How Jay Ingleston Emotionally Connects With Readers | Buying Local #74

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Speaker 2
Welcome, everyone, to Buying Local. I’m your host, Mike Nelson from Five Towers Media joined today by, I don’t even know how many times you’ve been on the show now, Jay, but Jay Engelson, writer, author extraordinaire.

00;00;13;11 – 00;00;15;27
Speaker 2
Is this your sixth time? Seventh time coming on the show?

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Speaker 1
I think you I’m six. I think it’s sixth. Yeah.

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Speaker 2
I might be a record for the show. I don’t.

00;00;21;04 – 00;00;23;01
Speaker 1
Know, but now I.

00;00;23;01 – 00;00;30;02
Speaker 2
Got I got some Bruce Shaq coming on next week though. He, he’s in he’s in contention for any. We get him on all the time too. So.

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Speaker 1
Oh jeez.

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Speaker 3
Oh gobble gobble. That’s what I call yeah.

00;00;35;21 – 00;00;47;14
Speaker 2
So Jay we’re going to talk about a couple things. But before we get into it, maybe just, you know, introduce yourself to the audience for people that haven’t seen you. Previously on the show, just kind of tell them we are. And some of the things that you get up to.

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Speaker 3
My name is Jason Eggleston. I usually go by Jay.

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Speaker 3
Not by Jay’s. That’s my grandmother’s, thing.

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Speaker 1
I wasn’t a big fan of that name. Yeah. Yeah.

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Speaker 3
Written. This is my sixth book. I’ve got seven and eight coming out. Hopefully within the next couple months. I’m an audiobook that I’ve been trying to record, but that’s been, a thing in itself. What else.

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Speaker 1
Have you just you for that?

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Speaker 3
Is this I can but and here’s the thing, I, I was going to go that route, but everybody I talked to, like you got to use your own voice. You got to be the one to read it. I think it would come across. So I, my pot, my microphone, my whole setup is, like, around me. I got a.

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Speaker 1
Four.

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Speaker 3
Condenser thing. I got a whole, a whole studio here. I’ve got the the thing on my laptop. So that’s been interesting learning that.

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Speaker 1
Well, Dylan.

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Speaker 2
Isn’t there an AI that allows you to use your voice?

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Speaker 3
There is. And the thing that I’ve been doing research and stuff on it.

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Speaker 1
Yeah.

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Speaker 3
We I can have an issue with live and live. Okay. So to to get that type of stuff down, what words have two meanings or, you know.

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Speaker 1
Two different student.

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Speaker 3
Pronunciations. I, I was in a group talking to a different couple authors and they’re like, yeah, we want to use AI, but you run into some, some hiccups. I mean, now there could be some programs out there that will that can recognize that. But yeah, the majority from what I from, you know, the information that I’ve learned about, they have an issue still with that.

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Speaker 1
So yeah, I.

00;02;31;03 – 00;02;51;08
Speaker 2
Really, I haven’t gotten into that part of things too. Maybe we use AI a ton for all sorts of things, but, and I was playing around the other day with making a buddy of mine say things that he didn’t actually say. So that was fun. That’s very possible. And but the one thing was the voice.

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Speaker 2
It wasn’t his voice. It was like an AI voice, almost like a, a Siri, but like the guy version of Siri. And, and I looked in a little bit about using your actual voice and then like, because we were like for commercials and stuff for this show. I screw up the live reads all the time.

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Speaker 2
So, like when I try to record them on, like, it ends up being 20 takes before I get the final commercial done. So it ends up being a two hour thing for me and I. I tried to get into the using the AI stuff a little bit, but it just, I don’t know, it was rough. It was like inflection and tone and sometimes it was like, you know, trail off or it would make an abrupt ending to things.

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Speaker 2
I it just didn’t sound. It didn’t. It was.

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Speaker 3
Cut. Yeah. Yeah. I screwed around with a little bit on cat cut. And it will use your voice, but it will stop a sentence where it shouldn’t be. It can’t articulate. I mean, it’s still on the early infant stages technically. So I think within the next couple of years it it’ll be no problem. Like and it’s funny that you bring up like reading I have a TikTok channel called Nostalgia Time and I do older 80s 90s movies, and I basically do back stories and follow up like it just for a one minute 32nd read.

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Speaker 3
I will have to do like sometimes 20 takes, sometimes ten, sometimes I’ll get them out pretty fairly easy, but I tend to like try to make up words as I’m reading and that are there. So I have to jump back. And that’s part of my like my dyslexia, I guess, and trying to like insert words that don’t exist.

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Speaker 3
But yeah.

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Speaker 1
Yeah.

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Speaker 3
It’s it’s something like, I might be an author, but reading is not my strong suit. Neither is punctuation and spelling.

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Speaker 2
So I, I’m a comma guy. I put commas everywhere, bro, when I am writing. It’s so funny because thank God for a I know it proves absolutely everything I write, but oh yeah, when I was writing my own blogs and writing my own articles, and then I would hand them to, the perfect that our editor or to the person doing the proofing.

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Speaker 2
They’re like, hey, did you want to put another comma in there somewhere, bud? And I’m like, I’m like, I don’t know. I just I write the way I think. So when, you know, when there’s a pause and it’s not the end of a statement, I’m like, well, there should be a comma there. And I also like to put things in parentheses.

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Speaker 2
I love parentheses, brother. I like it’s like I’m saying something, but then I’m thinking as I thought about it. So that’s got to go in parentheses. Like or or.

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Speaker 3
Throw that explanation up where it really doesn’t need to be like.

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Speaker 1
Yeah, yeah, I, I do that.

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Speaker 2
Grade school and high school teachers would not be happy with.

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Speaker 1
With my grade. I could hear the opposite of me.

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Speaker 3
My first couple books don’t have any punctuation or anything in them, and I did it that way because I really didn’t know where to put stuff. So I wanted to be like, you know, it’s my baby. So I just made sure the lines ended where they’re supposed to and they didn’t cut down. But I’m starting to learn the use of commas and punctuation where it needs to go.

