Oh no, I made a book video for TikTok

Because Runaway is out in paperback, and also, why not?

February 21, 2023

Today, Runaway: Notes on the Myths That Made Me, a book that took me four years — but also, my entire life so far — to write, is out in paperback. Paperback! It features new blurbs from its gracious reviews, and it even has a little badge on the cover telling the world that NPR named it one of their best books of 2022. I’m very proud of this book and I don’t care if it sounds like bragging to say so. I didn’t “write a thing.” I wrote a book about my mother’s harrowing and joyful time on the road as a teen runaway in the 1970s, and how learning the truth about her story and my father’s changed my life, and I hope everyone reads it.

I had the loveliest of hardcover launches last fall. I can’t say enough good things about the team at Belt Publishing, which has been an absolute dream house to work with: Publisher Anne Trubek, who scooped me up out of my “I broke up with my agent and nobody will ever love this book” blues and got the vision I had for Runaway; Michael Jauchen, my most precise, patient, and intuitive editor; David Wilson, our brilliant cover designer who created the Mystery Girl on the cover (who IS SHE?!); Martha Bayne, who not only copyedited but talked me down out of a serious pre-publication freakout tree at AWP; and publicist extraordinaire Phoebe Mogharei, who is so damn good at her job, you don’t even know.

Deborah Jayne worked with me to plan the fall Runaway tour, and my conversation partners and I were welcomed by so many indispensable independent bookstores: The Strand, which hosted the indefatigable Sue Shapiro’s amazing panel and even more amazing crowd; Word in Jersey City; Philly’s A Novel Idea (and Latchkey, Philly’s best new record store!); Baltimore’s Ivy Bookshop; Mac’s Backs in Cleveland; Two-Dollar Radio HQ in Columbus; Malaprop’s in Asheville; Read Spotted Newt, in Hazard but on the road in Richmond at Apollo Pizza; at Joseph-Beth in both Cincinnati and Lexington; and of course my home base of Carmichael’s in Louisville. Shout outs to Georgia Center for the Book, George Mason University’s MFA, and my own Naslund-Mann School of Writing at Spalding University for amazing reading/conversation events as well!

But the truth is that a paperback launch is a different beast. The book, it’s out there already, but I know it hasn’t found all of its audience yet. This spring, I’ll be appearing at festivals, university visits, and reading series, and I’d love to book some more. Book talks and in-conversations and readings and panel appearances and signings, I know how to do and I’m pretty good at it, I think. What I don’t know how to do is talk to readers where they are online to get them more invested in my book. So I did a thing, as we say. I made a video for it for TikTok.

I did not do this lightly. I built my platform on Twitter, mostly, which is currently in a slow slide to oblivion that reminds me of the shopping center we called The Off-Price Mall when I was a kid. (It wasn’t always a dump, but once A Real Mall opened, its fate was sealed. Slowly, tenants vanished, and upkeep suffered.) I’m also on Facebook, sort of, and on Instagram, where I post photos of my home bartending efforts and my pets. In those places, I think I do a good job of talking to folks who already know me, or some version of me. But this essay by Leigh Stein on LitHub, “BookTok Is Good, Actually,” really resonated with me:

Prestige? Success? Hollywood jackpot? Even if we win, HA!, say it with me and Tripper: It just doesn’t matter! IT JUST DOESN’T MATTER!

What do I want as a writer? For people to read my book, and want to read more from me, so I can keep writing them. And when Leigh writes, “When I scroll TikTok, I see creativity, joy, pleasure, energy, and a contagious enthusiasm for books,” my first reaction was YES PLEASE MORE OF THAT. (Case in point: Carmichael’s!)

My second reaction? Paralyzing fear, hello old friend! I started treating it like homework, starting with a long creative conversation with Drew where I hammered out the concept. I got this close to drawing up storyboards before I realized I was taking this way too seriously because I was afraid.

So I made this instead.

Is my first foray into TikTok videos excessively silly? It is. Am I afraid of being very uncool in a space I don’t know very well? You bet I am. But what if It just doesn’t matter if I look like a dork on TikTok? If this video makes one person I don’t already know aware of my book and curious enough to read it, it’s worth it. You can’t lose TikTok. It’s not a competition. If you’re on TikTok, I’m @eekshecried over there, as I am on Twitter and IG. Follow me and I might get up the courage to post more North Star Energy over there.

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