2022: was it a good year or bad year? I experienced some extreme highs and extreme lows this year. The pandemic still lingered, my sister and brother-in-law were in a bad car accident, and I lost an old friend to a fatal motorcycle accident. But I also got signed by a literary agent this year and my latest novel was accepted to be published by a university press (to be released in 2024). More sad news: Malvern Books in Austin, Texas (one of my favorite bookstores) is closing on December 31, 2022; what a terrible way to end the year. But I’m not here to dwell on the bad or gloat about the good. I’m here to talk about one thing: BOOKS! I read so many great works of fiction: novels, collections of short stories, and the craft of writing books. Here is my list of the Best Books of 2022. Many of these were released in 2022. Some were released in late 2021 and some may not be out until early 2023. I have eclectic taste in books, so their categories vary from humor to literary to suspense to surreal. One thing is for sure: all of these books are great! Let's congratulate these stellar fiction writers for their fantastic books.

Best Books of 2022

Now Is Not the Time to Panic by Kevin Wilson

Unlikely Animals by Annie Hartnett

Tell Me One Thing by Kerri Schlottman

The Last Karankawas by Kimberly Garza

Beasts of the Earth by James Wade

Pictures of the Shark by Thomas H. McNeely

Valleyesque by Fernando A. Flores

Black Marker: A Novel in 100-Word Stories by Ran Walker

Hell of a Book by Jason Mott

Sparrow By Brian Kindall

Twentymile by C. Matthew Smith

Mixed Company by Jenny Shank

Honorable Mentions of 2022

If you read all of these wonderful books and are chomping at the bit for more, then I offer up my 2022 honorable mentions. Hannah and Ariela By Johnnie Bernhard, More Than You’ll Ever Know by Katie Gutierrez, and We Are All Together by Richard Fulco are great novels, too. Two books I’m reading now and enjoying, but haven’t finished yet: Saint Sebastian’s Abyss by Mark Haber and Year of the Buffalo by Aaron Burch.  I read quite a few book on the craft of writing, but these were the best I read in 2022: Refuse to Be Done by Matt Bell, Before and After the Book Deal by Courtney Maum, and Talk Talk: Interviews with Writers by Allan Vorda. I also read a ton of classics, but the two classics I loved the most in 2022 were: Tortilla Flat by John Steinbeck and The Complete Maus by Art Spiegelman. The best coffee table book / comic book aficionado tome was—hands-down: Fantastic Four No. 1: Panel by Panel by Chip Kidd.

Support writers as well as indie bookstores this holiday. Find many of these books over on Bookshop.org at the following link:

https://bookshop.org/lists/books-featured-on-austin-liti-limits

I am grateful to have interviewed many of these fantastic writers on the web series I co-host with my esteemed colleague Larry Brill: Austin Liti Limits. Watch here:

https://austinlitilimits.com

Have a great holiday whether you celebrate Christmas, Hanukkah, or Kwanza. And may 2023 be a great year for books, writers, bookstores, and readers everywhere!

Take care,
Scott

2021: what a year. The pandemic still rages on and the state of politics in the U.S. is... well, it’s a pile of stinking garbage. But I’m not going to get into that. Let’s talk about books! I read so many great works of fiction: novels, collections of short stories, and micro fiction. Yes, that’s a thing—a marvelous thing! Here is my list of the Best Books of 2021. Many of these were released in 2021. Some were released just prior to 2021, give or a take a year, or three. I have eclectic taste in books so their categories vary from humor to literary to thriller to microfiction. One thing is for sure: all of these books are great! Let's congratulate these stellar writers for their fantastic books.

The Secret Lives of Church Ladies by Deesha Philyaw

Trust Me by Richard Z. Santos

Summerlong by Dean Bakopoulos

Memorial by Bryan Washington

Olympus, Texas by Stacey Swann

River, Sing Out by James Wade

A Burst of Gray: A Novel In 100-Word Stories by Ran Walker

Porno Valley by Philip Elliott

The Elephant of Belfast by S. Kirk Walsh

Valentine by Elizabeth Wetmore

Escape from Oblivia: One Man's Midlife Crisis Gone Primal by Brian Kindall

Sisters of the Undertow: A Novel by Johnnie Bernhard

Honorable Mention: If you read all of these wonderful books, then I offer up my 2021 Honorable Mentions. Another fun indie novel is Knock on Wood by Leslie Tall Manning. A fun indie short story collection is Walking The Wrong Way Home by Mandy Haynes. A non-fiction book that is very moving and very powerful is Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption by Bryan Stevenson. I also read a ton of classic fiction, but the two classic novels I loved the most in 2021 are The Dog of the South by Charles Portis and All My Friends Are Going to Be Strangers: A Novel by Larry McMurtry; both novels are very funny and very unique. Oh! The Bottoms by Joe R. Lansdale is also a great literary, suspense / thriller novel from the early 2000s.

