Stark Reflections on Writing and Publishing EP 441 - A Bookstore for Indie Authors with Donovan Scherer
Mark interviews artist, author, and indie bookstore owner Donovan Scherer about his writing, his art, and his store in downtown Kenosha, Wisconsin.
Prior to the interview, Mark welcomes new patrons, shares recent comments, a personal update and a word about this episode's sponsor.
This episode is sponsored by an affiliate link to Manuscript Report. Use code MARK5 at checkout and save $5.00 off your own personalized report.
In their interview, Mark and Donovan talk about:
- Donovan background as an illustrator creating various characters, and then eventually moving on to writing middle grade chapter books
- Never really learning about how to sell books online, but rather through in person events like comic book conventions
- The popularity of the ZomBeans (zombies) Donovan has drawn, including unique caricatures of his patrons
- The idea of working on a "talking flowchart" to help understand what people gravitate towards
- How Donovan has been doing local markets for 15 years -- since 2010
- The regular festivals Donovan has started running in the parking lot across the street from his store
- Acquiring the Studio Moonfall 400 square foot store in 2019
- What Donovan carries in his store
- How Donovan acquired ten pallets of books from a library that was wanting to move them
- Half of what Donovan sells in his own store being his own work -- meaning that his average margin is much higher than most other bookstores
- The CUT THE LINE promo where authors can get their books featured in the store and via the store's socials by providing 8 copies of their book to Studio Moonfall
- And more...
After the interview Mark reflects on the incredible effort and unique approach to creating his own store in order to ensure his work was available in a brick and mortar space. He also talks about the various margins that are typical for bookstores and how Donovan has navigated that with some ingenius moves.
Mark also shares a special offer for patrons related to the CUT THE LINE promotion Donovan has in place.
Links of Interest:
- Donovan Scherer: Adventures in Art & Madness
- Studio Moonfall
- EP 440 - Behind the Scenes of the Podcast Guest Playbook with Matty Dalrymple
- Mark's Substack Article: When the Math for an Author Event Doesn't Add Up
- Manuscript Report (Mark's affiliate link)
- Buy Mark a Coffee
- Patreon for Stark Reflections
- ElevenLabs (AI Voice Generation - Affiliate link)
- Mark's YouTube channel
- Mark's Stark Reflections on Writing & Publishing Newsletter (Signup)
- An Author's Guide to Working With Bookstores and Libraries
- The Relaxed Author
- Publishing Pitfalls for Authors
- An Author's Guide to Working with Libraries & Bookstores
- Wide for the Win
- Mark's Canadian Werewolf Books
- The Canadian Mounted: A Trivia Guide to Planes, Trains and Automobiles
- Yippee Ki-Yay Motherf*cker: A Trivia Guide to Die Hard
- Merry Christmas! Shitter Was Full!: A Trivia Guide to National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation
Donovan Scherer is an author and illustrator creating worlds of adventure with a sense of humor and a little bit of dread that everything will go terribly, terribly wrong.
In 2009, he started the Fear & Sunshine series of middle-grade illustrated novels and began his work in book publishing. Along with developing more of his own series across novels, comics, video games, and animation, he also works with independent authors to help bring their stories to life.
In 2019, he opened the Studio Moonfall in downtown Kenosha, Wisconsin - an art studio and bookstore featuring his endlessly increasing body of work and highlighting other local and independent authors and artists.
The introductory, end, and bumper music for this podcast ("Laser Groove") was composed and produced by Kevin MacLeod of www.incompetech.com and is Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0