Tag: retail bookselling

Winding Down

Well, yesterday was a great day at my local Barnes & Noble branch–I sold over half the books they ordered for me and met some really cool people by saying hi and good afternoon to everyone who walked within talking distance of my table. I also decided to create a list of everything I need to take to a book event from now on because I left half of it at home! But the bookstore seemed pleased; they let me sign what books were left over, and then they invited me back for the Christmas season to do another event! So that made me feel good.

This week I have three interviews–one with an MFA mate in the metro-DC area on Tuesday via Zoom, another with a different local TV station with local TV personality Walt Grayson, who has been in broadcasting longer than I’ve been alive, and a final one on Friday with an MFA mate and author Rod Davis from Texas who is releasing a Katrina novel in September this year.

And then I’m done for a while.

I’m not completely done with book events. Even though I’m not a panelist this year, I plan to attend the Mississippi Book Festival in September. I am going to work with our local library to start up a writers’ group for the last four months of the year and then gauge interest in continuing. And I already have three events in January 2026 scheduled and another set up at Mississippi State University, where I went to school, for April 2026. So the fun isn’t over quite yet.

But what a ride it has been. I’m hopping back on the query merry-go-round with my new completed manuscript and will see what happens from here. I’ve got another story cooking in my head, but I’m not going to actually start drafting until I get the current one sold, if ever. No use in getting ahead of myself.

Gearing Up

So this August will mark one year since Hurricane Baby: Stories published. It also marks twenty years since Hurricane Katrina struck Mississippi and Louisiana. That has really brought a lot of attention to the book right now.

–The “Writers Drinking Whiskey” podcast drops on July 23. Bill Hincy and I talk the book and my debut journey here.

–“Talk to Me Day” on Mastodon on August 3. The #ScribesAndMakers group hosts me taking questions about writing and my book throughout the day that Sunday.

–Interview with The Southern Review of Books publishes on August 6. My MFA mate Katharine Armbrester put this Q&A together for this online publication

–Book Signing at Impression Books, a locally-owned bookstore here in Flowood. MS at noon on August 9.

–Book signing at Book Mart and Cafe on August 15 in Starkville, MS at 2 p.m., followed by:

–Panel and signing at Possumtown Book Festival in Columbus, MS on August 16 all day. Panel is at noon and the signing is following.

–Book Signing at Barnes and Noble Booksellers in Flowood, MS at noon on August 23 at the front of the store

–“Lunch and Learn” podcast with Kyla Hanington, another MFA mate, at 11 a.m. on August 26.

–TV appearance on WJTV with Walt Grayson at 3 p.m. on August 27 on the “Focused on Mississippi program.

–“Tombigbee Tales” podcast with host Shannon Evans and guest Rod Davis to talk Hurricane Katrina memories and literature on August 29, TBA.

I think that’s everything.

And then I’m going to relax by continuing to query Looking for Home!

Seriously, if you can find a way to support some of these events, I really would appreciate it. Trying to do a big push to drive sales here before its book birthday. Thanks to all of you reading for all the support over this magical time these last few months. Happy writing!

Life and Times of an Indie Author

So on Tuesday, I wrote my contact at the bookstore I went to yesterday and asked if he had my books in stock. He said no. I thought “OK. They’re stuck in shipping again.”

On Wednesday, he wrote and asked if I was bringing books, a common arrangement for independent authors. I said no. So what finally came out as we talked is that he thought I was bringing them, and I thought he was ordering them. Oopsie.

But he had a workaround–could I pick up stock from another store and bring them? He would work it out with the store to pay them for the books, and I would just deliver them. So I gave him the contact for the store we had here in town. I didn’t know how many they might have, but something was better than nothing at all.

Soon he messaged me back with the done deal. I brought fifteen books to the signing. We sold eight, the bookstore kept two for their stock, and the bookstore here got five books back. I didn’t think I would sell fifteen because I’m not really well known where I went, but I did come close!

It was really a great bookstore, too–a pair of bookstore dogs, a variety of beverages, lots of books, and very welcoming staff. They made me and Bob feel at home. So he enjoyed himself as well.

Two people I know came–my MFA mate Allison, and my lifelong friend, Lorie, who lives in a small town south of where I signed. We’ve talked a lot over Facebook over the years, but it had been a very long time since I’d seen her. To inscribe the name of my lifetime friend in a book that I wrote was a very cool moment.

Lesson: Always be clear on the details! And have an alternate plan in your back pocket if you’re not!

Happy reading, everyone!

FIRST Book Signing

(Pic overhead courtesy of Bob Whitehead)

Whew. Yesterday turned out to be a thrilling day. We had a lot more people than I was expecting based on my emails, texts, and Messenger posts. I joked that I guess you find out how many friends you have when they all text you that they’re not coming.

But we wound up having a good crowd, almost sold all the store’s books, and the store asked me to sign the ones they hadn’t sold, so now they can’t return them to the company that published them.

It was a cap-off to a good week; a book review ran Sunday in the closest thing Mississippi has to a statewide paper; I had a quick LIVE TV interview on a local feel-good news show as well. Next week I have other article running in two fairly large newsletters that I hope will turn well out as well, then a talk on a statewide talk-news-station on Thursday.

Then we take out a week for my daughter’s wedding, and I kick off traveling again the next week.

Y’ALL.

I am now a PUBLISHED AUTHOR. Looking at that sentence, it just barely computes. I DID IT. I set out to do it, and I did it!

My moderator for my book talk and I have known each other professionally almost 25 years now. He said in his introducing of me, that when he first started dealing with me in my freelance career when he was a publicist (I had not heard this story) that whenever I called for information or whatever, that in his office, I was called “the bulldog freelancer” because if you didn’t do what I asked right off, I’d be calling you for it right back for it if I didn’t get it.

I’m going to hold on to that. In my work-in-progress, at my job, selling this book–I’m a bulldog who doesn’t quit.