Support writers as well as indie bookstores this holiday. Find most of these books over on Bookshop.org at the following link:

https://bookshop.org/lists/books-featured-on-austin-liti-limits

I am grateful to have interviewed many of these fantastic writers on the web series I host along with my esteemed colleague Larry Brill (who has another great novel coming out, but not until 2022): Austin Liti Limits. Watch here:

https://austinlitilimits.com

Have a great holiday whether you celebrate Christmas, Hanukkah, or Kwanza. And may 2022 be a great year for books, writers, bookstores, and readers everywhere!

Take care,
Scott

2020 will go down in history as a year to remember. No, not for the pandemic, but for all of the great books I read! Here is my list of the Best Books of 2020. Many of these were released in 2020. Some were released just prior to 2020 (2018 and 2019 were also great years for books: sans-pandemic). I have eclectic taste in books so their categories vary from humor to literary to thriller to microfiction. One thing is for sure: all of these books are great! Let's congratulate these stellar writers for their fantastic books.

Ain’t Nobody Nobody by Heather Harper Ellett

The Seclusion by Jacqui Castle

In Wolves’ Clothing by Greg Levin

The Hollow by Owen Egerton

The Illusion of Leaving by Jeannette Brown

The Nickel Boys by Colson Whitehead

All Things Left Wild by James Wade

Nothing to See Here by Kevin Wilson

The World Is Yours by Ran Walker

The Printer and the Strumpet by Larry Brill

Let the Guilty Pay by Rick Treon

The Dark Corners of the Night by Meg Gardiner

My Thoughts on Harper Lee, J. D. Salinger, a Writer’s Legacy, and Their Wishes for Their Creative Work

On February 3, 2015, it was announced that Harper Lee, the author of the young adult classic To Kill a Mockingbird, approved the publication of a sequel 55 years after her much-beloved, award-winning, singular novel was published. According to a press release from Harpers (who only communicated through Lee’s lawyer and literary agent, not with Lee herself), a manuscript was “discovered” titled Go Set a Watchman attached to an original typed manuscript of To Kill a Mockingbird in storage. Then the frenzy began! “Another book by Harper Lee?!” they mostly said. “I can’t wait!” There were also dissenters who said, “Uh, this sounds fishy. Why now?” And I agree. Why now? For one reason only: Money.

You can Google the history of To Kill a Mockingbird and the behavior and quotes attributed to Harper Lee in dealing with the staggering success of her novel in the decades following the initial publication of the book. She never wanted to publish another book and was also quoted as saying that everything she wanted to say — as a writer — was in To Kill a Mockingbird. She was reticent to talk about the themes of the book, claiming everything you needed to know was also in the book. In the years following the publication of To Kill a Mockingbird the book as well the release of the award-winning and beloved movie version starring Gregory Peck, Lee certainly could have gone to her publisher and said, “I have another book! It’s about Scout and Atticus 20 years later. It’ll be a bestseller. I’ll rule the literary world!” But she didn’t, and the reasons she didn’t make complete sense to me as a writer.

It is easy for me to understand the excitement from readers who love To Kill a Mockingbird and their desire to want to read this newly “discovered” novel titled Go Set a Watchman. To Kill a Mockingbird is an American classic. People love this book. Practically every student in middle school or high school in the United States has read this book. It’s still in-print and sells over a million copies a year. People wanted more from Harper Lee back in the 1960s, and people still want more now. But as it states here, “Ms. Lee abandoned the manuscript [of Go Set a Watchman] after her editor, who was captivated by the flashbacks to Scout’s childhood, told her to write a new book from the young heroine’s perspective and to set it during her childhood.” Lee pulled out the best parts of this manuscript, abandoned it, and wrote another novel. Lee knew it wasn’t good enough then, and in the years after To Kill a Mockingbird was published, it still wasn’t good enough.

