Available Everywhere

Hello!

My new science fiction novel Surrender is available everywhere now, listed by Bookshop.org, Book Depository, and Amazon.

Wow.

I will do an audiobook also, but not for a few months. I’ve hired a publicist, who is going to be working on pitching to influencers, working the big Amazon machine, and pitching to libraries. (Fun fact: Apparently, for every copy of your book on a library shelf, you sell six books.) There are a lot of moving parts to this full-scale book promotion, and I have no idea what they all are right now; but I’m finding out fast.

If you’re an influencer (I know a few subscribe to 500 Words) and you’d like to mention the book on your feed, I’ll send you an EPUB edition.

It’s Global

Much has changed since I published my first book on Amazon in 2014, but one thing hasn’t changed: this is a global endeavor. Checking on Ingram, my primary distributor, I see that bookstores from as far away as Australia are buying Surrender, and they are buying the hardback edition for their shelves. (Another fun fact: When you order a hardback edition on Amazon, Amazon orders it from Ingram or Book Depository and resells it to you.)

It’s like the Olde Days of the Interwebs

As Twitter spirals into irrelevance, you may have been hearing more about Mastodon, the weirdly named but useful federation of servers that creates community online, but without the hate speech and ads.

Mastodon is free. (You can donate to the person who runs the server if you like.) There are servers, called “instances” in Mastodon-speak, for just about every interest. I’m on one for scientists and writers. If you like books, you will probably like Bookstodon. If you’re looking for a Mastodon instance to try out, you can use this directory to search, or this wizard to help you find one. If you were a user of Tweetdeck or Tweetbot, people are building Mastodon replacements for those apps that are even better.

It’s a little like the old days of the internet, with creative types posting about their projects and nice people who actually respond to your posts. I posted about my standing desk, actually a bar table that my mother made from a fallen tree, and I felt the old feels of the old days when people wrote back to you, asked questions, and celebrated whatever fringe or weird thing you posted about, proving that it wasn’t so fringe after all.

If you’re wondering if this Mastodon-thingie is going to stick around, it has grown by 733 accounts in the last hour as I write this and 21,608 new accounts in the last day.

Reading

I just finished reading Stop Saving the Planet by Jenny Price, a brisk manifesto that reframes our environmental crisis so you don’t have to stress about it and can take meaningful action. And I’ve been savoring The Singularities by John Banville for its rich language and shifty moods.

If You’d Like to Help

If you’d like to help me and the book, please buy the edition of your choice on your favorite platform. They’re all here.

Share about the book with others. Word of mouth is a potent driver.

Share about the book on social media. I’m using the hashtag .

If you don’t want to buy the book online, give your local bookshop a call and ask them to order Surrender for you. (Third fun fact: If your bookstore is ordering the book for a few customers, they are more likely to stock it on their shelves.) Here’s a link to Indiebound. Click through, and you can find your local indie bookstore along with contact info.

Thank you for sharing in this moment with me today! I’m grateful for your support.

Lee