Monthly Archives: May 2025

Am I telling you to self-publish your novel? Well …

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Okay, this post comes with SO MANY caveats.

It’s very, very early in this process.

A few random sales can prompt big movement among the lower reaches of Amazon’s sales chart. Believe me, I’ve seen this with our four true crime books, which were published by History Press.

And ultimately this won’t put a lot of money in my pocket or, if you follow this path, yours. We didn’t become writers to make money, did we?

But today I checked the sites selling my novel THAT OCTOBER – Bookshop, Barnes & Noble, Powell’s Books and Amazon among them – and was surprised to see that on Amazon, the book was marked with a “#1 New Release in Teen & Young Adult Law & Crime stories” label.

On the mobile Amazon, this:

A red banner. As opposed to a Bruce Banner.

So I don’t know any more today than I did yesterday about how my book is doing or will do, before or after its June 1 publication date. (That’s five days away as I write this.)

But it looks like it hasn’t hurt to self-publish the book, in paperback, through Ingram Spark.

I can’t tell you what to do. Your scenario is not like mine. I’m a guy who doesn’t have years to take the traditional publishing route. I hadn’t really thought about self-publishing until last fall, when my friend and editor Jill Blocker, who had self-published one language edition of her great book WHAT WAS BEAUTIFUL AND GOOD, suggested I might want to consider it. Jill did all the heavy lifting and my friend and artist Sara McKinley created an incredible cover that has sold at least as many copies of the book as the promise of what’s between the covers.

So should you self-publish? Maybe. There’s no doubt there’s much more prestige in being published by an indie or small press, not to mention a big publishing house, compared to self-publishing. Some people will always look on self-published books as “vanity” books. That doesn’t bother me at all.

I hope you like THAT OCTOBER. I don’t expect to make much, if any, money off it. I encourage you to buy it (the ebook version is coming) or borrow it from your local library. Libraries do a lot of society’s heavy lifting, and I would be thrilled if you read it or any of my books through a library,

But I will say I’m not, not encouraging you to self-publish. This is working so far for me.

If there’s any questions I can answer, look me up on BlueSky or on my Facebook page, which is called, in a blindingly brilliant move, Keith Roysdon author.

The pleasure of finding your book for sale – especially unexpected places

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I’m not sure I remember the exact details, but when my first true crime book, co-authored with my longtime writing partner Douglas Walker, came out in 2016, it was pretty thrilling to see the book for sale in bookstores, drug stores, gift shops and online.

It’s one thing to have a book out there and to sell it and sign it, but realizing our publisher, History Press, had actually gotten the first book, “Wicked Muncie,” in stores and online sites, was pretty amazing. History Press kicks all kinds of ass in getting books in stores, by the way. All four of our true crime books found a good home with them.

Another highlight was finding our books offered by libraries, which are very nearly my favorite places on the planet. A while back, I realized our third true crime book, “The Westside Park Murders,” was available through the Chicago Public Library. I’m still boggled over that.

So it’s been fun, with THAT OCTOBER, my new 1984-set high school crime novel, finding the book on all kinds of bookselling sites. I wasn’t certain if I would have to take steps to ensure this because THAT OCTOBER is self-published.

But I didn’t have to. At some point recently I was asking the folks at Ingram Spark, the venue I used to publish the book, if they could tell me when it would be available for pre-order. They responded and noted that it already was available and showed me where Amazon was selling it.

Since that time, I’ve been excited to see that not only Amazon, a site I have qualms about, but Barnes & Noble, Bookshop, Powell’s Books and Waterstones, the famous Brit seller of books, all offer it (for pre-order right now, as publication date is June 1).

So I’ve been on social media, posting links to most of those booksellers and screenshots. It was as especially exciting to see that Powell’s, a bookseller I’ve visited in Portland, Oregon, and have done business with online, offered it.

Oddest place I’ve found the book for sale so far: Saxo, where the book is available for about 259 Danish Krone.