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Speaker 3
Especially with this.

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Speaker 2
Oxford comma or no Oxford comma.

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Speaker 3
No Oxford comma.

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Speaker 2
No Oxford comma. So I use the Oxford comma. I feel like it changed the meaning of a sentence quickly.

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Speaker 1
Oh yeah, it makes it look.

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Speaker 3
It makes it look prettier.

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Speaker 2
Come. Yeah. That’s it. Commas are just pretty, man. We just we like to put them everywhere we can. And I know we’re going to talk about the books, but we’re just going down this tangent. What about as you’re writing now? So obviously, you know, this is your I think you said what this is book six that we’re about to talk about.

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Speaker 2
And then you in you working on seven and eight. I’m curious, I have two questions, about the evolution of your writing style. Kind of like what we’re talking about, you know, now, your six books in. So you, you know, obviously you learn things as you go, you change, you know, you’re growing as a writer. But I’m also curious if you’re using AI at all.

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Speaker 2
And I hate to keep talking about AI, but it’s just such a a constant part of everybody’s life. And I think it’s a valuable question. Are you using it for proofing and editing?

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Speaker 1
I am, yeah.

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Speaker 3
I sure am. I like before we have my friend Erica like proofread stuff or I would, you know, give it to certain people. Now it’s just the file. Hey, can you put whatever it needs to be wherever and let me know, blah blah, blah blah. And I pay for the the paid portion of ChatGPT. So, I named my ChatGPT poorly after my grandfather.

00;07;34;24 – 00;07;56;26
Speaker 3
So poorly basically knows me now and knows my writing style. So if I don’t have something in the right place, Holly will tell me after he proofread it and said, well, maybe a period here, but I would kill that. That word, maybe put a different word like that’s. To me, that’s just it boggles my mind that we’re in that that whole space now.

00;07;56;29 – 00;08;20;11
Speaker 3
But it’s also cool that I can bring Pali up like I spoke my mother owl big time because he knows my backstory. He knows, like I’ve told him about my grandfather and I’m speaking to him like I’m talking about him like he’s a folk person. So I bring it to my mother and like, hey, politoed. So, tell mom about, you know, my grandfather Polly, which was her father.

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Speaker 3
And he goes on the whole, Polly was on the tugboats for this many years, and it’s blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And here’s his daughter and he had blah, blah and like goes off and she’s just sitting there going.

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Speaker 1
Wow.

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Speaker 3
That is that’s kind of scary but cool at the same time.

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Speaker 1
So it’s what I.

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Speaker 2
So I’m not a ChatGPT guy anymore. I use cloud, yeah. I just like the interface better. I don’t know that one is better than the other, but right, I, I whenever like I use cloud so much for so many different tasks now that I’m like, I talk about cloud like it’s a person, which is funny that you’re saying that you named it Polly because I’ll.

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Speaker 2
I’ll be talking to my team about something. I’ll be like, hey, so I was talking with cloud. Here’s what we came up with. I’m not sure Cloud’s right on this. I wanted to get your input on it. You know, like like it’s another member of the team. Oh, yeah, but she pretty much is.

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Speaker 3
But yeah, that’s. And that’s where they’re going. And at first I was kind of hesitant, but, with the proofreading and all that stuff, it can be done in a matter of 2 or 3 minutes. You put it in there and comes back with changes. Put that in there. As to go back to like my writing style and stuff, how it’s changed.

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Speaker 3
I’ve touched on this before. My first couple books.

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Speaker 1
Were.

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Speaker 3
Stuff that I used, like I would write and have no forethought about it and then read it back after. And go, oh, that’s what I was thinking. They’re like, everything would just pop into my head and I just write it down. Now I’m more cerebral with it. I like, I tacked things or before I would just let them flow.

00;09;52;04 – 00;10;10;24
Speaker 3
Like if I come up with a, like a concept, like the the whole grief book, me and my buddy Justin Baker talked about about wanting to do it and, and I had written, like, I’m constantly on my phone, right? Writing on notes, like out something pops in my head in the middle night. Sometimes my wife would be like, what were you doing?

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Speaker 3
So I that happens all throughout the day. I’ll come up with stuff. So I had a lot of like grief quotes that didn’t fit into anything else book wise or even if there weren’t grief quotes, they could be like changed around. And that’s the other thing that I learned when I would write a quote, it was like I couldn’t change it.

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Speaker 3
Like I couldn’t go in and I don’t want to change what that because that means it’s like to me, it’s like my baby or whatever. Now I’ll go in and go, all right. Then when they don’t fit now, I’ll just change. You know what that means? I’ve learned to do that now. Like, my writing style is more like I want everything to fit piece by piece and I want the reader to be able to pick it up.

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Speaker 3
And I think you’ve even said this to me, reading is easy when it’s my book, because you can just pick it up, go read a couple things and put it back down and it’s not a dive in and have to read, you know, in-depth. It’s they’re all easy reads. And and the more that I write, even the not like the novelization that I’m doing with the thriller book, it’s gone from 200 pages to 300 down to 250, down to 200 to 180.

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Speaker 3
Like the the book was finished the last time we talked. So I thought, well, I went in and totally like gutted it and changed things. And now it’s kind of not like a novelization. It’s kind of like a short story novelization. So I think I’m going to keep it around 180, 200 pages, because I think it’s some of the best stuff I’ve written, like, and I’ve never written fiction, I’ve never written a psychological thriller, but I had the concept of the beginning, and I had the concept at the end, and now it’s just like trying to fill everything in, to make everything, you know, meshed together the way I want to.

00;11;52;24 – 00;12;14;26
Speaker 3
But I’m so. I guess I’m so anal retentive about it that I want it to be perfect. And every time I read it. And so then I pull something out and then I’ll add some. And then, yeah, that book should have technically been out before this one, but this one just came together so easily cuz I had a backlog of like 50 something quotes, and then I just wrote 30, I think 35 more.

