Over the past year or two, away from the day jobs of curing male baldness, finding a solution to the world economic crisis and also figuring out who invented liquid soap and why, I’ve also been working on a ukulele book. It’s a novelty book, a light hearted look at the ukulele. Each chapter has a comedy vignette, illustrations and a song to play. Chapters titles include Country Music, Hawaii, Ukulele Heroes of the Western World and lots more. It’s the sort of book you might find on the counter of your local bookstore, an impulse purchase or a present for someone else. If you want to learn how to play the ukulele like Jake Shimabukuro or Roy Smeck then it probably isn’t quite what you’re after. If you want some lighthearted fun then this is the book for you.
Image: Paul Andrews
I have a fantastic illustrator working with me on the book, Paul Andrews. The book will first be released as an eBook for iPad and kindle. We also plan to produce a high end hardback edition, perhaps limited edition maybe even with a small print of one of Paul’s illustration’s with the book. Nothing’s decided yet though, so that’s a wait and see. There’s also a good chance we might extend it to a mass market print book as well.
The book’s written and the illustrations are just being finished but there’s still loads to do before launch. I’ve not figured out the interactive parts of the ebook yet and there’s lots of other stuff to do like meta tagging and other ebook type stuff.
There’s a small book site - www.ukulelebook.co.uk. I’ll be adding some stuff, perhaps even starting a humble blog with some videos and other bits and bobs about ukuleles, depends on time. There’s also plans for a book trailer, time permitting as well.
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