I Published a Book! (Not Clickbait)

It is pretty clear to anyone that interacts with me for any long amount of time that I have more ambition in my pinky finger than most people have in their whole bodies. That ambition doesn't know when to sleep. 

The TLDR of this post is that I published my art as a coloring book. It's 100+ pages and it was a labor of love. You should buy it. To learn more about this process, read on. 

It was late spring when I began doodling on my white board at work. This was something I've talked about enjoying before. I've doodled since my school days. Two years ago I even did a challenge of one doodle a day for a year and I did it! But it wasn't until I was doodling at work and my coworkers were commenting on it that I realized I've never done anything with my doodles besides share them on the internet. I've tried my hand at writing, illustrating, and self-publishing my own children's book but wasn't (and still am not) thrilled with the outcome. I wanted something that could compile a group of doodles in a way that I could be proud of and that wouldn't seem too pretentious. Enter the coloring book idea.

I'm not sure if it was myself, a coworker, or a friend who first presented the coloring book idea to me. As soon as it was there, though, I knew it was the perfect way to share my love of doodling. At first I just began doodling new things while at work (sorry boss). While I was in meetings or waiting for things to be reviewed and approved, or those early minutes in the day before anyone else came in I would just doodle anything that came to mind. When the idea was firmly set in my head, I knew I needed a classic "Andrew Gardner Super System".

If I was going to do this right I needed to have a plan. I needed to know exactly what  I wanted to come out of the book. I needed to know what it would include and what the story would be behind every page. I wanted this book to mean something but not have the heavy burden of expectations. I wanted to be proud enough to want to sell it, but not so invested that I would collapse like a star if it didn't go viral (Which it won't). The mission became clearer: Make a coloring book that showcases my doodle art in a fun, creative way and make it worth someone's time and money.

To do this I was going to divide the book into a few different sections. The first would be what I called a few years ago "The Doodleverse". This section includes some select doodles from 2021 when I did one doodle for every day of the year. It's this time in my life that really gave me the confidence to see my little doodles as something that could be enjoyed by other people. While it is a silly little hobby it is also its own dignified skill that I have worked hard at curating. 

Second, I would take all of the coloring pages I made as a teacher and put them into the coloring book as well. I remember the first time I made a coloring page for my 1st graders. A fellow teacher laughed at me and said, "Watch this." And she proceeded to show me how easy it was to make copies of a preexisting coloring page. That was all well, no shame to those who do that. But I always have to be extra and my students deserved the best. So I did it myself. I made coloring pages every year that I taught. From 1st graders to 7th graders, my students loved what I created for them. Now they live in the "Doodleverse".

The next section would be old art revisited. It's hard for even me to believe and remember that there was a time in my life where I worked purely as a freelancer. Freelance writing, freelance photo/video, freelance illustration. During this time I created loads of interesting pieces of art that have now been all but lost to time. For the few pieces that I kept in sketchbooks, digital libraries or portfolios, I was determined now for them to see the light of day. For this section of the coloring book I took old pieces of art and gave them a doodle makeover. Sometimes having to redraw whole pieces from scratch to give them the coloring book aesthetic.

With all the old pieces finally in a place outside of my own archives, I now knew that I needed to incorporate newer pieces. Just like with every creative field, though, the well sometimes runs dry. I could and often did use suggestions by friends and colleagues to make new doodles. But that wasn't a crutch I wanted to lean on every time I hit a road block. That is when I turned to A.I. to help me with my creative process. You can learn more about how I incorporated AI in my creative process in this blog from earlier this year. I was going to include these drawings into the coloring book as well. 

And finally, I knew I needed to create for the sake of creating. I needed to include art and doodles that came from nowhere else other than this big 'ol brain of mine. The final section of the coloring book would be totally new. This included doodles, stain glass drawings, house drawings and more. I drew and drew until my fingers grew callous from the pen. I drew on my lunch breaks, in airports, on planes, on vacation, in parks, at the pool. For a couple of months, any free time I had was spent drawing or thinking about what I was going to draw. 

It was while I was on vacation that I knew the book was coming to a close. I was getting tired and I knew this phase of creativity was waning because it began to feel like work instead of fun. When I looked at my folder of drawings it read somewhere near 90. I couldn't live with that. So I pushed. 90 became 100 and 100 became 115. And then I dropped my pen. I had been piecing it together bit by bit using online design software and I new it was time to submit it. The submission process was the longest I've ever taken to self-publish something (I've self-published 3 books now under different names and none took me longer than one revision) but this book, for whatever reason, has taken five revisions with the publisher and almost two months to be approved. 

But now, I'm happy to finally say, that I have published the book! Into the Doodleverse: The Coloring Book is an 8.5"x11" coloring book with over 100 pages of original artwork. With pieces spanning years, I have curated a collection of old and new artwork that is beautiful to look at and fun to color. I am very proud of this book and how every page tells a new story about myself (and my dog, Stevie). My hope is that whoever may get a copy will find some joy in flipping through its pages and coloring in or outside the lines. 

The book is available now on Amazon. It is print on demand so please be patient with the shipping times. If you're local to me and would like to purchase directly, shoot me an email or Instagram DM and we can set that up also. 

Thank you to everyone who was in support of this book and of my nonsense doodling. Enjoy!