Countdown to Pubdate

My latest book, Jews vs. Rome: Two Centuries of Rebellion Against the World’s Mightiest Empire, will be published on August 19. Like any author, I await pubdate – as they call a book’s publication date in the book business – with excitement, enthusiasm, joy, and the jitters. After years of research and writing I find it hard to believe that the big day is almost here. Will readers like it? Will the reviews be as favorable as the one that I received from Library Journal? It says, “Historian Strauss hits another home run… VERDICT There is no better history of this important but little-known subject.”—Library Journal, starred review

Publicizing a book is no small thing. The process starts months in advance. I am fortunate to have the help of many wise and talented professionals and many friends, but in the end, it’s my job, and it’s a big one. A labor of love, to be sure, but it takes a lot of jawboning to get the word out. And every author worth his salt wants to get the word out because we have something to say and we want people to hear it. And to read it.

As to just what I have to say, well, there will be a lot more on that in the coming weeks. Stay tuned! For now, I can’t help but think of the classic opener of Cole Porter’s musical, Kiss Me, Kate, “Another Op’nin’, Another Show.” In that marvelous song, the members of a theater troupe juggle dreams of success and cases of the butterflies as opening night approaches. They are to appear in a musical version of Shakespeare’s Taming of the Shrew. Their opener is a bubbly song-and-dance number from postwar America’s age of optimism in 1948. It’s an anthem of show business, but it could equally apply to the book business. The song concludes that, with the music about to begin and the curtain set to rise, you just have to hold your breath and go. I know the feeling.

And so, dear readers, it’s almost showtime.