The Publishing Performance Show

Ray Hartjen - Writing Your Truth: How Personal Memoirs Create Connection and Healing

• Teddy Smith • Episode 73

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Ray Hartjen is an author, musician, and cancer patient advocate who has written several books including "Me, Myself and My Multiple Myeloma" - a memoir about his journey with blood cancer. After being diagnosed in 2019, Ray transformed his experience into a platform to help others, with all proceeds from his book benefiting the Multiple Myeloma Research Foundation. Beyond his cancer memoir, Ray has co-authored "Immaculate: How the Steelers Saved Pittsburgh" and writes about his other passions including auto racing with his upcoming book about the Indianapolis 500.


In this episode:

  • Ray's journey from cancer diagnosis to becoming an author and advocate
  • The process of writing a deeply personal memoir
  • How Ray's perspective shifted from "fighting" cancer to living with it
  • The importance of community in the cancer patient experience
  • How writing helped Ray connect with others and expand his purpose
  • The challenges and benefits of working with editors and publishers
  • Marketing strategies for authors promoting their books
  • Tips for writing authentic biographical stories


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[00:00:00] Teddy Smith: Hi everyone, and welcome to the publishing informant show. I'm here with Ray Hartgen, who is a author and a musician, and we're here to talk about his books. So Ray, welcome to the show. 

[00:00:17] Ray Hartjen: Thank you so much, Teddy. Thanks. Thanks for having me. I appreciate the opportunity. 

[00:00:21] Teddy Smith: Great. No, it's good to have you. Now you've written your book, the me, myself, and my multiple myeloma.

[00:00:28] Teddy Smith: So could you just give us a bit of a background into why you wrote that book? 

[00:00:31] Ray Hartjen: Yeah that's my second book. Me, myself, and my multiple myeloma. it's a book that, well, first of all, multiple myeloma is a blood cancer. A relatively rare blood cancer, quite rare enough for my liking. and I was diagnosed with that, in, 2019.

[00:00:44] Ray Hartjen: I had the, the privilege of being, you know, interviewed, soon after my diagnosis for, for a couple different reasons. But, you know, with those interviews and with those videos, I, I had people reaching out to me, patients from around the world, you know, asking, you know, about.

[00:00:59] Ray Hartjen: My treatment and my diagnosis and, and how it might relate to their diagnoses. it still continues to be the biggest honor of my life to communicate with other multiple myeloma patients. But, but it was done on a, on a one to one basis. And I was just wondering, you know, how can I scale this up and make it a one for many?

[00:01:17] Ray Hartjen: And so that, that came up with the idea of me, myself and my multiple myeloma, a cancer patient memoir. I don't think it's not just a cancer book. I don't want it to be viewed as that. You know, I, I like to think of it as a living book, right? You know, and so it's a book of a lot of different things, but certainly, one of it's a book of, of hope and I very much wanted to, to write this book, like I said, to scale up my interactions with, with cancer patients and cancer patient caregivers and cancer patient allies.

[00:01:45] Ray Hartjen: But I also wanted to do it in a very authentic way and make it a book you know, by the community, to the community and for the community. And for that reason, you know, I made it a fundraiser for the Multiple Myeloma Research Foundation, all my net writers proceeds, for the book, benefit the MMRF.

[00:02:02] Ray Hartjen: And so, so it's a book that I'm proud of. It came out in July the paperbacks in July of 2024. A book I'm proud of and I'm happy to speak to. 

[00:02:12] Teddy Smith: Brilliant. I mean, so writing a biography in itself, and especially given the circumstances must have been like quite an intense process, I guess, you know.

[00:02:21] Teddy Smith: Was it inspired you to write it in this format? 

[00:02:25] Ray Hartjen: Yeah, you know, it's it's a certainly a bit of a, excuse me, Teddy, I'm sorry. It's, 

[00:02:30] Teddy Smith: sorry. It, 

[00:02:30] Ray Hartjen: it certainly was an, an introspective journey, but then I found that my, my fight with cancer was very introspective to begin with, you know, prior to my diagnosis in March of 2019.

[00:02:42] Ray Hartjen: I'd lived in kind of a little bit of a bubble, you know, as it related to any serious health concerns for myself and for those around me, and I certainly lived in a bubble as it related to cancer. and you know, I didn't really, you know, cancer wasn't really kind of part of my life. And then all of a sudden I got diagnosed as a, you know, it was a shock.

[00:03:02] Ray Hartjen: I got diagnosed from a routine blood test, basically, you know, a regular CBC test came back a complete blood count and then came back and I was a little anemic. And so, you know, go trying to find a source of my anemia led me down a path of multiple months multiple blood tests, more sophisticated blood tests.

[00:03:20] Ray Hartjen: And then. A very painful bone marrow biopsy that then, gave me the diagnosis of multiple myeloma, you know, and so it came as kind of a shock to me, because I was, I felt healthy. I didn't, I wouldn't be going to the doctor. Even today, I wouldn't be going to the doctor if I didn't have cancer.

[00:03:36] Ray Hartjen: Right, you know, so I felt perfectly fine, you know, in retrospect, you know, I can think back and I said, well, you know, I was kind of fatigued but you know, at the time I was 54 years old, married, had a full time job, two kids and private expensive private universities. Give me a break, man. I should've been fatigued, right?

[00:03:52] Ray Hartjen: You know what it's like being a parent. You get tired. You know, when I got diagnosed, I approached, I mean, this is a fight. You know, and I, and I write in the book about, you know, different patients have different approaches. You know, some people will talk about a journey with cancer, you know, and they like to take away the combative nature of it because, you know, if there's a, if it's a combative type of metaphor that you use, well then, you know, it said that there's a winner and a loser and there's certainly no loser in a patient thing.