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Speaker 1
So, you know.

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Speaker 2
It’s it’s interesting you say about the reduction, you know, when in some cases when I’m writing things, I might start with three pages or four pages or whatever it is, or 1500 words. And then I go through and I start pulling pieces, and I sometimes worry I’m pulling too much out due. As you’re going through and editing this fiction book.

00;12;40;10 – 00;12;43;19
Speaker 1
Are you are you worried about that? Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

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Speaker 3
And it’s I done it to where I had this. It was a conversation in a diner between the between two characters and the dialog I thought was too in-depth. And I pulled a lot of it out. And then when I went back in, I’m reading it like, well, now it’s like, it don’t make sense because I should have kept that so the audience could actually put a visual.

00;13;11;29 – 00;13;26;02
Speaker 3
And then the visual disappeared and it was kind of like two people talking were before I was like, and they’re sitting in a diner and they’re talking conversation wise, and they bring up, you know, high school and they’re blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And then when I took certain parts out, I’m like.

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Speaker 1
Well.

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Speaker 3
The beat wasn’t there. It kind of went. And then the like flatline and then took back up again. So that was one of the first things I changed and put that back in. And then of course when I changed that, I changed sections down the line. So now I got to go all the way back and to fix that.

00;13;43;02 – 00;13;49;29
Speaker 3
Yeah. It’s been it’s like I always picture Criminal Minds where they’re on the board and they’re circling things and this goes here and.

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Speaker 1
That goes there.

00;13;51;07 – 00;14;13;00
Speaker 3
And I’m like, oh shit, I got to cross that back out, pull that back here. It’s been very oh so taxing. But, writing fiction is a lot harder than writing everyday stuff that I can feel emotionally. But I think fiction writing is more I think it’s more gratifying because I look at and go, oh, I just made this up in my head.

00;14;13;02 – 00;14;37;26
Speaker 3
And I was telling my wife the other day we were watching, that movie, Project Hail Mary. And I’m like, oh, this came out. This came like it was a popular book, and they made it into a movie. But I’m like, this came out of somebody’s mind like, this is any movie watches comes out of a writer’s mind like that is manufactured and put into, you know, into, you know, Disney Coast or whatever you want to call it.

00;14;37;28 – 00;15;01;04
Speaker 3
And like that to me is like the coolest thing. And that’s why I like there’s been days like where I go, I don’t I don’t want to write in a line like I’m, I’m all pooped out here. And then I go, no, because the gratification of putting things on paper and then, like I’ve said 100 times, having one person come up and go, hey, that, that was that really got me like that.

00;15;01;06 – 00;15;29;11
Speaker 3
The The Dad Clark book. I’m still like getting messages and that and that’s one of the bestselling books that I’ve put out. So far besides the first one. But it’s just that I don’t know the relationship you have with the audience that not a lot of people can understand in, and it’s kind of hard to articulate, but the words touch people, and if you can make a difference again in somebody’s life for just one person, like.

00;15;29;13 – 00;15;30;19
Speaker 1
That’s.

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Speaker 3
To me, it’s like, I don’t want to say it’s like a religious experience, but it’s like an experience that not many people can can hold in their hand, go, yeah.

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Speaker 1
Like so yeah, I try to, I try, I.

00;15;43;16 – 00;15;45;24
Speaker 3
Try to make it make sense. But yeah.

00;15;45;27 – 00;16;09;15
Speaker 2
Well and it’s, you know, I think about well a couple things like one like I love Stephen King, especially his older stuff, but like Stephen King would go into explaining the texture of the curtain on the wall like, like it was wild to me. Sometimes the universe of detail that he created in his mind and then put on paper.

00;16;09;22 – 00;16;37;06
Speaker 2
So to your point, right, of like having detail in there, but also sometimes I’d be like reading and I’m like, all right, Stephen, like, I don’t need all that detail on the damn Kirk. Yeah, okay. Like so I, I can’t imagine how hard excuse me it is to filter it enough, but still give it context and continuity and character and, you know, like something that’s tangible, right?

00;16;37;09 – 00;17;01;04
Speaker 2
And then, but also like, from a continuity standpoint, like when you were talking about, like if you remove something here, then it affects something downstream, which your other books, like you said, like, I mean, I could pick it up, I could read a couple pages and I could put it down. And like, page 57 really didn’t rely on page 23, you know, like they were all individual quotes.

00;17;01;06 – 00;17;12;16
Speaker 2
So I can’t even like those are such two different styles of writing, jumping over to the fiction writing from what you’ve been doing that that sounds, yeah, sounds pretty overwhelming, bro.

00;17;12;18 – 00;17;13;07
Speaker 1
Oh, yeah.

00;17;13;14 – 00;17;43;20
Speaker 3
Yeah. I mean, I’ve been writing this book. I think it’s coming up close to a year, and like the original title was echoes in the walls. And then I switched it to Welcome Home, and then I changed the whole concept of like, I gave, no spoilers, but the original concept was the guy moves back to his hometown, buys a house with his teenage daughter, but then I change it till he moves back home to that the house he grew up in.

00;17;43;22 – 00;18;02;08
Speaker 3
And then, you know, that has to be changed in the beginning. And then certain parts of the book have to be changed because you’re still going on. He just bought a house and moved back to town. But you want that. You want that subplot underneath of this is the house he grew up in, and these are the people that he knows.

00;18;02;10 – 00;18;29;08
Speaker 3
And then he can walk into this room and that’s his old bedroom and talk to his daughter about this. And so again, that’s where the continuity in your character development, even though people don’t get it right off the hook, is if you change it was his house to it was his house. There’s so much more plot you can add as opposed to he just bought a house and it’s just a tiny little things that change.

00;18;29;10 – 00;18;31;09
Speaker 1
The whole, like the whole.

