The Upside of the Virtual Book Launch

“You know, Mom, this is a celebration,” my wise and observant daughter said to me four days before the virtual book launch of my memoir The Red Kitchen. It was good to be reminded that what felt like the notorious “marathon mile 25” was also a short distance from the finish line.

When She Writes Press accepted my manuscript for publication I pictured myself standing in my local bookstore, hoping the room would be full, and signing a few books. That was back in 2019 and disappointed I had to wait until April 2021 for my pub date. By April 2020, I was grateful for the delay, knowing that bookstores as well as authors were still figuring out how to virtually promote books.

I’m lucky. Where I live in Bellingham, Washington, there’s a thriving bookstore, Village Books, with an abundance of author and community events on the calendar. I wanted to be close to my pub date and before my birthday—two major events for me this year—and emailed Claire at the store. She arranges the author events and hadn’t even started booking for 2021—nothing like being first and having my choice of a date! We settled on Friday, April 9th at 6:00 PM (PDT) to allow for friends on the east coast to join me. This was my first aha! moment. I wasn’t limited to just local people to attend and sent a bookmark and printed invitation out to 50 friends all over the country and Canada.

After I had my launch date, I talked Cami Ostman, founder of The Narrative Project, into being on the launch with me. She taught the memoir class where my decades old stories about my family came to life. During the nine months of the class, stories I’d filed here and there on my PC—one I’d written the first time in college decades ago—or found in a box and brought them into a book. 

We agreed to chat on zoom in mid-March to make a plan for the launch. She had several other virtual author conversations under her belt and took the lead. What a relief to have good company.

“We’ll choose four or five questions that illustrate the arc of your book,” Cami said. We agreed on a series of events that illustrated what the book was primarily about—a complicated family, reconciliation, and coming of age for both myself and my mother later in her life. 

“Not now but in the next few weeks, write down your answers to these questions, let your ideas cook the way you tend to process, and then don’t look at them again. If I see you reading from answers during our hour, I’m going to ask you a different question—one you won’t find in your notes. It has to be a real conversation and not a recitation.” I had watched a few authors launch their books and knew she was right. 

By late March I was feeling the pressure of creating a most enjoyable hour possible for friends who would join me. By Wednesday, April 7th, I had stopped answering the questions in the middle of the night and had settled down to only moments of waking stage-fright.

The day before the launch I was fighting an allergy attack—tree pollen extraordinaire plus singing sinuses. I must have looked ashen as my daughter and I were working out my big night key details—the right lighting, the best outfit, and what to do with the cat if she starts meowing.

“Do you have some blush and foundation, Mom?” I couldn’t remember having been into my makeup drawer in over a year. Since the pandemic, the most I did was fill in my eyebrows if I was really going out, not just running to the store or meeting a friend for a walking, coffee chat. Even a bra had once again become optional to say nothing of the five at-home outfits I chose in the morning after my shower to wear.

God bless the friends and fellow authors who sent me emails launch day wishing me the best. Now it started to feel like a celebration. 

Cami, Claire from the bookstore who would run the video and introduce us, and I each had a glass of wine at 5:00 PM, an hour before we went live. If there is one thing out of all of the preparatory steps to take, this might be the best one. I’m not talking about slurring your words; dark chocolate be your thing. The point is to find something relaxing enough to take the edge off and make it fun for you and your guests. 

And it was fun! It was my night and I’d worked my butt off for several years to write the best book I could, with a wonderful cover, and this was my hour. And one more tip that may or may not apply. Very much like my experience getting married—young, too young—I was so nervous that later I couldn’t remember very much about the event. I did know the groom missed and I had a little cake up my nose, but past that it was a blur. This event—no cake, no blurred memories, and a video of the hour that I could send to friends who couldn’t make it and to watch myself.

I haven’t watched the video yet and not sure why. I think like writing a memoir you need a little distance before you’re ready to put pen to paper. I’m looking forward to sitting down some evening in the near future, put my headset on, have a glass of wine, and watch. 

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In the past, Barbara Clarke has written extensively for corporate clients, trade magazines, worked under a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation grant, non-profit organizations as a grant writer, and for local and alternative newspapers on a variety of topics. In 2009 she published an indie memoir, “Getting to Home: Sojourn in a Perfect House,” about the process of building a house as a single woman. Other publications followed. For more info, visit https://barbaraclarke.net/. 

THE RED KITCHEN: A MEMOIR

At the age of seven, Barbara witnesses a frightening incident between her parents. She goes on to spend much of her childhood toggling between the happy family she longs for and the unhappy one she’s in but can’t repair. Disturbed by the smell of rotting leaves and an uneasy feeling about her father, she will spend half her life trying to get to the bottom of the reasons why.

As an adult, a summer in Africa allows Barbara to live without labels—wife, mother, daughter, sister—and become the woman she wants to be: funny, compassionate, complex, and often flawed. The Red Kitchen is the story of both Barbara and her mother, who, like many women, both spend much of their lives surrendering to society’s expectation to be one thing while yearning to be another. Ultimately, both women—in very different ways—come of age, find the loving parts of their mother-daughter relationship, and start living their best lives.

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Category: Contemporary Women Writers