Tuesday, November 24, 2009

Michelle Obama's biography, Kenya's draft constitution etc

The Kenya Draft harmonised Constitution was released to the public on November 17th. It is an interesting document. Sample:

Chapter Four Clause 24 (1) (j) All citizens have the responsibility to develop their abilities through acquisition of knowledge, continuous learning and the development of skills.

I liked that bit...
I also got a copy of Liza Mundy's 'Michelle: A Biography.' So far a nice read though light years away from Nigel Hamilton's exhaustive, insightful and absorbing biographies. Maybe it's because there is pretty little to say about Michelle as compared with Bill Clinton, maybe.

Quick, I get over and done with Michelle and move on to Joseph Conrad's 'Heart of Darkness' and a number of travel books.

A reminder: Next bulk purchase will be Malcolm Gladwell's 'Blink' and 'Outliers.' I know there are 13 books awaiting purchase but, I will get to them.
Cheers.

Tuesday, November 3, 2009

What is your book editor's CV worth?

I am looking for a job, a normal job. A job where I can plan my own
work, where I can see my son, and daughter and my wife most of the
year. A job where ... I am looking for a job. I am a trained book
editor but have worked with magazines and now working with a newspaper. And it sucks.
So, in the spirit of job seeking and resume upgrading, I came across this post, off tompeters.com, http://www.blueprint4resumes.com/2009/04/whats-your-resume-worth.html
Here: (Sorry the figures are all in dollars - but you could as well replace them with shillings)

What’s your resume worth?

About $250,000 - $550,000 if you land a Chief Operation Officer (COO) position.
About $100,000 - $150,000 if you land a Retail Regional Manager position.
About $75,000 - $125,000 if you land an IT Manager position.
About $65,000 - $85,000 if you land a Technical Writer position.
About $45,000 - $65,000 if you land a Cost Accountant position.
About $35,000 - $55,000 if you land an Elementary School Teacher position.
About $25,000 - $45,000 if you land an Assistant Restaurant Manager position.
About $22,000 - $32,000 if you land a Receptionist position.
About $17,000 - $27,000 if you land a Retail Sales Clerk position.
About $17,000 - $22,000 if you land a Fast Food Cashier position.
About $3,000 to $18,000 if you are looking to go part-time for the majority of retail positions.
About $8 if you count the cost of resume quality paper, folder, envelope, a
few squirts of ink toner to print it, and then… you never mail it.
About two cents if you print it on copy machine paper (but you wouldn’t do that… would you?).
About .008 cents for the amount of electricity spent to e-mail your resume to a potential employer.
Zero (that’s Z – E – R – O!) if you never send it out.

What’s your resume worth? Do I need to explain this?

The above writing sent me thinking about the plight of book editors in the unfortunate event that they are fired, or, as our HR boss gleefully puts it, 'separated.'
I should correct the above paragraph to read: A conversation I had over the weekend with my mentor and relative, Mr O, sent me thinking about life after early loss of paid employment for book editors. Mr O is a published school books writer with 10 books to his name.
Anyway, he was telling me about his former editor, Mr K, who was edged out of a job in a prominent publishing firm in the country. Though he told Mr O that he had opted for early retirement, it was obvious he had been 'separated' for he was looking for a job, a teaching job.
He tried to talk Mr O into publishing a revision book with him, never mind that Mr O already had a revision book under his name and published with Mr K's former employer. They were to meet for Mr K to sell his proposal to Mr O. Somehow, Mr K didn't show up; he sent a text to say he was away in the farm so would get back to Mr O. Three weeks later, he hasn't.
Before he was edged out, Mr K, an outstanding editor, was earning over Ksh100,000 a month. As a an editor out of employment, Mr K could start his own publishing firm, do consultancy, seek for a job in another firm, take up teaching or move out of editing and publishing altogether.
Employment in another firm, unless at a higher level, was out of question. His employer is the best paying slave-driving firm in publishing; no other employer can afford to pay him the salary he was getting at that level.
For Mr K, his area of specialisation was such that he could not leave on consultancy, unless all the editors in that field all died and he had to edit the various firms' books one after the other.
He could as well go into self publishing: With the severance pay, get a few teachers, compile a revision book or student companion of sorts, publish it and market it like crazy. I will say nothing of his setting up a publishing firm but he could take up teaching. considering he is trained as a teacher.
All those options aside, the fact that as an editor of certain subjects, once you are fired you are as good as dead, professionally, should worry those in the field. Should they think of a career away from editing and publishing - have a solid career elsewhere and only dabble in publishing and editing as a side job? Maybe publishing firms should consider hiring such editors on short contracts so that from the word go they learn to fend for themselves or better still, remunerate them handsomely.
Those feeble suggestions aside, if you are a book editor in Kenya and employed by one of the numerous publishing houses: What would happen if your employer retrenched you tomorrow, next week, next month or next year? What would you do to sustain your family? Think about it, now. Then act. So, what is your CV worth?

Monday, November 2, 2009

Prestige Bookshop is the place to be ...

Many are the times, as a book lover, I have walked into a bookshop and left, an hour or so later, feeling drained, assaulted and insulted.
The routine is: Walk in, 'shelf' shop, flip through titles, pick a title, two or three or ask for particular titles, pay and leave.
I feel drained after endless shelf/title hopping. Throw in the feeling that I may never get to read as many interesting titles as I may wish and the fact that I cannot afford as many books as I'd love to own, the drain is complete.
The assult and insult comes in the way the staffers respond to your queries - as if they are swatting a fly. So easy, so effortless and with such a bored look, you feel an idiot, a million times over.
However, today at the Prestige Bookshop, none of these 'ill' treatments were given. Indeed, if you happen to be in Nairobi and you are a lover of books and you love order, neatness, technology ... name it, go to Prestige Bookshop, (Mama Ngina Street, I think).
There is a way you feel when you walk in and are met by these warm, custom-made shelves, neatly and appropriately labelled: Fiction, Classics, World Affairs, Self Help, Business, School etc.
You get the feeling that so much thought was put into arranging/stacking the books on the shelves. It is not the size of the book noor the name of the author nor ... but, in my view, the cover of the book that attracts you. I thought this is a good thing: Let the book sell itself to you.
The staffers, as good and neat as they were, had half of their work done for them. Apart from a question or two about this or that title that could not be found on the shelves, they were more or less left to idle around.
I went looking for Frank McCourt's 'Angela's Ashes' but didn't find it. I tried John Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath, nil. Of Mice and men, nada.
Not to despair, Sara introduced me to Frank McCourt's other works: 'Tis and Teacher Man. I found Teacher Man interesting. I should buy it over Christmas.
Oh, and Gabriel Marquez Garcia's A Hundred Years of Solitude,hardcover no less costs a friendly 880/-.(Elsewhere, the paperback costs 990/-).
It is a nice place to go for books.
Kudos Prestige Bookshop