Support your local bookstore

I'm so in love with my local bookstore Pages: a bookstore, I support it whenever I can. And it has supported me as well. I've had three readings there.

I hope you will do the same to make sure we keep our bookstores alive. In view of that here is a post I just came across from the Book Marketing Expert, reprinted with his permission. Let's work hard to prevent bookstores from going away.

Reprinted from "The Book Marketing Expert newsletter," a free ezine offering book promotion and publicity tips and techniques. http://www.amarketingexpert.com

What Happens if Bookstores Go Away?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

That sentence alone is enough to send chills down my spine. No bookstores? I can't imagine a world without them. Yet the fact of the matter is, that's likely where we are headed.

I don't often share this, but you know that term "bucket list"? One of my bucket list items is to get locked in a bookstore overnight - with a fully-functioning Starbucks of course because a girl needs her caffeine to stay up all night and dig through the thousands of titles on the shelves. Truth is, that one bucket list dream may never come true (and I suspect, neither will the dinner date with Bradley Cooper, either). Let's face it, the world is changing rapidly. Amazon is making book access so much easier and without having to get in your car and, you know, drive somewhere. Look, I do love Amazon and what they've done for indie authors is tremendous, but the opposite side to all of this good is that bookstores are desperately trying to find a market. Ironically, in the mix of all of this, the independents, once proclaimed to be dead, are not fairing as badly as the chains. Well, the chain: Barnes & Noble.

My prediction, though perhaps wild and seemingly out there, is that we're going to start seeing more niche stores, so children's bookstores, all-fiction, etc. because at the end of the day, we are catering to an audience who doesn't want to have to sift through hundreds of books to find the niche they are looking for. We live in the custom society: custom coffee, custom cars, custom pretty much everything. Would the same go for bookstores? Sure, why not? I also think that we're going to start seeing a lot more book departments expand within stores. Hallmark has been experimenting with this for years, though granted their book section is small compared to everything else they offer, they could expand this, too. I don't think you'll see airport bookstores go away anytime soon. There's a need there, gotta have something to read on the plane, though the surge of eBook purchases may change the need for those too.

Let's face it, the structure is changing. Ironically it's not going in the direction we once thought. A few years ago many bloggers said that libraries were a thing of the past, sweet but ancient dinosaurs. However, libraries have seen a resurgence in a down economy and librarians are eager to keep step with technology, offering eBook lending, etc.

The biggest challenge we face as authors and book promoters is that if, in fact, bookstores go away that takes away a huge chunk of those trusted book connoisseurs who would otherwise be out, on the frontlines, recommending books. Also, the shelf space, which for most of us isn't really a factor since our books won't be in bookstores anyway. But for those publishers and titles that depend on bookstores, how will they gain exposure? The answer is, of course, online.

I think as we see the market changing, we're going to see things like niche social media sites, which despite Facebook's online real estate could pull in more readers because, again, we want what we want. We don't want to sift through tons of data to find that great, new read.

Free books and excerpts will become a must. I've spoken with a lot of authors who feel this is just something they don't want to do. The numbers would, however, encourage a second look. Whenever we've run freebie campaigns we see a huge uptick in sales after the freebie is over.

Book bloggers: As time progresses, we'll need more voices out there. As we do now, we'll start seeing a lot of niche blog communities popping up and, I dare say, that if the bookstore demise happens we're going to see a lot more paid reviews.

Paid placement: Yes I think you'll start seeing much more of this. Though not through ads but through paid content online. Some call it advertorial, and perhaps that's a better term for it, but I think as we progress content generation to drive sales will become a huge factor.

What can you do now, this far ahead of the curve? Candidly, I think we'll start seeing the downturn of the bookstore right after Christmas. We're seeing it now already but as 2013 continues, more and more of the sales numbers are going to be facing a decline. What you can do now is stake your claim. Make friends with bloggers, network, put out good content. Don't wait for the bookstore rug to be ripped out from under you before you act. Do it now. And when the eventual demise of bookstores happens, you'll be ready to face that challenge.

Many of us ignore the library market because it's not glamorous, but guess what? Librarians are a fantastic group of book lovers who could really help your book succeed. Been ignoring the library market in lieu of something more glamorous? You may want to rethink that approach.

No one wants to see bookstores go away, least of all me. But the writing has been on the wall for a while and even if I'm wrong, which would be great, I still think that the online world will become more and more significant in all of the ways I've described. Let's face it. With all of the books published each day in the US, the market has been expanding on one side and shrinking on the other for a while.

So, head to your local bookstore and support them, but make sure you keep an eye on the future.

A successful bookstore reading and discussion

My friend, Eleanor Vincent came down this weekend to fulfill our commitment to do a reading and discussion at my local independent pages: a bookstore. She arrived on Saturday afternoon, and after much stalling we got to work planning the event Sunday morning after breakfast.

