up the book at a store? What sells? And who is my target audience?

(To the last question, I already had a clear idea. But I was curious to learn what they thought.)

With every draft submission, I asked for critical feedback. I was happy to re-write as much as needed. I wanted it to be comprehensive - all my best ideas, with all my best words - so I could point to it even decades later.

In-studio meditation with acrylic inks and posca markers.

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Bonus reason: The chance to make something bigger than myself

When I held the author copy in my hands last month, I appreciated the book in a way that was not possible with PDFs. The feel of the cover, the spine, the touch of the pages, and the way it reads when you flip it back to front and front to back (I love doing this). I realized then that this book is much bigger than anything I could make by myself.

Even if I had all the resources, and all the time, and the ability to fully realize my own imagination, I could never have made it this way. I realized that even though this book would go by my name, it was truly a collaborative product. Make (Sneaky) Art is my book with Quarto, in the truest sense of that word.

And I will find out, I guess, how it does. Soon enough. But right now I think certain things simply need to be made with other people. A singular vision is a beautiful thing, but perhaps great execution requires more hands (and minds)?

Drawn at Kensington Market in Toronto with a Kohinoor multi-colour pencil.

In case you missed it

✍🏼 There is still time to participate in this month’s tiny story contest. Write a tiny story for a tiny person and have the chance to win one of the three original drawings shared in this post!

📭 Giving it away is one of the good things you can do with your art.

💙 At the Aspen Ideas Festival, I explained my big idea to save the world, my big idea to write this book.

Thank you for reading. I am glad to share my upcoming book with you, and have a slice of your time and attention this week.