Book updates

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A couple of months ago, I noted that I had been approached by a major publisher who asked me to write a book. That one is not going to happen now. I presented two ideas to them, both of which they liked, but in neither case was I willing to deliver a text in the style that Owen Jones, Grace Blakeley, and Nick Shaxson use. They write as journalists who interview people to develop a thesis based on what others might say. As is apparent from the way I write here, for better or worse, I build my own ideas and write about them. The result is a very different type of output.  So, these two ideas have been set aside for the time being.

There are some other things to also note on the book front.

Wiley

One is that some people are still being misled by statements made by Wiley that I have a book coming out this month. This book was in progress when I had Covid for the second time in 2022, which episode took me about eight months to recover from. When I had done so, the book in question no longer felt like the thing that I wanted to write, and it was abandoned with about seven chapters written. I am not currently planning to return to it because my thinking has moved on quite a long way since then, most particularly as a consequence of writing the Taxing Wealth Report. So, please do not try to order that book as it does not exist. That said, Wiley is a publisher who is keen to have a book from me, but this admin failure has not filled me with confidence.

The greatest hits collection

There is another dimension to this issue as well. A comment was made on this blog yesterday, suggesting that if I had not got a book in progress, a good one would be a collected work of my best blog posts, plus some of the best comments on those from some of the more regular commentators. I have, occasionally, been told this over time, but I have always had reservations because the style used for blogging is not necessarily that required in a book, precisely because blog writing is part of a continuing narrative, and that is not true with regard to book writing, which is a discrete exercise.

I also do not know which blog posts I consider my best on any subject, or what comments might be included. In practice, I think that an independent editor would have to review my writing to find these. Even then, I think that this would be more like an e-book, rather than a book for sale in a bookshop. I would, anyway, rather keep that space clear for something more substantial that I still have in mind.

That said, is there anyone interested in researching what those blog posts might be for a collection to be produced as background reading for those new to this blog, in particular? I am not suggesting that there's any funding for this. It would be a labour of love, and at the end of the day, would still require a fair amount of cooperation with me. However, if there is someone interested in pursuing this project and can suggest a viable methodology, including post-selection and comment selection, I am open to discussing it. Please start by commenting below, and we will see what happens from there.


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