[00:04:20] Ray Hartjen: I mean, you know, I recognize that. But for my personality I like the, the metaphor of a fight against cancer and, you know, when I jumped into, you know, being a cancer patient, you know, I was, I was fighting with everything I had, you know, and, you know, based on my past experience as a, as an athlete, as a musician, as a worker, you know, as a student or whatever, you know, I'd always led up to sort of a fight.

[00:04:46] Ray Hartjen: Capstone event. It was either, you know, an exam date or presentation date, you know, a work deliverable, a gig, a contest, you know, there's, there's always a fight night or a game day coming up, right? And that's how I was kind of approaching you know, dealing with cancer and it lasted two weeks, Teddy you know, sitting at dinner with the family on a Friday night, actually a little less than two weeks.

[00:05:07] Ray Hartjen: Sitting at a restaurant and I was just exhausted, physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually just exhausted. And I, and I realized that, man, you know, I, I needed to change my approach. And so, you know, getting back to your original question, you know, this introspective thing, you know, my journey with cancer was just one introspective, you know, journey of the other.

[00:05:27] Ray Hartjen: I recognize that there is no, no game day or fight night. Every day is game day or fight night. It's a process. I have a chronic disease. It's incurable. So, you know, it's, it's living with it every day, right? You know, so what's, what can I do to sustain that? You know, and I recognize soon after that Friday night, sitting at a restaurant and just not even being able to read the menu, you know, that my whole being is my physical being, my mental being, my emotional being, my spiritual being, it's sort of like.

[00:05:56] Ray Hartjen: levels in a, in a recording studio on a mixing board, you know, it's like, you know, one of those can lift the others. One of them can also drag down the others, you know, and that, that gave me new insight for me. And, you know, when I, when a couple of things like that, and I have a lot of examples like that to my journey with the things that I've learned through my cancer patient support group, you know, it just you know, I felt as though.

[00:06:20] Ray Hartjen: When I needed a helping hand, there was, there were people back there that were reaching and pulling me forward and I feel good and I feel strong and I have a responsibility. I feel to my community when I'm like that and others need a little, a little help forward. I need to be that person that reaches back and pulls them forward.

[00:06:36] Ray Hartjen: And, you know, again, you know, me, myself, on my multiple, my mom and this book, you know, it's my attempt to, you know, to scale that effort up to a one to many. It's like, you know, if you need help, I want to be the, the, the person here to. be one of the people there to help you move forward. 

[00:06:52] Teddy Smith: Yeah. Yeah. That's an amazing story.

[00:06:55] Teddy Smith: I mean, cause obviously you're writing about yourself and these issues you've had, what was your process right? Like for getting that story down on paper because it. This is, this is writing a biography like this is slightly different to writing a novel or a you know, a, a self-help book or something like that where your outline, you're trying to get to a particular outcome, or you're trying to get the story to a particular point.

[00:07:19] Teddy Smith: If you're writing a biography, I, or in this way, I'm guessing it's you're writing much more about things that have happened to you. So did you have an approach to. Getting that structure down and getting the book written. 

[00:07:31] Ray Hartjen: Yeah. You know, it's I think it's a lot easier, you know, where's these points of conflict and so forth for me you know, writing the memoir.

[00:07:44] Ray Hartjen: Was a very organic type of process, you know, there it's a, it's a collection of, you know, you know, relatively short chapters the book and it's just one topic at a time one topic, for example, be the you know, speaking about losing hair and you know, going through treatment and the, the, the medicines that causes, you know, one of the side effects is, Is losing here.

[00:08:04] Ray Hartjen: And you know, how, how I dealt with that and how I prepared to deal with that. But you know, also, you know, just exploring and, and you know, relating stories of people I know that also face this in maybe a different way, you know? And and you know, my learning along the way my, in my, you know, cancer patient support group, there's actually a neighbor of mine.

[00:08:21] Ray Hartjen: She lives, I didn't know her before the group, but she lives four across the street and four houses down. And you know, she's been a long time a cancer patient and she's running out of therapies to take and she has one available to her and has had one available to her for a long time, but it's going to almost undoubtedly cause her to lose her hair.

[00:08:43] Ray Hartjen: And she doesn't want to lose her hair. And it's a, it's a, it's a therapy that, you know, when she starts, she really can't stop. So she's going to be, you know, hairless for forever. And you know, she does not want to do that. And I always thought, you know, you know, before I had cancer, before I had to deal with things like that, it's like, what?

[00:09:01] Ray Hartjen: I mean, you have a treatment that will save your life or prolong your life. You know, why won't you do it? You know, but, you know, it's different for a woman I've learned, you know, you talk to them. You know, so if a man doesn't have hair, it could be for a whole bunch of reasons from fashion and style to hereditary or what have you, you know, and it's, you know, a society kind of look at them as just being normal.

[00:09:22] Ray Hartjen: But you know, if it's a woman without hair, then, you know, you immediately fall into like, Oh, she, she must be sick. She's, you know, she's, you know, there's a, there's a reason for it. And, you know, cancer patients, a great deal of them don't want to have that stigma with them. They don't want the first thing that people to think about is you know, your disease and you know, our disease as patients certainly are part of us.

[00:09:41] Ray Hartjen: But it's not our, the only part of our identity. So now I can relate to her you know, just a lot better, but you know, for me, this, the stories are, you know, kind of easy to come about, you know, exactly, just pick up a topic and explore, you know, a topic about being disabled, you know, a topic about, you know, some of the, the things that cancer has given me.

[00:10:00] Ray Hartjen: And I think that's, you know, that's one of the things that I think surprises some readers, you know, we, we tend as a patient community, think to think of. Cancer, any serious illness, those. That's something that takes something away from you as a person. And there are some things like that, you know, there, you have to adjust to a new normal and some things are, things are not the same.

