Charles Jacobs

As a long-time avid reader, newly retired and with a nascent itch to write, I found this title irresistible, which is, of course, the whole point. This book is a marketing ploy, pure and simple. Once you get past the enticing title, it offers very little for aspiring writers of any age.

First of all, it is not about writing, it is about selling. If you are looking for insight into the art and craft of writing, ways to tap into your creativity, writing techniques, or even just good grammar, show more look elsewhere.

Secondly, there is very little that specifically pertains to retirees beyond emphasizing we have expertise and experiences worth sharing and we have the time to write. That doesn’t take a whole book to say.

What this book does do is give people who want to self-publish resources and encouragement to achieve that goal. If that’s all you want, the appendix lists recommended books and websites. In fact, the appendix is really all you need, as much of the book just consists of ideas and quotes from those sources.

The bottom line is, any book on writing should at least be a model of a well-written, well-organized, and informative work. This book isn’t. show less

There's a lot of information about writing in this book but little to set it apart from the vast sea of other how-to-write books that 1. assure you that yes, YOU can write and 2. tell you the secret is marketing.

Actually, both these things are true, and the author, Charles Jacobs, is an example of that. He's found a hook -- the vast pool of retired and soon-to-retire people who know how to type and think they have something to say.

The book is full of pithy advice, like "It isn't enough just show more to write. What you turn out must be saleable." That's fine advice, but hardly news. And, of course, salable is spelled wrong.

And that's the problem I (as a professional editor) have with this book. It's self-published. What Jacobs' many years as a newspaper executive should have taught him, but apparently didn't, is that EVERY writer needs an editor.

OK, so his wife, an educated woman, helped him whip the MS into shape. The result is that it's well-organized, but it's still more than a bit overwritten. As millions of bloggers have found, it's so easy to sit at the keyboard and just keep typing.

That's how one ends up with sentences like this: "Deciding what to charge is somewhat more difficult for those of you who want to harness your writing skills to continued involvement in your former line of work or to the business world in general." I think he means that if you write for a business audience it may be difficult to know how much to charge.

Bottom line: If you don't have a basic book about the business of writing, this one will do fine. The information may take a while to pull out of the thicket of words, but it's accurate.

Otherwise, give it a pass. show less

If you pick up this book expecting it to be about the craft of writing you will be disappointed. This book is about getting your work published. Being retired is inconsequential, anyone who wants to be published could get good ideas from this book.

This book makes the point that getting published is hard work; hard, time-consuming and expensive. If you're one desire in life is to publish your work then you can find a way to do it in this book. I f you want to be a professional writer this show more book lists the steps to take.

If you want to know how to write however then look at the resource list in the back of the book. There are books there that will help you to that goal. You will not find that help here except in very general terms.

To sum it up this is a resource and reference book on publishing. Writing is a separate topic. show less

This book is aimed very clearly at a particular audience -- retirees. The book addresses its readers directly, referring to the readers' years of experience. This is a broad overview of the topic, with just enough depth to thoroughly introduce the reader to the particular topic. The author quotes liberally from other books that supplement each sub-topic, pointing the wise reader towards those books for more depth.

He starts with defining the difference between fiction and non-fiction, and show more leads the reader through an introduction to the salient points of each.

After the book is written, he procedes to the next step, publication. He surveys the options there, as well. After that he talks about marketing. All the steps are covered, in an introductory, easy to read way. The liberal use of quotations in boxed sidebars involve his bibliography engagingly in the text.

The layout, with all the boxed sidebars, breaks up each page, making it seem shorter. However, i found them distracting at times.

I found the book to be superficial. On the other hand, I think this "broad but not deep" approach to the subject is precisely what the author was aiming for. The audience for this book appears to be those who have thought briefly about writing a book, but are not sure what that really means, or who find that a somewhat daunting idea. show less