Mark interviews John Gaspard about his book HELD OVER: HAROLD AND MAUDE AT THE WESTGATE THEATER.

Prior to the interview Mark shares a personal update and a word about this episode's sponsor.

This episode's sponsor:

This episode is sponsored by an affiliate link to Manuscript Report. Use code MARK5 at checkout and save $5.00 off your own personalized report.

In the interview, Mark and John talk about:

John's appreciation for the honesty of the podcast and one of his favorite episodes, and why he liked it
John's background and the two different cozy mystery series that he has written and published
The Eli Mark's "Behind the Page" podcast that John uses to share behind-the-scenes and brilliantly market the books in audio and other formats
A person with a PhD in "shuffling cards" who was a guest on John's podcast
How John approached his deep love and affection for the 1971 movie HAROLD AND MAUDE
The Minneapolis theatre (Westgate) that helped make this movie a cult classic
How John couldn't have written this book 20 years ago
John's Popcorn Principals books
The book HELD OVER: HAROLD AND MAUDE AT THE WESTGATE THEATER
John's philosophy of "I'm writing for me."
A bit of the history of the Westgate Theater
The approach to his writing and recognizing that most of the books are likely not to earn much more than making back the initial money invested into them
Deciding which researched bits made it into the book
How Scrivener was a helpful tool in the writing of the book and various research elements
The design company that John worked with on this book
The Kickstarter that John ran related to this book and what it did for him (beyond earning a bit of up front money to help with funding the expensive project
Working with Bookvault on the production of this book
Advice John would offer to writers who haven't yet pursued that passion project
And more...

After the interview Mark reflects on passion projects, networking and connecting with other writers, and the advice to pause/hesitate

Links of Interest:

John Gaspard is author of the Eli Marks mystery series and the Como Lake Players mystery series. He also has several other stand-alone novels, including “The Greyhound of the Baskervilles,” “A Christmas Carl,” “The Sword & Mr. Stone” and “The Ripperologists.”

He hosts: "Behind the Page: The Eli Marks Podcast."

In real life, John's not a magician, but he has directed six low-budget features that cost very little and made even less - that's no small trick. He's also written multiple books on the subject of low-budget filmmaking. Ironically, those books made more than the films.

John lives in Minnesota and shares his home with his lovely wife, several greyhounds, a few cats and a handful of pet allergies.

The introductory, end, and bumper music for this podcast (“Laser Groove”) was composed and produced by Kevin MacLeod of www.incompetech.com and is Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0

Geriatric Bad Bih

Good Moms Bad Choices

Intro

The AI-powered Podcast Player