It’s silly, I know, to be so excited about this, but I didn’t think it would ever happen.

Next I’ll be telling you how excited I am to find THAT OCTOBER for sale at Half Price Books or McKay’s.

Music and my playlist for THAT OCTOBER

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I know writers – and readers – who want absolute quiet when they’re writing or reading.

For me, maybe because I spent decades working in a newsroom, with overlapping conversations, police scanners and all manner of noise competing for attention, I can usually tune out the noise when I want to. Or maybe it’s that I like some noise while I’m writing.

However it works, I like having music playing when I’m writing, especially with novels. When I was writing my first novel, SEVEN ANGELS – not yet published; maybe someday? – in 2019, I played non-stop the music of the Highwomen, the Chicks, Bonnie Raitt and other artists. It’s music I like and the main character is a strong woman, which really fit with the music. When I was writing my second novel, GHOST SHOW, in 2020, I played artists of the 1940s because the book is set in 1948. This wasn’t as conducive to writing for me. I knew the music and artists but didn’t get into the right headspace during it.

When I was writing THAT OCTOBER 2021-2023, I played music of the early 1980s non-stop for a year and a half. The story takes place mostly in October 1984, so I kept my playlist – almost exclusively youtube posts of music videos – limited to songs that predated that month and year.

I incorporated some of that music into the book, making references in some cases by having the high-school-age characters mentioning or singing or dancing to the songs. I didn’t include lyrics in the novel because it can be expensive or nearly impossible to get the rights to print lyrics.

When I readied the book for publication this year, working with my friend and editor Jill Blocker, I decided to get on Spotify and make a THAT OCTOBER playlist. I used songs that I listened to during writing, songs that are cited specifically in the book and songs that just work well with the story.

Duran Duran, Ratt, Cyndi Lauper and more than a dozen others are on the playlist. I’ll probably tinker with it at some point and add some more.

THAT OCTOBER publishes June 1 and you can pre-order it now through most of the usual online booksellers. Hopefully it can be found and purchased from one of the booksellers that aren’t among the very worst on the planet.

In the meantime, here’s a link to the THAT OCTOBER playlist on Spotify. I hope you enjoy it, and the book.

Social media and selling books

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You think that guy looks insufferable there, wait until a few more weeks pass. You’ll be sick to death of him.

My 1984-set crime novel THAT OCTOBER publishes June 1. It’s available now for pre-order on the usual bookselling sites, although I encourage you to purchase it through the least harmful to society one.

I hope you like the book. The authors who were kind enough to read it and give me some comments that I could blurb seemed to like it, citing the 1980s nostalgia content and the twists and turns of the plot.

Although THAT OCTOBER is self-published, there’s nothing especially straightforward about marketing a book these days. Unless you’re a huge author, you have to flog your book to potential readers. That’s usually done through social media.

There are a lot of authors who innovate in how they market their books. Some include odd tidbits they came across while researching and writing their book, and I’ll probably do some of that. Some authors post recipes true to the time period or story. Others, notably Beau Johnson, make and post creative videos to publicize their work. Beau’s videos are hilarious and effectively promote his books, including LIKE MINDED INDIVIDUALS, which continues Beau’s multi-book storyline of anti-heroes who punish the worst criminals on Earth.

Since social media is important to promoting our books, it’s especially tricky to do so in a manner that doesn’t promote some of the worst humans around, including the owners of the former twitter and Facebook and related platforms.

I don’t spend a lot of time on the former twitter anymore, mostly just to check on friends who still post there as opposed to a slightly more “clean hands” site like BlueSky. For the past week, I’ve tried to observe a week-long boycott of Facebook-related platforms, breaking that only to note a rare earthquake in East Tennessee and a Mother’s Day post about my mom, who left us nearly 20 years ago.

But I’ll continue to post on my author page on Facebook to publicize my writing. It’s not a decision I’m entirely comfortable with, but Facebook is still a place where people go, and authors are expected to have a social media presence there.