[00:10:21] Ray Hartjen: But you know, when I, when I think back to where I was before March 11th, 2019, you know, I was a husband, a father, a son, a brother, an employee, a bandmate, a boss, you know, all these different roles I had, Teddy. And, and with each one of those roles, I had accountabilities and goals and responsibilities and things I wanted to achieve.

[00:10:44] Ray Hartjen: And you know what? On March 11th, 2019, when I got diagnosed, I was still a father, a husband, a son, a brother, a boss, a bandmate, and all the like. I had all those same roles. And I still had those same things I wanted to get accomplished. But you know, I have new ones now too, you know, in the last five years.

[00:11:05] Ray Hartjen: You know, I'm now a fundraiser for the MMRF and other cancer charities. I'm a cancer patient advocate. You know, I've added new roles. Cancer has given me an opportunity to add. Meaning to my life, particularly changing my focus from, you know, maybe all about Ray to being in service with others.

[00:11:23] Teddy Smith: Yeah, of course. And another strength of yours is you're also now a writer as well. So it's something that you might not have even done had you not gone down this journey. 

[00:11:33] Ray Hartjen: Yeah, absolutely. You know, I, I was I've always, you know, I'm not, maybe not always been a writer, but I've always been a storyteller.

[00:11:40] Ray Hartjen: Throughout my career and being in marketing, I've created, you know, more than my share of marketing collateral content. But you know, being a musician, I'm always looking for a little saying to put on the back of a t shirt so we can make more money at gigs. And you know, you know, soon after being diagnosed with cancer, I did an exercise that I, as a facilitator has facilitated this exercise for hundreds of people, and it's a basic timeline exercise.

[00:12:07] Ray Hartjen: And if you're unfamiliar with it, Teddy, and you listeners out there as well, it's really quite a simple introspective exercise. Just take a blank piece of paper. Actually, you can use even, you don't need a piece of paper, you can do it in your mind. And you just draw a horizontal line from left to right across the paper in your mind.

[00:12:22] Ray Hartjen: And the far left hand side, you make a tick mark, a hash mark. Far right hand side, you do the same thing. So that the hash mark on the end of that timeline that you drew, that represents your birth. And then the right hand side, that represents your death. And then you just kind of take a moment and think, where do you think, where do you feel that you are on your timeline?

[00:12:43] Ray Hartjen: And so for years, Teddy, as I facilitated that for other folks, as part of the goal setting exercise, You know, I don't just like a haphazardly throw a line right down the middle and and I, you know, I was going to live forever, Teddy, I was going to at least be a hundred, you know, and you know, when I got diagnosed with cancer and I revisited this exercise for myself, not for others, you know, I thought, you know, I'm a lot further to the right than maybe I have put myself down in the past.

[00:13:07] Ray Hartjen: I don't know. None of us know. Tomorrow's not promised for any of us, but you know, I'm a little further to the right. So that led me to believe in if not now, when? You know, there's things I want to get accomplished. And, you know, that led, I actually use those words with the coauthor of my first book, Immaculate, How the Steeler Saved Pittsburgh.

[00:13:26] Ray Hartjen: My buddy, Tom, for years had talked about this story about how the city of Pittsburgh had to go through a de industrialization transformation. And you know, they came out, you know, the other side of it as a new economy success story for a city, yet there's so many of their Rust Belt cousins in the United States, like Cleveland, Detroit, continue to struggle.

[00:13:44] Ray Hartjen: What's the difference for him? It was the hometown football team, the Pittsburgh Steelers. And, you know, he had this idea, this thesis in his mind, but he's not a writer. So he didn't know how to get started really. 25 years worth of rolling around in his mind. You know, so I just, you know, said, Tom, you're like, I'm a writer.

[00:14:00] Ray Hartjen: Let's just, if not now, when? Let's get started. Let's do this. So if not then if not now, when? You know, that led to, you know, writing our first book which has been, you know, successful and doing doing well. A source of pride for me and, you know, that led into writing Me, Myself, and My Multiple Myeloma, and I've written two other books since Me, Myself, and My Multiple Myeloma, so you're, you're absolutely right, Teddy you know, it's you know, cancer's added book author as a as a role and and I have, you know, accountabilities and goals and objectives I want to achieve from that.

[00:14:30] Ray Hartjen: And and then, and also that, that motto, if not now, when has has evolved to punch today in the face. That's one I'd like to use with cancer patients, you know, it's, today's a gift, man. Not everybody received the gift of today, right? So, you know, how do we honor those that didn't receive the gift?

[00:14:48] Ray Hartjen: How can we honor ourselves? How can we honor the day? You know, let's use it up and seize it for all the opportunity it has. You know, where punch today in the face came from was, you know, I just wanted to get to today's attention. I want to, I want today to know that Ray Hardship was here and you know, what's, you know, what way grabs your attention more than anything else.

[00:15:08] Ray Hartjen: Well, you know, if you've ever been punched in the face, I kind of get your attention. I want to, I want to grab today's attention and, you know, and when I'm laying in bed tonight, you also want to look over it tomorrow and kind of give a point to it and say, Hey, I'm coming for you next tomorrow. 

[00:15:25] Teddy Smith: So, so talking about making the most of the day, obviously, when you write a book, you can't do everything yourself.

[00:15:30] Teddy Smith: So what was, did you get any outside help? For example, did you have someone to ask you questions whilst you're writing it? Or did you get someone to do any editing or ghost writing for you whilst you're writing the book? 

[00:15:43] Ray Hartjen: Yeah, I did all the writing. There was no ghostwriting. It certainly wasn't editor. My editor is Courtney Donaldson and I gave her the the manuscript.

[00:15:50] Ray Hartjen: When it was done it's always difficult as you know, Teddy to, you know, have an editor take a look at things. Cause you know, you think you got it, you think you, you got it pretty good after all the rewrites and all that. Yeah. And you're thinking there's not going to be hardly, there's hardly anything for you to do, Courtney.

