ANDREW LAWRENCE INTERVIEW ON PUBLISHINGGURUS.COM

Andrew Lawrence was Wicked Sunny’s first Book Formatting Client and has completed 6 books with him.

Andrew Lawrence

Q. Andrew, please tell us something about yourself – for example, your age, education, where you live, and so on.

I am a baby boomer in my early 60’s. During the Vietnam War era I graduated from Ithaca College with a degree in business administration and, after that, I began a career on Wall Street. I spent four decades in New York and then, having had enough of cold winters, I relocated to warm and sunny Los Angeles, where I have resided since 1989. Yes, the weather here is great, there’s no snow and no humidity. You can go swimming on New Year’s Day!  In Los Angeles, I live in an area called the Hollywood Hills and I am midway between Universal Studios and Warner Bros. In fact, I can see Universal Studios from my terrace.

Personally, I have always been an avid reader, since I was ten years old. I like to read mostly fiction, though as an author I write only non-fiction. I write books that help people, books that help people improve their lives. I write books that help make you smarter, richer, and happier. My books are always short, always easy to understand, and are always uplifting and inspirational.

Professionally, I have a business background; but most of my books derive from my life experience, which also includes a highly-developed spiritual side. I have had an extraordinary life and want to share my personal and professional insights and knowledge with others. Maybe it will help them. Writing books is a good way for me to help others.

Q. What exactly do you do for a living?

I semi-retired some years ago, though I was fairly young at the time. I do not have a full-time job or work full time. I am a partner in an online international business, based in Los Angeles, which retails high-end designer fashions. I do all the fashion photography, and also created and currently maintain the web site. It keeps me busy, but not TOO busy. And, of course, I also write books.

Q. When did you first decide to write books?

I wrote my first book, Stories of a Lifetime, in 2000. It was published in paperback and is currently available at amazon.com. It’s an inspirational and motivational book based on extraordinary events in my life. I’ve had a lot of those!

Q. How many books have you written? Tell us about them.

I have written six books so far. Lately, I’ve been writing two books a year, assuming I can come up with the right subject matter. My latest book, How to Thrive after 65, is a book on retirement. It’s not your typical retirement book: this book reveals the secrets of how to have a HAPPY retirement. I also wrote Glimmers of Hope: the Future of America and You, from Now to 2020. I wrote The Happiness Transformation: How to Be Happy NOW and For the Rest of Your Life. In addition, my other books include MONEY – The Basics, an easy-to-understand book for anyone who wants to be more savvy about money; and Discover Your Life Purpose in 30 Minutes, an interactive book that reveals your unique and special purpose in life. And I wrote Stories of a Lifetime, an inspirational book of amazing and true stories.

Q. What are some of your favorite books by other authors? How have they influenced your own work?

When I was ten or eleven years old I read a lot of mysteries. My favorite was The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Arthur Conan Doyle. I loved all the Sherlock Holmes stories; I loved the unique mysteries, and the use of logic and clarity to solve them. I like logic and clarity. I am also very fond of The Old Man and the Sea, by Ernest Hemingway. In fact, reading Hemingway taught me how to write. Hemingway had a sparse style of writing. He only used enough words to tell the story, and no more. That’s exactly how I write; and that’s why my books are short, clear, and to the point.

Q. Do you have any hobbies, things about which you’re really passionate? Other than writing, that is?

I like photography, and, for the past ten years, have been specializing in fashion photography. I’m guessing that I have shot over 15,000 fashion photos. I like the challenge of capturing beauty on film.  And I’m a big reader. Reading has been a lifelong hobby. I enjoy adventure, mysteries and thrillers – I read a lot of fiction – and usually read a book a week.  I’ve been doing that practically my entire life, starting at age ten, and I’ve probably read over 3,000 books. And, of course, I also write books.

Q. Whose services have you used for editing and designing your books?

For me, the easiest part of being an author is writing the book. The hardest part for me is editing and formatting the book for publication. On my first book, I tried to format it myself and quickly gave up in complete frustration and failure. That’s when I found Wicked Sunny, who is now running PublishingGurus.com. Not only is he lightning-fast, he does a great job! And he’s 5,000 miles away in India, which has never been a problem. I email my final text to him from Los Angeles, then he formats the covers and the text and emails me the final pdf in the trim size I specified. Then, all I have to do is upload those final pdf files to my publisher. That saves me a lot of time and a lot of headaches, because I simply can’t do it myself. It takes a bit of highly-technical design skill and I don’t have that kind of skill. So I am happy to pay Wicked Sunny … because without him I could not get my books published. I am also thinking about hiring someone in the future to copy-edit the final text on my books. Though I edit each book many times, I always miss a few things, and that can cause my published book to be less than perfect. Because I have high standards, I want my books to be error-free.

Q. What’s your target audience? Do you only write for an American audience, or are you also interested in writing books for Asia and Europe?

I mainly target U.S. readers. That is because I am an American and I write like an American. So, it may be a little more difficult for foreign readers to benefit fully from my books, though The Happiness Transformation and Discover Your Life Purpose in 30 Minutes are universal. Both are excellent for readers in Europe, Asia, and around the world.

Q. How do you market your books?

I market my books via Amazon.com. I promote my books through my blog, Andrew-Lawrence.blogspot.com, and I create a simple web site for each of my books. I also write an article for each book and submit the article to article banks, where web site owners can get the article and reprint it for free.

Q. If a traditional publisher or bookstore approached you about publishing your work, would you accept the offer, or would you wish to remain your own boss?

Though it may be more prestigious to have a traditional publisher publish your book, today that is becoming more and more difficult — unless you are famous. Traditional publishers have to invest a lot of money in publishing an author and, as a result, they want to publish authors who will sell a lot of books based on their name and their fame. If you are an author who is not well-known, traditional publishers are not inclined to provide the costly and extensive publicity and promotion necessary to sell a lot of books. Publishing unknown authors is just too risky, as opposed to publishing a book by someone famous or well-known.

As for traditional bookstores, one of the things I like best about being an author is that my books are available at amazon.com. I don’t have to sell my own books or ship them to traditional bookstores. At this stage of my life, I am not interested in doing invoicing, accounting, or shipping to individual brick-and-mortar stores or book chains. If I were younger, I would probably do all that; but now I just want to concentrate on writing books, not the wholesale selling and shipping of books.

I just want to be an author, not a publisher or a book wholesaler or a shipper. But that’s just me.

Q. Tell us something about your upcoming books.

I am now finishing my latest book. It’s a book about retirement titled, How to Thrive after 65:  Secrets of a Happy Retirement. There are 77 million baby boomers who will be approaching retirement age over the next ten years. That’s a huge potential market for my book. And, of course, Wicked Sunny will be formatting my covers and text!

Here’s a New Author You Should Know!

Q. What advice do you have for new writers?

My advice for new writers is to write. And rewrite. And rewrite again. And keep rewriting until your work is good enough to publish – and good enough for readers to read. Do that first, that’s the most important thing. After you do that, then you can start worrying about all the rest of the publishing process. First, be a writer. Be the best writer you can be.