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Turk Pipkin Presents His 'Book Of The Every-Other-Month Club'

"It is crazy," Turk Pipkin says of his ambitious new project, Turk Pipkin's Book of the Every-Other-Month Club. As the name would imply, everyone who joins the club gets a new book in the mail every other month for one year; the crazy part is that all of the books are written by Pipkin himself, and some of them aren't quite finished yet.

"As we talk, we have the first one, Moleskin Mystery, back from the printer, hot off the presses. You could get high smelling the glue in the binding," Pipkin says. "The second book, Requiem for a Screenplay, went to the copy editor yesterday. The third book, All for Love, which is a novel... goes to the copy editor as soon as the second one's done. So I'm good on those three," he says with a laugh. The other three are in various stages of completion -- he's still writing the last book, A Christmas Song. But Pipkin assures us he's ahead of schedule.

If you join the club, you'll get three novels and three other books, including a children's book (Grace and the Moon), a book of poetry (Words for Your Songs), and the aforementioned screenplay collection. Pipkin's also throwing in a bonus seventh book. 

"I managed to get my hands on a bunch of hardcover first editions of the book I wrote with Willie Nelson, called The Tao of Willie, or as Willie calls it, The Toe of Willie," Pipkin says. "Which I think is a really beautiful book. So that's a bonus book when people sign up."

As is often the case with Pipkin's undertakings (such as all the work he's done on his nonprofit Nobelity Project), he's aiming to raise some funds for his charitable works. "There is a one for one model. We're building three libraries at schools in rural Kenya out of this project, so everytime someone subscribes, that's six -- there's a bonus book, so there's seven -- books that I'm putting into these new libraries in Kenya," he says. "So we're going to get three libraries in Kenya out of it, which is pretty good."

But filling up Kenyan libraries isn't Pipkin's only goal with this project. He also wants people to read the books. "I'm pretty excited, to tell you the truth," he says. "I really love Moleskin, I really love All for Love. I'm pins and needles on A Christmas Song, because I haven't actually finished that one. You know, if you write you want people to read your work."

Pipkin's kicking off the project with a (free and open to the public) party at Hotel Ella on Tuesday night. "It's a literary salon," Pipkin says. "I'm going to read... and we're going to have a party."

For more info on the Book of the Every-Other-Month Club, see Turk's website.

Mike is the production director at KUT, where he’s been working since his days as an English major at the University of Texas. He produces Arts Eclectic, Get Involved, and the Sonic ID project, and also produces videos and cartoons for KUT.org. When pressed to do so, he’ll write short paragraphs about himself in the third person, but usually prefers not to.
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