[00:16:07] Ray Hartjen: Yeah. And, you know, and then it comes back and there's red everywhere. It's like, Oh, it's a, it's a, it's a humbling experience. You know, the, the questions I had prompted to me were really, you know, questions that I receive over social media from other patients, you know, part of this process of, you know, this decision making process to write this book was, you know, these people reaching out to me and asking me questions.

[00:16:26] Ray Hartjen: And, you know, so, you know, that was very helpful. And it's because, you know, these patients very organically. Asking me what they, what they wanted to know gave me, you know, an impetus for these are things I should, I should talk about. So that, that was, you know, very helpful. It's funny, you know, I haven't, I don't think I've really articulated that before in other interviews.

[00:16:45] Ray Hartjen: No one's asked me that question. So, but yeah, I mean, I have to give it up to the worldwide patient community for reaching out to me. Because those, those questions that they ask, you know, very directly led to to me deciding what are the things that I wanted to talk about in the book. And so, you know, that was very helpful.

[00:17:01] Ray Hartjen: And then, you know, just sharing sharing drafts with you know, people, I call my street team. It's what we used to do in music before the Internet, you know, for the Internet, you get your street team out and they go out and hang up banners on telephone poles and things like that. Same type of thing here, but now we do it digitally through social media and.

[00:17:18] Ray Hartjen: Book reviews and the like. And so, you know, given that, giving that you know, drafts and, and letting those individuals take a look at it, provide feedback, which is, you know, it's, you know, sometimes you have to draw it out of them because, you know, these are people that are close to you and you know, you know, sometimes it's very difficult for them to give constructive feedback and it's great.

[00:17:35] Ray Hartjen: It's awesome. It's like, no, no, no, seriously, no, like, what are things I can improve upon? So, you know, going through that process and your professional editing process you know, that, you know, that could be crumbling. I want to call. No, maybe it's painful. It's like, oh man, I thought it was. It's certainly ego, you know, downwards.

[00:17:50] Ray Hartjen: I go, man, I thought, I thought I had things at a high quality level. It turns out I just had it at a level so, so, but yeah, those those were all helpful aspects. And then, you know, turning the book over, you know, me, myself and my multiple albums published by Morgan James publishing it's you know, and so being able to, you know, work with their design team.

[00:18:10] Ray Hartjen: You know, I think, you know, some of your audience who might be in the process of, you know, you know, working on their first book. Interior design is something that I had never even thought about before. I wrote my first book, Immaculate, How the Steelers Saved Pittsburgh, you know, they talked about the interior design and the amount of time it would take to design the interior.

[00:18:29] Ray Hartjen: I'm like, what are you talking about? I've already designed the inside. It's all the, it's my words. It's my brilliant words. And it's like, no, there's a lot of thought that goes into Just pagination. Right. You know, and always starting to, you know, the, the first page of the chapter on the odd page and the page that looks up at you, not the, the back of a page and, you know, orphans or widows, you know, little, a couple of words that hang out on the end of a, a sentence that result in the next page.

[00:18:55] Ray Hartjen: And little transitional artwork between if you, you use section breaks between chapters. All this stuff is new to me. So relying on, you know, professional interior designers are very helpful and all I have to do is provide feedback and come up with some ideas as opposed to actually going through and designing the inside of the book.

[00:19:12] Teddy Smith: Yeah, that's interesting. What you said earlier about people in your community, like the cancer community who'd asked you questions and that had impacted some of the stuff that had gone into the book. Were there any parts of those questions which changed the direction of the book or the way you wanted to take it?

[00:19:29] Ray Hartjen: No, I don't, I don't think so. Because I, you know, I've, while I wanted to be of service to others, I, you know, I needed things to be. You know, true to myself, you know, and you know, topics that I thought were important and things that I thought were you know, relevant to me, you know, and, and there are, you know, choices people make with with their health care.

[00:19:46] Ray Hartjen: Sometimes it's, you know, they feel as though it's dictated to themselves, don't really have an advocate for themselves. So I, I certainly like to, you know, to, to tell people that, you know, as a patient that, you know, you, you need to be your advocate. And if you can't, for whatever reason, you need someone to be an advocate for you.

[00:19:59] Ray Hartjen: You have. And insight into directing your care, but you know, there's also some, you know, you know, people that, you know, just don't, they don't, they don't want to go through the process for for a variety of reasons. And that's the decision that they make that's right for them. Right. You know, it's not right or wrong.

[00:20:16] Ray Hartjen: And so. You know, some of the things you know, I would get, I, I've heard this from patients before, you know, you find out who your friends are really quickly, you know, and what that comes from is a relationships that fray and quite often they break upon a diagnosis. You know, and I always like to you know, that's, that's, that's, so maybe, you know, to your question, this is a, this is one of those points where it's like, yeah, you'll find out who your, you know, for me, I was, I like to encourage patients to look at things a little bit differently here, you know, is that, you know, quite often we as humans just don't know what to say.

[00:20:50] Ray Hartjen: Right. You know, and I would have been, I have been this person many times before, you know, like for me, it was with significant others. You know, I once went to went to grad school with a woman, her name's Therese and geez, I forgot her husband's name even because of this story. You know, is a guy I enjoyed hanging out with and I would see him socially, right?

[00:21:09] Ray Hartjen: Tracy, I think his name was. And then, you know, one time I see her at a party and I'm like, you know, Hey, Therese, where's Tracy? And he just looks at me and kind of says. You know, I'm like, Oh, there's trouble in paradise. They're, they're no longer a couple, right? And that scarred me forever, man. That Teddy, I, I want to ask.

[00:21:25] Ray Hartjen: About any social you know, you know, domestic partners, spouses, you know, people like that. I wouldn't ask about them at all until you mentioned it first. Cause I didn't want to put myself in that awkward situation again. And I think we all know examples of people, you know, like, you know, Hey, when are you expecting?

