Christian book publisher Thomas Nelson laid off a tenth of their work force this week. Their president and CEO, Mike Hyatt, has been blogging about the decision. His candor and openness are quite refreshing—not to mention educational for aspiring authors like me. He gives us an glimpse into the tough inner world of book publishing.

The words "tough" and "book" don't belong in the same sentence. It's like putting Shirley Temple into a film about Jack the Ripper. As I read through Mike's posts, I realize that part of my anxiety about getting published comes from this tension. How do we marry the creative and practical sides of writing and selling books?

I might ask the question this way. Are books really about this:



Or are they really about this:



Of course the answer is that they're about both. You can't keep making books unless you make a profit. Yet nobody who chooses a career in publishing chooses it purely for the money—other industries will make you wealthier quicker. As Mike says, "It is partly about the money. Otherwise, we won't stay in business. But that is certainly not what gets us up in the morning."

So we don't want to say that the "good" side of publishing is the creative/intellectual side while the "bad" side of publishing is the practical/financial side. The two sides have to stick together. Divorce is not an option. You can't have one without the other.

Yet, from an emotional standpoint, when I imagine being a published author, it's not the money that gets me excited. It's the readers. It's the bookstores. It's the physical presence of the book itself.

Yesterday morning I spent 45 seconds sniffing C. H. Dodd's The Epistle of Paul to the Romans, which was published in 1932. The yellow pages are browning at the edges like an old daguerreotype. Dodd's commentary is fierce, but it smells sweet—literally, like a summer meadow.

My dad published a few books when I was a kid. I remember him bringing the galleys home—oversize pages with fine, typeset lettering—a sort of prototype for the book. Looking at them was like sneaking a glimpse into a secret world. They would be marked up in blue by a copy editor, who even noted things like indentions and headings and the location of page numbers—things no ordinary reader would ever know someone had fussed over. I hear publishers don't use galleys anymore. They've been cut adrift and left to bob in the wake of digital technology. Pity.

I love books, and I love reading—not just doing it, but imagining it done—the long, united centuries of paper and print and the people who have loved them. When I write a paragraph, I don't think about its market value. I think about its meaning, its function, its structure, its beauty or lack thereof.

But I know that to get published I must sometimes take off my wire-rim spectacles and don safety goggles, or even a helmet, and charge once more into the fray, and let slip the dogs of market analysis and pitch meetings and niggling contract terms. I have to make the beautiful sell.

It's tough straddling the worlds of books and business—one foot on land, the other on sea. You have no choice but to serve both logos and mammon.

I am now the number one reference returned by Google for an image search on "subconjunctival hematoma". Go me!

Warning: The link above is not for the squeamish. I'm not kidding.

Writing is terrifying. It shouldn't be, but it is. I've got no kind of public, yet I can't stop wondering what people will think. I'm on no kind of stage, yet I've got stage fright. I'm already embarrassed about mistakes I haven't even written yet. Consequently, often when I sit down to write, I end up surfing the web—the modern symptom of writer's block.

I've tried various strategies for tricking myself into actually writing. One of my favorites is to dictate the first draft. I get myself driving on an unhurried freeway. I ask myself a question and pretend to be interested. Then I simply talk out my answer, capturing the results with a digital recorder. When I get home, I transcribe the recording, then edit with a crowbar and hacksaw. I've had pretty good results with this technique, believe it or not. Best of all, it gets me writing and I don't even feel it. It's like putting cough syrup in your kid's ice cream.

Yesterday I discovered another weapon in the war against writer's block. I call it the Planning Document-Draft Document Bait and Switch. PDDDBS, for short.

I found it by accident. I was working on a chapter for a book. I had created a blank document with the proper formatting (Times New Roman, 11 point font, nifty headers and footers) to act as fertile ground for the chapter. I then created—as a diversion from actually writing—a second document. This one was formatted in an "informal" way, with a sans-serif font and colorful headings. I would use it for planning and note taking.

Rather than switching back to the main document, I lingered in the planning phase a little while. I planned and thought and researched and took notes for half an hour. It helped, actually. It helped me understand the chapter I was about to write. In a flush of confidence, I saved the planning document and switched over to the "real" one. As I did so, I felt the footlights on the edge of stage blaze to life.

The cursor kept winking at me, like a vengeful prompter. I heard the deafening silence of the audience. And I crawled away to hide in my planning document.

That's when I discovered it: The PDDDBS Technique.

Underneath all the planning I created a new section called "How To Start?" Then I started.

Suddenly, I realized, I was writing, but I wasn't nervous.

I was all alone.

Nobody was looking.

I wasn't "writing," I was just "trying out ideas."

Best of all, the words appeared in a chummy sans-serif font. Even the style of the page told me I was home, out from under the spotlight.

I wrote a page or two. Then I read it, and it was okay. I copied it over to the real document. There was a smattering of applause from the audience, and it was enough to keep me writing through the end of the chapter.

I have just translated my first Hebrew passage and it has made me absolutely giddy. I'm embarrassed to admit that an academic exercise could fill me with such delight, but there it is. Up until this point, I've parsed individual words and translated single sentences. Today was first time I translated a whole block of the original Hebrew scripture.

The passage is Jonah 1:1–5, which we're studying in my second-semester Hebrew course at Dallas Theological Seminary. Part of what makes the translation such a pleasure is the story itself. Jonah has an amazing, vexing personality. His adventure is engrossing, profound, helpful, and hilarious, all at the same time.

Translating from the Hebrew brings color to each word. I discover that the word we translate "to sleep deeply" (1:5) can simply mean "to snore." I begin to see connections I hadn't noticed before. Jonah is an underachiever. Both God and the ship captain have to tell him to "get up!" People keep throwing things: God throws a wind upon the sea, prompting the sailors to throw their stuff overboard. Later, they'll cast lots, and then of course they'll chuck Jonah.

The star of the show is kind of a lovable nut. What is more comical—and yet disturbingly believable—than a prophet who thinks he can escape from God? What kind of weird mix of faith and rebellion would enable someone to sleep through the perfect storm?

But Jonah is more than a slapstick crank, and much more than a children's book character. The tension that drives him is one that drives me. On the one hand, he wants to serve people and bring them closer to God. On the other hand, he thinks God is too good for those people—and by implication, so is he. It's easy to hold contempt for those you're sent to serve. So when God speaks to Jonah, I try to keep my ears open.

After nine months of studying Hebrew, memorizing 400+ vocab words, learning Qal verbs and Piels and Hiphils and Hophals and myriad Weak verbs, it's a relief to finally apply that knowledge. I feel like a man who has been studying a map so long he can barely focus his eyes, until one day he is dropped off in a foreign city and discovers that he already knows how to get around.

I've just released a new flash game: Coffee Shop, available at ArmorGames.com. This summer I partnered with Daniel McNeely, who owns and runs ArmorGames.com, to release Phit. We had so much fun we decided to do it again, and Coffee Shop is the result. James Dalby's art and Chris Branscome's music really bring it to life. Enjoy.