From Button to Book: The Evolution of All My Friends Are Dead
8.3.10 | Avery Monsen and Jory John | Entertainment, Guest Authors
When you’re strolling through your favorite mom-and-pop bookshop and you see our new book, All My Friends Are Dead, and you immediately buy a copy for yourself and four more for your best friends, you might not immediately realize that that little book has been in the works for a long time.
Yes, it’s a story as old as time itself, full of intrigue, mystery, two births, an intervention, and at least one unsolved murder.
Just kidding. But it’s a pretty decent story. And it all starts with a button.
Here we go…
PHASE I: THE BUTTON WE JUST REFERENCED
We met while working as counselors at Camp Winnarainbow, a performing arts camp in Northern California. It’s the kind of camp that teaches you how to juggle, where to put your compost and how to get along with each other in 110-degree weather.
In the summer of 2003, on the drive up to camp, we decided to buy a button-maker from a mail-order catalogue. It’s hard to say exactly what we were thinking. For some reason, in the car, it made so much sense. We’d sell the buttons to other counselors for $1 each and the button-maker would pay for itself!
Then we realized no one brought any cash to camp, and our entrepreneurial aspirations were momentarily crushed. We were $300 in the hole. That hole, however, didn’t stop us from gleefully button-making the days away, as the children placed in our care went largely unsupervised. (Note to anybody from camp: just kidding!) (Note to everyone else: we’re absolutely not kidding. It’s a wonder those kids made it out of there alive.)
All day long, we’d make buttons of little drawings and clippings from old magazines. We knew we’d struck gold when we cut out a dinosaur from a National Geographic and wrote “All my friends are dead” on it. The button was quickly bartered to another counselor for the price of one deep-tissue back-rub. Remember: nobody had cash. Also remember: we carry a lot of tension in our shoulders.
Here’s a blurry, faded photo of that original button, provided by its owner:
PHASE II: THE SHIRT, WHICH WAS A LOGICAL STEP FROM A BUTTON
Everyone seemed to like the button. At night, people would gather around it, giggling until the sun came up.
We thought, aloud: “Heeeyyy … if people like this image on a button clipped to a shirt, maybe we can eliminate the middleman and just put the image directly onto a shirt!”
Presto! “All My Friends Are Dead” t-shirts were born. They were black & white and they looked like this. (Remember: this is 2003, when Avery hadn’t yet figured out how to draw a dinosaur.)
Much to our surprise, all 50 sold out within a couple weeks. So we printed some more, this time in color and in different designs!
Like a giraffe, demand for the shirts was high and tall and with a long, disgusting tongue. (That last part may only apply to the giraffe.) People connected to this sentiment and they wanted our shirts, using actual currency (no more back-rubs!) to purchase them. Soon, most of our friends had gotten one, and then their friends wanted one. And so on.
It started getting to the point where we’d be sitting in a restaurant and we’d see somebody we’d never met sporting our shirt.
“We made that!” we’d shriek. “That shirt you’re wearing! We made that! You’re wearing it and we made it! Where did you get it? Did you buy it? At a store? What’s your name?”
We’re really very charming.
PHASE III: THE HANDMADE BOOK
So the shirts were selling regularly, and all was well. We decided to expand our clothing line, and tossed around ideas. This was where we had a gentlemanly disagreement that eventually altered the course of our lives.
One of us (to remain unnamed) decided that it would be a good idea to make a new shirt with a talking tree, saying, “All my friends are end tables.” The other one of us (Avery Monsen) thought that the idea didn’t work out of context. Without the original dinosaur, he thought, the tree wasn’t funny.
Imagine 15 phone calls where that was the only item being discussed. Welcome to our lives. Seriously.
Somehow, this all led not to another shirt, but to a 12-page book that we made by hand at Kinko’s, a book called (any guesses? anybody?) All My Friends Are Dead.
We’d hunker down in our local copy shop, jittery from various energy drinks, hands twitching and gyrating over the nation’s finest copiers and computers and cutting instruments, emerging hours later with 50 little books which we carried in a shoebox. We sold them on our website and at Little Otsu, a swell little paper-goods establishment on Valencia St. in San Francisco’s Mission District.
