The Process of Writing- My Debut Hosting on Bhutan Echoes

I feel honoured to be given this opportunity to host a session on the process of writing, a subject that is close to my heart, a subject that I worked so hard to understand when I co-founded the Writers Association of Bhutan and a subject that's at the heart of what I do with BOOKNESE.

You will see how natural and spontaneous we are during the discussion, not because we rehearsed so much but because the subject was as close to their hearts as mine. My guest Tshering Wangchuk, former CEO of Business Bhutan and BBS, is the author of A Thousand Footprints. My Other guest Utsav Khatiwara is an editor who works as a lecturer at Royal Thimphu College. Within an hour that I spent with the two outstanding personalities, with whom I haven't had so much associations in the past-- especially I met Utsav for the first time on the day of the shoot-- I felt a lot richer in terms of my knowledge on writing and publishing. 

Save all your questions until the end of this show;

Sorry Dasho Nishioka- A Book Review

Dasho Nishioka (1933-1992)

The story of Dasho Nishioka and his life in Bhutan is no short of a fairy tale; I still can't fathom how a sophisticated metropolitan had possibly left behind his comfortable Japanese life and decided to work in Bhutan in 1964? 

The book, Dasho Keiji Nishioka- A Japanese who lived for Bhutan by Tshering Cigay and Dorji Penjore deserves the recognition of being the first to recount the life of a great being who by all means deserved to be remembered. However, it should be forgiven for not being a comprehensive biography, one that is worthy of celebrating an extraordinary life and works of Dasho Nishioka.  

A foreigner who is awarded Bura Marp by His Majesty the King, given a grand state funeral, awarded Druk Thugsey Medal posthumously, built a chorten in his memory and has a flower named after him, if he is not worth several volumes of books then something is missing.

Dasho Nishioka Chorten in Paro

His numerous accolades are not what defines Dasho Nishioka, the true value of the man is in knowing why has he been recognized so grandly. His death from a tooth infection in 1992 at the prime age of 59 could have been avoided if he was anywhere outside Bhutan. He paid the ultimate price for his dedication to this country. When lamenting the loss of a great being, his daughter, Yoko says her father had nothing much to live for, having achieved so much in his short life. His was truly a short and fat life. 

I have heard of a certain Japan Sayab who revolutionized agriculture in Bhutan but it was only in this book that I connected all the dots and began to form a whole picture that I could appreciate. He came to Bhutan in 1964 when life in Bhutan was physically daunting; only Thimphu and Paro were connected by road and it wasn't until the 1980s that we had electricity. But despite the formidable odds the Japanese volunteer chose to stay beyond his two years assignment and gave 28 years of his life to Bhutan, until his death. He spent five years of his life in Bhutan in Zhemgang, the Dzongkhag that took weeks to reach on foot back then and that still is considered a difficult place in 2020. 

Dasho Nishioka's Home in Panbang

A prosperous life awaited him in Japan but he laboured in Bonday Farm to change agriculture in Bhutan. The book gives us an overview of his experiments and initiatives to mechanize farming, improve seeds, enhance yield, create access to market, improve storage, initiate processing, packaging and exporting, build the capacity of the farmers, leverage on the organic brand from Bhutan. What? déjà vu! 

If I hadn't read this book I would be disillusioned into thinking that we have come a long way but half a century later we are still talking about the same issues in agriculture. My conversations with Dr. Lam Dorji on his 'farm to market' project and with Farmer Sangay on Farming 4.0 will never be the same. I want them to read the book and have a soulful conversation with them on how we failed Dasho Nishioka. 

This year the pandemic forced us to wake up to the hard reality that we are still not capable of producing our own food, not even rice. The book tells us that Dasho Nishioka succeeded in enhancing the rice yield three times by improving the seeds. How much have we enhanced it since? It's a shameful revelation of our hypocrisy that we haven't been faithful to the mission that Nishioka started. We left it to him. 

On page 59, a picture of Bonday Farm from the 1980s is juxtaposed with another one taken from the same spot in 2010, almost 30 years apart, and in sharp contrast to the common expectation that the Farm would have flourished into a mega farm, one could see the farm was doing better in the 80s than 30 years later. 

The book relates how even back in the days Dasho Nishioka had to bargain with insincere and lazy Bhutanese to work hard on their own farms by means of reward and punishment. Imagine the frustration of a hardworking Japanese when faced with our suffocating complacency. Had we inherited a little bit of Nishioka essence we won't be having the debate on food security today. We will be exporting premium organic food to the world.