We quickly decided to alternate two or three readings with short chats related to them, and then open the discussion to the audience. We chose on our reading portions – I chose two and Eleanor chose three – and then we practiced and timed the whole piece, including our remarks. I also created an agenda so we could each have one at the ready as we sat in front of the attendees later in the afternoon. I had already purchased a few bottles of wine and sparkling water and some veggies and dip to serve. Mike O’Mary shipped us books to sell. Eleanor’s went directly to Pages. Mine came to my home.

With all that we declared ourselves ready – mainly because we are very knowledgeable about our books’ messages and the commonality of our stories. That enabled us to easily play our experiences off one another.

I did have the usual worry of: suppose you throw a party and no one comes. As usual, several people who said they would be there didn’t show, and several people I didn’t know would attend did. I think that has happened with every event I’ve participated in so far. The good thing is most of the chairs were filled – about twenty people were there.

Reading and Bantering

I think our banter and readings about writing as healing went very well. And we had many questions, comments, and tears from the audience. But the disappointing part was that we didn’t sell many books – I think we each sold four. Lisa DeLong from my writing group, who is also a bereaved parent, attended and sold a few of her book, Blood Brothers, too. Of course our Dream of Things publisher warned us that authors don’t usually sell a lot of books at bookstores. (I was definitely spoiled by the over sixty I sold at my book launch in 2011, so of course I expected to sell more.) As Eleanor said, people just don’t get it. When they come to a reading and book signing they need to be prepared to buy books.

Lisa, Madeline, and Eleanor

So, Eleanor and I are now ready to take our show on the road – to other venues pertinent to our subject matter where we can sell books in the back of the room: libraries, book festivals, conferences, speaking engagements. Anyone out there, who wants to book us, please let me know.

All told, I think we had a great event. Like I’ve always felt, it’s not really about selling books. It’s about erasing the stigma of mental illness and preventing suicide. If my events help do that, I’ll feel successful.

Eleanor’s book is Swimming with Maya, 

just out in paperback and eBook 

(Dream of Things, 2013)

My book is Leaving the Hall Light On 

(Dream of Things, 2012)

Thank you Mike O'Mary of Dream of Things for publishing both our books. 

Introducing Sonia Marsh

I met face to face with Sonia Marsh for the first time yesterday after a long virtual friendship and a lot of win-win networking.

She is the author of the newly released memoir Freeways to Flip-Flops (available at Amazon.com in both paperback and Kindle, as well as Barnes and Noble) and the Gutsy Living blog. I posted my gutsy story there in June, and I’m pleased to say, I won for the gutsiest story of the month. Please go over to Gutsy Living to receive a special gift. Just scroll down and look for the red starfish.

So Sonia and I talked nonstop – mostly about how to go about the business of selling a book. We shared websites, conference information, how to get on panel discussions, what organizations we belong to. I urged her to join our Greater Los Angeles Writers Society. Although Sonia lives in Orange County, GLAWS has members who come to meetings and events all the way from Arizona.

Yesterday’s highlight was meeting with one of the proprietors of my local indie bookstore: Pages in Manhattan Beach. Pages: A Bookstore held a wonderfully successful launch event for my memoir, Leaving the Hall Light On, in May 2011, and now Sonia will also have a book signing and reading there as well. 

Please look for more information about Sonia here at Choices. She’ll be my guest in September answering questions about her book, and I’ll post a review just as soon as I finish it.

Her topic – living on a tropical island for a year with her husband and three boys – is very reminiscent of the 19 months my family lived on a tiny island in the South Pacific back in the mid 1970s. 

A book launch and signing - Part Three

Here’s the third installment of my blog about my book launch and signing.

Signing a Book  - What a Pleasure 

Part Three – Lessons Learned.

1. Book the venue early. I contacted the Pages  (http://www.pagesabookstore.com/) bookstore on February 2 and received an answer the very next day. I booked May 12 – four days after the book’s scheduled release – absolutely perfect timing.
2. Be prepared to do most of the publicity yourself – I used my Facebook and email network; the bookstore helped by posting it on its weekly newsletter with a nice blurb and links to my book cover and trailer.
3. Try to arrange for other publicity early. I asked both of my local newspapers way in advance to publish a story about the book. One published a great interview with me on the day of the event; the other just posted a brief notice on their weekly calendar of events. Even if someone says they’ll be glad to support your event, it doesn’t always happen as expected.
4. Send out lots of invitations – don’t worry about filling up the room with people in all the seats and standing around the perimeter. I created an invitation on Facebook, and I used the Punchbowl email invitation system (http://www.punchbowl.com/?gclid=CLTDmv6U8qgCFQcnbAodAjvGCA). I found it a lot classier than Evite. The invitations came in an envelop with “stamps.”
5. Since the time of the event was given as a range, people came and went throughout the evening. One person arrived an hour a head of time. And the last stragglers arrived after the store was ready to close. Also a lot of people didn’t know about the reading. Come to an agreement with the bookstore about what time the reading will take place and list the time on the invitation.
6. Don’t offer food – just a little wine and water. We had to bring most of the food back home, and I had to give it away. It was a huge waste of money.
7. Here are a couple of nice things to do: get someone to have people sign a guest book (my husband did that job), and ask someone to take photos (my daughter-in-law, Marissa, was the photographer). After the event Marissa presented me with a beautiful photo album and she posted photos on Facebook – to share with folks who couldn’t be there.
8. And I think this is the most important lesson. Have no expectations about your attendees. Some people who say they’ll be there, don’t show. And people you have do idea will attend will be there. Some of them will be people you’ve never met. 

