Pre-order link for Terrestrial, out in May! Also available at: Bookshop.org, Magers & Quinn Booksellers (so cool!), and Barnes & Noble.

Grateful for this review of Terrestrial by Gabrielle Stecher Woodward in the wonderful Independent Book Review.

There’s a Terrestrial e-book giveaway on StoryGraph.

Frolic Press was kind enough to include Terrestrial on this list of weird books by women (almost typed books by weird women, which, yes).

I brought some postcards I had made up for Terrestrial to the coffee shop I stop at on my walk to work after getting off the train. They have a table by the door with flyers and free zines and I have long imagined leaving something here. It reminds me of the coffee shops I went to when I was young, in Phoenix, with flyers and take-a-number posters, or Zia Records. I wish I could leave a copy of my book at Zia. Maybe I can make it out there this summer to leave one.

I asked the barista if I could leave a few flyers and he said sure, then asked what my book is about. Forced to quickly respond, I said it’s about a girl in Arizona who thinks she sees lights, which is close enough. A good exercise in having my reply ready.

I had emailed my old writing instructor about my forthcoming book because his writing classes were my first workshop classes and he taught me how to write a story arc. He replied kindly and asked if I would like to be a guest speaker for his advanced fiction writing class and tell them about my path to book publication after taking the classes in 2016. I remember the guest speakers we had during my time in the class, and said yes right away, before remembering that I am a Not Good speaker and can barely speak in front of more than 3 people. In the early days of his class, actually, he offered to read my story to the class in my place because I was so afraid. I turn red, feel faint, can’t hold the words and either speed read if I have the benefit of reading from a document and if I don’t then I can’t think and freeze up, forming thoughts and speaking on the fly is out of the question. Why had I thought I could do this?

I wrote down all my speaking points and debated taking an expired beta blocker but decided to just rely on the paper. I was so anxious but it went okay! The students asked thoughtful questions and the instructor guided me a bit after I read through all my pre-determined points. We even ended up discussing book release readings and bookstores. I learned a lot, too, as some of the students are going the route with querying and agents, and one said it opened their eyes to hear other options like indie publishing. I’m glad I did it.

xoxo