About Nathan J. Murphy:
Nathan is currently the founder and Lead Researcher at Prepolitica, a research group that takes a science-first approach for the development of political theory.
In the past, Nathan has invented, patented and sold medical products, lobbied the highest levels of Government for prison reform, founded three technology businesses, been a sponsored rock climber, built a large social media following, sold tens of thousands of books, created online courses, renovated a dilapidated house (DIY), and—over the past five years—he has been working in political theory, writing academic papers, and presenting at conferences.
What inspires you to write?
As a non-fiction author, I am driven by a desire to figure out what is true—or to get as close to the truth as we can. These days, we have a mass of scientific knowledge that is not yet fully utilised across many domains. My aim is to try to connect these domains of knowledge and help draw more useful conclusions.
What authors do you read when you aren’t writing?
I love any science writer who has dedicated many years to distilling entire fields into language that anyone can understand. I prefer to read books that are not part of 3 book deals—these 'books of a life time'—are the best value reads.
Tell us about your writing process.
I think my writing process is more akin to a siege. For the main body of research and work for my latest book (The Ideas That Rule Us) I spent two years working six days a week and about 12 hours a day. I did not quite realise it during the process but I was a little burnt out by the end of that phase.
After that, I tend to go through the manuscript in washes. These phases are depressing because you find out how badly the previous work was written or where it lacked consistency. This started to feel like hacking through a jungle path I thought you had already cleared.
The last phase is with my editor, he hacks through the book and I have to keep up to make sure that the intent—and important scientifically relevant language—is not distorted. From there on, it is endless proof reading!
What advice would you give other writers?
Writing an ambitious non-fiction book is a significant undertaking. I did a major DIY renovation of a house once, and writing The Ideas That Rule Us was probably three times as much work (if less dusty).
How did you decide how to publish your books?
I decided to self-publish. My reasoning was to do with the reality of the book industry; a publisher often only expects to make money from 1 out of 10 books—and therefore if mine was one of the 9 commercial failures, they are unlikely to invest much time or money into its promotion. Not only that, but the commission I would get per-book would be very low and I would still be expected to do most of the promotion work.
The end result would be that I would have to promote my book to sell it but get almost zero cash-flow in return and the publisher would own the rights to my work indefinitely.
I took the view that I am happy to live and die by my own efforts. There is no one to blame and if it does well the revenue would compensate for the costs.
The early indication is that this was not a terrible strategy. I have a sold a few thousand copies, it is ranking in Amazon categories and this is giving steady daily sales. The downside, I think, is that a publisher helps to add credibility—but I think this can be made up in other ways.
I would note that I am lucky in that I can self-fund my writing/editing/publishing process. Not requiring an advance certainly helped enable the choice in how I published.
What do you think about the future of book publishing?
It is likely that we will see more AI generated books crowding the space with derivative trash. It is also possible that book discovery will become more dependent on algorithms too—which might just make it harder for publishers or authors without technical ability to sell books.
What genres do you write?: General Non-Fiction
What formats are your books in?: Both eBook and Print, Audiobook
Website(s)
Nathan J. Murphy Home Page Link
Link To Nathan J. Murphy Page On Amazon
Your Social Media Links
Goodreads
Instagram
YouTube
All information in this post is presented “as is” supplied by the author. We don’t edit to allow you the reader to hear the author in their own voice.
