Tuesday, August 11, 2020

Reminiscing about My Second-born (Book)

Sometimes I wish I'd known the best way to promote/market my YA historical novel, Erin's Ring, when doing so might have made it a successful book.


Six years after publication, it has died a quiet death, without eulogy, without mourning.  I think it was last year that my publisher at Bezalel Books, Cheryl Dickow, informed me that she would not be able to carry the title anymore for distribution, because it had not sold well enough.  New and used copies of the paperback are still available from other sellers on Amazon; I also have a number of copies that I bought myself, back when I thought I might need to have them on hand for book signings and the like, and I have sold those here and there over the years.  But now I kind of regret not having made Erin's Ring available in the Kindle format at the outset, which might have helped sales (although who knows?).

Marketing books does not come naturally to a shy and introverted person who loves to write them (almost as much as she loves to read them) but can't imagine a scarier scenario than being center stage or trying to call attention to herself.  When I used to confess my discomfort about getting out there and doing what seemed to be "tooting my own horn," Cheryl would always remind me that it was the work I was promoting--work that gave glory to God and the Catholic Faith--and not the author of that work.

I would remind myself all the time that this was true; and yet I struggled.

But here I am, six years later, with a promotional post about a book that never really found its audience, even though it received two Book Awards from the Catholic Press Association and it seemed to have so much potential--especially in the Catholic homeschool community, perhaps.



If you go to this page of the Bezalel website and scroll down to the cover of Erin's Ring, you'll get an idea what this novel is all about. 

Also, here is a generous blurb that appears on the back cover of the book, written by Nancy Carabio Belanger, a well-known author of Catholic YA fiction:

"Highly recommended for Catholic classrooms, Erin's Ring is a Catholic novel that weaves Irish-American history with the present. This wholesome novel had me shed tears of sadness and joy, and these brave young Irish-Catholic women from different generations drew me in. Lovingly and tenderly written, Erin's Ring is a story of true friendship, sacrificial love, and above all, the God Who is never bound by time or space."   --Nancy Carabio Belanger, author of The Gate First Place Winner, 2014 Catholic Press Awards for Novels

Talk about shedding tears: that exceedingly kind endorsement by an author I greatly admire makes my eyes glisten with tears of gratitude.  

God has a plan, I firmly believe that.  There was a reason that I wrote Erin's Ring, a reason that it made it into print, and even a reason that it didn't sell.  In spite of its lack of material success, I can only be happy when I think about that book.  I will always remember the complete joy that infused my very being every single time I sat down at my computer to write, during the six months that I worked on it.  It was truly a labor of love.  And just as I said of my first not-very-successful novel, Finding Grace,  I feel that if even one soul was touched in a positive way by the story, it will have fulfilled its purpose.

Why did I write this post today?  I guess just as mamas like to reminisce about the lives of their precious babies, long after they're grown, maybe authors like to reminisce about the lives of their books?  Sure, let's go with that.

Happy reading, dear readers!  

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