But Sorry Dasho Nishioka, we failed you. Should you come back somehow and see how far we have reached since you left you will be heartbroken.

This book should be read like an initiation prayer by every Bhutanese who joins the agriculture sector so that they recognize and appreciate the history of modern agriculture in Bhutan, and about the foreigner who put his everything in it; to let them question why we are still where we began and to inspire them to work toward a real change with the dedication that would have won the approval of Dasho Nishioka.

The book that was published in 2011 deserves a second edition with more contents on the legend's private life in Bhutan to make it a complete biography. The book needs better design and change in the paper type (non-glossy) to make it reader-friendly while printing the pictures on glossy paper. 

BOOKNESE- Just for Bhutanese Books

When I was growing up, becoming a writer was the most romantic idea to choose as a dream. I tended to this dream by reading biographies of authors, watching movies and documentaries based on the lives of writers, collected pictures of V.S Naipaul, Salman Rushdie and Sidney Sheldon when kids of my age were collecting posters of Leonardo DiCaprio and Salman Khan. 

One day after I became a man, the beautiful dream turned into a disappointment when I learnt that there was not a single dedicated book publisher in the country and that the Bhutanese book market was too poor to produce any fulltime writer. There were only a few authors who managed to go beyond their first book, which is a sign that they managed to sell their first book enough to save them from bankruptcy and dare to publish again. In short, there was no hope. The idea is only romantic. 

I didn't want to believe that there isn't any hope after a lifetime of waiting to become a writer. I wanted to make things work. That's why Nawang and I sat down and charted out a plan to bring together all the Bhutanese writers under Writers Association of Bhutan (WAB). We thought we could collectively create a society where literature thrived and therefore writing became a well-paid profession. A decade into building WAB with some founding members we came nowhere. 

We failed to convince our writers that we could be a lot stronger if we worked as a community, create services and facilities that every writer could leverage on, build a platform to launch books and reach masses in ways that we individually could not achieve. We are disillusioned individuals who carry a massive ego to form any functioning team; everyone thought they are popular enough to survive and thrive alone.  

Crowdpublishing-What an Idea!

Well, all is not lost. WAB managed to create a platform where aspiring writers honed their skills and gained recognitions. Nawang's 'Crowdpublishing' model helped several new writers publish their books, including my book PaSsu Diary. I used my social network to sell 3000 copies of my book easily. If WAB became an institution much can be done to help every Bhutanese who aspire to become a writer and also those who have already published but couldn't do much as writers, which is a common problem that we fail to recognize. 

But when WAB didn't happen as expected because it involved so many players to make an association, I pushed for a more personal and smaller dream with Nawang and Tharchen, to do almost the same thing as WAB but as a private venture. And that's BOOKNESE. 

What is BOOKNESE?

BOOKNESE is an ecosystem of Bhutanese books, their writers, their readers, and the bookstores where they are sold at. It’s the platform that is making an extra effort to celebrates Bhutanese literature because if we don’t, no one else will. 

BOOKNESE is archiving and exhibiting every book ever written by Bhutanese so that we could come to appreciate that a small country has produced so many works of literature, perhaps the highest per capita in the world. We showcase and promote every book with equal passion and unbiased attention. 

86 Bhutanese Writers Registered on BOOKNESE thus far

BOOKNESE aspires and works towards becoming that national archive where anyone interested in Bhutanese literature will come to seek authentic and reliable information so that no one will have to rely on random third-party foreign online sources, where we are not even treated with due respect. 

BOOKNESE ensures that every book receives its fair share of readers and that the content of the book is discussed objectively, reviewed fairly, and judged for its worth. BOOKNESE has established ways to celebrate good books, critique bad ones, and ensure that no writer is disillusioned by a few good reviews from close friends, or disheartened by a few bad reviews from jealous readers. 

BOOKNESE guarantees every book gets equal access to the market; ​the ​market that is enhanced through ​a network of bookstores​ that is made accessible from any dzongkhag through this online platform. Booknese establishes trust and goodwill with the bookstores and sources books from them and expands their reach beyond their towns to the whole of the nation and even beyond.  

BOOKNESE is a nonprofit venture, not because we aren't interested in profit but because there is no way we will ever make a profit out of books, especially Bhutanese books. It's, therefore, more profitable not to do this business but if we don't do it, who's going to do it?

It's been a difficult two years building the idea into a platform, and putting together 151 books by 86 writers, one by one, suffering the lukewarm response and complacency of so many writers. It took me hundreds of hours, sleepless night, more than three request messages and reminders to each writer before they responded. 

