Part 8: Making of the Book

I signed a publishing contract with Chronicle Books, one of favorite publishing outfits. I'd been working on this book for a year, talking with Chronicle since May, weeks before Michael passed, and now they've told me I have two choices. The first choice is to go the traditional route and take 9-12 months to publish the book, maybe even wait a year after that because book stores will be flooded with MJ. The seconds is to fast track the book and give casual readers a high quality choice when looking for a MJ book. We knew fans and readers who appreciate good design and photography would eventually find my book, this year, or the next. In the end we decided on the second option, offering the casual reader, whose interest is fueled by popular culture, a heartfelt and substantive book. My editor at Chronicle told me I had to finish the book and get it to the printers in six weeks. A nine month process reduced to six weeks. The speediest production schedule in the history of my publisher. Some people at the company were skeptical that I could complete the task in time. But they didn't know that I'd lived with these photographs for over 25 years and had already put a years work into the book.