On April 10 Bethany House kicked off author Beverly Lewis’s semi-annual, 10-day book tour with a stop at the Har-Mar B&N in suburban Minneapolis that drew 40 people. That in itself is not unusual, but Lewis, who is promoting her latest Amish novel, The Fiddler, will not just visit chain bookstores in the Twin Cities metro area, but will also stop at Christian bookstores and public libraries in small towns dotting rural Minnesota, North Dakota, and Wisconsin that rarely, if ever, host author events. There are 30 events scheduled between April 10-21, in 25 cities and towns ranging in population from greater Minneapolis (population 3,317,308) to Greenbush, Minn., in the northwestern part of the state, with a population of 719.
“If I could do the whole tour in towns of 25,000 or less, I would,” Steve Oates, Bethany House’s v-p, marketing, said, explaining that Lewis, whose novels typically sell 220,000 copies, is a big draw with the larger accounts, as well as with the small independents, thus necessitating the inclusion of three stops in the Twin Cities before the tour swings eastward towards Door County, Wisconsin before heading north to towns along the Canadian border.
“We build up the tour around independent Christian stores, and then add on the public libraries, and cross our t’s with our accounts by filling it in with stores in the Cities.” Lewis, who lives in Colorado, has written over 70 adult and children’s books, including 24 novels with Amish themes published by Bethany House.
Oates, who has accompanied Lewis on all of her tours since 1998, and does all the driving, explains that audiences –and sales – are much larger in small towns than in large cities. “The smaller the town the larger the crowd, the greater the sales,” he said, “There’s a social dynamic that takes place. You’ve created a party in places that have never had an author visit before. Everyone in town knows you're there.”
Oates recalled that on one stop in a previous book tour, in an Illinois town with a population of 120, 113 people attended the author signing, most of them buying at least one book. Typically, library events draw 60-80 people, and store events 40-60, although in areas with a significant Amish presence, audiences have topped 200.
Oates estimates that Lewis and he drive about 2,500 miles on each book tour. This year, Bethany House marketing manager Deborah Larson will accompany the two for the first five days, and fiction publicist Noelle Buss will accompany them during the second leg of the tour.
The Fiddler has been released with a 220,000 initial print run. “Lewis’s novels are about small town life and family values,” Oates explained, “Match that with a rural setting, and there’s a symbiotic relationship.”
