Tuesday, November 10, 2009

November notes

Surgery on my spine, rescheduled yet again, gave me unexpected leisure time until month's end. I'm doing what I enjoy most -- critiquing stories and writing.

And, I'm walking around town again! Natures' sights and scents sustain my soul as motion tones my body. Ideas swirl in my mind and settle quickly into possibilities that seem logical to me. Too impulsive, some might say of actions I take, when I forego more refined planning.

My three-voume series of Montana regional history, Behind These Mountains, vol. 1-3, have been out-of-print and sold out for many years. Recently, a class action against Google resulted in a settlement -- a "grab all rights" settlement, in the opinion of many authors, myself included who have out-of-print books. Google gained the right to digitize, make available, and disseminate books in that classification, electronically.

While it's doubtful that Google will digitize my books, I've begun the process of digitizing them myself, thereby putting them back in print.

But in this case, I'm not acting impulsively so Behind These Mountains, volumes 1-3 won't be available in .pdf format for an indefinite time.

In the meantime, the books are in The MAC archives, museums in northern ID and northwestern MT, Spokane Public Library, libraries in WA, ID and MT and a few other states, USFS offices in MT, and in private collections.

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