Of course, it's time for me to sit back and watch because the BOOKNESE is now ready to receive entries directly from you. 

Someday you will beg to be on BOOKNESE! That day is not today, so tell your writer friends to register their book for free. It may not remain free for long. Who knows, one day if a book is not on BOOKNESE the book doesn't even exist. 

If you are a good reader, you can become an asset for BOOKNESE by becoming a star reviewer who is loved and feared by every Writer. They will wait to see your review and quote you on the cover of their second editions. Your reviews will be printed in newspapers regularly and it might become a second source of income. 

How to Self-Publish Your First Book (in Bhutan)

In 2003, I took the manuscript of my collection of 30 short stories and went to the two places I knew might help me in publishing it. I first went to Kuensel and then to DSB. It cost me all my pocket money to print two manuscripts, and both the places didn’t even read them yet kept them. My idea of publishing was limited to them, and it stopped there. I now understand that even they were limited by so many factors. They were not the true kind of publishers we have heard of to expect anything. And I fear we still don’t have that kind of a publisher. Therefore, I shall tell you about self-publishing. 

 

In 2018, during the Mountain Echoes Literature Festival, I told DSB how it broke my little heart when I didn’t get back my manuscript. He couldn’t believe that I came to him 16 years ago. He went back, dug into his storeroom and fished out the manuscript I submitted. 

 

That book could not be published. It’s been my dearest dream to print that book, but somehow, I published another book. With the experience from publishing PaSsu Diary, my first book of selected posts from this blog, and several other books for friends, I have acquired the knowledge and confidence to publish books. I may finally publish my short stories any time this year.

 

In this post, I will use my experience to create a simple guide to self-publishing a book in Bhutan. I will do it as if I am explaining the process to my younger self back in 2003 to help everyone who is aspiring to publish a book. 

 

WRITING & EDITING

Once you finished writing the book, start rewriting it. It’s said that good stories are not written; they are rewritten. You must hire a good editor to refine your book. Even professional writers have to get their works edited by their editors. Stephen King said, “To write is human, to edit is Devine”  

 

It could cost you anywhere between Nu. 20,000 to Nu. 80,000 for a serious editor. But don’t worry, you could get your English teacher or someone who is strong in language to edit your work for free. 

TITLE & COVER

This process is about branding your book. For your book to be discussed or bought, way before the story is read and reviews wrote, the book needs to carry a captivating title and cover. 

You can start off with a working title for the book while writing but once you have completed the story, consider naming the book all over again. Note that for a Bhutanese book to stand out with its own identity, always try to add some Bhutanese elements in the name and even the cover. 

 

Cover design (Jacket) with spine and Blurb  

The book cover is the face of the book, and you must invest as much time in it as you did in writing the book. Seek help from artists, graphic designers and people who have experience in the field. Look for examples and show them to your designers to work out several drafts for you. 

Remember, a book with poor cover design can hardly sell because people judge the book by its cover no matter what. Forgive them. 

LAYOUT & DESIGN 

Hire a graphic designer to design the layout of your book. This is when your book is transformed from MS Word format to PDF format on software like InDesign, in exact shape and size it will appear when printing. 

You must let the designer know the size you desire for the book. If you are not familiar with the standard dimensions of the book, take a book of desirable size and ask the designers to design your books like that.

Technical page and sample layout work done.

Once you have your book layout done, you know the number of pages and the exact amount of paper it will require. These details are required for the printing company to decide the cost of printing your book. 

 

Designing the layout of your book could cost you Nu. 10,000 to Nu. 20,000. Some printing company will do it pro bono since you are printing the book with them. 

COST OF PRINTING

The cost of printing a book is determined by the following factors;

 

1. Paper quality
2. Number of pages (after the layout is done)
3. Colour or B&W
4. And the number of copies

 

To give you a rough idea, if you are printing a novel of 200 pages on a good quality paper, and you are printing 1000 copies of the novel, the printing house will quote approximately Nu.150 per copy, which means you need to pay Nu. 150,000 for printing the 1000 copies. 

However, if you are going for 2000 copies, then the price per copy will drop from Nu.150 to somewhere around Nu. 110. So, you will be paying Nu. 220,000 for printing 2000 copies. That’s because the printing machines use a certain aluminium plate to transfer the image onto the papers, and when you increase the number of copies, the cost of the plates gets divided further. If you are not interested in the technical details, just note that the printing cost per book reduces if we increase the number of copies. It’s more economical to print in bigger bulk, but the risk is big too.

