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Shel Holtz
Communicating at the Intersection of Business and Technology
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POD-published book honored

My friend and colleague, Terry Fallis, has been honored with the 2008 Stephen Leacock Medal for Humour. The honor was presented for Terry’s book, “The Best Laid Plans.”

I knew Terry had made it to the short list, but found out today, via Joe Thornley’s blog, that he had won. (Joe and Terry run Thornley-Fallis Public Relations, and Terry is the co-host of the excellent Inside PR podcast.) This is gratifying on a number of levels. First, it’s a terrific book. Second, Terry richly deserves the honor. But I’m particularly tickled because Terry used a Print-On-Demand (POD) shop to publish the book when he couldn’t get any attention from a mainstream publisher or agent. (I wrote about this—including some comments from Terry—here.)

Lee Goldberg, an L.A.-based writer, is single-minded in his disdain for POD (as evidenced here), which he confuses (in my opinion) with vanity press. One of his assertions, which he made in unwarranted and inaccurate attack on Yvonne DeVita, is that good books will get published by mainstream publishers; if a mainstream publisher doesn’t want your book, it’s probably no good. The Leacock Medal has been awarded in the past to authors like Mordecai Richler and Robertson Davies, so Terry is in outstanding company, proving that (a) good books don’t always get noticed by mainstream publishers and (b) POD is a wholly appropriate approach to take. It’s also worth noting that the books of other finalists were published by mainstream publishers.

But aside from gloating over the POD aspect of Terry’s victory, I just want to offer my heartfelt congratulations to Terry. Well done!

04/30/08 | 1 Comment | POD-published book honored

Comments
  • 1.Thanks so much Shel. It's been a wild couple of days.

    Terry Fallis | May 2008 | Toronto

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