I run the book club for Remotive, a networking space for remote workers (including folks seeking remote work). It’s not your average book club. We don’t pick a book to read together. Instead we meet once a month to discuss whatever we’re each reading individually and swap reading recommendations.
The group includes folks from all over the world. In addition to our monthly meetings, I post a discussion question in our Slack channel. I recently asked the following question to my book club:
Question: Have you ever written a book? Or, would you like to someday?
Below was our discussion (and I’d love to continue the conversation with you in the comments section!):
This post contains affiliate links which means, at no cost to you,
I’ll receive a small commission if you purchase using those links.
Members names and images have been removed for privacy.
Answer #1:
Yes, I’ve written a book. Or two. Or three.
Want to write some more too.
Answer #2:
I have Two that have been published. One in progress. All non-fiction. I’d like to write and publish more fiction.
Answer #3:
Never have. At some point, if I believe I have something to say, I just may.
Would love to hear at some time what books the others wrote.
Response to #3:
I wrote ‘Aves de Buenos Aires‘, an illustrated field guide introducing children to birdwatching and to Buenos Aires’ indigenous birds. I also co-wrote ‘Antarctica Log Book‘, a log book for Antarctic travellers.
Response to #3:
Technically, not “books” in the full sense or at least none that have been published yet. I’ve written a series (which I’m rewriting so I’ve taken down), and a few short stories:
Answer #4:
Yes, I wrote a series of books on entrepreneurship for Pearson, years back… this is the second edition of one of them: Start Your Business Week by Week.
Answer #5:
I have not written two books
Two times I had an author’s contract with a (the same) publisher and have cancelled that after some time. Which is really problematic for the publisher when they already listed the book with Amazon because Amazon is not happy about retracting book announcements with advance orders.
“Many people don’t want to write a book but to have one written”
Response to #5:
Why did you cancel the contracts?
Response:
I planned to write books on software development topics while being full time working as a developer. The topics would have needed further investigation and some experiments. So in fact I didn’t have the time to do it. I promised the publisher’s reader (is this the correct term?) to never come back to him to write a book
And I’m still sorry for the inconvenience I caused with Stephan. He’s such a nice guy.
DISCUSSION: So, what about you? Have you ever written a book?