The Adventures of Sammy the Wonder Dachshund

As a kid I was good at making deals and negotiating to get the things I wanted.  This involved pushing back bedtimes, scamming grandparents, and sometimes even working for things when I couldn’t talk my way into or out of something.

My dad did not believe in the South Carolina Child Labor Laws, so at the age of 14 I began to work.  Hard and often.

Over those next 15 years, I had various sales jobs.  I sold Hawaiian shaved ice, pretzels, frozen lemonade, cotton candy at NBA games (best job ever), rugs, health insurance, life insurance, and even cars.  The car thing still gives me nightmares…

Something I like to do at the end of readings and after the kids ask a bunch of questions is throw out a sales pitch.

So the other day I was reading to a school and decided I was going to have some fun and go all “Don Draper” on these kids and really sell them on getting a copy of the book.  The pitch varied from group to group depending on age but mostly went something like this:

“Raise your hand if you want a copy of the book.”

(They would all raise their hands.)

“Well when I was your age, I was really good at getting what I wanted!  Sometimes I would beg, do chores, or I’d even cry every once in a while if I had too! If you really want a book, just tell your parents you’ll do the dishes, take the garbage out for a week or even offer to cut the grass. I’m sure one of these things will work.  Now go out there and show me what good little sales people you are.”

When I got back to the school on Friday, not only did I sell more books than I have at any other school, but I had this waiting on me:

A Ziploc bag with $7 in paper bills and the other $8 in pennies, nickels, dimes, and quarters (All of which I couldn’t even get into the shot.)  I like to think this kid got the $7 out of some elaborate deal he struck with his folks. The other $8 I assume came from his 401k (piggy bank.)  It was one of the cutest things that has  happened to me since I began all of this.  I hope the kid is happy and enjoying his new book.

And I hope his parents got some yard work out of it…

I think one of the funniest things about going to schools and reading to the kids is the expectation the kids have of my celebrity.

I don’t know if this comes from teachers trying to get the kids excited about reading, or just the fact that a new person is in the school they’ve never seen before.

I eventually have to explain that I am not really famous, only about 9% famous. (based on a weird scale my business partner and I made up)

Once I did lie.  I told some 3rd graders I knew the Jonas Brothers, but only because I was asked to pretend to be famous to encourage a group of kids to think reading was cool by a frustrated teacher.

Kids often ask me if I know “other famous people”.  Some of these people have included:

Miley Cyrus, George Clooney, Justin Timberlake, Barack Obama, Jay-Z, anyone from Twilight,  and Oprah…

So to be honest:  Since I’ve been an author, I met the mayor once and

I did a piece of artwork for Paula Deen and she is basically white Oprah…So there.

I had honestly wanted to make an effort to start this blog 1/1/10 but as things go with children’s books and life I have not met that goal.  So I guess 19 days later is as good of a time as ever….

So I’m going to start writing this blog to share some stories about being a 20 something children’s book author. I have read to more than 30,000 kids over the past year with my first book.  Up until then I couldn’t tell the difference between a 2 year old and a 10 year old.

I know now.

I’ve shared many of these stories with friends and other people, some fimilar with kids, some not.  This is pretty much the only thing I actually have to talk about these days, because I basically spend most of my time hanging out around kids.  So now I’m going to start sharing them with the inter-web…

As a disclaimer:

This blog has nothing to do with the actual character Sammy from my books.  The views, opinions, and stories expressed in this blog are soley about me, Jonathan Miller, the person.  Some of this stuff might not be cut out for the average kindergarten age Sammy fan.  Don’t worry I’m not going to talk about anything too crazy and I will use clean language.  Just scan it to see if you think it appropriate before you share it with a kid…

With that all said, stay tuned.  I’ll be back to tell you some pretty incredible things that have happened in the past and as they are going on in the life of a children’s book author.

JM

More to come.