As a writer, I’m appalled at the idea that a few months after her sister died in the fall of 2014 (Alice Lee, a lawyer who was her companion and her protector from public scrutiny) and knowing that Harper Lee was in failing health (she had a stroke in 2007 and was nearly blind and deaf) that she would now, AFTER ALL THESE YEARS, approve the publication of a novel she abandoned in the 1950s. It’s just absurd. As great as To Kill a Mockingbird is as a book, great writers don’t always “hit them out of the park.” Sometimes great writers “whiff a few.” Sometimes, they write some stuff, and they think it’s shit. If she would have wanted this novel published years ago, then she would have done it. She was in the position to do it, whether it was crap or not. This is celebrity voyeurism at its worst, and contrary to Harper Lee’s wishes for her legacy.

Read the full article on Medium.com

This blog post originally appeared on Medium.com, January 6, 2020. Written by Scott Semegran.

I've recently been working on a web series I created with fellow author Larry Brill called Austin Liti Limits. It's a show about writers talking to writers about writing, something akin to Inside the Actors Studio but with writers. We will feature writers living in or visiting Austin, Texas and the episodes are filmed on location in Austin. Our next two episodes will be filmed at a cool coffee shop called Kick Butt Coffee on May 27, 2019 at 7pm. For more info about this live event, please go here.

Our focus is to feature a variety of writers to talk about the craft as well as the writer life. Our writers will range from bestsellers to indies to up-and-comers. Larry and I are very excited to bring this show to you and the viewers on the internet. You can view the Austin Liti Limits episodes on the website or subscibe to the two video channels:

https://austinlitilimits.com

https://vimeo.com/channels/1453667

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCQibsX2zypXAl41Ci4EpNig

Here are the two videos from Episode #1 featuring yours truly. Enjoy! And for more, visit https://austinlitilimits.com.

In the fall of 2018, I received the final version of my novel To Squeeze a Prairie Dog from my proofreader. The novel had gone through countless revisions, then spent long stints with two editors, so receiving the final version was very gratifying. After a few weeks of creating various eBook files, the paperback PDF, and the hardcover PDF, I was ready to release my lovingly crafted novel to the world. But wait, excited indie writer! I said to myself. You need to launch this new novel correctly. I saw my reflection in the computer monitor and remembered all the mistakes I made when launching my previous two books. It was a painful memory filled with regrets and poor decisions. I wanted to give this new novel — one that I had painstakingly written, revised, edited, proofed, and created — the proper send off. I wanted to release this book the way the big publishers release theirs.

How do you do that? you may be asking. That’s easy, my indie writer friend: careful planning.

In an effort to share what I have learned about properly launching an indie book with my fellow indie writers, here are all the things I did to properly launch my new novel. This is a long, comprehensive guide. It’s not for the cavalier writers, the ones who are too impatient to even read this guide in its entirety. Prepping a proper book launch is in many ways more difficult than actually writing the book you will be launching. But I promise you, there is some excellent information here. When possible, I will link to or at least refer to the sources of this information. I didn’t learn these things in a vacuum; I used Google, of course, to find this information. Each of these sections of information are out there on the internet for you to find, but I will collate the information in a concise, chronological guide the best I can.

Warning: some of this advice involves spending your own money and just like starting a small business, you will need to wisely dip into your bank account. This guide is not a pie-in-the-sky fantasy for a delusional writer who believes they can simply publish their book then land on a bestseller list; it’s a practical guide. I had to spend some money to launch my new book, but I tried to be smart and frugal about which services to pay for (then I eventually did land on a bestseller list). I will try to explain when and where it was worth spending money for me.

One more thing: I mostly write and publish humorous, literary fiction. You may publish romance or thrillers. There may be some promotional avenues I didn’t pursue because of the type of books I publish. I will acknowledge and elaborate on this when possible.

Ready? Let’s do this.

Read the full article on Medium.com

This blog post originally appeared on Medium.com, April 15, 2019. Written by Scott Semegran.

Recently, writer and contrarian Will Self declared that literary fiction is not widely read anymore. I couldn’t agree more. Sixty years ago, the likes of Lolita, Doctor Zhivago, and Catcher in the Rye were bestsellers; nowadays, a recent NYT bestseller list is filled with mostly crime fiction and thrillers. You’d be hard-pressed to name a literary fiction novel that has sparked the imagination of the masses recently in the way The Da Vinci Code, Fifty Shades of Grey, or any Harry Potter books did. In fact, I’ve recently had to explain to many curious readers just what exactly literary fiction is. As a writer of humorous literary fiction, I find this to be very disheartening.

