The Dead Writer's Society

     First, put this song on, “Love Never Dies” by Julian Lennon ( the link at the bottom of this piece), then read.

Let’s be blunt here. I write because it burns inside me. I post it in the hopes that you, as the reader, will love it, comment on it, share your thoughts, and let me in on how it affected you and also to learn your stories. I also want to grow my readership. It’s going slowly.

      I asked my small Twitter following for advice on how to grow my readership. “Follow writers you love and engage with their posts and readers.” Great advice. So, I followed a few authors who came right to mind, and then…crickets.

      Most of the writers I love are dead. Hmmm…Seems I must form The Dead Writer’s Society. Thoreau, Emerson, Whitman, Mary Oliver, William Still, Jean Craighead George, Holling C. Holling, James Baldwin, and the list goes on. They are all dead. No Twitter, no Social Media sites to engage with them. Where does this leave me?

      Well, it leaves me with questions, of course, because that’s how my soul operates. They are selfish questions as they revolve around the “Now what?” in today’s self-promotion vehicles. I have a book coming out in May 2024. (Details will come, just not yet). It’s my first book, and I really wanted to get representation for it, to get it published before my parents died. The good news is they are both still living (91 and 86 years old), and both know that my book will be published.

     Yes, at age 61, I am still wanting to make them proud. And I have. You see, I’m a middle child between two highly intelligent sisters, and never felt like I measured up. I don’t measure myself against them anymore. They are my peers, and they are my fiercest cheering squad.

     But that still doesn’t solve my problem with The Dead Writer’s Society (TDWS) and spreading my social media presence. Is it morbid to ask, “What dead writer do you love, has influenced you, or continues to influence you? Is that the defining question for TDWS?

      It feels like I’ll have to change my profile photo to me dressed in black (oh, that’s not a problem as you read about when my daughter defined my style as that of Steve Jobs), Wednesday Addams makeup, hairstyle (oh, wait, I already wear my hair in two braids…they are just silver, not black), staring at the camera in a hopeless gaze into nothingness, very Nietzche.

      If you know me, most photos capture me in a laugh, a giggle, a smirk, a sparkle which now is punctuated by the lines leading to my eyes. I hate the term “Crow’s Feet.” That’s not what mine are. They are Laugh Lines-that’s how I got them. Oh, that and baking in the sun. Ahhhh, the sun. I do not regret a moment of my un-sunscreen squinting.

     This still does not solve my problem of how to promote myself or how to gain readership so that I can share my book, my story, and the story of coming of age in Cold War West Germany.

Some of the people in that book are now dead. They weren’t when I first started writing it, but I kept getting rejected by Literary Agents and Small Press Publishers.

      Who are the dead writers you admire, read, and inspire you? Share them in the comment section if you would please. Let me know; I am not alone. Thank you for listening, and thank you for reading.