Romanian Marian Godina, a traffic policeman from Brasov, who has more than 150,000 Facebook fans, has turned into a publishing phenomenon after his debut book registered about 5,000 pre-orders in just a few hours.

Godina, who has become popular on Facebook due to the real stories from his day-to-day activity, which he tells in a funny note, has decided to put all these stories together in a book.

“I didn’t do it to get my sentence reduced,” Godina wrote on Facebook, referring to the high-profile inmates in Romania who have been publishing books in recent years to get out of jail earlier.

“I did it out of pure pleasure and listening to your advice, which appeared in the comments to all my Facebook posts,” he added.

Curtea Veche, one of the top publishing houses in Romania (which also published President Klaus Iohannis’ autobiography), has decided to publish Godina’s book.

The book, which is called Oncoming Flashes (in Romanian: Flash-uri din sens opus), will be officially launched on February 18, but Curtea Veche started a pre-order campaign on Friday, February 12.

In just a few hours after the campaign started, the publishing house had close to 5,000 orders - the total they were hoping to sell during the entire 2016. The publisher’s website was blocked due to the high traffic so employees had to take phone orders until late in the evening.

As Godina promised he would sign all books ordered between February 12 and February 17, he spent most of his weekend signing books.

“Whoever cursed me because I fined him can now enjoy the moment because I can’t feel my right arm,” Godina wrote on Facebook.

editor@romania-insider.com