I needed a distraction from my editorial work this week so I decided to google our new Holiday Connections book. Imagine my shock when I found all four of our books available in the UK, France, Estonia, Denmark, Holland, South Asia, South Africa, Spain, Japan and many places in Canada. And that was just the first five pages of results. Some of the sites, I had to hit the “translate this page” just to understand what I was seeing.
I also found Holiday Connections mentioned on sites such as the British Columbia Booksellers Association as one of the new Christmas releases. I spotted the book in several Christian bookstores; it was listed among the new releases for a small independent bookstore in San Antonio, TX; and I found it for sale at quite a few Canadian independent bookstores. I even found it listed on a general gift site in the UK that also sold jewelry, toys, music and health products.
The feeling was so wonderful, I immediately called mom and shared my search results with her. We both agreed that it brought a whole new dimension to being authors: to know our names and our works are all over the world brings us both much joy.
I don’t know if that will ever translate into sales, and I’m not sure I really care. But the thought that someone across the ocean in Europe, Africa or Asia might be sitting curled up by a fire getting lost in one of our holiday tales or falling in love with Sam Osborne of The Fate Series is thrilling.
It also showed me how much I don’t understand about the big wide world of distribution and global commerce. We went with the same printing/distributing giant that our former publisher—Spectacle Publishing Media Group used: Ingram Sparks. I’d read that they have the widest spread around the world—even wider than amazon’s publishing arm. But how fast this all came about and how very broad that reach is, was jaw dropping
Surprisingly, it didn’t make me feel like a small fish in a huge ocean as you might imagine. It made me feel connected—part of the school of fish that loves books.
Readers: Don’t forget the holiday special for our newest book is available through November. Contact us at swopeparente@gmail.com if you want to order an autographed book at the discounted rate.
And thank you for being part of that school of fish!
Genilee Swope Parente
swopeparente 