Writers Life | Book Clubs

For most authors, it would be a dream to have one of our books read by a book club.

I have had this happen five times that I am aware of. Three times for my non-fiction book, Sword Fighting: Applying God’s word to the battle for our mind, and twice for my Grace series. I say for the series because both of the book clubs loved the first book so much that they eventually discussed Books 1-3 of the 6-book series.

Advantages of book clubs

1. It introduces people to our books who may not have heard of them.
2. If they like the book, the readers may read more of your books and may even become super fans who will read everything you write.
3. Hopefully, in their excitement, they may tell others about our books.
4. With my recent experience, they ordered 20 more of my books directly from me. That was a good-sized single order.

Maximising the possibility of reaching book clubs

1. Write books that have issues worthy of discussion. Book clubs need books with enough meat in them to discuss for at least an hour.
2. Provide discussion questions. I have done this in two ways. For my first series I put them on my website because I wanted to lead people there and get them familiar with it. This also increased the likelihood that they’d become newsletter subscribers. I put a note on a separate ‘page’ of the book about where the discussion questions could be accessed. In my Old Testament series, I just put the discussion questions in the back of the book.
3. Let readers know you can be contacted to speak to book clubs. Most will assume you’re much too busy.
4. Keep alert. The first one I spoke to was because I saw them make a comment on Facebook that they’d used my first novel for their book club and loved it so much that, for the first time ever, they did three books by the same author in a row. I contacted them (a US group) and asked if they’d like to have a Q and A. They were ecstatic (it was rather funny because they were super nervous until they discovered that I was just a sister in Christ).

Different ways we can participate

Each of the book clubs have been different. With the non-fiction, some of the book clubs did one chapter each week and I was asked to be there a final week. I also answered questions about the book and the writing journey.

Another club does four weeks on a single book during the summer holidays. They were covering about four chapters each week. I was simply asked to participate in the final week and then answer questions about the story behind the book and my writing.

With the novels, the group did their own discussion first. Then I joined them afterwards (or on a separate week) so that they could ask questions about the series, my writing in general, my process, my motivations for writing …

I particularly enjoy this latter sort because authors so seldom get asked about all the background of our writing. It motivated me to continue writing.