This led to something that probably doesn’t happen too often…
PHASE IV: THE BOOK-BOOK
An editor at Chronicle Books happened to be shopping at Little Otsu and happened to see one of our mini-books and happened to buy it and happened not to lose it on the walk home. Everything was going our way! Like the end of “Serendipity” starring John Cusack, where he meets his soul mate at an ice rink and it starts snowing!
Anyway, to make a very long blog entry slightly less long, Chronicle came to us, one day, in the form of three beautiful editors. As far as we can remember (it’s hazy) they were all wearing white robes and one of them carried a harp.
“How about making this 12-page mini-book into a 96-page mega-book?” they asked in unison, as doves flew out of their robes, and we said “yes” on the spot.
And the rest was history.
So, what’s the takeaway from all this? It’s simple:
If you buy a button-maker, you’re absolutely guaranteed to get a lucrative book deal with Chronicle Books. It’s simple math:
Summer camp + buttons – focusing on your campers + brainstorming + magazines + dinosaurs = a book deal! Always!
Got it? Now get out there, and buy our book! (Please, please buy our book. We’re terrible with money, and this is sort of the only thing we’ve got going on right now. In a very real sense, our student loan payments depend on you.)
Your best friends for life,
Avery Monsen & Jory John
Comment on this blog post for a chance to win an All My Friends Are Dead t-shirt! 3 lucky winners will be chosen at random on Friday, August 6, 2010 and notified by email.
Hey! I have a button maker…
I love this post! Have been checking the book out online for a bit, and I'll probably be buying it soon… The story's awesome too.
Me, me, me, me, me, me, ME! All my friends are dead too. Okay, not true. They're just dead to me. Okay, also not true. Just…can I have a t-shirt please?
I ordered the book! Now I need the shirt!!
Well, I guess I need to go and buy a button maker now! Haha. :P
This is remarkably similar to how I got my book deal. Which took so long to write that the only friends I have left are, in fact, end tables.
Love you, love your book.
I always wanted a button maker. I suppose this could be motivation to get one! Now if only I could come up with an interesting book idea to go along with the button maker…
Excellent….a pretty odd entrepreneural success story. Love the oddball, random humor and the giraffe metaphor. I will most definitely be getting this… Now off to purchase a button-maker to pay off *my* student loans…
i love it! and now even more so after you guys went through such an epic journey that almost rivals that of the real dinosaurs (whos friends are all dead) hope it works out better for you haha xx
Beautiful.
I love the story of how this book came to be! Who knew – a button maker can lead to a book deal. :)
In the Beginning there was a Brainstorm. And Brainstorm begat Button Maker. Button Maker begat Button and Button begat Shirt. Shirt begat Better Shirt and his brethren Color Shirts. Better Shirt begat Mini-Book.
An Angel appeared (or three) and said to the Shepherds Avery and Jory, unto you in the City of St. Francis is born a Real Book Deal and its name is "All My Friends Are Dead". This shall be a sign unto you: you shall find it in an independent bookstore, swaddled in brown paper, and lying in a remainder bin if you don't hurry up and get some books sold.
Creation, Evolution, AND Intelligent Design. And my head hurts now.
Great story! Wish the whole buy a button maker, get published thing would really work:)
Great look at how a nifty idea becomes a cool book!
great story of how it all happened!
I love this on so many levels. I can hardly wait to get a shirt for my dad to wear. I will win the "best insulting birthday present ever" contest and will put the trophy on my shelf for all to see.
How can I buy your book when I am saving up for a button-maker?
Love the story! I'm heading out to become a button-making camp counselor right now!
This is great! i never knew that all my friends are dead started from the national geographics at camp (winnarainbow). you've inspired me to start my own collection, "all my friends are alive." just kidding, not actually, but i like it alot.
This is a fantastic story about how a fantastic book came to life! Love it!
Congrats, boys! What, no spoiler for Serendipity? :P
Avery! I'm a manager at a bookstore in Ithaca, NY. Should I contact Chronicle if we want to purchase order more than 10 on a business credit card? Email me or text me, buddy. I got yo' back. xo, Donna
Oh that's hilarious! I had no idea of the back story to the clever little book. Not so sure about the logic of button-maker –> book deal, but it seems to have worked! :)
I would love a shirt. Loved the whole story.