[00:21:38] Ray Hartjen: It's like, well, I'm not pregnant. You know, it's like, no, you know, that once happened not to me directly, but I'll standing right there on the spot party at my house. And a woman I was talking to another woman comes up to her and says, you know, Hey, when are you expecting? And she's like, I'm not expecting.

[00:21:53] Ray Hartjen: And that scarred me. And so I would never ask questions about. And so these are two examples about like, Hey man, I don't, I don't know what to say. So it's better not to say anything at all. And you know, sometimes as cancer patients, we think about it all from our perspective. I don't know what's going on in your life, you know, so you have not called me, you know, you know of my diagnosis from whatever reason, but you haven't called me.

[00:22:18] Ray Hartjen: That doesn't mean you don't care, you know, you've got other stuff going on in your life. I don't know what that is. And also maybe you just don't know what to say. Right. And I think I would have been in that case, you know, prior to my diagnosis, you know, if someone's, you know, close to me and I don't know what to say.

[00:22:34] Ray Hartjen: So I'm not calling tomorrow. I'll figure it out. And then tomorrow start needs the next week and that leads the next month, the next year. And then you find out who your friends are, you know, and, you know, I'm like, you know, give them a bit of a break, you know, maybe, you know, Maybe they're not friends of yours, right?

[00:22:51] Ray Hartjen: But they were friends of yours at one time, right? And there must've been a reason for that. So, you know, give them a break and it's a difficult conversation. And you know what? It's every bit as difficult for the patient to say something like, Hey, Teddy, you know, we haven't spoken in a while and I don't really know what that reason is, but I'm hoping that maybe we can get to this, you know, maybe a difficult, you know, 15, 20, 30 seconds and then get back to our friendship.

[00:23:16] Ray Hartjen: And that's exactly the same type of thing I recommend to people who don't know what to say to the patient. Jeez, Teddy, I don't know what to say. So I want to start there and hopefully we can kind of work this out together because I want to be there. I love you, I care for you, to, I want to be supportive of you.

[00:23:33] Ray Hartjen: So, you know, yeah, I guess the book doesn't, you know, those questions that I got out on social media and the like, things that I hear from you know, other patients and support groups you know, guide you know, what are the messages that I want to give. 

[00:23:45] Teddy Smith: Yeah. Did you find that once you started writing the book that those, that more people who maybe you hadn't spoken to in a while wanted to speak to you about like the book itself?

[00:23:56] Ray Hartjen: Yeah. And you know, and if they read the book, you know, I kind of give them permission, you know, it's like, you know, if you haven't spoken to her, that's, that's fine, man. That's, that's you and it's, it's, it's okay, you know, I'm doing my thing and that's okay too. But, you know, if you, if you ever, do you want to reach out to me reach out to me.

[00:24:12] Ray Hartjen: And of course, nothing stops me from not reaching out and talking to people that I haven't spoken to in a while either. You know, it's just not, you know, if you want to connect with people, you know, you just don't sit back and wait for the phone to ring you know, the phone works both ways. So yeah, you know, there, there were people that, you know, that like, Hey, I just didn't know.

[00:24:29] Ray Hartjen: I just spoke to a good friend of mine. Last week, and we hadn't spoken in years and part of it was, you know, he, he has now been diagnosed with cancer, prostate cancer, you know, and, and he feels guilty that he didn't reach out to me and, you know, even, you know, as a patient, you know, and a new patient, I'm like, Dude, it's, it's, it's fine.

[00:24:49] Ray Hartjen: It's okay, man. You know, you, you have stuff going on. I've got stuff going on and don't feel guilty about it. And let's celebrate the fact that we've connected today. You know, let's, let's talk about you and you know, how I can be a service to you. 

[00:25:02] Teddy Smith: Yeah, definitely. Now, when it came to your books, like this book and also your other book, the, about the Pittsburgh Steelers.

[00:25:08] Teddy Smith: Now, what did, did you have any particular approach to getting the word out there about the books? Did you do any particular marketing tactics, which. 

[00:25:17] Ray Hartjen: Yeah, excellent questions. You know, today's in today's publishing, you know, a world writers are responsible for the marketing and promotion of the books.

[00:25:28] Ray Hartjen: And, you know, unless your name is Stephen King or something like that, you know, particularly in the nonfiction area. You know, a large publishing house will publish nearly 20, 000 nonfiction books a year. When you think about that, it's like, that's a staggering number of books, you know, and that's just from a large publishing house.

[00:25:47] Ray Hartjen: That doesn't include all the self publishing and things like that. You know, so, it's definitely an aspect you have to do. You know, at Morgan James Publishing the publisher of three of my four books they the founder of that company, David Hancock was a his mentor was Jay Levinson, the guerrilla marketing guy, you know, and they've created a lot of guerrilla marketing books together, including guerrilla marketing for, for authors, for writers, you know, and a lot of those marketing techniques are, are, are free, but the basic foundation.

[00:26:16] Ray Hartjen: Of guerrilla marketing as relationships, you know, don't worry about books, sell sales, you'll, you'll get to that, build a relationship first count, you know, get customers that, that are just, you know, relationships. And you think about that, you know, the, the books will come and the best way of selling books are.

[00:26:33] Ray Hartjen: Word of mouth. I think product product reviews is good for any product and certainly for, for a book and also reviews help trip algorithms suggestive algorithms. So, you know, if we use Amazon for an example with, you know, you know, customers who looked at this also looked at that or bought this also about that.

[00:26:50] Ray Hartjen: You know, but you need reviews to trigger some of those. So it's really important when a book launches to have your digital street team that I referred to earlier. You know, it's like you, that you give them copies of the book and say, give me your authentic review. You know, I don't like pandering for five star reviews.

