Second life: Finding options for out-of-print books

BY SHELLEY A. LEEDAHL

When you’ve been publishing with small presses for decades, at some point you may receive notice that the publisher is closing shop or your book is going out of print. I’ve been there—eight times—and each time I learned that my book would no longer be available, I felt a stab of sadness. It was, in effect, a small death in the family. Several of these books took many years to write, and even the first one—a slim poetry collection titled A Few Words for January—never embarrassed me. I wanted it to live on, damn it.

But it didn’t. And that first little death was followed by the passing of several of its cousins: my short story collection Sky Kickers; novel Tell Me Everything; poetry collections Talking Down the Northern Lights, The House of the Easily Amused, and Wretched Beast; my favourite child—the short story collection Orchestra of the Lost Steps; and my juvenile novel Riding Planet Earth.

Imagine dominos toppling. Yes, I was still publishing new books, but what did it say that more than half of my books were out of print, unavailable, and buried?

I sat with that for a long time. Decades. Then I decided to do something about it. I’m a full-time writer and have had to be a thrifty and practical gal, from my second-hand wardrobe to do-it-myself haircuts. It physically pained me that work I’d put so much effort into was now either sitting in boxes in my closet or, on occasion, dog-eared and only available via online outlets.

One morning I was thumbing through my poetry collections and considered how—with a few tweaks—some of the poems could become song lyrics. I began researching songwriting and literally within a few minutes, a minor miracle transpired: I found a legit music producer (on Craigslist!) searching for songwriters. I wrote, he said to send samples, I did, he selected a few phrases, and a contract and fat cheque followed. I earned more from those phrases than I’d earned from the entire book … possibly more than I’d earned in royalties from three books. The band is Maltavar, the song is “Shots of Bacardi,” and it’s a knockout (available on YouTube).

How else could I repurpose my work? Podcast production. I received a $5,000 Canada Council grant to produce one season of a literary podcast—Something Like Love—featuring my formerly published work, music, and writing prompts. As I now had the equipment and a makeshift recording studio, I wrote and produced two more seasons. Audio engineering was a sticky learning curve, but after hiring a producer for the first season, I learned the free program Audacity, and having the know-how led to contracts from a publisher to produce two audiobooks—and earn real income.

I’m presently filtering through my library of short stories and compiling a “new and selected” manuscript. It’s been nearly thirty years since those first stories saw publication, and hey, the rights belong to me. I prefer to not let the best of these tales turn to dust in my closet, and I encourage you, fellow writers, to find new life for the cream of your out-of-print work, too. Be resourceful—think across genres and disciplines, seek funding opportunities, collaborate. Add a dash of luck, and you may find, as I did, that the dominos don’t inevitably have to fall.

Shelley A. Leedahl is a multi-genre writer in Ladysmith, BC. Her most recent books are Go (poetry, Radiant Press), The Moon Watched It All (children’s literature, Red Deer Press), and I Wasn’t Always Like This (essays, Signature Editions). Her literary podcast Something Like Love was named among the top literary podcasts in 2022. See: writersunion.ca/member/ shelleya-leedahl