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wsmorrison

Re:A Shout Out To Donald J. Ross
« Reply #25 on: January 31, 2006, 06:17:24 PM »
Thanks, Brad.  You did elicit a response ;)

I'll send you the manuscript and the Flynn and Ross plans for CC York.  Did I send them to you previously?  We'd appreciate you looking over the manuscript.  I forgot that we need to get the info on Flynn's course near Chicago--Pine Meadow.  Still waiting for info from the Archdiocese that owned the course.  Our publisher is Ann Arbor Media Group's Sports Media Group division.  According to them golf architecture books have been slow movers of late.

wsmorrison

Re:A Shout Out To Donald J. Ross
« Reply #26 on: January 31, 2006, 06:36:18 PM »
I do hope you make it out here someday, Sean.  It'll be fun.
Best regards,
Wayne

Mark_Fine

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re:A Shout Out To Donald J. Ross
« Reply #27 on: January 31, 2006, 06:51:58 PM »
Actually, there will be "TWO" books out in the market on Flynn.  I am writing the Cliffnotes version for those of you who don't have the time or money to read a $250 "1000 page" book when the images and layout are completed  ;D

Just kidding Wayne.  But as I told you before, the draft is the easy part.  It's the editing that gets painful.  Brad's book on Ross was probably 1500 pages till he slashed and burned to get it to a reasonable length to publish.  
Mark

wsmorrison

Re:A Shout Out To Donald J. Ross
« Reply #28 on: January 31, 2006, 06:55:33 PM »
Brad,

How many pages was your manuscript before the editing process?

Mark,

How many pages was Forest and your manuscript?  How many pages did it end up being?  Sorry, I haven't gotten my copy as yet.  At this point, I just hope we publish an unabridged version, likely in 2 volumes and we'll just let AAMG decide what the commercial version ends up being.  I'm too busy to fight the good fight.  Our editor and project manager seem like they're on the same page as us.  We'll see.
« Last Edit: January 31, 2006, 06:57:49 PM by Wayne Morrison »

Mark_Fine

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re:A Shout Out To Donald J. Ross
« Reply #29 on: January 31, 2006, 07:18:36 PM »
Wayne,
I'd be careful allowing your editor to edit your golf book.  Spelling and grammer yes, but unless they know your subject very well (which I doubt, you will need to do most of the cutting).  I really don't know how long our draft was but we knew from the beginning (it was in our contract) how long our book could be, how many images we were going to have (give or take), how much color there would be, etc.  There were a lot of guidelines laid out by Wiley.  You never get what you ask for but you have to compromise and get on with it.  

You have to balance all those things about not getting too wordy, keeping the reader awake, making it interesting, focusing on the key points, etc. etc.  We could have written a book on each chapter in our book but we had to keep it consise and manageable.  It still ended up about 360 pages or so with the color section.

I just got Philip Young's book A.W. Tillinghast - Creator of Golf Courses and it is a great read and about the same length as ours.  He could have easily put in a lot more information but was probably cut off by his publisher as well.  By the way, I highly recommend the book if you have any interest in Tillie.
Mark

wsmorrison

Re:A Shout Out To Donald J. Ross
« Reply #30 on: January 31, 2006, 07:29:30 PM »
We weren't given too many guidelines by our publisher.  We estimated the book would be 400 pages with photos and drawings.  We missed by a mile!  The commercial version will be about that length.  The truth is, I don't care if we don't sell many books and only care about an unabridged version for family and friends.  I am not in it for acclaim or anything else.  I'd like more people to know how great Flynn was, but if the courses he was involved with sold the books in their shops and we had enough sales to make the publisher happy, I'd be content.  I just wanted to get his record on paper.  That's done whether anything else happens it is just gravy to me and to Tom at this point.

What I failed to mention to Brad is most of the tournament histories will be edited out, especially Merion.  That's OK, I wanted it for the unabridged version.  This will reduce the book by about 60-70 pages to start with.  If some clubs want to use the info for customized copies, that's even better as we plan on making these available to the right clubs.

Brad Klein

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re:A Shout Out To Donald J. Ross
« Reply #31 on: January 31, 2006, 07:57:20 PM »
Wayne,

conversions are tough to figure. Standard typescript paper is 275 words per page, with a standard book 400 words per page. That way, a typical 100,000-word manuscript that's 364 pages in manuscript gets published as a 250-page book.

Adding imagery, larger format, wider margins for a book like yours changes everything. Your tome is 224,000 words, which is 815 old typescript pages for a book of 560 pages. Add images and you're up over 700 pages published. No wonder such books don't "move" in market terms. They can't even be lifted.

I can't translate typescript pages onto computer file pages because the fonts differ, there's basically single spacing, and then you're double spacing between enormous paragraphs. Writing in double-justified text also packs in more per page than would be the case if, as is conventional, you had single-justified it on the left margin. Not that it matters for editing purposes.

