Ask the Author: Mike Robbins
Answered Questions (6)
Mike Robbins
Cheap Rioja. An industrial Chardonnay also helps.
Mike Robbins
He was elected. He changed the constitution.
Mike Robbins
You're not joking. Actually Amazon isn't the culprit in this case; it's the publisher - even I have to pay highly for copies. This is an ongoing problem with academic publishers as they don't appear to understand Print-on-Demand, and therefore commission conventional litho runs on which their accountants insist that they recover costs. This is something that really needs to change.
You might be able to order it through your local library. If you have reading rights at an academic library of any sort, you might find it easier, as many university libraries have it. Within half an hour of my office. the New York Public Library, New York University and Columbia all do. But "consumer" copies are very rare. It annoys me because this book is perfectly accessible to the intelligent lay reader, and I would love it to be more widely read.
You might be able to order it through your local library. If you have reading rights at an academic library of any sort, you might find it easier, as many university libraries have it. Within half an hour of my office. the New York Public Library, New York University and Columbia all do. But "consumer" copies are very rare. It annoys me because this book is perfectly accessible to the intelligent lay reader, and I would love it to be more widely read.
Mike Robbins
No - not interested in chasing figures like that. Even if your Amazon sales figures are bumped up into four figures for 48 hours, it won't really sell books. Only word-of-mouth recommendations do that. I do arrange review copies for people who genuinely want to review a book, and I appreciate their interest. But it is not a priority.
I write because I want to. No-one would bother doing it to get rich. Spend too much time worrying about marketing and you won't be writing much that's good.
I write because I want to. No-one would bother doing it to get rich. Spend too much time worrying about marketing and you won't be writing much that's good.
Mike Robbins
There have been two. The first, Even the Dead are Coming, wasn't really travel in a way; it was an account of the time I spent in Sudan as a development volunteer in the 1980s. The second was The Nine Horizons, which was a series of shorter pieces, each about a place where I had travelled or worked. I like the book, but because it is about so many different locations, it can lack focus for some readers; people are usually looking for a book about somewhere specific.
The Nine Horizons wasn't an autobiography - it was about the places I'd been and the people I'd met there, not about me. Some readers have understood that; others have thought it should be more personal. I never really saw why. It is not me but where I have been that is interesting.
The Nine Horizons wasn't an autobiography - it was about the places I'd been and the people I'd met there, not about me. Some readers have understood that; others have thought it should be more personal. I never really saw why. It is not me but where I have been that is interesting.
Mike Robbins
They are my experiences, yes. Although it's not an autobiography as such, everything in the book happened.
The book was written from memory - but some parts of it were written very soon after the event. The Sudan chapter was adapted from another book, Even the Dead are Coming, which was written only a year after I returned to England, and Oil in Greeneland within a few months of the journey. But the chapter about Syria was written 15 years after I left the country.
The book was written from memory - but some parts of it were written very soon after the event. The Sudan chapter was adapted from another book, Even the Dead are Coming, which was written only a year after I returned to England, and Oil in Greeneland within a few months of the journey. But the chapter about Syria was written 15 years after I left the country.
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