[00:27:06] Ray Hartjen: I think that's. You know, not authentic and it doesn't help anybody in the long run. It's like, you know, if I give you a book, Teddy, I want you to give you my, your authentic review, but it's helpful for other readers. Right. And you try to get through on Amazon, particularly try to break through number 30, right?

[00:27:21] Ray Hartjen: Another marketing tool that's really important is pre orders and getting the number of pre orders out there. Particularly for in the United States, we have a, we don't have a whole lot of big bookstores anymore, but the biggest bookstore will be Barnes and Noble Barnes and Noble has locations throughout the country and you can get pre orders above 300, that's a trigger to Barnes and Noble to, to put your book in all of its locations.

[00:27:49] Ray Hartjen: Right. So that's the number to shoot for. And it's difficult to achieve. Now, if you're Stephen King, or, you know, some well established author who's going to sell millions of copies, that's not very difficult at all. I mean, you buy it out of trust. It's like, Ted, he's got a book coming up. You know, he's a superstar writer.

[00:28:04] Ray Hartjen: I'm definitely pre ordering it because the first day, you know, it's going to be delivered to me. That doesn't work when you're, when Hartchen, right. You know, you got to go out there and Apple scramble for that. Right. So during that pre order window, you know, what can you do to get pre orders as high as possible, which is kind of, you know, it's, it's one of the things that you, you know, an author might struggle with because, you know, you also have books to sell and there's no higher margin on a book than a book that you sell.

[00:28:29] Ray Hartjen: This copy of me, myself, and my multiple myeloma, I'm holding my hands. I mean, that, that costs me just a, a couple of dollars, but if I can sell it for $18 I'm making, I'm making more money than I am to a, a retailer where, you know, my royalties will be a dollar or whatever, you know? So, I think for a lot of authors, it.

[00:28:46] Ray Hartjen: Geez, you know, I don't want to do pre orders. I'd rather just sell books out of hand. That's a short term approach, right? So, you know, book reviews are important. Pre orders are important. And then, you know, rounding up you know, very consistent presence on social media, just, you know, spreading the word, you know, trying to build communities with with people, whether it's you know, Instagram community about you, the writer or about the book.

[00:29:09] Ray Hartjen: I basically have both on all my social networks. You know, like Immaculate, how the Steeler Safe Pittsburgh, there's a Facebook page for that book. There's a Instagram page for that book, you know, and so build, same with me, myself, and my multiple myeloma. So, you know, building our communities to the book or, or through you as an author and just you know, engaging with your, with your readers.

[00:29:28] Ray Hartjen: There's one thing I, I really like and I, I like this exploration aspect of it. There's a writer I know here in the States. His name is JC Hutson Hutchins. He's written a lot of things and yeah, he's in the, like, the sci fi type of aspect, but he has a serial called The 33 that he hasn't worked on lately, but I think there's two different 33 books.

[00:29:50] Ray Hartjen: One of them has four parts. The other one is three parts. And these aren't like four books and three books. These are four parts of a single book. So he's inspired by comic books. And yeah, and so, you know, what he does is write, you know, the first. Part of a four part book, you know, put it on, put it available for sale for a 1.

[00:30:08] Ray Hartjen: 99, you know, knowing that it's a four part series, this is an eight 99 book or what have you. But what I find interesting about this is that it relates to your previous questions when, you know, you engage with your community and, you know, the community can help direct, maybe where the story's going to give you immediate feedback.

[00:30:25] Ray Hartjen: You know, it's like, Oh, I really like this. I can hardly wait for, you know, a part two to come out because I want to know what happens to this, you know, Ray character or what have you. That's what I find fascinating about the serial aspect. You know, if you have a type of book and the type of story that you can tell in parts you know, then you can, you know, in a way, start being able to start collecting feedback from your group and have this dialogue with your community on what they want to see next.

[00:30:48] Ray Hartjen: And, you know, maybe you. Maybe you reshape a bit of the story that's in your head. It, it's a, I think, a fascinating idea. I, I gotta figure out how I can do it. I wanna give it a try, you know, , give it a try, but you know, maybe it's a, a, a piece of fiction or something like that. You know, I am a songwriter.

[00:31:03] Ray Hartjen: Those are two small of stories to tell. I mean, it's a, yeah, three minute story and a lot of it's repetitive. Right . So, but if I can that that you know, allows me to to break up a, maybe a fictional story into four parts or something, I'm just fascinated by that idea. 

[00:31:18] Teddy Smith: Yeah, why not? It kind of leads on quite nicely to the next question, because I was going to ask if you did, if there's anything you do differently with writing your books next, so it sounds like you have learned some lessons and you've learned at least what you'd like to do next, but have, was there anything you do differently in terms of the books you've already got out?

[00:31:34] Ray Hartjen: You know, that's a, that's a good question. And maybe, you know, we'll certainly have a different answer later, you know, as I, as I write more, you know, you need to write about what you know, I think that's important for every writer to know. You know, so it's just going to be a lot easier and, you know, so I have a book coming out in May.

[00:31:54] Ray Hartjen: It's it's about the Indianapolis 500. It's called the Indy 500 year long quest to win the greatest spectacle in racing. And it's a book that I'm super excited about. And it's a book that I'm passionate about because I'm passionate about the Indy 500. And I grew that passion out of a reading a book.

[00:32:10] Ray Hartjen: When I was a kid, you know, it was a chronicle of the 1970 Indy 500. As a kid, you know, I read this book, you know, like 72 or something like that, you know, it just captivated my imagination and it ignited my passion for this event and for the sport. And and I, I always wanted to update it, you know, and so I, I think when to update it, what I mean is talk about like a current year's race.

