The escape tunnel begins here
15th of December 2010
filed under book publishing

I've worked for myself for 30 or so years now, starting my first "work from home" business before I had even left school. In all that time I've always been searching for the best way to make money, but it was only six or seven years ago that everything started to fall into place for what I now call Plan B - my blueprint to escape the rat race.

It was about that time that I began to write Get Out While You Can. I actually started work on a similar book, How To Rob Banks And Other Money-Making Ventures, way back in 1999 and still have the ISBN to prove it. Although never finished (it never got beyond a few chapters),

How To Rob Banks And Other Money-Making Ventures mistakenly appeared for sale on Amazon for a time. Hopefully the two souls who ordered it and never received it didn't go on to pursue a career in armed robbery. If either did, my apologies.

More than for anything else, I wanted to write Get Out While You Can for my family. My two children, my sisters, and my nephews and nieces. Partly so that they would know what I actually did to earn money (and no, I don't rob banks) and also to inspire them to consider an alternative to a life of wage slavery.

It could have stopped right there. I could have printed a dozen copies via Lulu and putt them under the Christmas tree (and yes, if you are in my family and you are reading this, no prizes for guessing what you're getting for Christmas this year).

Instead I find myself as a newly published author with a book to promote. The official publication date is the 16th of May, 2011, but an advance run of 1,000 copies has been printed and they went on sale as of the 13th of December 2010 via Amazon. So if you want to read Get Out While You Can five months before its in the bookshops, there's your chance.

To be honest, I did have my doubts about making Get Out While You Can available to a wider audience. After reading a few sample chapters, a friend said to me that I'd either be seen as a madman or a genius. I'm under no illusions of being a genius so that doesn't leave me much room for manoeuvre ;)

So why did I publish this book?

As an entrepreneur, it's obviously a way to make some money. I'll write more about the economics of self-publishing later, but I don't actually stand to make a great deal from the initial print run. And if the book doesn't do well, not only will that be the initial print run, it will be the only print run. Of course, I hope it does very well indeed.

There was another reason. The historian and liberal politician, Lord Acton, said that you can learn as much by writing as by reading and I believe that to be the case. What I really want to know is if what I have to say strikes a chord with others who are determined to break away from the chains of wage slavery. And the easiest way to find out was to publish my book.

If it does strike a chord, my genuine hope is that Plan B offers at the very least a framework for people to start making their way along the escape tunnel to financial freedom.

Get Out While You Can is very much a primer, a crash course in embracing the endless opportunities that the information age offers you and me both to escape from a lifetime of wage slavery.

Exciting times lie ahead, of that I've no doubt, and I'll continue to share my thoughts and ideas here at the Get Out While You Can website in a bid to strengthen my case for leaving the rat race behind and for developing a Plan B.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I've some escape routes to go over.