My Wonderfully Uneventful Book Launch
My new book was published on October 4, 2023: Terror at Twin Lakes. It’s a retro horror novella + collection of surfing tales. As this is my sixth book, I’ve been through this process a few times already. I’m rather proud of this new book of mine, primarily because the stories are near and dear to me. When I finished the novella, which is about a family camping in Northern California in the summer of 1984, I immediately began toiling away on a series of surfing stories (I’m a lifelong surfer). Most of the surfing tales found themselves seasoned with a good amount of horror, suspense, and the supernatural. It therefore seemed like a decent idea to combine the surfing stories with the camping/horror novella.
I’m an indie fiction writer, lacking many of the skills and abilities that have become necessary in this wacky age of social media and the internet. I post an occasional article on Substack and Medium, create some content on my Instagram account, and that’s about it, folks. I lack both the time and the desire to fill my days and nights seeking beta readers, sending out advanced reading copies, wishing upon a shooting star that an agent will take me on as a client, or begging for online reviews of my books. I just write, revise, publish, and try to make friends within my local book community.
When Terror at Twin Lakes was published this month, I spread the word to friends and family, made a post or two on Instagram, and updated my website with information about my new book and a link for making a purchase. The owner of a local bookstore offered to host an author event around Halloween to promote my horror-themed book. That sounded just grand to me, and I agreed. I might have a second author event later this year at another local bookstore. Then, it will be on to the next writing project, which, for me, has already begun (my next book will be for young readers).
When you publish your book and set out to begin promotion, ask yourself in advance what it is exactly that you are attempting to accomplish. Is your top priority to monetize your writing? Perhaps you will never feel as if you have truly “made it” as an author until you scoot your way onto one of the many bestseller lists, and you therefore feel the need to do everything within your power to earn the literary approval of complete strangers. Or are you a literary artist with a day job who cares solely about creating a body of work of which you are proud?
For me, there would have been no reward in a stressful, handwringing book launch that involved social media strategy sessions, paid advertising and unhelpful feedback from anonymous readers with unseen faces. I have come to enjoy more than sufficient satisfaction from authoring books that are true and honest — books that are mine and mine alone — books that will always remain untainted by the commercial process and corporate demands.
Knowing that my obscure little indie books sit quietly upon the shelves of local bookstores and libraries each night after the lights have been turned out, with just a few orphan crickets left behind to run about the place, suits me just fine.
J.S. Lender’s new novella + short story collection, Terror at Twin Lakes, is on sale now! Follow J.S. Lender on Instagram and on Substack.
Copyright © 2023 Reef Point Press / J.S. Lender