[00:32:32] Ray Hartjen: So, you know, my book is really a kinda like a year long diary, so to speak, leading up to the Indy 500 that was run just a few months ago. Not 108th running. And you know, I, I, I, I, I put that up there, you know, because I wanted to go back, you know, if you write about the things that you're passionate about, you know, and that's, you know, one of the things that I learned, if not, it, it, it becomes a much more difficult, you know, so I'm passionate about the me, myself and my multiple, my mama book, passionate about the Indy 500 book.

[00:32:59] Ray Hartjen: Immaculate, How the Steelers Saved Pittsburgh was not my passion project. That was my co author's Tom's passion project. And you know, that was, I didn't know anything about Pittsburgh. I didn't know anything about the steel industry, for example, I knew you know, a bit about football, a lot about football and a bit about the Pittsburgh Steelers, but there's a lot of work that I had to do to be able to contribute to that book.

[00:33:20] Ray Hartjen: And a lot of research where, you know, me, myself, I'm a multiple Paloma. It was, it came about, you know, pretty easy you know, cause there were things I had to research but, you know, the book flowed for me because it was just coming from, you know, from something I was passionate about. So, you know, as, as books come forward, you know, you know, I know that the things that.

[00:33:39] Ray Hartjen: I need to find other topics that I'm passionate about and knowledgeable about just because it makes it makes it more fun. And I think it makes for a better product, right? You know, when you read something that, you know, that the writer knows about or feels strongly about or feels passionately about, ideally all of them together, you know, it comes across on the page and you know, it's sort of like performing as a band, you know, if it.

[00:34:02] Ray Hartjen: You know, if, if, if the band's enjoying being together and and, and playing then, you know, you feel it in the crowd. If you enjoy being there and sharing the experience with them, I think the same thing with the book. 

[00:34:14] Teddy Smith: You can tell when people know their topic and they're passionate about it. I mean, you could like when, when you read especially nonfiction books where you can tell when someone knows what they're talking about or not just by looking at the pages, it's obvious.

[00:34:26] Teddy Smith: And 

[00:34:27] Ray Hartjen: you know, for, for budding writers out there, you know, you know, re redefine what you think is a book because you know, the, the publishing industry has changed and books are no longer war and peace when immaculate how to steal or say Pittsburgh first draft, 132, 000 words and a publisher, Morgan James, like, it's too big and we're like, well, you can't cut it because it's, it's, This is the story.

[00:34:51] Ray Hartjen: And in fact, we weren't able to cut it very much. The final edits, about 130, 000 words, but it is a big book. They worried about it. But when they were telling me about it, it's like, it's a big book, you know, it's, it might be difficult to sell. I actually had a copy of War and Peace, Tolstoy's War and Peace on my desk.

[00:35:08] Ray Hartjen: This book's over a thousand pages and they're like, you know what? No one buys war and peace anymore. You mean it's like they don't, you know, they, you know, bookstores want to sell paperbacks. Not so much hardbacks. They want a short, you know, shorter books. And you know, that you can have my third book is a, is a B2B marketing book.

[00:35:29] Ray Hartjen: It's called revenue orchestration. And today's new era of B2B sales and marketing, it's like 18, 000 words. It's a 90 minute read, right? You know, it is a, what some people call a shook, a short, helpful book, right? You know, it's one of those things that you have a very short airplane trip. You can flip through it and you're done by the end of your flight.

[00:35:48] Ray Hartjen: And and, and there you go. And so, you know, you know, listeners out there don't think that you need to. You know, writing the great novel or any book is, you know, like a years long process where you're stuck away in an alcove on a, you know, a beautiful cottage overlooking a pond or something like that.

[00:36:03] Ray Hartjen: And you're just immersed in your book, but it takes a year. It doesn't, you know, it takes about, you know, 400 words a day for a half a year and you got yourself a pretty good book. Right? So, 400 words is not a lot per day. 

[00:36:14] Teddy Smith: No, I interviewed the guy, a guy called Mike Capuzzi from Bite Size Books, and he writes a lot about those short books, especially for people who want to use it for their own business and to grow their business.

[00:36:25] Teddy Smith: It's a really good idea. So check that out if you're interested more in that. 

[00:36:29] Ray Hartjen: Yeah. Mike's a contact of mine as well, you know, and we've, we've talked about how, you know, if, if you are a business person and you have a pitch deck. You probably have a book, you know, if it takes you an hour to kind of go through the deck and like a first call meeting with a prospective customer and show, you know, what you do and the value that it adds to them, that's, you know, you're, you're getting right there into a book range as well.

[00:36:53] Ray Hartjen: So, you know, think about that you know, particularly for your business. Because, you know, there's something about having a book that, that adds credibility is that, you know, you're an authority in the space because you have a book it doesn't need to be a thousand pages of war and peace. You know, it can be, you know, 50 pages of today's new era and B2B sales and marketing.

[00:37:10] Teddy Smith: Yeah, of course. Now, just just for the last question, I just wanted to go back to this idea of writing books that are kind of biographical and about your own story, because I think it is quite different to some of the other people we've spoken to. So do you have any, like, just short tips for people who are thinking about writing either their first biography about themselves or about someone else?

[00:37:30] Ray Hartjen: Yeah, you know, you have to be honest. And, you know, sometimes, sometimes you don't want to be right, but, you know, you, if you are writing about yourself, you know, you just can't, you know, paint it as a, you know, how great you are, you know, it needs to be a full frontal nudity for for, for who you are as a person and you know, so that, you know, might be a bit of a challenge, but, you know, be, be honest with yourself because your readers are going to want to expect that.

[00:37:56] Ray Hartjen: And so I think you know, that's, that's the, the thing that, you know, you might have to be, become more comfortable with you know, warts and all who you are. And you know, not, don't try to justify it. You just, you know, say what you are, you know, the reader is intelligent, probably smarter than you are.

[00:38:13] Ray Hartjen: So, you know, let's, you know, give just. Give them the things, the way you see it to let them, you know, don't try to sell them into something about who you are and, and, you know, share the story that you want to share. And, you know, hopefully, hopefully they see it your way. 

