Behind-the-scenes book talk with a bestselling author and his unicorn. Join 6000+ readers of my 150 books as I share stories behind the stories, unbox the creative process, and lead a disobedient "artisan author" movement to treat readers like rockstars and make the book world suck less.
My lifelong dream, finally realized
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This Wednesday, I had one of those moments -- one of those landmark days where you say, "Oh, wow ... that thing I always imagined finally happened." And it's so surreal, you almost don't know how to react to it. And so you barely do react to it. Until later in the day, when you suddenly find yourself thinking: Okay, that was really, really fucking cool. I need to be more excited. And that's when it hits you. I'm about to tell you all about it, but first some quick housekeeping. I'll do it bullet-point fashion because it's about my currently-running Kickstarter (for City of Fire) and I know a lot of you don't care about Kickstarters. Bullet points make the info scannable, and also scan-past-able if you don't give a shit and just want to move on to the next thing. See how I'm working for you? You're welcome. Here we go ... just two obnoxious bullet points and then we can move on:
Okay. Back to the cool thing from Wednesday. See, I've always wanted to write. Since I was a kid, I thought it'd be cool to be a storyteller. And that came with a lot of trappings: a lot of things I felt it meant to be a storyteller. One of those things (and the most important, most notable of them in my mind) was to walk into a bookstore and find my own book on the shelves. But the problem is, I'm an independent author. I know, I know ... you all think I'm super pro and basically Stephen King. Obviously I'm Stephen King. People confuse me and ol' Stevie all the time, probably because we live in side-by-side solid gold mansions. But in truth, I'm an indie. And indies don't usually end up in bookstores. It can happen, of course, but most of the time it's because some big publishing house buys the rights to an independent book and that's how it gets into bookstores. It's rare that we end up on shelves without selling rights. I always had this dream of walking into my local store and seeing my book there. Just ... there, casually beside the other "real authors who make real books," as if I was one of them. Well, it finally happened.Earlier this week I visited iconic Austin bookstore BookPeople. If you're an Austinite, you either know BookPeople or are a poseur. And look what was right there in the horror section! So that's rad. But what's even MORE rad is that on the heels of this triumph, I twisted their arms to also carry Unicorn Western (the huge Full Saga paperback) and Pretty Killer. They put both of those books out today. Here's Pretty Killer in the Mystery section. (With Unicorn Western beside it for some reason. I was told it'd be in Fantasy, so I'll need to check up on that.) Unicorn Western got some GONZO ASS PLACEMENT. Here it is on the big front table right out front: They also put it in this sweet promo section, dead center: Secretly, I'm hoping that Unicorn Western takes off locally. The unofficial slogan for the city of Austin is "Keep Austin Weird," and Unicorn Western is REALLY WEIRD. You just look at that cover and think: WHAT. If you're in Austin or nearby, come on out to BookPeople and grab yourself a copy of one of my books! You'll be in exclusive company, because before now, nobody's ever bought my books off the shelf of a physical bookstore that I know of. Plus, the fact that people actually BUY my books when they offer them will ... you know ... encourage BookPeople to keep stocking them and stuff. OH! And if you actually do decide to visit BookPeople and grab one of my books, email me to let me know, okay? If I'm available, maybe I'll pop down there to sign it for you or something. Bring friends! So that was my WTF for the day. It was very, very cool. JT P.S: A lot of my physical-edition books are available through bookstores even if they don't stock them in-store. You can always just walk into your local bookstore and request them. And while we're at it, you can also request that your local library stock my books. That way, you can read them for free! |
Literary As F**k
Behind-the-scenes book talk with a bestselling author and his unicorn. Join 6000+ readers of my 150 books as I share stories behind the stories, unbox the creative process, and lead a disobedient "artisan author" movement to treat readers like rockstars and make the book world suck less.
There's a little flow chart thing that happened when you read the subject line of this email. As such: Option #1: If you've ever lived in (or regularly visited) Austin, Texas, chances are good that you read this email's subject and thought, "Oh, Johnny knows about Bob!" or possibly "Does he mean that Bob Schneider?" Option #2: If you're not an Austin regular, you probably said, "Who?" ... and that right there is the first way that I'm basically the Bob Schneider of authors. You're welcome?...
Last week, a friend asked me a question: If I could pick just one book for the world to remember me by, which would it be? After much hemming and hawing, I chose Unicorn Western. I love all of my books, but in a pinch I had to give UW the win. It's just so ... WEIRD and UNUSUAL and LIKE NOTHING ELSE. I like the idea of being known for something truly wacky -- something that manages to be bizarre and profound at the same time. The problem is, a lot of my readers haven't read Unicorn Western....
Good morning! I've got three small things to share this week, so I figured I'd put them together in a single email. Finally: Something from me that's scannable! THING #1: Talking to creative kids about the hard parts of artistry, self-worth, and angst Most Fridays, I record a very fun podcast about writing and creativity -- a peek "inside the author's studio." It's called the One-Drink Book Club and is usually a paid benefit for members of my Substack. However, I decided to make the most...