Why I Love Substack: Today's Example

Plus saying hi to new friends and goodbye to an old friend

One of the things that’s so great about Substack is how it helps writers build a community. That community can be other writers, or it can be much more specific, like other writers who are interested in boats and books. One of the pleasures of the last few months on this platform has been seeing how my subscriber list grows—maybe just one or two new people a week join us here, but our little community continues to grow each week. All thanks to Substack.

My case in point for this week: I subscribe to Small Craft Advisor (SCA), which is a Substack about boats and boating (duh) but the posts include such wonderfully diverse topics and voices—they even post letters from readers. I thought SCA would be a great place to find a larger audience for my own small craft adventure so I emailed them. They came back saying I could send them an excerpt from Honeymoon at Sea and they would feature it along with a book giveaway. How cool is that? So I sent them the book’s prologue and here’s what part of yesterday’s SCA page looked like (partial image of their front page below):

And this morning, I went on to see that a number of members of the SCA community had read the excerpt and responded to the opportunity by commenting that they’d like to be in the running to win the signed copy of my book. Some even commented on the prologue itself, saying they would buy the book if they didn’t win it! Again, how cool is that? Very cool. Check out my full prologue-post on SCA here.

Obviously, this is a win-win—the editors at SCA get fresh, unusual content and I get new eyeballs on my writing, probably sell a few books, and possibly even get a new subscriber or two. In fact, I got a new Substack direct subscriber today, which might have been from SCA. The ripples spread and grow wider, and so does my community of readers. Those of you who are still blogging, or thinking of blogging, might want to think about joining Substack.

Yesterday my second podcast and radio show with Positive Talk Radio (PTR) also went live. It was broadcast live on KIXI (a Seattle radio station) the day we recorded it, but I was finally able to see and hear it. What was funny about the video was that I recorded it in the bright sunny Port Townsend Yacht Club clubhouse, instead of on my boat, because we were up at Fort Worden on a mooring at the time, and the wifi was too iffy to risk recording from Watchfire. You can listen to my Positive Talk Radio episode here.

I embraced some other book/writing groups this week, too. I joined the Bookish Road Trip Book Club for another of their lively meetings (find the Bookish Road Trip on Facebook) where we discussed bourbon and a new novel or two. And tonight I am will be joining the The Southern California Writers Association for their weekly “virtual Happy Hour”! You can find out more about the The Southern California Writers Association on their webpage here.

Some sad news this week when I learned that Warren Robertson—my wonderful teacher when I was an aspiring actor in NYC—passed away just shy of his 92nd birthday. Warren was an inspiring teacher and mentor whose lessons still resonate in my life. He never lost his love of life, according to his daughter Carra, who kept all of us up to date with her dad’s lively comments and quips in the last couple of years. I’m so glad I was able to honor and acknowledge the legacy of Warren’s teachings in Honeymoon at Sea. I’m polishing up a poignant short memoir piece about his class that I hope to publish. (Image of a smiling Warren Robertson below.)

On a happier note, I want to thank you all for your assistance in promoting Honeymoon at Sea—the number of Amazon reviews has doubled since I requested your help. Luckily, they are all 5 stars, which is wonderful…Keep those reviews coming!

Not that I worry or fret about such things, but it was exciting to see my book hit #10 in Kindle and #12 in Books in New Releases in Hot New Releases in Canada (my publisher is Canadian).

So does this mean I am now an internationally bestselling author? I’ll just leave this screenshot image here and let you decide about that. (Amazon Hot New Releases image below.)

That’s all for this week…

hasta pronto!