Literary fiction is a catch-all category of fiction, an umbrella category covering a broad range of themes; it is a spectrum of literature. Many of you may be asking: What is literary fiction? NY Book Editors define literary fiction as a type of fiction that “doesn’t adhere to any rules. Anything can happen which can be both exciting and unnerving for the reader. Sometimes, literary fiction takes a common theme in genre fiction and turns it on its head.” This is opposed to genre fiction, such as mysteries or romance, which is also “known as popular fiction… Genre fiction is more appealing to a wider audience. It’s written for the mainstream reader” and typically follows a storytelling formula and is plot-driven: Boy meets girl, boy falls for girl, boy loses girl, etc.

NY Book Editors further describe genre fiction as entertaining, often featuring happy endings, making it easier to sell for publishers, mainly because something easier to categorize is easier to sell. “It’s a romance!” That’s a simple widget to describe, which makes it easier to commodify — supposedly. Literary fiction isn’t plot-driven; it’s character-driven. Literary fiction uses creative storytelling, explores the human condition, and many times has ambiguous endings. Most of the great works of literature are categorized as literary fiction: The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, The Catcher in the Rye, and To Kill a Mockingbird, to name a few. (These are American examples, of course. There are numerous examples from other countries as well. That’s another article for another time.)

Many works of literary fiction plumb the depths of the human condition and could be described as serious and dour. When many readers look to reading as a form of escapism, a book that is “serious and dour” can be a hard pill to swallow. Genre fiction can be easier to consume and therefore more appealing to a wider audience. But this an oversimplification. If literary fiction “doesn’t adhere to any rules,” then it doesn’t have to be serious or dour. In fact, two of the three examples of literary fiction I gave above are hilarious, and that’s not just my opinion. Huckleberry Finn and Holden Caulfield have endeared themselves to countless generations with their humorous and witty observations. So why is literary fiction now perceived as “serious fiction” and more substantive — therefore not as entertaining? Why does exploring the human condition have to connote that literary fiction is “depressing?” Defining a type of fiction that doesn’t follow any rules as depressing is, in itself, depressing. Literary fiction can be fun and entertaining while exploring the human condition. Literary fiction can also have happy endings.

And indie writers are leading the way with radical literary fiction that is free from constraints. Indie writers are breaking the rules, not only with their writing, but with the way they publish literary fiction: self-publishing.

Read the full article on Medium.com

This blog post originally appeared on Medium.com, Feb 24, 2019. Written by Scott Semegran.

These three indie books--one a rom-com, another a fictional memoir, and the final a satirical romp--will make you laugh, think, and smile (hopefully not all at the same time). Don't believe me? Check out the Starred Reviews for these fun, indie books.

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"A fun, satisfying read that will particularly appeal to older readers looking for romantic mulligans of their own." - - BlueInk Reviews (Starred Review) for Deja vu All Over Again.

"A piquant and fun romp that recounts the misadventures of a beer drinker who proves to be as insightful as he is amusing." - - Kirkus Reviews (Starred Review) for The Unlounging.

"An entertaining slice-of-life story that’s humorous yet uplifting at the same time. By the novel’s last page, readers will be longing for more." - - BlueInk Reviews (Starred Review) for To Squeeze a Prairie Dog: An American Novel.

Originally posted on RiffleBooks.com

Indie books sometimes get a bad rap because they are not from the big five publishers. Some indie books are from regional, small presses and others are from self-published authors. Here are five novels that will change your mind about indie books.

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The El Paso Red Flame Gas Station - "A well-wrought panorama of small-town dramas and discontents." — Kirkus Reviews (Starred Review)

Missing Mr. Wingfield - "With his impressively honed craft, Clark has produced an equally compelling literary draw." — BlueInk Review (Starred Review)

Sammie & Budgie - "Semegran is a gifted writer, with a wry sense of humor. Poignant, yet never maudlin, this novel will appeal to literary-minded readers and fans of magical realism." — BlueInk Review (Starred Review)

No Big Thing - "A well-written story—one that includes Old South traditions and dirt-road romances, with a healthy dose of beer joint camaraderie thrown in for good measure." — BlueInk Review (Starred Review)

Delivering Virtue - "Threads of satire are skillfully woven into this tapestry of humor and pathos, magical realism, and historical fact." — Foreword Clarion Reviews. Clarion Rating: 5 out of 5. 2015 INDIES Finalist.

Originally posted on Rifflebooks.com on 2/1/2018