Read my book, or maybe you should wait for the next one

I made a terrible mistake the other day: I read my own book, the one published a few years ago, “Looking at the Pint Half Full.” (Lest you think I’m trying to hawk my book here, you should know there’s only a handful of copies left, or maybe none. The last few were available only at Robbins Book List in Greenville and it’s possible they’ve sold out by now, in which case I should stop by the store to pick up a check so I’ll have beer money this weekend.)

I had never read my book before. I mean, I read it as I was writing and editing it, obviously, but never after it came out in print. I’m not sure why; it just never occurred to me to do so.

I only read it the other day because it’s the only “print” book in my house. I had just finished my last unread Kindle novel and my Internet connection was down, so I couldn’t download another one.

I read my book because that’s all there was handy.

Now I wish I hadn’t.

Why? Well, first off, it’s not as good as I thought it was. The book is (mostly) a collection of my newspaper columns, some from 10 or 15 years ago. I’m a better writer now than I was then and some of the phrasing feels clunky to me. Also, there’s one chapter in which I discuss my old rotator cuff injury. For reasons I will never understand, I referred to my boo-boo, repeatedly, as a rotator “cup” injury. What’s a rotator cup injury, or for that matter, a rotator cup? I have no idea, but there it is in my book!

There’s also a typo in there somewhere. Only one, but it bugs me. How did that typo sneak past me? I’ll admit, I did most of my editing on the book while sitting in my favorite booth at Moose Winooski’s, a little pub in Clawson, where I was living at the time. It’s possible the 40-ounce, two-dollar drafts they serve there had something to do with that typo; I’ll never know for sure.

Also, there are too many chapters about my last divorce and all the horrifying dating experiences that followed. Some are funny, but a couple are just darn depressing. 

And why did I write about losing my job and my house? I have no idea, other than it seemed like a good idea at the time.

At least I had enough sense to include the column about hopping trains during summer vacations back when I was a kid; it’s my personal all-time favorite, although I’ve never had a reader mention it as being one of his or hers.

I guess the book’s OK, if a little uneven. If it was someone else’s book and I the reviewer, I’d probably give it 2.5 stars out of four.

They say a writer is his own worst critic.

I hope that’s true.

mtaylor325@gmail.com