Anyway, god go with you in the next few weeks (months? years?) as you see me posting here and on social media to promote THAT OCTOBER. I hope you tolerate me and I hope you like the book.

SPOILERS for THUNDERBOLTS and you know what …

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Hype is a thing. And hype might be THE thing in the movie business.

Beware – some spoilers ahead.

I won’t tell you that if you didn’t see THUNDERBOLTS* during its opening weekend that social media is determined to spoil it for you, but Marvel and many other social media accounts are hyping the holy hell out of one of the final big twists for the film.

SPOILERS HERE:

In the final scene of THUNDERBOLTS*, the reveal of what that asterisk was all about comes as they’re announced as the New Avengers. This puts them into conflict with the Avengers team that Sam Wilson, the new Captain America, is going to put together at then-president Thunderbolt Ross’ request. There’s even a reference to Sam threatening to sue the scrappy team of anti-heroes who never really accepted the name Thunderbolts.

If you know some Marvel history, you know that in the late 1990s, the comic book company decided to spin off the Avengers and the Fantastic Four into their own universe.

To fill the void – no pun intended, if you’ve seen THUNDERBOLTS* – in the Marvel comic book universe we know, where Spider-Man and the X-Men were still operating, a new Avengers team was put together in a comic book titled “Thunderbolts.”

The secret, revealed at the end of that first comic, was that the new Avengers were not heroes at all, but were actually the supervillain team the Masters of Evil.

They were villains who pretended to be heroes, although eventually many of them warmed to the idea of doing actual heroic deeds and grew into heroic roles.

The movie THUNDERBOLTS* put a nice spin on this, with shady anti-heroes coming together to save the world. And at the end, in a manipulative political move, they are dubbed the New Avengers.

The funnier or, alternately, more frustrating element of all this as related to the movie THUNDERBOLTS* is that beginning Monday morning (this morning as I write), Marvel has saturated social media sites with the film’s supposed “new title” THE NEW AVENGERS and posted video of the cast revealing the name and even Winter Soldier actor Sebastian Stan “covering” a THUNDERBOLTS* bus stop poster with one featuring the new title.

It’s a great publicity stunt that pays off months of speculation about what the asterisk at the end of the THUNDERBOLTS* title meant.

It you didn’t get caught and spoiled, you might agree.*

*Or not.

October – actually THAT OCTOBER – arrives a month from today

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I promise I won’t give you a daily countdown, but how could I resist a nice round period of time like one month?

On June 1, my 1984-set crime novel THAT OCTOBER will be available. My editor Jill Blocker and artist Sara McKinley and I have really reached the finish line in this self-publishing journey – don’t all journeys have finish lines? – and all that remains now it to get the word out.

The paperback is available for pre-order on various sites now. Before June 1, we should have the electronic version available also.

I’m doing a couple of talks back in my hometown of Muncie, Indiana – inspiration for the city of Middletown, where THAT OCTOBER takes place – in June. although I don’t expect that to be of interest to many of you unless you’re in the Muncie area or somewhere in the Midwest with a lot of time on your hands.

In the next month, I’ll tell you a little about THAT OCTOBER and the world when it takes place: A time when high school students should have been spending all their time thinking about dates, football, seeing the biggest movies – “The Terminator” was new in October 1984, and “A Nightmare on Elm Street” would come out within a couple of weeks – MTV and Halloween.

Instead, the six high school friends in THAT OCTOBER are thinking about the murder of one of their classmates and the taking of another.

And they don’t understand why the adults in town seem unconcerned or, at best, evasive when the friends urge them to DO SOMETHING to solve their friend David’s murder and bring Lee Ann home.

Jackie and Michael, new siblings in a blended family, and their friends Sammi, Toni, Elmer and William push forward with their own investigation, which follows a trail rooted half-way around the world, in a time before any of them were born.

I’ll share a bit more as we move forward. I hope you come along for the ride.