You are correct, the editing is necessary and painful. Also crucial in getting this into shape. The writing needs some work - always. It may be better and more efficient to knock out whole long blocks of text rather than think the cutting will come phrase by phrase. In my "Rough Meditations" manuscript, I submitted 110,000 words and we ended up just tossing the second half of the book and running the first half of it. For the Ross biography, by contrast, I wrote 105,000 words and that's what we ran - but the manuscript had 350 or so images and so the 400 page manuscript ended up getting published at 366 pages.

Warning. That book costs $85 (in 2001), full color, large format. Fine & Richardson's book on bunkers, 306 pages, medium size, partial color, also costs $85 (2005 prices). I can assure you no publisher is going to charge $105 for a Flynn book.

My advice is get a scissors. Not to stab the editor or yourselves, but to prepare for major cuts in the manuscript.

 
 
« Last Edit: January 31, 2006, 07:58:31 PM by Brad Klein »

wsmorrison

Re:A Shout Out To Donald J. Ross
« Reply #32 on: February 01, 2006, 08:03:08 AM »
Brad,

Firstly, thank you for taking the time to consider our work.

I should have mentioned that the tournament histories I wrote probably number about 100 pages.  This will come out in the first editing for sure.  I wrote these pieces in case we have custom books for certain clubs.  These tournament histories can be added to their versions.  Because Ann Arbor Media Group is a publishing arm of a printer, the break even on custom versions (cover and text) is rather low.

We are using only B+W photographs except for the cover of the book jacket.  In some custom versions we'll use embossed leather (naugahyde?) with club logos.

As I said to you in an email, I wouldn't care if we sell 100 2-volume sets at whatever price that includes a DVD of a complete set of low resolution drawings and the complete writings of Flynn.  I wanted to get the story written.  I don't care so much how it is mass marketed but that the information was put together in one place.  Ask Tommy how he feels, but I think we did not look at this effort in commercial ways at all and that is why the complete story (as of today) is compiled.  

Maybe we're naive or idealistic, but that's why we did not accept any upfront money.  We paid for the entire project ourselves and we did it our way (cue the Frank Sinatra music).
« Last Edit: February 01, 2006, 08:03:43 AM by Wayne Morrison »

Brad Klein

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re:A Shout Out To Donald J. Ross
« Reply #33 on: February 01, 2006, 08:18:33 AM »
Wayne, fully appreciate the classic spirit of amateurism (in the best sense) that animates this worthy project.

By the way, my standard fee for evaluating a manuscript is $6,500, but given the heft of this tome, it'll cost you $11,000. I expect a check from FedEx in the a.m. before I read a word of it.
« Last Edit: February 01, 2006, 08:50:51 AM by Brad Klein »

Dan Boerger

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re:A Shout Out To Donald J. Ross
« Reply #34 on: February 01, 2006, 08:35:49 AM »


OK, I'll ask the leading question (I'm relatively new, so excuse my ignorance on this matter ...)

Is the Pritchard restoration at Aronimink not true to the Ross vision concerning bunkering?

(On a similar topic, a friend of mine and Aronimink member told me that he was literally on the 12th hole when the back hoe on the second swipe found sand from an original fairway bunker.)

- Dan
"Man should practice moderation in all things, including moderation."  Mark Twain

wsmorrison

Re:A Shout Out To Donald J. Ross
« Reply #35 on: February 01, 2006, 08:52:38 AM »
Brad,

The check is in the mail.  For $11,000 you have to read every word of it though, including Tom's excellent two and a half paragraphs  ;)

TEPaul

Re:A Shout Out To Donald J. Ross
« Reply #36 on: February 01, 2006, 09:04:34 AM »
DanB:

I doubt this website could stand to go through that Aronimnk bunker restoration discussion or argument again. Aronimink is happy with what they did which was to restore to Ross's own drawings even if the bunkers may not have been originally built that way for reasons no one can be sure of. Some on here may think they can be sure or may say they can be sure why they were not built to his drawings but I can guarantee you that no one either way can be sure.
« Last Edit: February 01, 2006, 09:05:34 AM by TEPaul »

Dan Boerger

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re:A Shout Out To Donald J. Ross
« Reply #37 on: February 01, 2006, 10:06:33 AM »


Thank Tom. I really like what they've done at Aronimink.- Dan
"Man should practice moderation in all things, including moderation."  Mark Twain

TEPaul

Re:A Shout Out To Donald J. Ross
« Reply #38 on: February 01, 2006, 08:49:58 PM »
Dan:

Wayne and I were over there and spent the morning with Aronomink's new super John Goesslin. He plans on taking the sand lines up a bit on some of the bunker faces he says have grown down too much since the project. They'll still be basicaly "grassed down" but the golfer will see a bit more sand from approach areas. In my opinion, JohnG is really impressive. I think Aronimink is going to get some real notice with its "playability" to come.

mike_malone

  • Karma: +0/-0
Re:A Shout Out To Donald J. Ross
« Reply #39 on: February 01, 2006, 10:32:36 PM »
Tom,

   Make up your mind! Aronomink or Aronimink , which is it ?
AKA Mayday

TEPaul

Re:A Shout Out To Donald J. Ross
« Reply #40 on: February 02, 2006, 06:47:13 AM »
Mayday:

Take your pick. You can even call it Aronofox if you want---most dedicated golfers will know what you mean.