00;18;31;11 – 00;18;52;29
Speaker 3
The whole beat of the book. Like I’m constantly thinking of beats like it’s weird because I’ll go to, like, professional wrestling in the way they tell stories and you have your characters, you have your heel and you have your babyface. You have to have some sort of chaos if you want. You know, everything to to bump off each other.

00;18;52;29 – 00;19;05;24
Speaker 3
And that’s like with this book, I made sure in the beginning I knew what the beginning was, and I knew the huge plot twist at the end. And I’m like, so excited to make the middle. And now making the middle has been fun.

00;19;05;26 – 00;19;08;20
Speaker 1
Yeah, not real, but I yeah.

00;19;08;22 – 00;19;22;05
Speaker 2
Well, I’m sure that it’s, you know, it’s kind of like working out, right? Like you don’t necessarily enjoy it sometimes while you’re in it, but overall you enjoy it. Right. Like, yeah. Is that is that fair.

00;19;22;12 – 00;19;23;10
Speaker 1
So yeah. Yeah.

00;19;23;10 – 00;19;41;10
Speaker 3
And sometimes you work out and you want to take a break for like a week. So I took I haven’t touch my laptop. I open that file because I’m like, I’m going to get into this and I’m gonna look up and there’s seven hours gone and I’m looking at and I’m like, all right, I rewrote that four times, and then I gotta rewrite this five times.

00;19;41;13 – 00;19;53;02
Speaker 3
So I just, I needed to take a break. I think if I go back in, I’ve got it. Maybe a good 50 pages to finish up, change a little couple things, and I think I’ll be good to go.

00;19;53;04 – 00;20;04;01
Speaker 2
Well, don’t take too long. I know I’ve read about that. I’ll they’ll start a book or even finish a book and then put it on a shelf for ten years and then pull it back down to like, all right, I think I’m ready to finish this thing.

00;20;04;03 – 00;20;05;18
Speaker 1
And now my, my.

00;20;05;18 – 00;20;20;29
Speaker 3
My psyche and my wall. Oh, definitely won’t let me do that. Like, I can’t even like it coming into this and, like, shit, I’m like, I really wanted to have this book ready because I know my good would get a kick out of it. But then I’m like, yeah, it’s got to be. It’s got to be perfect for me.

00;20;20;29 – 00;20;49;21
Speaker 3
I mean, not perfect, but it has to be where I can read it and go, wow, that’s going to hook. That’s going to make somebody go, that was pretty cool, because I think I look, I’m a huge fan of like the M, not M Night Shyamalan and like, endings in the way flip stuff. And I think I did a really good job of not copying, but, honoring the way he does stuff like that to my own.

00;20;49;23 – 00;21;10;08
Speaker 3
My own kind of universe that I’ve created in this book, because I think, after this one, I’m going to sit down with myself and think about if I want to, you know, do another quote book. I’ve been really, really I’ve already started, actually. I probably should just pick one thing and go with it, but that’s not how my mind works.

00;21;10;10 – 00;21;43;11
Speaker 3
So I have a sequel to The Dad Clock, and it’s going to be, you know, the dad clock was all these moments, and then the sequel is going to be like the accolades and go into certain things and, you know, only so many softball games or getting in depth to, to kind of like that whole structure type stuff because I’m like that, like out of any book that I’ve written, that’s the most personal and most, I think the most emotional book, definitely by far.

00;21;43;13 – 00;22;25;17
Speaker 3
And to have people like, openly tell me, like they don’t read like I’m not I won’t throw his name out there. This this guy bought the book and a day later, two days later, he bought eight more because he’s not a reader. But it made him emotional. And it seems like everybody that I’ve come in contact that has bought the book is I had a really good emotional experience with it, and every time I read it, I can’t get through it like I, you know, truth be told, I haven’t read the book cover to cover in book form, but when it was in like the transcript phase, I think I said something on the last

00;22;25;17 – 00;22;26;08
Speaker 3
podcast about.

00;22;26;10 – 00;22;27;19
Speaker 2
I was going to call you out of that.

00;22;27;19 – 00;22;29;00
Speaker 1
Actually my wife, I.

00;22;29;00 – 00;22;32;11
Speaker 3
Couldn’t get through it and she’s like videotaped me crying and reading that right.

00;22;32;15 – 00;22;34;08
Speaker 1
Back. That kept Catholic.

00;22;34;11 – 00;22;43;13
Speaker 3
But and then like, dedicate it to my daughter like, like long after I’m gone, she can put that book up and say, you know, that’s my dad.

00;22;43;20 – 00;22;44;24
Speaker 1
Or, you know.

00;22;44;26 – 00;22;50;22
Speaker 3
Anybody that has kids can pick it up and immediately go to, hey, that’s a good that’s a good memory there.

00;22;50;22 – 00;22;52;24
Speaker 1
And like, again, like.

00;22;52;26 – 00;23;19;27
Speaker 3
We get fixated on time not and like a construct of where it’s endless but unknown to us, that’s the way we really do think about it because we don’t think about it. The, the brick wall at the end and you got to get as much in before the brick wall as possible. And I think lately that’s kind of been my mantra is not to be,

00;23;19;29 – 00;23;45;21
Speaker 3
Not to hang on the outcomes of things and not, you know, not to be fixated on what can be, well, almost like my desk over here, but to not be attached to an outcome. So if I write a book and it doesn’t track, well, guess what? I can write another book. You know, if my the way I perceive something today might not be the way I perceive something tomorrow, like not being attached to an outcome I like.

00;23;45;21 – 00;23;54;20
Speaker 3
I’ve been trying to tell people, like I freely say, like I had a counseling meeting the other day and my counselor is like, you’re very interesting.

00;23;54;22 – 00;23;56;10
Speaker 1
And I said, well.

00;23;56;13 – 00;24;19;00
Speaker 3
About three or 4 or 5 months ago, I decided that I had to change things because, you know, I haven’t had depression or anxiety in quite a while. But once I like kind of let go of outcomes and being attached to things like whatever happens, happens and you roll with it and you know, again, we’re we’re almost I’m almost 50 years old.