And don't forget to enjoy yourself!

A book launch and signing - Part Two

As promised here is part two of my three-part blog about my book launch and signing. In Part Three I'll discuss lessons learned.


Part Two - The Actual Event

Reading at {Pages}, a bookstore

Our son Ben arrived at our house at about five thirty ready to help bring books, food, and drinks to the Pages bookstore, and by the time we got there, about six, Jetena, the receptionist from the building where I used to work, was already there. Although Ben joined his wife Marissa and her folks for dinner, Bob, Eleanor – my friend from Oakland who came down the day before to keep me calm and centered – and I opted to stay in the shop. Eleanor and I put out the strawberries, mangos and cheese cubes in a divided platter that I brought from home, Dinah, the cupcake host, arranged the mini lemon cupcakes, and the store manager and his assistant arranged the drinks – wine and waters – on a separate table, some chilling in ice buckets. They made a cute pyramid cup arrangement.

Flowers from my publisher, Lucky Press LLC, 

looked great on the food table's blue tablecloth

People trickled in gradually and as I interacted with them all of my stress dissipated. Some people I had never met came in, and one came up to me almost immediately and told me the story of suicide in her family. By the end of that conversation we were both crying.

At seven thirty the room was full, people filled all the chairs and others were standing around the room when the storeowner suggested we start the reading. Also the store needed more books brought in. I had taken over five on Tuesday. and I realized this might be big when the owner called the afternoon of the reading to remind me to bring more books – they were down to one. So within an hour and a half forty-five books were sold. Ben had brought in two boxes of twenty right away and brought in another box of twenty as soon as our reading was over. All but four of those were sold by the end of the evening.

I chose to read a short piece from about the middle of the book. I didn’t want to read anything that discussed Paul’s bipolar disorder or the gory details of his suicide. I wanted something that was a little more upbeat, so I read about packing away his clothes four months after he died, explaining that this was my first step in an attempt to get back to normal (new normal). I also asked Bob, Ben and Marissa to each read a poem and speak a little about the poem they read. A few people asked questions afterward, e.g., How do you feel about putting out such personal information for the world to read? Did you consult with your husband about your decision to have this book published? Have you thought about putting Paul’s music on a CD and selling it? (I’ll answer these questions in later blogs.)

And the signing began again – with people standing in line, waiting their turn patiently to come up to me. During that time I heard several stories from people I hadn’t met and people I’ve known for years about how they had been touched my bipolar disorder and/or suicide in their families. It’s amazing how much we don’t know about people and how much tragedy and heartbreak people have in their lives. Perhaps my putting my story out there so explicitly gave them permission to tell me theirs.

And people kept coming in the door. In fact by about half past nine the store manager asked me to get people to leave, he had to close the shop and take his young helper home. Since Bob and Ben had taken all the leftover food and drinks – and we had plenty – to the car (the store wanted to keep the leftover books), we ended the evening with a few stragglers at our open 24-hour downtown coffee shop, The Kettle, to have something to eat and a final toast. That was a good thing. I hadn’t eaten anything all evening besides a couple bites of cupcake, and my heartburn – that came on suddenly like a punch right after I read – was giving me fits.

I'm the last one out the door, looking pretty tired

So this launch and signing event, as I’ve written before, was a huge success. Even though most of the people there were family and friends, selling sixty-one books was way more than I had expected. Hopefully, I’ll be able to repeat that experience again and again.

Book launch and signing - a huge success

The launch party for Leaving the Hall Light On at Pages: a bookstore in Manhattan Beach CA last night was a huge success. People from all parts of my life attended: high school friends, former work colleagues, neighbors, friends from the Los Angeles area and Las Vegas, Ojai, San Diego, and Oakland, and many family members. In addition people came as a result of a wonderful article about my book in our neighborhood newspaper, "The Beach Reporter": http://www.tbrnews.com/articles/2011/05/12/stepping_out/step3.txt. 


The room was filled to the brim with standing room only during my reading, and it was a dream come true to have so many attendees wait in line for me to sign their books. In all, the event resulted in the sale of sixty-one books - with some people buying two or three.


People I've known for years and people I've never met came up to me to tell me their similar story of bipolar disorder and suicide in their lives. I am indeed thrilled they chose to attend last night and read my book.