 

Once you know the cost of printing, then you can determine the price of your book. If you are paying Nu.150 per book, then let the price of your book be Nu.300, be gentle on the price since it’s your first book. One day when you are popular, then you could strike higher. 

 

Always print the price of your book on the back cover to ensure that your readers get the book at the price you set and that bookstores don’t charge higher than you intended. 

The book's cover page will either have a separate cost (Nu. 5 per piece) or come as a compliment with the book. This has to be agreed upon while negotiating. 

ISBN & BICMA No.

ISBN Number is issued by the Centre for Bhutan Studies (CBS) in Bhutan. Go to their website and apply for an ISBN number for your book by furnishing the online form with your book details or (download an actual form and emailing it to Mr Tashi Tshering at ttcering@gmail.com/ttshering@bhutanstudies.org.bt.) 

You will get it issued within a day or two. You don't have to pay for this service. 

 

Also, you need to get the publishing approval from BICMA. Print a dummy copy of your book and submit it to BICMA along with the application form. You should get the approval certificate with the BICMA number within a week or so. A Nu.1500 fee is charged.

Certificate of Registration for Book Publication from BICMA

You have to put both the ISBN and BICMA number on the back-cover page along with MRP and on the book's technical page. Generate a bar code using the ISBN number and have it printed on the back cover. 

Barcode and Price on the Back Cover

Once you have these details, you can wrap up the design and layout works and send the work to the printing house. 

Note: You must compulsorily deposit three copies of your book to the National ISBN Agency, the Centre for Bhutan Studies and GNH Research, and additionally 2 copies to National Library. 

PROOFREADING 

But wait, one last thing before sending for mass printing, send it for proofreading. This is the last chance for you to remove any error from the book, so get the copy proofread by someone good at it, preferably a fresh pair of eyes. If any error is spotted, you have to ask your designer to make the necessary corrections. 

Once all is done, you give the green flag to the printer, and they will take about a month to print your book and deliver it to you. 

LAUNCH and PROMOTION 

Once you receive the book from the printing press, organize a book launch ceremony. Invite people from media as guests. This is your opportunity to let the country know that you have published a book. Set up a bookstall somewhere and let the guests buy the book, but let someone else sell the book for you. Arrange a corner for 'book Signing', where you sign the book for the guests.

Book Signing during the launch of PaSsu Diary

When this event is over, it's time for you to run for marketing. I know it's a little too undignified, but the goal is to sell your book, and there is no other way around unless you have someone else who will do it for you. Go to the bookstores and distribute the books and negotiate a percentage commission for them. They will ask anywhere between 20-30%. The tragedy is that you don't get paid upfront. They will pay you only when the books are sold, so it's important to keep your online promotion aggressive and send buyers to bookstores. 

For wider recognition and possible promotion, register your book on BOOKNESE, the online platform for Bhutanese books. They will help you stage your book in the circle of readers and get it discussed, besides marketing it online and distributing it to different dzongkhags through Bhutan Post. 

 

 NOTE: If you don't have the money to publish your book, wait for my post on Crowdpublshing. 

PaSsu Diary- Publishing Blog into Book

How unfair is it on my part, not to discuss a word about my own book PaSsu Diary on this very blog where it was born and bred? It’s been three months today since the launch and I am surprised that I have waited so much. In the past ten years I have never let go of any such event without recording them, but it all stopped since the day I decided to publish the blog into a book. The idea took all my attention and I was gradually getting used to not blogging. Surprisingly I survived.

But I vowed to myself that I will return to full-time blogging once the book got published, not foreseeing that there is whole world of marketing to explore after publishing. Therefore, even after months I have been able to keep my words. I am still sorting out my accounts and wondering if I should send the book for reprint.

Meanwhile, I want to recount the overwhelming experience I have had in the whole publication process. Of the many dreams I had since high school, publishing a book was my favourite. But my first attempt at publishing a collection of short stories in 2003 failed and the disappointment grew with me for last fifteen years. I was still considering the publication of my short story book when the idea of publishing this blog came by.

I wasn’t even confident to publish PaSsu Diary because all the articles were already published online and there was nothing new I was offering, yet I wanted to try it out because I wanted to get the feel of holding a book of my own without much effort. I thought, may be it might motivate me to get my short story book published. I was only looking at it as a means to publishing my next real book, but now I feel differently. I was absolutely wrong in assuming that all the posts published on the blog would be read. No one has done that.

