State of Play V and Game Addiction!
Two momentous things will be happening in a little over a week.
First of all, the book will be finished. At least, it’s going to be in a finished draft form, and we’re going to have a face-melting book proposal. This means that Shavaun and I can really start to market it to publishers and agents. While the book truly makes a killer read in its current form, agents and publishers often like to look at the market, look at the book, and apply their own insight so as to make the book most enjoyable to the people who’ll be reading it. Which is good, since it’s likely that everyone’ll be reading it. Honestly, Shavaun and I really believe that we’ve made one of the most intriguing and easily-read general audience books on gaming, but most especially an angle to gaming that people are really motivated to learn more about. One which additionally is far, far underserved. It’s an exciting time, but I’m also a bit exhausted.
Release is still TBA, and while we would like for copies to hit bookstores as far before this Christmas as possible, we are still in the process of feeling out our options. This is the first book for both of us, so there’s a certain level of learning so as to move intelligently.
This is just a cover that I made for fun. Comments welcome - as are ANY and ALL comments you have on what YOU want to see in the book!
We’re toying with titles. While we want to tell a story, this is still an open book. Maybe “Game Addiction: The Cause and Cure?”
Secondly, I’m off to Asia for the first time in my life. I’m going to Singapore for the State of Play conference. Officially, I’m reporting the event for Gamasutra.com. While that’s exciting on its own, I’m looking forward to meeting dozens of academics and journalists whom I’ve only spoken to via telephone and email. I’m also hoping to find at least one publisher, English-speaking or no. While game addiction, at least what we call game addiction, certainly is seriously influenced by cultural variances, it predominantly relies on human responses to a new medium. Whether we’re talking media experience or psychological/chemical addiction, Game Addiction is going to cover it, and other countries need it. Yesterday.
We’re definitely looking at our different options for publication – so please let us know soon if you know somebody who would be interested in the book!
And let me know if you want to share a hotel at the conference in Singapore. But let me know on the Singapore thing soon, since I’ll likely be booking tomorrow or the next day.
Hi Neils
I just saw your blog and also spent some time watching Shavaun Scott’s videos on UTube about Video Game Addiction and read her blog as well.
Congratulations on co-authoring this important book.
I wrote the 1st biography of Bill Clinton in 1992, which sold over 180,000 copies in paperback. It was published by Ian Shapolsky, of SPI Books, Inc. in Manhattan.
I can introduce you and Shavaun to Ian Shapolsky who specializes in non-fiction books and has great distribution.
By the way, my nephew is a video game addict and I am searching for a therapist for him.
Can you please make an introduction to Shavaun for my sister and brother-in-law to discuss the possibility of working with my nephew?
Thanks,
Robert
Hey Robert, thanks for the post!
We’re getting ready to send out queries, and the book proposal pretty much only needs some cleaning on a sample chapter. Our plan is to first try to grab an agent, and then see what happens in terms of publication - but we want to meet everyone that we can.
Shavaun is licensed in California, while there are restrictions on going ‘out of bounds,’ (California therapists can be jailed for doing online therapy), I’ll throw her email your way, and hopefully you two can talk about the best way to help your nephew.