Booklife is an informative guide for creating a successful and balanced writing life. VanderMeer breaks the book into two sections: Public Booklife, covering marketing elements, and the Private Booklife, focusing on the writing process - while emphasizing the importance of creating an authentic balance between the two.
The first section delves into online platforms and media opportunities including blogs, social networking (Twitter, FaceBook), book trailers, reviews, podcasts, and dedicated book / author websites, and provides insights to select the most effective and honest strategy. VanderMeer recommends setting goals and outlines how to create detailed plans. In part two, he discusses writing and revision, how to deal with rejections, and setting work schedules. This well-organized, thoughtful book concludes with more than 100 pages of appendices filled with information from and about agents, booksellers, editors, publicists, and published writers.