It’s guest post time! Ynze van der Spek, author of children’s books and part-time inventor writes about how his self-published children’s book ended up in a bookshop
Imagine you’ve written a children’s book. A children’s story, about Bibber, a vibrobot. A real story with a plot and a hero (Bibber) and a conflict. You’ve written and rewritten until all the words and sentences tell the story the best way they can. You have also illustrated this book with paint and brushes, and put text and pictures together. You have made a real booklet, with a cover and a blurb and a title page. Everything’s done and dusted. Imagine you’ve done all of that. What do you do next?
Send it to a publisher? No, that’s scary. You’re not ready for that just yet. But that’s ok, that will happen eventually, you tell yourself while patting yourself on the back.
So you do it youself. You have a whole bunch of booklets printed and people can buy them on your own webshop. You also give those books away to children you know, and if they tell you they love your book, you’re very proud of yourself. And if people buy your book from your webshop: even prouder.
But you want more. Because a webshop is quite boring. Bibber and his book belong in a proper bookshop. A nice bookshop, with lots of lovely pretty children’s books, where lots of children go to. A bookshop like Van der Velde in Groningen at Akerkhof, for instance.
So what do you do? You bring Bibber and his book to the bookshop, and you hide them on the shelves between the other children’s books. Without a recommended retail price and a bar code, so you can’t pay for it. The Bibber books at Van der Velde are, what I call, priceless. Children can search for Bibber’s books. And if you find one, you can keep it. Free of charge. That’s what you do.
Have you read about Bibber yet? Would you try and find one of Bibber’s books if you were close by? Would you ever consider hiding your books in a bookshop? What should Bibber’s next adventure be about? Please let me know in the comments! I will make sure Ynze reads all of them. Also, don’t forget to follow me for more book-related posts!
The Open Book 