[00:38:28] Teddy Smith: Yeah, that's great advice. Well, thank you so much for this conversation today, Ray.

[00:38:33] Teddy Smith: It's it's been, it's been, as you just said, it's been honest. It's been really helpful. I think it's going to give people some really good tips. If they are looking at writing a biographical book and also you're looking at some of those other ways of asking questions of themselves. I think it's really great to.

[00:38:46] Teddy Smith: Hey, you talk about those things so clearly and it's been really entertaining. So thank you very much. 

[00:38:51] Ray Hartjen: It's been my pleasure, Teddy. I, you know, like I said at the very beginning, thank you so much for the for the opportunity, you know, I love what what you do and and I just, you know, appreciate the, the opportunity to, to hang out with you and, and share my point.

[00:39:04] Teddy Smith: Yeah, good. Well, thank you so much. So if any people want to get in touch with you or follow you around the internet in any way they want to, what's the best way for them to do that? 

[00:39:13] Ray Hartjen: That's a great question. You know, I actually, in my book, I, I, in the, be myself in my multiple alone book, I have my phone number and my email address.

[00:39:21] Ray Hartjen: I learned that from an author of the California named Bob Goff, who said like, you want to reach out to me, I want to hear from you. I am available on all the social networks. It's my name, Ray Hartchin. With the exception of TikTok, for whatever reason, I'm Ray Harchin 5. I think I just, my sausage fingers pushed too many keys when I, when I did it, but I, my website is also my name, Ray Harchin, R A Y H A R T J E N, and that's my email address at gmail.

[00:39:48] Ray Hartjen: com. Great. I would love to hear from you if there's any way I could be of service to you, particularly if you are a cancer patient. Cancer patient caregiver, just a cancer patient ally. If there's any way I can be of service to you would be humbled and honored at the same time to be able to do so.

[00:40:04] Ray Hartjen: So, you know, please, please reach out to me. 

[00:40:06] Teddy Smith: Brilliant. Well, thank you very much, Ray. That's really helpful. . I wonder if there's four other Ray Hargens on TikTok just waiting , you know. 

[00:40:14] Ray Hartjen: Yeah. You know, I'm Ray Harin ii. Right. But I'm pretty sure my dad's not one of them, you know, my 84-year-old dad today, but my son, who happens to be a Ray Harin the fourth.

[00:40:24] Ray Hartjen: But yeah, I, but I, I think I just, I think I just, you know. Brain fade and just dive in with my fat fingertips and hit a number I don't need to hit. 

[00:40:37] Teddy Smith: Yeah, well, great. Well, that's super helpful. Put links to all that stuff in the show notes anyway, so people can just click on them. So just before we go, there's just one final question and what's the one book that you recommend everyone should be reading?

[00:40:49] Ray Hartjen: Yeah, you know, my favorite book, I have two favorite books. One's a fictional books writer by the name of Andy Weir, who I believe self published his very first book called The Martian and it turned out to be hugely successful. He has a movie, the same book from the film. Book behind the film, right?

[00:41:06] Ray Hartjen: Right. So he has this book called Project Hail Mary, which is I love that book as a fiction book, but the book that I, I recommend to everybody it's available on my bookshop. org store. Is Bill Bryson. He, he met, he became famous as a author writing travel books. And I believe it was his first non travel book.

[00:41:24] Ray Hartjen: It's called a short history of nearly everything. And you know, to, to give you an idea of what this book is, you know, as a travel writer, he's sitting in an airplane one day, 37, 000 feet looking out at this, you know, wonderful planet of ours, just realizing, I don't know anything about it. Really.

[00:41:40] Ray Hartjen: anything about this planet. So he goes on a multi year quest to learn about all the science, just little bits of it. So this is a pretty big book that delves into these, just these fascinating people and these fascinating discoveries, scientific discoveries from everything from like space to geology.

[00:41:57] Ray Hartjen: You know, there's a, there's an example, you know, that he gives of a, like a guy who spent his entire year career just studying St. John's Wort. In London, you know, or or a priest in Australia who has this knack of looking into the sky as an astrologer and seeing things that he's never seen before and discovering supernova and stuff like that.

[00:42:16] Ray Hartjen: A lot of them. And it's, it's just an amazing book. So I recommend that to everyone whether you like science or not. Particularly if you don't know much about science, you'll learn so much. And the way that Bill Bryson writes he's, he's just a, a fabulous writer. I, I, I read almost everything about bill Bryson Oh, amazing.

[00:42:32] Ray Hartjen: Is a wonderful biography. Great book that is is, is, is a great book. So a, a short history of nearly everything. But Bill Bryson. Fantastic. Put it on your list if you haven't. I will do, yeah. If you haven't read it. 

[00:42:43] Teddy Smith: I've read it. I mean, I, if you, for any Americans listening to this, you should also definitely read his Notes from a Small Island if you're ever coming to the UK because it's a really funny book that encapsulates a lot about Britain.

[00:42:55] Teddy Smith: So if you are ever traveling here, then you should read it because you'll understand what he's saying from an American's perspective. 

[00:43:03] Ray Hartjen: I'm going to check out that book and he also has a good book called, I think it's just called home. And it's about, you know, the things he's learned from owning an Abbey in England and you go again, kind of like a very exploratory and like, you know, I want to find out about grass.

[00:43:17] Ray Hartjen: When do we start putting grass in the lawn and doing things like that? You know, he's a great storyteller. Great. 

[00:43:25] Teddy Smith: Well, thanks so much. Looking forward to seeing your new books come out and we'll speak again soon. 

[00:43:30] Ray Hartjen: Yeah. Thank you so much, Teddy. You have a great day. 

[00:43:33] Teddy Smith: Thank you so much for tuning into the publishing performance podcast.

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