The Writers Coin

A few months ago I decided to try different things to make some extra money. Since I love books, I figured I’d give selling used books a shot. My first try ended with some people calling me a thief. But after that I went to a used book store hunting for valuable books that were being sold on the cheap.

The idea was to buy them and then sell them online for a profit.

It hasn’t worked out so well: I spend around $40 and sold one of the books. I did make a profit off it, but the other books haven’t sold, so I’m in the hole.

But one of the books I found was a first edition copy of Michael Lewis’ The Blind Side. The book is also autographed by the man himself, who just happens to be an idol of mine.

The Dilemma

Now that the book is being turned into a big Hollywood movie (comes out on Friday) and there is a lot of chatter about Lewis’ book, I figured it would be a perfect time to do my very first giveaway on The Writer’s Coin. I could create some buzz on the site by getting people to comment or subscribe to my RSS feed, or something.

But then I opened the book up and flipped through it a little—it’s in fantastic shape. It’s autographed by the man himself. It’s about Michael Oher, whose story is unbelievable and who may turn out to be a force in the NFL (he’s a rookie this year).

Hell, he may turn out to be a monster in the NFL, one of the greatest ever. And that means a signed, first-edition book about that player’s life written by one of the greatest writers of our generation would be worth quite a bit of money down the line.

You see where I’m going with this?

Give Away or Invest?

For now I’m keeping the book, but I’m curious to hear what other people out there think about treating this book as a potential investment. It feels like I have a penny stock that I think might shoot up in 10 years, but that’s quite a long shot.

If that were to happen, I would look back at the time I gave the book away for a few extra RSS subscribers and think to myself, “What the hell did you do that for?”

• The No-Stats All-Star by Michael Lewis. If you loved Moneyball and you don’t hate basketball, this is a great article for you. And even then, it’s Michael Lewis, so you know you can’t go wrong. Then small bit about Shane Battier’s life is even more interesting after just recently finishing Outliers. A MUST read. (thanks to Jim for scooping me on this one!)
• How to Build Confidence and Destroy Fear by JD at Get Rich Slowly. JD has moved beyond the whole “personal-finance tips” and into the “third stage” of personal finance. I for one am a big fan if he continues with these kinds of posts. In his latest he takes a look at how confidence is built over time and how important a role it plays in our successes.
• Sugar, Spice and Vitamins: Three Types of Posts that Will Grow Your Blogs Traffic at ProBlogger. This was one I read a while back but kind of forgot about. It’s aimed mostly at bloggers but I think it applies to anyone who does any kind of writing on a day-to-day basis. Writing compelling stuff that gets people’s attention isn’t easy, but this was a very straightforward article that really laid it out nicely. Well done.

[image by Elaine Vigneault]

Haven’t done one of these in a while but leave it to Michael Lewis to get me started again:

• Two more Michael Lewis articles for you. Both from Portfolio.com. One is about him renting “The Mansion” in New Orleans and how he connects that with the current housing crisis. This is a really entertaining one. The other is about Wall Street and “The End” of the boom—if you read Liar’s Poker you absolutely have to read this…he meets up with John Gutfreund at the end!
• Stocks Are Less of Your Net Worth Than You Think: Quite the title, no? This one is from Jason Zweig, the guy who wrote all the Commentary for the new issue of The Intelligent Investor. It’s an interesting way to convince yourself that, if you think you’re too heavy into stocks, you really aren’t.

That is all…

Rarely do I recommend a specific article or blog post that I find out there, but it seems anytime Michael Lewis writes a new one, I’m doing that very thing. He’s just that good. This one is one near and dear to my heart—it’s about baseball in Cuba. Lewis actually goes out there and watches some games, sees some prospects, and talks to some former legends. It’s kind of sad that so many of these players, who would have otherwise become legendary, are living an anonymous existence on the island.

The story of the agent is also pretty sad. He’s clearly on his side during the whole story, and at the end of it so will you. We’re talking Lewis here, he’s that good.