To answer some few questions about ‘da Book’.

• Yes, it is based around the blog – I’m taking blogposts from here, rewriting some of them, adding in new information and putting some of them in context.
• Yes I am happy being published.  Very happy strangely enough.
• I have to have the first draft in by the end of February, around 90,000 words.
• I was approached by the Friday Project, I didn’t approach them.  Actually I was approached by three publishers at once.  Thus proving that publishers are like buses, none for ages and then three come at once.
• The idea of publishing it under a Creative Commons license was my idea.  I think that the Friday Project are incredibly cool and forward looking to let me do this.  Publishing under this license will hopefully sell more copies, and let me feel like I’m not selling out.
• I am surprised that people want to publish me.  When I started writing this blog it was the furthest thing from my mind.
• Yes, Work know, and are happy with the whole idea.
• No…it hasn’t quite sunk in yet…

Tuesday 20th December

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE



The Friday Project secures publishing rights to London Ambulance Service blogger, 'Random Acts of Reality'


The Friday Project is delighted to announce that it has secured the rights to 'Random Acts of Reality', a book based on the acclaimed online diary of London-based Emergency Medical Technician (E.M.T.), Tom Reynolds.

Tom began working as a nurse for the NHS at the age of 23. He worked in four hospitals but moved to the London Ambulance Service after realising that working in A&E was making him 'want to torture patients'. Now, as an E.M.T., he has finally found his true calling - so much so that he has stopped torturing 'all but the congenitally obnoxious... and drunks.'

Since 2003, Tom has kept an online diary (or 'weblog', or even 'blog'), candidly recording every aspect of his daily working life. From the tragic to the hilarious, from the heartwarming to the terrifying, the stories Tom tells give a fascinating - and at times alarming - picture of life in inner-city Britain, and the people who are paid to mop up after it.

Random Acts of Reality will be published in August 2006 in paperback format. It will also be the first mainstream UK title to be published online in its entirety under a Creative Commons Licence.

Paul Carr, Editor-in-Chief of The Friday Project explains: "Like many people in the media, we've been huge fans of Tom's writing for a long time. When we first approached him about turning his blog into a book, he suggested that we might also publish an online edition to allow people to access the full text electronically before deciding whether to purchase a hard copy.
It's a fantastic idea and one that suits the material perfectly.
And hopefully it will encourage other publishers to be less nervous about making material available online in order to increase hardcopy sales."

Publishing under a Creative Commons Licence makes the entire text of the book available online and also entitles readers to download it, and reproduce it for personal, non-commercial use.
The publisher and the author retain all commercial publishing rights to the material.

The paperback edition of the book will be available in all good bookshops, published under The Friday Project's 'Friday Books'
imprint.


ENDS

Do you know how hard it is to keep quiet about something when you blog about pretty much anything that wanders across your mind? You'll notice I have a new category 'Da Book', where I'll put anything that occurs while I write the thing. It won't 'bubble up' to the main page, so as to not fill this blog with booky concerns.