Suddenly, I started seeing my 2003 failure as a blessing because over the years I have learned a great deal about how to and how not to publish a book, especially how crucial it’s for your first book to be something that you won’t regret. Therefore, I have paid attention to every little detail; paper type, font, binding, cover art, cover design, dimension and even the thickness of the book. Even if the book failed in all aspects I wanted it to be a good showpiece. Seriously.

My editor Nawang Phuntsho, who helped many young people published their debut book using his crowd-publishing platform was so confident in my book, much more than myself, to vouch for 3000 copies in the first print, highest number ever attempted with any book we handled so far. He refused to change his mind about it. Now I feel he had seen the future.

On the day the book came out of the press even I became a little too over confident because the combination of Chimi R Namgyal’s cartoon, Binu Creativedonkey’s colour alteration and cover design, Che Dorji’s layout and design made the book look so grand. Inside the book, I know my editor has put in his heart-work. That’s the way I wanted my first book to look like.

The Fantastic Four

The book launch event was something I was looking forward to for the past fifteen years and I have shamelessly daydreamed many a times over the years. It’s that single event perhaps every aspiring writer hunger for, to hold their book, read to the crowd, and give their autograph. But after so many years of preparation when it was finally happening to me, I was strangely embarrassed. I was so disappointed to find myself not as happy as I should be. Perhaps I was overwhelmed to see my biggest dream come true so easily.

Book Launched by my favourite author Dr. Karma Phuntsho

The event was hosted by my friend Chimi Zom at her hotel, Dorji Elements and my team made sure that it felt like a real book launch. The setting was perfect, better than those in my daydreams. I had only one condition, that they should not make me sell my own book, which I pitifully saw happening during a few book launches I attended. I had one of my favourite authors, Dr. Karma Phuntsho grace the event. His book History of Bhutan made me look up to him as a super human.

In the confusion of everything I realised that I haven’t prepared a speech at all. I quickly thought of few things that are worthy of talking about my book, and having been a teacher all my life, spoke as if I have prepared it all night;

1. The book is crowd-published. 16 friends invested in the publication of this book. I must admit that even after all these years I don’t have money to publish my own book, but even if I had money I would have still crowd-published the book because it also means crowd-marketing. Investors are paid back in terms of books and they help you reach your book to their network of people where we can never reach. So on the launch day, even before I sold a single book, 1500 copies are sold in principle. Thanks to Nawang for the great idea.
2. Blog to book. It’s the first of its kind in the country and I hope this will pave way for the young bloggers to consider it as an ultimate blogging goal. But unlike mine, they could plan it well and focus on certain subjects or theme right from the beginning. 
3. Book is always judged by its cover, therefore never take design aspects lightly. When you put your book on the shelf with other books, you should not feel sorry for your poor book. 
4. My book is on ordinary subjects written in almost simple 'spoken’ English, that anyone can easily read and dissect, which will often make you think, “If writing such things can be published as book then even I can be a writer.” And that’s what I want people, especially young one to think, to see how possible it is to publish a book. 

Reviewing PaSsu Diary by Kezang Choden

I am proud to share that my book was received warmly by the readers across the country and I enjoyed overwhelming response from the readers on various media platforms. I only made sure that the book was available in every Dzongkhag through my network of friends- and not just lazily rely on the bookstores, while the readers did the promotion for me. I owe to so many people for letting people know and helping me reach my book to the farthest corners.

From the many reviews and comments, I knew that my book was touching young hearts so I tried to reach out to parents to buy the book for their children. I assured them that the book would tell their children so many things they longed to tell them, without having to argue with them.

The best compliments I received was from some readers who admitted that it was the first book they ever read. They shared how my short articles were so easy to read and how they kept going ‘just one more piece and I will sleep’ for the entire night. They were on page 307 by the time they realised.

And of the many pictures parents sent to me of their children adventuring with my book, the most heartwarming was of a girl who has reviewed my book as part of her English assignment, where she went on to argue with her teacher about how a teacher should be. Her language, analytical power and handwriting will grab your attention.

Review by Sonam Choden, XII, DMSS

Review by Sonam Choden XII, DMSS

At the first booktalk I gave at the Bhutan Art Gallery I had a firsthand insight into how seriously people are discussing the subjects I have written about. I am happy that the issues I discussed long time ago are back on the table with this book, therefore I am looking forward to the few booktalks I have planned to take part in.

Book Talk at Bhutan Art Gallery- by Wang

Book Launch Covered by BBS News