Newsletter: January 2025 Edition

Writer’s Wrapped 2024 and 2025 Goals, Latest Author Interview, and More

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Photo by Tim Mossholder on Unsplash (and enhanced by Scott Semegran)

Welcome to the January 2025 Edition of my newsletter and the beginning of a new year. I don’t know about you, but for me, 2024 was a mixed bag. Some amazing things happened, but some terrible things happened as well. My beloved cat and social media star, Berri, passed away in May. Then our family dog, Victory, passed away the week before Christmas. So sad! And don’t get me started on the U.S. presidential election: the saddest thing of all in 2024. That orange felonious sexual-predatory insurrectionist for president? Yuck! We could have had JOY, someone with intelligence and common sense, and our first woman for president. Anyway, onward to the writer newsletter stuff.

As for my writer self, 2024 was a bang-up kick-ass year. So many fantastic things happened, some of which were bucket-list items. Here’s my 2024 in a nutshell.

2024 Writer's Wrapped:

Published my 9th book The Codger and the Sparrow on March 22nd. Paperback from TCU Press and audiobook from Vibrance Press.

Book launch event at BookPeople on March 28th in Austin, Texas hosted by author extraordinaire James Wade (what?!)

Book launch event at Nowhere Bookshop on March 30th in San Antonio, Texas hosted by fiction grandmaster Andrew Porter (what-what?!?!)

Prepped my 10th book Starman After Midnight for March 4, 2025 release (my tenth book? WTF?!)

Finished first draft of my 11th book (OMG!)

52k words into first draft of my 12th book (what’s happening??? I’m on a roll!)

Appeared on live TV (so weird LOL)

Featured author at Boerne Book Fest (awesome)

Featured author at Greater Austin Book Fest (awesome)

Interviewed on the Desideratum Podcast by Theresa Bakken along with the narrator of my audiobook for The Codger and the Sparrow: Brian P. Craig (a special episode)

Interviewed on the Simply Write podcast by Polly Campbell (also special)

I’m so grateful for the support from writers, bookstores, libraries, editors, podcasters, publicists, my agent Mark Falkin, and—most importantly—my wife and family (♥♥♥♥♥). Writing is a solitary endeavor, but publishing takes a team. I’m glad I have a great team!

For 2025, I already have some events lined up including an appearance at the Hill Country Literary Festival and my first in-person appearance with a book club (!!!) to discuss The Codger and the Sparrow. I applied for a Guggenheim Fellowship. The Codger and the Sparrow was nominated for several book awards and I’m waiting to find out the results. And, like I said before, my new book Starman After Midnight will be released on March 4, 2025. Kirkus Reviews called it, “A big-hearted, often amusing tale of the weirdness of suburbia.” But my main focus in 2025 will be writing writing writing, the thing I love most about being a writer.

Something that really hit home over the last couple of years especially after being traditionally published with my ninth book (I self-pubbed my eight previous books through my imprint Mutt Press) was that writing fiction and publishing fiction are two very different things. There are a few elements that overlap but, for the most part, they are vastly different. They use very different parts of my brain and require a different energy and focus. Writing is always fun for me, or at least 99% fun with an occasional bit of frustration. I’ve developed a solid routine that allows my creativity to drop into the zone when I want it to, and there’s nothing better than that! When I have my coffee and a snack and my favorite writing tunes and my creativity is hitting on all cylinders, that’s always fun for me. Always. As a writer, there’s nothing better.

Publishing is a different thing altogether. Publishing is a business (and a somewhat dysfunctional one at that). Many things related to publishing that some people think are great are actually ephemeral (fame, money, status, etc). Many expectations are difficult to achieve or simply unrealistic (a career with longevity and support—LOL). Although several great things happened for me in 2024, a lot of these type of things aren’t guaranteed in the years to come. Many writers I know are struggling with publishing, several of which have deals with larger independent publishers or the Big Five, and yet they’re still struggling. How so?, you may ask. In so many ways. Too many books are coming out and most people in the U.S. are reading less, finding their entertainment elsewhere. Jeez, so what can a writer do? I know what I’m going to do. I’m going to do what I always do: write more fiction. Will my books find more readers? I can only hope. There’s always hope. I’ve had a day job as a webmaster for going on 25 years. When I was a young writer, I desperately tried to land a book deal that would get me out of my day job. But as time has gone on and I figured out how to write and publish books while also working as a webmaster, I’m glad I’ve kept with my day-job webmastering. It’s allowed me to support my family while also pursuing my writer dreams. I keep dreaming of a future where I only write fiction for a living. Maybe one day…

If you enjoy reading fiction, then please accept this hearty THANK YOU from me and all of my writer friends. We really do appreciate you! There are signs that reading paper books, just like listening to vinyl records, is making a comeback—thanks to the pandemic (can we thank the pandemic for something???). Maybe there is hope for a growing literary audience in the U.S. that hungers for reading more and more books. That is a future I’d like to see.

Recent Author Interview

My latest Austin Liti Limits interview is with Antoine Wilson! His novel Mouth to Mouth was my favorite book of all I read in 2024 (and I read a decent pile of books). It was also one of Obama’s favorite books of 2022. Watch this fantastic interview here:

https://austinlitilimits.com/episodes/episode-64-antoine-wilson.html

My Latest Book

I can’t sign off without mentioning once more that I have a new book coming out on March 4, 2025 called STARMAN AFTER MIDNIGHT, a quirky novel-in-stories about two beer-drinking next-door neighbors who couldn't be more different. When they discover a naked man roaming their street late at night, they decide to form a posse and investigate.

BlueInk Review declared it, “Effortlessly funny, likably odd, surprisingly moving, and imminently relatable—a genuine pleasure to read.” (* blushing profusely *)

You can get 25% to 50% off (!!!) of your paperback preorder from Tertulia. Receive 25% off your preorder using discount code STARMAN at checkout. Or get 50% off and FREE shipping if you opt-in for a free 30-day trial of a Tertulia membership — no commitment, cancel any time. Either way, you can preorder my new book and receive a great discount! Preorders are SO important for authors and new books. Get yours here:

Preorder STARMAN AFTER MIDNIGHT paperback on Tertulia

If eBooks are your thing, then preorder for your Kindle now at a great low price:

Preorder STARMAN AFTER MIDNIGHT eBook for Amazon Kindle

Thank you for your support. Until next month, read more books, support your local bookstores, visit your local library, be good to each other, and above all else: pursue happiness!

Sincerely,

Scott

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