A Newsletter without News

AKA: The Life of a Writer

Little Odie in the Big Woods

We are in full-fledged fall. Late afternoons are golden and warm, and Joe and I will sit in the back yard after work with a beer to watch the dogs play and sun go down. It’s simple perfection. This part of the season is apprehensive, though, and I find myself just waiting for that one big November storm that will rip all the leaves down in a single night leaving the trees skeletal and brown. Exposed. From that moment till April, I’ll mourn living in a place where the seasons are otherwise spectacular because I loathe winter. It’s not as gray and bleak as New Jersey, but West Virginia—our part, anyway—still has a pretty boring winter. Which is totally fine because I’m so out of practice of driving in snow, but it makes for long months of cold, damp, dreary weather and none of the beauty winter affords the more northern states, or even more south-westerly areas of Appalachia. The one lovely thing is the wood stove, which we have already used a few evenings to take out the chill, send the aroma of a campfire into the crisp night, still the early novelty and not yet the daily burden it will become.

Boy, am I a ray of light.

On to my topic for this month’s post: The Author’s Online Presence

I decided a while back to get my ass off social media. Not completely, but significantly so that it’s no longer a boredom crutch. But it’s been a slow withdrawal. I don’t post a ton, but I do still look for opportunities to genuinely talk to friends I can’t see in real life. However, more often all of the platforms are giving me ads, cultivated annoying strangers, and less and less showing me posts from people I actually like or care about. Twitter is non-stop stupid questions, which I try to participate to stay active but don’t care enough to do so consistently. Facebook never refreshes anymore and shows you the same freaking post a thousand times a day…or so I hear from people who check it a thousand times a day. Ha. Instagram—which I always enjoyed because I love taking and preserving photos—has become the new TikTok. And a shitty version.

I first joined Facebook in its earliest inception - 2004ish. I had three small children, was home a LOT, and very isolated without friends. Facebook was new and so interesting and the fact I, a person who has moved at least 20 times, could find so many people I’d crossed paths with and reconnect—I was hook, line, and sinker. It remained a major source of actual communication and connection for me until recently, mostly because I think a lot of people have been quicker than I to quit it.

Why am I waxing on about social media? Because if you’re a writer/author, you were likely told—or will be told—you need to have a social media platform. And there is a real (albeit ridiculous) fear of missing something important. Well, I’m here to assure you, unless you want to spend hours and hours procuring followers, it’s not all that true. And I’m not convinced it actually sells books. Even if you have 10k followers, how many of them are actually buying your book? I once ran a giveaway of ten copies of one of my books in exchange for a review—all people I actually knew—and I think I got 2 or 3 reviews. Thank you, if any of those were you, reader.

So, I’ve been gradually reducing my posts and time spent in the virtual world, and by the time you read this, it’s all (except instagram) been taken off my phone. I’ll continue to post photos because social media has become sort of an archived photo album and really the only pictures I have since the fire. I still like the digital history, the memories. But I’m not going to buy into the “you really have no choice” as an author to not engage on social media. I think it can be fun, friends can celebrate you, teachers and librarians can find you, but in the end, unless you absolutely love it, it’s not worth stressing over. Just have a nice simple website with a contact page and you’ll be fine.

All that being said, if you’re still even here after my diatribe, one way to stay engaged in social media but not have to rely only on yourself, is to join or create a marketing cohort of colleagues. I’m part of Mighty Middle Grade, for example, where several of us have a zoom-chat every month, coordinate to engage on our group platforms, and do events and giveaways together.

This has been very fun and a great way to self-promote without feeling like you’re constantly self-promoting. Rather than simply posting we look for real opportunities to connect and market. We’ve made good connections, to each other and other groups, and continue to discuss future opportunities based on location, interests, common book themes and more. We are still working on a website, but have already done a lot of stuff together and somehow got 600 twitter followers within about 2 weeks of shared tweeting. There are various talented people involved from an actual publicist to graphic designer to regular ole me who can create a mean google doc. We use our talents collectively and that works for all of us. I highly recommend it.

But before I go, here’s pictures from our joint signing in Winchester which went better than expected and we each signed several copies of all our books. It was trick-or-treat on the walking mall so lots of cute costumes and kids. And an older man, who had been there by chance, saw Send a Girl! and waited for us to arrive because he wanted a signed copy. He’s a retired firefighter and was super excited about the book, which is to prove picture books can be for anyone.

That was all way too long, apologies. I’m going to hide under my electric blanket now.

See you all in December.