00;24;19;00 – 00;24;19;11
Speaker 3
I don’t know.

00;24;19;11 – 00;24;21;29
Speaker 1
About you, Mike, but anyway.

00;24;22;02 – 00;24;26;11
Speaker 2
I am also almost 50. I just turned 49 a couple of weeks ago.

00;24;26;13 – 00;24;31;03
Speaker 3
I know then that then I hit 49 and then we’ll celebrate our 50th anniversary.

00;24;31;05 – 00;24;32;05
Speaker 1
Sounds good to me.

00;24;32;09 – 00;24;58;02
Speaker 2
Well, and, you know, it’s funny about what you’re saying to. I don’t know if you’re familiar with the the bag. A bag of God. Vida. Jesus, I can’t even say it. Anyway, in the in the Geeta, there is a line where, the main character is being talked to essentially by God. And, and God is saying to them, like, you’re entitled to the work, but you’re not entitled to the fruits of that work, right?

00;24;58;02 – 00;25;13;12
Speaker 2
That’s what when you’re talking about, that’s what it made me think about, right? It’s like you’re entitled to the labor, but you’re not entitled to the fruits of that labor, which just means like, yeah, you need to do the stuff, but the outcome is completely not up to you, and worrying about it isn’t going to do anything like you’re not owed.

00;25;13;15 – 00;25;16;19
Speaker 2
You’re not owed the outcome you want. Right.

00;25;16;21 – 00;25;18;16
Speaker 1
Yeah. But you are getting work from imposter.

00;25;18;16 – 00;25;36;03
Speaker 3
Syndrome into this whole like deconstruction thing. And it’s like my uncle passed away in November and he left me all his musical stuff like everything around me that you can’t see. There’s massive amount of guitars behind me.

00;25;36;05 – 00;25;37;06
Speaker 1
But.

00;25;37;09 – 00;26;02;08
Speaker 3
It was the first, kind of the first death. And we were we were close. We didn’t speak for like two years, but like, he was my hero growing up, like, music wise, amazing guitar player. Loved his family, loved my daughter, whatever. But when he passed, it was it was the first, first time somebody passed away where I wasn’t like, my life didn’t stop, like, I wouldn’t.

00;26;02;08 – 00;26;08;10
Speaker 3
I didn’t hang on the I’m going to be depressed and I’m going to because I knew.

00;26;08;12 – 00;26;19;11
Speaker 3
Like, again, don’t be attached to the outcome of things. Life goes on. He would definitely want me to not sit on my ass and, you know, and grieve every day.

00;26;19;13 – 00;26;22;01
Speaker 1
And this, you know, I’m like, you know what?

00;26;22;03 – 00;26;32;28
Speaker 3
For this book, I’m going to finish it for him. And I’ll make sure that there’s some things in there that I know he would be.

00;26;32;28 – 00;26;33;28
Speaker 1
Happy.

00;26;34;00 – 00;26;56;01
Speaker 3
That I put in there. But again, it’s again, we can’t just sit in, you know, in and, you know, cry in our hands, even though it’s good to do that. But I didn’t want it to be because I’ve had death, like I’ve lost some of my best friends. And it’s just like it takes you completely out. But I knew with this I had book the book in mind.

00;26;56;01 – 00;27;13;11
Speaker 3
I wanted to do it. I really can’t play guitar as long as I used to be able to do it because my shoulder and my bicep tendon. But there’s some songs that I learned for him, and I’m just like, see this as a positive thing instead of woe is me type stuff.

00;27;13;13 – 00;27;15;12
Speaker 2
And then her grief.

00;27;15;14 – 00;27;32;16
Speaker 3
Yeah, getting stuck in the grief cycle. And that’s why I like with this book, you can pick it up and if you’re feeling a certain way, every man like I made sure everything made somebody’s day a little bit better. Like, I’m like, I’ll, I’ll do. I got a couple samples.

00;27;32;16 – 00;27;34;01
Speaker 1
On every day. Yeah.

00;27;34;04 – 00;28;13;05
Speaker 3
So page 19, you don’t owe anybody a strong version of yourself. You’re person. You’re not a performance. That’s my favorite one of my probably top five quotes I’ve ever written. And it’s my favorite in the book. Because we are a we’re a person, we’re not a performance. And I know people that put the smiling face on. And you can tell there’s just rumbling underneath and there’s sadness, but if you get it out there and you, you put it into the, you know, put it into the air, a lot of stuff gets the it just falls off your shoulders, at least in my sense of stuff.

00;28;13;07 – 00;28;32;22
Speaker 3
I got a couple other ones here. I, I got little, pink post-it notes that I put on. It’s that he’s, anger is part of grief. It is love with nowhere to go. You know, that’s it’s kind of a take on an hour, that’s already been put out there. I just put my spin on it.

00;28;32;24 – 00;28;33;20
Speaker 3
But.

00;28;33;22 – 00;28;34;19
Speaker 1
You know.

00;28;34;22 – 00;28;41;16
Speaker 3
We get angry because people leave us. But there again, we have the moments, we have the memories.

00;28;41;19 – 00;28;43;26
Speaker 1
And.

00;28;43;29 – 00;29;09;10
Speaker 3
Till the day I die, that’s going to be my mantra. Many memories and moments and people don’t understand until, you know, some people on their deathbed don’t understand. But that’s all we got at the end. This is another one. Your loss does not need to be smaller for other people. It mattered to you. It mattered. So, that’s the.

00;29;09;10 – 00;29;11;01
Speaker 1
Cover of.

00;29;11;04 – 00;29;14;24
Speaker 2
Just for today, because that after those assets is the current book.

00;29;14;26 – 00;29;18;29
Speaker 1
And is this.

00;29;19;01 – 00;29;25;07
Speaker 2
It’s similar to, to the previous books where it’s, it’s it’s a series of quotes throughout the book.

00;29;25;07 – 00;29;27;20
Speaker 1
Right? Yeah. I keep.

