Hello Friends!

This picture was taking 15 years ago, in October of 2001. I had just arrived in the country, and I was full of hopes and dreams.

Unfortunately, soon I learned that my degree in journalism was looked at less because I had got it in a different country. I also learned that my broken English made me unqualified even for a retail job. So I started washing dishes, earning $7.5 an hour.

I am telling you this story because I want you to understand the impact that your support is having. Either if you pay $30, $9.99, $5 or if you bought the book with Inkshares credits, taking a chance on me has completely changed my life.

I am proud of myself, and I want to present to you a book that I will be proud to share. So I will be working hard with the Inkshares team to turn The Catcher’s Trap in the best version of itself.

The day The Doctor invites me for a ride in his Tardis, I will ask him to take me back to the day I took that picture, just so I can tell that kid, “hold on because it will be bumpy and hard, but it all will work out in the end.”

Love

Ricardo

The Aftermath...

It took me a couple of hours to move from the corner of my couch where I usually sit when I am depressed. “One book, you lost by one book.” I kept telling myself while wondering whose fault that was. Was it me for not moving fast enough? For not asking enough people? For skipping doors in my neighborhood? Or was it that friend who said she was pre-ordering 3 weeks ago and after 5 reminders never did?

If I have learned anything from 50 years of Doctor Who, is that there are moments fixed in time that cannot be changed no matter what we do. I believe this was one of them. I was not meant to win The Nerdist contest, and I have to live with that.

Yesterday’s urgency and  later on grief made me miss something magical happening around me. A chain of people from all over the world; from Eugene –Oregon-  to Sydney; and from Hamden to the Chilean Atacama Desert, spent a day fighting shoulder to shoulder with me to help me win.

My phone was ringing the whole day with messages and texts from friends who decided to turn yesterday into a global “get out the vote” day for The Catcher’s Trap.

 It certainly felt like an election day. By noon –Eastern Time- I knew it was going to come down to 1 or 2 books. I was hopeful, though; orders were pouring, and an entire contingency from the University of Utah had joined the campaign mid-morning. In the opposite side of the globe, my massive Chilean family worked as a team trying to figure out a website written in a language unfamiliar to them.

At 2:58 I knew I had fallen short. I watched the seconds fly away as a landslide of rage and sadness overcame me. For the next two hours, I obsessed over the failure.

Today I feel nothing but blessed. The universe decided that the best way to show me how many people care about me was making me lose one of the most important campaigns I’ve ever run. Well played universe; I get it, I totally get it.

The Catcher’s Trap will become a reality one day. I am not sure when, though. I am really close to the 750 copies needed for an electronic run of the book, but I am not sure I will go that road.  I need an actual book, one that I can sign and personally deliver to that core group of people who yesterday put their lives on hold, just to support a friend’s silly dream.

Thank you all for your support. I promise I’ll be in touch.