Nosy November at Northanger: The Making of a Blog Tour

With my first published book (Onoto Watanna, a biography of my novelist grandmother, in 2001), there was no such thing as a blog tour in existence, so I was innocent of the subject. The book was published by a university press, and since my grandmother was something of a pioneer, being the first Asian American novelist and movie screenwriter, the book got some newspaper reviews and articles. By the time my Austenesque novels Mrs. Darcy’s Dilemma and Mrs. Elton in America were published by Sourcebooks in 2008, the blog tour was in its infancy.  It wasn’t yet an established institution with set author practices, but blogs were booming. As I followed several literary groups, I knew a few good bloggers, British ones particularly, and put together my own ad hoc blog tour, writing pieces and having conversations with these friends – about half a dozen of them.  It was fun, and sales of my books were definitely positively affected.

Fast forward to 2019, when my sequel to Northanger Abbey, The Bride of Northanger, came out just before the JASNA AGM in Williamsburg in October, where it had its gorgeous debut, amongst costumes, balls, and historical sites. Things in publishing had made a drastic sea change since my last outing, and unless you are a massive best seller you don’t have staff to organize your book promotion – but you do need help more than ever to get the word out in the labyrinthine book selling world.  I didn’t expect to get national publicity, since Austenesque novels are no longer a rarity, but I did want Jane Austen fans to know that I’d written a sequel to Northanger Abbey, which is a rarity – there’s only one of those for dozens of Pride and Prejudice ones!  So, I worked with a publicist. Laurel Ann Nattress was the editor of the anthology Jane Austen Made Me Do It, to which I’d contributed a story called “Jane Austen’s Cat,” and I knew she could organize a good book tour for me. And she did.

With authors Devoney Looser, Jan Mullany, Victoria Hinshaw, Diana Birchall

The Bride of Northanger Blog Tour had no less than thirty-one stops!  In the olden days, publishing companies set up real life tours for authors, and they’d travel to that many cities in order to sit in bookshops and sign books. No wonder the virtual blog tour has mostly replaced that expensive and physically arduous experience – yet it was arduous enough! Laurel Ann presented me with my list of the 31 stops, and their dates. Some would be reviews (for which I didn’t have to do anything), but others were “guest blog” posts, for which I had to write an essay or article, while others were interviews, which meant I’d answer a series of written questions. All were interesting and fun, but quite a lot of work to get just right, to describe the book meticulously and appealingly, and answer all sorts of questions about my process, inspiration, background research, and of course, on the subject of Jane Austen herself.  The deadlines piled up fast and urgently, and it seemed I was up against one nearly every day for a month!  But I consoled myself with the knowledge that at least I wasn’t on an airplane, and after all I did know the subject – my book!

For the research pieces I wrote about the paintings I’d used on the cover of my book, a portrait by Elisabeth Vigee Le Brun that I used to represent Catherine Moreland, and a Constable painting of Netley Abbey. As an example, the Vigee Le Brun one was written for a lovely historical site called English Historical Fiction Authors:

https://englishhistoryauthors.blogspot.com/2019/11/elisabeth-vigee-le-bruna-brilliant.html

And here is an example of a pre-written interview, an extensive one that Deborah Barnum of the popular Jane Austen in Vermont blog and I did together:

https://janeausteninvermont.blog/2019/11/06/blog-tour-for-the-bride-of-northanger-interview-with-diana-birchall/

As for the reviews, to my great joy, they were all very enthusiastic, with such quotes as these (if you will kindly forgive my flagrant immodesty!):

“It’s impossible to overstate how well Ms. Birchall mimics Jane Austen’s style of writing” – Debbie Brown, Austenprose

“The Bride of Northanger reminded me in many ways of Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë and Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier.” – Vic Sanborn, Jane Austen’s World

“You just have to experience if for yourself – it’s a Gothic romance at its very best!”  – A Bookish Way of Life.

Finally, the tour was over. The work was done. I could relax and look forward to Thanksgiving, but I found that I missed the intensity, the process, the satisfaction – and am anticipating doing it all over again the next time I write a book!

In a final act of promotion, I will randomly choose from the comments a winner who will receive a copy of The Bride of Northanger!