00;29;27;23 – 00;29;28;23
Speaker 3
I don’t know if my latest.

00;29;28;23 – 00;29;32;02
Speaker 1
Right here showing up.

00;29;32;05 – 00;29;59;17
Speaker 3
Yeah. And then I have a whole basically a forward in a, I have dedications. I actually have a go back thing. I can read. Yeah. Grief does not follow a timeline. Some days feel manageable. Others arrive with the weight you didn’t expect. Just for today is a quiet companion for anyone learning to live with loss inside, or short reflections meant to open up at any moment in the morning during a difficult day or late at night when memories feel close.

00;29;59;19 – 00;30;07;12
Speaker 3
No instructions, no pressure to move on. Just simple words to help you breathe and make it through the day.

00;30;07;15 – 00;30;08;08
Speaker 1
Yeah.

00;30;08;10 – 00;30;14;23
Speaker 3
For you, it’s one of the things you wake up in the morning. I want to just read it and just.

00;30;14;25 – 00;30;41;03
Speaker 3
Give you some sort of clarity of the day or just to make you understand that we’re not alone. There’s other people feel the same way, carrying the same weight. And it’s okay to be, it’s okay to be vulnerable and it’s okay to talk about it. You know, some some people are afraid to get their their emotions out and and that’s something I really never been afraid of.

00;30;41;03 – 00;30;41;25
Speaker 3
So.

00;30;41;28 – 00;30;42;26
Speaker 1
Yeah.

00;30;42;28 – 00;30;44;14
Speaker 3
Again.

00;30;44;16 – 00;30;50;03
Speaker 2
I’m curious, you know, with the books that you’ve done. So this is the six one.

00;30;50;05 – 00;30;51;19
Speaker 1
Yep.

00;30;51;21 – 00;30;59;12
Speaker 2
Like, do you just wake up one morning and say, I want to I want to write a book on, to deal with grief or about grieving.

00;30;59;15 – 00;31;19;23
Speaker 3
Me and my, my buddy Justin were having lunch one day, and his whole life could be, a story. It could be a book. And we’re talking about losing people and losing best friends. And he’s lost friends, and I’ve lost, you know, my best friends and stuff. And we started talking about grief, and I’m like, you know what?

00;31;19;23 – 00;31;38;16
Speaker 3
I have? I have a bunch of quotes that directly would fit into a grief book. And then one day I just sat down and I think I wrote, like 20, and then I wrote another 20, and I wrote another 15, and it all matched up. Then there’s I think there’s.

00;31;38;18 – 00;31;45;29
Speaker 1
I want to say there’s 85 wrong here. I can’t remember yet. There’s 80.

00;31;46;01 – 00;31;49;27
Speaker 1
So yeah, it’s just.

00;31;49;29 – 00;32;08;12
Speaker 3
My mind never shuts off with how to string words together to make I don’t want to say put a picture in your mind. But quotes are like I’m constantly thinking of them. Like I will be driving and just.

00;32;08;15 – 00;32;08;24
Speaker 1
Pull.

00;32;08;24 – 00;32;15;04
Speaker 3
Over. Go. I got to put that in the note thing. Like I could pull up my phone while I’m on my phone right now, but just there’s quotes that like.

00;32;15;04 – 00;32;15;29
Speaker 1
F.

00;32;16;01 – 00;32;36;11
Speaker 3
Have written and I’ll go back in and try to think of something else. There’s poems. I mean, I think there’s 1800 and something in my notes right now, just that, that I need to either, you know, finish or put into something. But yeah, again, it’s my mind doesn’t shut up like I was talking to the counselor the other day.

00;32;36;11 – 00;32;54;05
Speaker 3
I’m like, explain it all. I got this book and then I’m trying to I’ve got to do this and I’m going to do that. And I got two other books in the can, but I’m finished in this one. She’s like, it seems like you don’t really have a lot of time to think. I’m like, well, lately I’ve been like trying to trying to calm down on all this stuff, all going on at the same time.

00;32;54;05 – 00;33;14;12
Speaker 3
So I’ve been I’ve been doing good like that. Like I said, I put the computer down. I didn’t, picked it up to go into that file. These are some other stuff. But I mean, this this book ended up the it reached number 20 on the, the, new release chart for grief, grief and bereavement books.

00;33;14;14 – 00;33;15;21
Speaker 1
Yeah. So that.

00;33;15;21 – 00;33;20;25
Speaker 3
Was cool. Again at any given time, there’s usually 30 million books on.

00;33;20;27 – 00;33;21;23
Speaker 1
On,

00;33;21;25 – 00;33;43;16
Speaker 3
Amazon and all total. I think this debuted in like, I like 63,000, which might not sound good, but it’s with 13 million books at any given time. That’s a track. Good. And to get all the way up to number 20 in the first week and I, I can’t complain.

00;33;43;18 – 00;34;05;07
Speaker 2
Yeah, I well, it’s, I mean, forget about any kind of monetary compensation or you know, or you but it’s got to like feel pretty good pretty validating right. Like, yeah you put these things on paper and like other people are experiencing them. And obviously if it’s make if it’s climbing the charts, that means that people want it. Right.

00;34;05;07 – 00;34;10;16
Speaker 2
And so they’re they’re looking for it. And I mean, it’s just got to feel really good.

00;34;10;18 – 00;34;34;09
Speaker 3
Yeah. And I just realized, well, I have my author’s page on Amazon and I can go in and look at the analytics for all my books. And I didn’t realize that until two weeks ago. My first book, Scribble Letters, which came out six years ago, almost the, Kindle version is still tracking and like, put like a like 1201 category.

00;34;34;11 – 00;34;36;23
Speaker 3
So it’s still, like it’s still up in the category.

00;34;36;28 – 00;34;39;14
Speaker 1
And I still get, you know.

00;34;39;17 – 00;34;43;08
Speaker 3
I enrolled that in the Kindle.

00;34;43;10 – 00;34;43;29
Speaker 3
Forgot the name.

