In this final stretch before Chained Birds: A True Crime Memoir launches on Tuesday, I wish to thank a talented, generous group of fellow debut authors who formed an alliance and brought me into their fold. I’m speaking of the 2024Debuts.
Long before I joined, some entrepreneurial authors with books coming out this year banded together and created a private, invite-only group for traditionally published debut authors on Slack, the cloud-based communication platform. As word spread (I arranged an invite after learning about it in a Reddit sub thread) the group swelled to over 450 authors from all over the world. Through our common bond of releasing a trad pubbed book in 2024, we became a community of support and sharing. My book launch and author career have benefited enormously from the 2024Debuts hive mind.
Our space on Slack has been a place to congratulate, commiserate (especially post-election) and celebrate one another. We boost each other’s Insta reels and repost anything and everything requested in the “all-boost-requests” channel. Those with sales numbers to report share freely in a separate channel, where the topic of advances, earning out, and how many copies sold make you a success are recurring. (Ten thousand copies is still echoed as a benchmark, although it’s agreed that many fewer sales in niche markets will still likely guarantee a second book contract.)
We are sad for an author whose publisher declines their second book option, whose marketing team has fallen flat, or who is unfairly maligned by a tabloid critic, and we send hug emojis. We are thrilled for each debut who unboxes their hardcovers through misty eyes. We cheer for them on their book birthday, at their first signing and bookstore appearance. They all get pink heart, party hat, and clapping emojis, just like our authors whose books are reviewed by the NYT, who win awards, and who become bestsellers. (At last count, we had 38 authors hit either the NYT, USA Today, Indie, or Sunday Times lists, and some appeared on more than one at a time).
We share book recommendations that aren’t even ours and photos of “stress scones” made to quell nerves during the election frenzy. We are there with a joke and well-crafted expletive just when it’s needed. We are there.
Lisa Tirreno, debut author of the young adult fantasy Prince of Fortune, out on Oct. 15, says writing is lonely and hard, but “finding ‘your people’ and keeping each other accountable and motivated to keep going and sympathizing with all the big and small struggles—I think it’s absolutely vital in building a sustainable practice. Once you’re ready for publication, being able to share opportunities and lift each other up is both practically helpful, but a comfort, as well. Writers need writers.”
Beth Dotson Brown, whose women’s literary fiction debut Rooted in Sunrise, out on Sept. 17, says our Slack channel “has given me a ‘group’ to travel with during this debut year. Hearing the questions and struggles of others who are walking this road helps keep me grounded and sane because I’m not alone in this publishing craziness. I learn so much when we share our struggles and our triumphs. I will be eternally grateful for this support.”
For me, I’m not sure I would have had the confidence to attempt to record the audiobook of Chained Birds without a nudge from a fellow 2024 debut. OB/GYN and sister-Philly author Dr. Karen Tang recorded her audiobook—It’s Not Hysteria: Everything You Need to Know About Your Reproductive Health (But Were Never Told)—in a Philadelphia sound studio and made a cute video about it, which she shared with me. This became a referral, and I ended up recording my audiobook in the same studio with the same sound engineer. I can’t imagine finding a better experience elsewhere.
The 2024Debuts is where I learned about the podcast match-making service PodMatch, where I now host a profile and have over-booked myself with guest spots to the point of madness (a topic for another post).
So many good things have come out of our 2024Debuts Slack channel.
Our entire group is indebted to our resident graphic artist and debut author, Anna Kopp, who each month (and often week) assembles the about-to-be-launched book cover collages that fill our socials and souls like chicken soup. Anna’s young adult graphic novel The Marble Queen launched in March.
We are also grateful to Shannon Ives for running the group’s website. Shannon’s adult fantasy Those Fatal Flowers will launch with Bantam Dell in January 2025.
And now, with only 18 of us left to debut before the year ends, the group is less active, but in a way, is a more intimate gathering place with a core roster of supporters. Many of us hope our club will continue, even as all signs point to its winding down. All good things come to an end, they say … or not. Who knows?
Thank you, my debut besties ❤️
Carla Conti is a true crime journalist, storyteller, and prison reform advocate. Her debut book, Chained Birds: A True Crime Memoir, will be published by WildBlue Press on November 12, 2024.
