Tag: Madville Publishing

HOMEGROWN 2026

I had the pleasure of going back down to the Mississippi Gulf Coast again this weekend and meeting Madville Publishing’s Kim Davis in the flesh for the first time, as well as meeting Micheal Amos Cody and reconnecting with Susan Cushman on our Madville Publishing panel on Saturday. We all talked about our books and read and did a little Q&A after the readings. We had people go in and out of our event–other events were going on at the same time at staggered times, so there was a lot of fluidity in the schedule. But it went well, and I think I sold right at half the books my publisher brought with her so that was good.

I did some chatting as well–I reconnected with Johnnie Bernhard; we had met at the last HOMEGROWN event I attended in 2024 and we talked on and off a good bit throughout the day. I talked with the owner of Pass Christian Books, Scott Naugle; he said nice things about how my book had sold well at his shop, so that was nice to hear! And I got to talk with other authors I had not met before like Micheal Farris Smith.

I also met with Monica Walton, who was talking with authors as a representative of Dogwood Press here in Brandon. I’ve sent occasional manuscripts to the publisher there, Joe Lee, but this project we discussed was something I don’t believe I’ve ever sent to him. So we will see how it goes once she gives him the information about this book. Fingers crossed!

Next on the agenda should be getting my royalty statements soon for 2025 and see how sales stack up, then in March is the Mississippi Philogical Association meeting at William Carey University in Hattiesburg, MS, and then in April, I visit Mississippi State University for the Caldwell Reading Series.

So lots of things still cooking over here. Hopefully the South can continue to thaw out, and we can have seasonable temperatures throughout February! Looking forward to that! Happy writing!

Publicity Matters

So now I am starting to be in the thick of publicity/marketing/selling Hurricane Baby. I’ve identified several bookstores I want to do small events with. Bookstore events are tricky, because the bookstore orders a lot of product, and if you can’t muster up that many people to show up at the event, they can return those books and get their money back from your publisher. I am trying to do bookstore events in conjunction with other events around the state so the events will be joined in time. People could possibly go to my events then swing by the bookstore and buy the book. So that’s one angle.

Another angle is getting news outlets to cover my book. I made a couple of big asks such as sending info on my book to big names like NYT, WaPo, and Kirkus. But I am really working a lot of my personal contacts for interviews, book reviews, and other publicity opportunities–people I worked with when I was a freelancer, colleges I attended and worked for to participate in readings on those campuses, people I attended my MFA program with (who have been absolute rockstars in promoting my book) and word-of-mouth among the people I know.

Another marketing avenue is book festivals. I have about ten, all in the southeast, that I hope to be invited to where I can make some noise about my book. The Festival for the Book, Southern Literary Festival, etc. etc. Most of that is legwork I’ve done myself; others already have a connection to the publisher.

And working all these connections is outside of what my publisher is doing, such as shipping my book to reviewers, nominating me for book awards, and playing up posts about my book on social media. My motto for this whole endeavor has been to do everything I could to position my book for the best outcome possible–and that’s what I’m trying to do.

FOR SALE!

Good afternoon! This past Friday night, I got the note from Madville Publishing that my book, Hurricane Baby: Stories, is now LIVE FOR PRE-ORDERS!

Go to the left-hand menu and click on the book’s title to see the brand-new webpage for my book, and you will see a button to click to pre-order my book through Madville Publishing’s site with delivery scheduled for August 20, 2024. As the book goes live in other places like Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Bookshop.org, I will add those buttons for you to click on as well. If you want to support your local bookshop as well, you can go and request that they order/stock it.

This page will be updated as I do events, readings, signings, and appearances. If you would like me to come do a reading or speak at your event, school, library, or festival, use the contact form to let me know, and I will see what I can work out!

This past weekend, I went to the annual meeting of the Mississippi Philological Association, which was held by the Mississippi School of Math and Science on the campus of Mississippi University for Women, where I studied for my MFA. I read the first story in the collection, “Still Waters”, and was terrified the whole time. I’ve never read anything as intense as that story out loud in public before this, and it showed. My mouth was so dry I wasn’t sure I was going to be able to finish it. It was well-received by the largely academic crowd, which made me feel good.

But this event, where I know people are going to be spending their hard-earned money on a book I wrote, is momentous. My life is not going to be the same again after this year. But I think that’s good. Keep growing, keep writing, keep learning. That’s my takeaway. Onward and upward!

My Final Copy

I turned in my final copy of the manuscript on November 1, early last week. Now it’s time for the editors to get going on it and find what I might have missed. I really worked hard to do all the corrections and typos and continuity errors, and I thought of one this afternoon I probably left uncorrected–in one particuIar spot, I called Tommy Hebert’s truck a diesel truck–and it’s not. So I need to at least correct that as soon as possible once I get the edited manuscript back. I’m hoping that’s the only glaring thing that’s there. I imagine there may be stylistic discussions, etc. as well. Which I do not mind getting into. If something needs changing to make more sense, etc., by all means, fix it.

I don’t know when those are going to come across–I figure after the new year with the way people usually work during the holidays. It needs to go to print February 1 or thereabouts. I just want the editing process to be smooth and not rushed. So I hope I hear back sometime in December while I am off for the holidays. We will see.

I am starting to turn my mind to my next project, and I think it may be my memoir project rather than any more work on Missing and Mentally Ill in Mississippi. I haven’t gotten any replies on it from the batches I sent out in August and September, and I was too sick to send many queries during October. And most of New York publishing shuts down during the holidays until the second week of January. I have the proposal, and it is still solid.

But I think I am going to invest in rewriting the story of those 24 months between when I told Bob I was pregnant with my youngest daughter and when I was actually diagnosed bipolar. And I can have my stats (if any!) from sales of Hurricane Baby to bolster my case for getting another publishing deal. Not sure exactly when I will get started, but maybe soon, maybe after the new year, maybe after i finish edits for Hurricane Baby. I’m going to start by reading that part of my thesis manuscript again and see what (if anything) I can incorporate from that manuscript to the new one.

Wish me well! Happy writing to you all!