00;34;43;29 – 00;34;44;28
Speaker 1
Of the thing anyway.

00;34;44;28 – 00;35;04;28
Speaker 3
And you get it. If you pay for, like, a monthly subscription to Kindle, you get that book free or whatever. My first two books are actually like that. I’m thinking about doing a Kindle version for this at some point because I have the the software now, or you can just transcribe it over pretty quickly. Before I had to do a minute, really, which was one horrible experience.

00;35;04;28 – 00;35;06;17
Speaker 3
But,

00;35;06;20 – 00;35;08;06
Speaker 1
But, I’m.

00;35;08;06 – 00;35;30;15
Speaker 3
Constantly getting better with, with the things I’m doing, especially with writing and be able to put like, you know, I came up with the concept for the Art of the of the front of this, which was I just wanted basic, did that with Canva and then like putting the copyright page together and all that type of stuff pretty, pretty easy.

00;35;30;17 – 00;35;34;12
Speaker 1
But there’s no there’s.

00;35;34;12 – 00;35;45;01
Speaker 3
Nothing on the spine of this. There was. But Amazon rejected it six times because it wasn’t the right spacing. It wasn’t the right size. And finally I go, you know what?

00;35;45;01 – 00;35;46;25
Speaker 1
I don’t need one.

00;35;46;27 – 00;36;08;04
Speaker 2
So yeah, it’s funny you say that. I think we talked about this on the last lesson. We’ve helped a couple people published books. Now, I don’t know if we’ll ever do it again. It’s just the Amazon. Yeah. I mean it’s a it’s an amazing thing, right? Number one, it gets to be able to give people like yourself the ability to publish books without having to go through a publishing house.

00;36;08;04 – 00;36;28;27
Speaker 2
And the old system that was very gatekeeper, kept a lot of people off the market. Right? So to be able to go straight to the consumer without that middle person and using Amazon publishing is I think is amazing. However, wow, it is not the easiest system sometimes. And I’m sure the more you do it, the better you get at dealing with it.

00;36;28;27 – 00;36;31;25
Speaker 2
But like it, it was hard.

00;36;31;27 – 00;36;53;19
Speaker 3
It was. Yeah. Format in the book is I got that down to a science now books before was my like hardest part because I was thinking about doing this in a hardcover too, because believe it or not, there’s not a lot of hardcover books out there in the, in the, in the self-publishing space, especially on Amazon. So when you do put one out, they tend to stick pretty good.

00;36;53;19 – 00;37;14;25
Speaker 3
And they, they track pretty good on a, on the charts. But yeah. As for getting it the the sizing, the spacing. Boom. I’m, I’m good with that. But for some reason, the spine thing is just the every book that I’ve done has been a pain in the butt. The dad clock, I just, I don’t know if that was I rolled the dice and three time was a charm and they accepted it.

00;37;14;25 – 00;37;25;11
Speaker 3
But six times on this. Yeah. My wife would come home from work and the was the three hours on the spine today. And five nothing.

00;37;25;14 – 00;37;28;07
Speaker 1
Yeah. And nothing and no.

00;37;28;09 – 00;37;36;27
Speaker 3
I shrunk it down to where I’m like, yeah, this is the specs that they want. And then I kick back and get kick back. No it’s it’s bleeding into whatever. And I’m like I.

00;37;36;29 – 00;37;40;22
Speaker 1
Never mind but like.

00;37;40;24 – 00;37;49;13
Speaker 2
Hey, I gotta ask, do you still got, how are the numbers on TikTok? The last time you were on the show, you blew my mind with this monstrous TikTok follow you have.

00;37;49;16 – 00;38;17;08
Speaker 3
Well, I haven’t really done a live or a face like an actual video of me talking on TikTok. I’ve been taking my quotes, cutting like nice backgrounds and throwing them up there. I’m still hanging around 59,200. I dropped like 100 followers, but I’m still hovering around that space. I’ve been told by because I been having that many followers on TikTok, they’ll send me messages, go like you can make, you can do this, do that.

00;38;17;08 – 00;38;26;00
Speaker 3
But I don’t know what I would do if I went live to talk to people about, you know, what am I doing wrong to read my book? No, I want you to buy it.

00;38;26;02 – 00;38;29;03
Speaker 1
But, I think that’s why.

00;38;29;05 – 00;38;47;27
Speaker 2
I say I, I you inspired me because after the podcast, I got Ahold of, Taylor, that’s our producer and does 99% of the work and, for buying local. And I was like, hey, I’m like, I think we need to be on TikTok. So I’m pretty sure we’re on TikTok. I’m not on TikTok.

00;38;47;27 – 00;38;49;05
Speaker 1
I think, yeah.

00;38;49;05 – 00;38;50;24
Speaker 3
I think I, I think I follow it.

00;38;50;27 – 00;38;52;13
Speaker 1
Nice. Thank you.

00;38;52;15 – 00;39;17;22
Speaker 3
Yeah. And then I started the second TikTok for nostalgia, which I think I got 1100 followers, and one of the top video I got is or was enemy mine. I did a whole breakdown enemy of mine, but I did The Secret of NiMH and that’s got like 18,000 views, a bunch of comments. But I did that just for because I, I love, I love old nostalgia things and like, it’s not just movies.

00;39;17;22 – 00;39;38;09
Speaker 3
I did, like RadioShack. I did a whole thing on that. And they’re all a minute, minute 30. Like, I just break down movies. Stand by me. Back to the future. And I do, like, way, Blockbuster Wednesday. I’m done. I want why I like blockbuster movies, I did what were they thinking with the Garbage Pail Kids?

00;39;38;10 – 00;39;40;19
Speaker 3
The movie.

00;39;40;21 – 00;40;03;19
Speaker 3
That type of stuff. But again, my mind’s still going. And then my my big TikTok account. I’ve been doing, I just throw quotes up there. Ones I haven’t even published. I just throw that up there. They’re starting to track. But it’s funny because you have so many followers, but you’re only getting like 203 hundred and 600 views because of the algorithm.