Great story!!!! Congrats on the book deal….I will ask in my local bookstore for it!!!!
Great things always happen when we least expect them. just by following our hearts…
You forgot to mention the key support that your parents gave you when stapling together those mini-books. If you ask me, this is a bunch of revisionist history, ignoring the "little people" that helped you every step of the way. Damned ungrateful kids…
So if I'm still the only one to have commented by Friday, do I win all 3 books?
Oops – too early to read full sentences apparently. Shirts, not books. Still like to win all three
I love this! I can't wait to buy a copy (with actual currency, seriously). Thanks for making me laugh AND for the inspirational words of wisdom about making my book-deal dreams come true. You guys are great.
i love the story behind the book. i can't wait for my copy to arrive, i only wish the mail would go faster!
What a great story…thanks for sharing it!
Why has no one mentioned that Avery and Jory are also wicked hot dudes?
I LOVE this post. Great writing and wonderful product.
this is the funniest blog post i've read all day….and now it makes me want to sport a shirt. :)
My niece brought this wonderful little book to my attention, very creative and original! I'll be buying a copy soon!
I am looking forward to reading the book to my pre-k students.
Great story and post. Very nice shirts!!
Hey, I have a button maker too! I love droll dinosaurs.
Such an awesome story. I'd love a tshirt, and grats to anyone who actually wins one!
What a wonderful story of button to book adventure and glory! Congrat's! I picked this one up at my local bookstore and ….what a great quirky read! Both humorous and cute at the same time…and in most cases VERY true!
Thanks for the chance to win one of the AWESOME tee's!
Happy reading! ^_^
Great story! I love this book and can't stop referencing it in conversation, much to the chagrin of my friends : )
If you are giving one away, how about one for my special needs grandchild?
Thanks
Cute story. I'm sort of partial to the slightly deformed looking vampire dino shirt.
This books sounds terrific, I'd love to be a walking talking billboard for it! Send me a shirt!
My son, who loves dinosaurs, would love this shirt. Please enter me!
Lynette
This is great! Give me a shirt! ;) I promise I will wear it in areas where many people will see it and ask me where I got it.
baileythebookworm (at) gmail.com
I love the story behind the book book!
My daughter says she loves me from before dinosaurs were born. I’d love the shirt for her.
What an evolution (no pun intended – seriously! Dammit, it *so* looks like a pun was intended).
Wow! This is the type of simplicity and wit that makes giggle all day long! Great job Chronicle!
Sure, that's how all books deals get made. Everyone knows that.
(Oh, how I would love to win a shirt.)
All my t-shirts could use an All My Friends Are Dead t-shirt friend!
I love that the dino on the first t shirt looks like it has vampire fangs.
If I walk the dog, will you forgive me?
Got the book in the mail the other day and read it in bed with my partner that night. I love the tree the best, but good ol’ brontosaurus is pretty cool, too. Would love to sport him!!
Count me in.
great recipe for success! I can’t wait to read the book!
Looks like someone will be getting a pretty awesome birthday present…
amazingly inspiring sequence of events! thanks so much for sharing this ;)
Found out about this book from Sucker Punch. I'm totally getting it from Amazon, and I'd love to win a shirt!
I would really like a shirt and would actually wear it all the time. The book is fabulous!
Oh boy, I hope I am not to late to enter. This book looks awesome!
Congratulations to t-shirt winners Lynette, Phoebe Pierce, and Heather!
Great great post, still don't know what the book is about, but want to buy it anyway! Will be looking for it in the bookstores!
Hello, my name is Jayne… i found out about "All my friends are dead" by my friend Tommy. He pulled it out and read it to our little lunch table like it was story time, yay! But anyway, yeah. I stole it from him. In the back of the book i found a web sight, and i kept reading and clicking and came upon this web sight. Then i couldn't help but notice, there is a contest to win free stuff, so COOL. So here is my comment and junk. Hopefully it's good enough for you, and if not, what's your problem. JEEZZE. I was just trying to be a nice person and stuff. Anyway, yeah i hope you enjoyed reading my comment, i certainly enjoyed writing it.
Love,
Jayne