What was an uncultured, middle aged, chubby, balding, football writer like me doing Thursday evening, an hour from home, at a book reading about the 19th Century Romantic Poets Lord Byron, John Keats, and Percy Shelley? Good question! To which there is an equally good answer.

When I read in Wednesday's paper that author Ty Roth was going to hold a book reading at the University of Toledo about his novel So Shelly, it caught my eye. Perhaps it was that Random House, a giant in the publishing industry, published Ty as a first time writer, a feat seldom heard of. Maybe it was that the American Booksellers Association listed him among the best "New Voices in young Adult Literature for 2011", that So Shelly was named one of the top 10 Romances for 2011 or that Ty Roth was described as a "Sharp New Voice To Watch". More likely though, it was the fact that this high school English teacher was for 10 years, also a high school football coach!

Obviously it was all of the above. If one wants to be a writer, you read the best writing. As I read the article, I thought, "Hot Author, English Teacher, First Timer and Football Coach - I've got to pick this guy's brain." And as a wannabe of all of those - well maybe never an English teacher - and someone writing a sports biography, off I went to see what I could learn.

Ty's book, and his advice, did not disappoint - well except for one teensy little thing I will get to later. So Shelly asks the question, if Gordon Byron, John Keats, and Percy and Mary Shelley were living adolescents today, how would their literary talents, notorious persona's, and known fates collide? What a creative twist on telling the lives of four larger than life literary figures of the Romanticism Era! I have only read a few pages, but already I can see that I should have waited and started this one when fewer things are tugging at me, because it is hard to put down.

Ty's advice on the book business and the challenges of a first time author was likewise engaging, practical and useful. I could see that if I ever had to suffer through another English class, he's the guy I would want teaching it! Although nothing about publishing was said that I hadn't read and heard before, it was alive and meaningful coming first person from one who has lived it. It could be discouraging if one would let it - especially his revelation that he wrote four books before anyone would pick one up - but I have from the beginning been grounded and known how big the mountain is, and strangely, it, if anything, was comforting to know that one can actually make it to the summit.

For those of you interested in So Shelly, visit his website and order the book at:
TyRothbooks.com

And for those of you who continually ask me why Myles Traveled, and Stories of the Shoe, are taking so long, read the beginning of Ty's blog, which chronicles his interesting journey through the publishing gauntlet.

I did talk to Ty afterwords, and he graciously offered to have a cup of coffee sometime and let me pick his brain about Myles Traveled. I will take him up on that - in spite of that one teensy thing I mentioned earlier that disappointed. Wouldn't you know, when I handed him my Stories of the Shoe business card, with the Ohio State logo, he turned to me and said, "Oh, I'm a Michigan Fan." Isn't that just So Michigan, writing about some romantic poets that have been dead going on 200 years now.

Think when I go to meet him I will wear Scarlet. That would be Sooo Buckeye.