00;40;03;19 – 00;40;04;25
Speaker 3
But the algorithm changes.

00;40;04;25 – 00;40;05;15
Speaker 1
So.

00;40;05;15 – 00;40;22;18
Speaker 3
Much that it’s like some days I’ll get a lot, some days I’ll get a little. But I’m I’m constantly getting paid. You want this for free from companies, but I think they blind test because like, I think I’ve already said this hair products woman’s woman’s makeup.

00;40;22;21 – 00;40;26;09
Speaker 1
Like, no, I don’t want it. My my what.

00;40;26;11 – 00;40;27;11
Speaker 3
Others might but.

00;40;27;11 – 00;40;29;21
Speaker 1
Not I’m well I’m good.

00;40;29;24 – 00;40;34;01
Speaker 3
That’s fine. Like a true classic. I’m wearing a true classic shirt right now. They send me free shit.

00;40;34;01 – 00;40;36;10
Speaker 2
So nice. Thanks. True.

00;40;36;10 – 00;40;38;29
Speaker 1
Classic. Yeah. Yeah.

00;40;39;02 – 00;40;49;15
Speaker 2
Yeah, I know, I know, we got to wrap it up, but, one more time. Give a give the audience the name of the book and where they can find it. And where they can find you on social media.

00;40;49;17 – 00;41;20;17
Speaker 3
Name of the book is just for today. Small words for heavy days. Good companion book to bring anywhere if you need. Just a good pick me up if you’re missing somebody. Available on Amazon.com. I didn’t do expanded with this because, expanded takes a little bit more percentage of what I can, what I can make, you can find me on social media, poet J on Instagram and Facebook.

00;41;20;17 – 00;41;43;20
Speaker 3
My regular Facebook is Jane Austin TikTok. Actually Eggleston. And my other one is nostalgia time 50. I don’t know why they gave me the 50, but that was my my adult. I got some book signings in the works. I’m in talks with my whole high school about doing a book signing for the dad clock.

00;41;43;22 – 00;41;46;00
Speaker 3
Hopefully within the next couple months. And I.

00;41;46;01 – 00;41;47;10
Speaker 1
And I think.

00;41;47;13 – 00;42;07;03
Speaker 3
That’ll be the the icing on the cake for that book. I mean, again, the, the the feedback in the sales and the overall take for that book is gone well above and beyond what I would have ever imagined.

00;42;07;05 – 00;42;09;15
Speaker 1
So,

00;42;09;17 – 00;42;16;22
Speaker 3
The other books, hopefully that the, psychological thriller Welcome Home will be out hopefully within the next couple months.

00;42;16;22 – 00;42;19;12
Speaker 1
In July.

00;42;19;15 – 00;42;20;26
Speaker 2
I am I like I’m looking.

00;42;20;29 – 00;42;22;02
Speaker 1
I’ll, I’ll send you.

00;42;22;02 – 00;42;24;16
Speaker 3
The transcript via the email like I did this.

00;42;24;16 – 00;42;24;28
Speaker 1
One.

00;42;25;00 – 00;42;26;09
Speaker 2
No, don’t do that.

00;42;26;09 – 00;42;29;03
Speaker 1
I want to see what the actual physical.

00;42;29;06 – 00;42;30;06
Speaker 3
I’ll wait for.

00;42;30;06 – 00;42;56;04
Speaker 2
That. But I want to touch it, feel it. I want to open the pages and smell it. But I’m, I am I’m really, excited about reading it. You know, I’ve enjoyed all the books that you’ve put out so far, and, I appreciate. And this being so, so different, I’m really excited to see, I’m excited to hear the story, but I’m also just excited to see how you do with it and how it comes out.

00;42;56;04 – 00;42;58;10
Speaker 2
So I’m I’m pumped.

00;42;58;12 – 00;43;25;25
Speaker 3
I just got to let go of the my concept of wanted to be perfect, but I think I think I’m through that. I just needed a little bit break because, you know again people tend to think that, you know, this is a 45 minute to an hour thing a day. And sometimes it like I’ve been, I’ve written for nine hours straight before, take a little break to eat, go to the bathroom, sit back down and and just let it all out.

00;43;25;27 – 00;43;27;29
Speaker 1
And then.

00;43;28;01 – 00;43;48;14
Speaker 3
Yeah, it’s both cathartic and it can be a pain in the ass, but it’s the the best. It’s the best, the best form of self torture. I think you can give yourself because at the end it’s gratification. So I can’t complain. And I’m never I if I ever complain, you can, choke me out.

00;43;48;16 – 00;44;03;28
Speaker 2
Okay. That’s fair I you I did probably the only way I could choke. Yeah, you’d have to let me do it. So, Oh, listen, man, I appreciate you. I love what you’re doing. I really enjoy your books. You know, and I appreciate you coming on the show and talking about a man.

00;44;04;00 – 00;44;32;09
Speaker 3
And I appreciate you having me on here. And I appreciate our friendship and the support. I can’t beat that man. And having just be able to talk to you and having other people see your conversations and, and know what’s going on and, you know, anybody’s life is it’s cool to me. I’m always been a podcast fan and and it’s cool when the podcast, your friend and you can get down to the nuts and bolts and not have to worry about saying something that you probably shouldn’t have said because.

00;44;32;11 – 00;44;35;17
Speaker 1
I feel comfortable for you. There you go.

00;44;35;19 – 00;44;38;16
Speaker 2
Like, Cynthia said that that.

00;44;38;19 – 00;44;41;01
Speaker 1
Well, it’s good to see it’s good because I never felt that way after.

00;44;41;01 – 00;44;42;21
Speaker 3
I left one of these. So we’re good on that.

00;44;42;27 – 00;44;47;12
Speaker 2
Good, good, good. Hopefully the next one we can, we can do in person here.

00;44;47;14 – 00;44;48;10
Speaker 3
Sounds good, brother.