Sandra Neily here:

About Library Presentations …

I am busy getting ready to do a library presentation. I haven’t done one in a while and need to get reactivated after pandemic sloth. Writing is a solitary gig and being out with people who ask questions about the writing but also about subjects that crop up in it …is renewing.

Michael at work, doing what he loves

I am experimenting with using a non-fiction partner, someone who won’t compete with my book sales, but one that will add interest and richness to the presentation as well as offer her or him good exposure. Michael Good is with me because I asked him to proof my draft of “Deadly Turn.” A bird naturalist with a guiding business, he’s also testified at wind power hearings about the core conservation issues I have in the mystery.

Here’s how I go about prepping for the day

Light pollution map shows clearly (with darkness) that Maine has the last chunk of forest in the east.

I send out a press release blurb that is convenient for a library to use. I send it out in Word and encourage them to edit in any way that works for them. It should have something “sexy” (a sit up a take notice thing) that will spark interest. This time I included the map of light pollution that shows Maine as the only eastern place that’s not overrun with civilization. (That means there’s habitat for wild creatures there.)

I also send along a headline that might be helpful. We crafted a title for the talk that might lure in guests: Live Birds and Deadly Forces. Check out Camden’s release to see how they used it  (They used most of what I sent.)

(The more we give overworked librarians material to use, the more we might add to the success of the event.)

I ask the librarian to announce a raffle for a free book. I draw up forms that include the person’s name and email. (I keep the emails for my newsletter mailing list but ask for permission before folks leave.)

If I have any slides that I’d like to use, I send the library my slides via Google Drive or a flash drive if the library is set up for that. Find it here. (More on that below.)

I add the presentation date and a shorter press release to any social media outreach I have going on and my website. And I include a link to the library’s announcement.

I gather up all my stuff: raffle slips and pens, a brochure rack for my flyer, signed books that include a business card of my contact info with a short book review, plenty of cash for change … (still not using my phone for payment; gotta get on that).

  If I have a work in progress, I put together some first chapter pages to hand out as a teaser and headline it with a short synopsis. I do juice it up a bit with pics or clip art.  I’ve included just the first paragraphs of a teaser here.

DEADLY HARVEST, A Mystery in Maine # III       

Can salamanders solve a murder mystery? Good question ….

     The Plot … the Murder … the Threat: Cassandra Patton Conover, weak from months long cancer treatment, arrives at her woods cabin only to fall through melting spring ice with her dog Pock. Life gets complicated when her snowshoes snag a body under the water and she finds her backyard woods littered with No Trespassing signs and cameras. Patton is intimate with this threat: an out-of-control assault aimed at the health of what it attacks. With her wayward dog, wild creatures of all sizes, and a game warden who cannot turn away from Patton or the looming loss of his tribal lands, she (once again) steps outside the law to solve a murder caused by relentless forces aimed at the Maine woods and its wildlife.

Chapter One

Up to my waist in broken ice, snowshoes scrambling for good footing in the melting marsh and lake bottom muck, I struggled for breath. Even though the water was chest high, I couldn’t seem to get air into lungs that had seized up. Ice-water saturated my clothing and found skin.  

I saw Pock sinking into a happy crouch. My dog is a Lab. Water—any water— is heaven-sent.

“Nooooooo,” I yelled. “No, don’t jump! Not fun in here. Not FUN!” …

“Deadly Turn” is about wind power where, perhaps, it may not belong. I’m doing some field research here.

Drawing Readers to the Heart of What Matters: Michael and I are using a short PowerPoint that I send to librarians (via Google Drive….it’s really easy and one creative effort is useful for a long time). Depending on the subject matter in the novel (and most of our novels deal with social or geographic issues in some way), I find readers do like us to touch on core issues or locations we explore. It doesn’t have to be topical. A mystery that takes place on a Maine island could have a few slides about the Maine Island Trail. Or if one takes place in a seamy, dangerous alley, a few slides on the old Commerical St. (where we were NOT allowed to go as teens) and what it has turned into now. That kind of thing.

Now that I’m all geared up for this week’s presentation, I will be ready to arrange fall and winter dates and get back on the road. (After the total knee replacement coming my way.)

Sandy’s debut novel, “Deadly Trespass, A Mystery in Maine” won a national Mystery Writers of America award, was a finalist in the Women’s Fiction Writers Association “Rising Star” contest, and was a finalist for a Maine Literary Award. The second Mystery in Maine, “Deadly Turn,” was published in 2021. Her third “Deadly” is due out in 2025. Find her novels at all Shermans Books (Maine) and on Amazon. Find more info on Sandy’s website.