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The new one

(apologies to the great Mike Birbiglia for borrowing his title)

So … I have a deal to write a new book.

We actually signed the paperwork a few weeks ago, but I wanted to wait until after the holidays before I said anything in public. Now it’s time to make the announcement. Would you like to guess? I promise you, we could sit here all day and you’d never guess.

My next book is going to be about…

The Westminster Dog Show.

Yep: My first book was a pour-your-guts-out memoir about my lifelong struggle to lose weight. This book involves a lot of hanging out with dogs. It’s a bit of a departure.

Here’s how it happened: I had pitched a couple of ideas to my fantastic editor, Jofie Ferrari-Adler, who now co-runs his own imprint called Avid Reader Press as part of Simon & Schuster. Jofie was lukewarm on the ideas I pitched him, which is fine and a normal part of the publishing business. I was trying to figure out what to pitch next, and he suggested that I just send him a big batch of ideas, so he could help me get a sense of which one might make the best book.

So I sent him 20 ideas.

Some of them were two or three paragraphs. Others were a few sentences. But idea number 19 was just this:

Westminster. I don’t have a brilliant idea here except to say that nobody
has ever done a great book on the Westminster Dog Show and it’s about
fucking time.

Jofie and his colleagues liked several of the ideas, and my agent, Sloan Harris, chimed in with his favorites. As we kept talking, and the Westminster idea floated to the top, I fleshed it out a little more:

The dog show is a fascinating little world — the owners and trainers and judges trying to determine the perfect version of all these different breeds, and the amazing and wonderful dogs parading around the floor of Madison Square Garden, oblivious to pretty much everything except the treat in the trainer’s hand.

What I really like about it is the contrast to the way we think about dogs in the regular world. Show dogs are judged for how closely they fit the ideal version of the breed. Regular dogs, we love for their quirks — the weird way they eat, or how their ears are different sizes, or how they always turn three circles before settling down to bed. But there’s overlap, too: Even the best show dogs have their own little weirdnesses, and somehow even the mangiest mutt can give off a flash of royalty.

People and dogs have been partners for tens of thousands of years. What do we get out of that relationship? What do they get out of it? It made me want to go find out — not just to Westminster and other dog shows, but to meet scientists and poets and other people who have thought hard about that deep connection between our dogs and us.

So the book will be about the dog show … but, I hope, also a lot more than that.

In some ways, this is a return to what I’m used to. My memoir was a bit out of step for me — I’m more used to writing about other people. There’s nothing about my work that I love more than diving into a new world, learning about it, and coming back to tell the tale.

I’m headed to New York in a few weeks for Westminster 2020, to dive into that world, and I can’t wait.

I’ll post a few updates along the way, but probably not many — I like to keep things fairly close to the vest while I’m working. But I suspect I’ll post some dog photos here and on my Instagram feed from time to time. And if everything goes well, in a couple of years, we’ll have a book.

The kicker: My wife and I just acquired a cat. But that’s a story for another time.

*****

While I have your attention … the paperback of “The Elephant in the Room” comes out NEXT WEEK — Jan. 14, although feel free to go ahead and preorder. I’ll be doing a short book tour over the next couple of weeks — if you’re in Charlotte, Athens, Atlanta, Nashville, Auburn, or Litchfield Beach, S.C., come say hey. I’ve already got a few more dates lined up for spring and even into the fall.

This book-writing life is such a gift for me — I always wanted to do it, but never knew if I’d get a shot. To be able to write a second book … well, I’m doubly blessed. Thanks to all of you for buying books, not just mine, but anyone’s. See you on the road.

— TT

Categories
Writing

Elephant in the Room: The end of the beginning

 

IMG_3573

 

Some of you know that I’ve been working on a book for a while — it’s called “The Elephant in the Room,” and it’s a memoir about my life as a fat man in a growing America. Just after midnight last night, I wrote the final sentence and then typed -30-, which is old newspaper lingo for the end of a story. I emailed the draft to my agent. Most of my columns for the Charlotte Observer were about 600 words. One of the features I write for ESPN might run 4,000. This was 61,000 words. I hope a few of them are good.

This is just the end of the beginning. A few trusted readers are going to take a look and give me some thoughts. I’ll read those and make some changes. Then my book editor at Simon & Schuster will get ahold of it, and he’ll have more ideas. What we end up with will be different than what I turned in today. That’s how it works and how it ought to work. I don’t know when there will be a book for you to buy. But you can bet I’ll let you know through this blog, Twitter, Facebook, emails, town crier, etc.

There’s still a long way to go. But for now: I wrote a book! I think I’ll go sleep for a couple of days.

 

Categories
Uncategorized

Book announcement

I’m too excited to give this a fancy buildup so I’ll just say it: I’m writing a book.

Here’s the announcement from the site Publishers Lunch:

publisherslunch

Yeah, I can’t really believe it either.

There are a lot of things I don’t know yet — we’re at the beginning of a long, long process. Apparently, now that the publisher likes the idea, they actually want me to write the damn thing. So it’ll be awhile before you get to hold a copy in your hands — although, if you’re reading this, I do expect you to not only hold a copy in your hands one day, but actually, you know, BUY it.

I’ve been thinking about this book for a long time, as I’ve tried to untangle not just my own struggle to get in shape, but the struggle of so many others. I’ve touched on it a few times, most recently in my piece for ESPN on Jared Lorenzen, but there’s a lot more to talk about. It’ll be hard. Trying to make yourself better in some way is always hard.

But I’m thrilled for the chance to tell this story, and to find out what it’s like to write a book — something I’ve always dreamed of. I’ll keep you posted on how it’s going along and along. Thanks to everyone for the support all these years. And to all of you who asked “When are you going to write a book?” — finally, I have a decent answer.