Every month, I sit down and write a letter to fiction authors who are serious about building a career — not chasing trends, not copying someone else's playbook, but doing the real work of understanding their readers, their market, and their goals.
Then I print it, package it up, and mail it to your door.
No email you'll skim and archive. No course you'll buy and never finish. A physical letter — ink on paper — that you'll actually sit down and read.
I need to tell you how I got here.
I always wanted to be a writer. Growing up in the 90s, "getting published" meant checking out one of those massive Writer's Market volumes from the library and snail-mailing query letters to agents and publishers — most of whom would reject you or never respond at all. Even if you got lucky, making a living from writing was rare. So I did the practical thing. I went to college for computer science. I was going to get a PhD, become a professor, build a respectable career.
Then I got very sick.
While I was in the hospital, I came across a post online about self-publishing. This was 2011 — before Kindle Unlimited, before most of the infrastructure that exists today. And lying in that bed, I had a moment of clarity that I couldn't unfeel: I don't want to do this for the rest of my life. I didn't want the office politics. I didn't want to play the prestige game. What I actually wanted — what I'd always wanted — was a life where I could read, learn, and write to my heart's content.
So I started learning everything I could about self-publishing.
I didn't make much my first month. Or my first year. But I loved the learning. Things were still new back then — there weren't many "standards" or "accepted practices" the way there are now. It was the wild west, and I was fascinated by all of it.
But here's what I noticed: every time I tried to copy someone else's success — every time I wrote something because it was supposedly "popular" or followed some other author's formula — I fell on my face.
I had to find out why.
What I discovered changed everything. The books that resonated most with my readers were the ones I wrote with knowledge of the market, yes — but where I did it my way. I zigged where others zagged. I stopped copying and started thinking. And slowly, I built a small but loyal readership.
Then 2020 hit. The pandemic disrupted everyone's life and workflow, mine included. A couple of friends started asking me for help with their ads. Turns out my math and data skills from my CS background — the ones I thought I'd left behind — were exactly what they needed. But more than that, I could look at their business holistically and figure out how to work toward what they wanted. Not what they heard in some drama-mongering Facebook group. Not what a TikTok guru told them to do. What they actually wanted.
Word of mouth spread that I provided no-fluff results.
I took a story that had never really sold and shot it up to the top 5,000 in the Kindle store with a few simple tweaks. I superpowered another author's backlist just by updating their calls to action. I doubled someone's page reads with a single blurb change. Not by throwing money at the problem — by understanding how the pieces fit together and making small, surgical moves in the right places.
That's when I realized: the authors who are struggling aren't struggling because they lack talent or even because they lack effort. They're struggling because nobody has shown them how to think strategically about their business — their business, not someone else's.
Here's something I tell every author I work with: spending money to make money works. It genuinely does. Ads can transform your career. But only when every other piece is locked in first. Your blurb needs to convert. Your cover needs to signal the right genre to the right reader. Your email sequence needs to build a relationship, not just blast promotions. Your book page needs to close the sale. When all of that is dialed in, ads become rocket fuel. When it's not, you're just flushing money down the toilet — and then blaming the ads.
Most of the authors I talk to have it exactly backwards. They start with the ads and wonder why nothing's working. I start with everything else.
And it's not just ads. The same pattern plays out everywhere. You see a successful author talk about how they hit a bestseller list with rapid release in KU, and you think that's the strategy. Or someone posts about going wide and making bank on Kobo, and you pull your books out of Select overnight. You copy the tactic without understanding the foundation it was built on — and then nothing works. And you think it's you.
It's not you. It's that nobody showed you how the pieces fit together.
The blurb has to match the reader psychology of your genre. The ad creative has to match the blurb. The landing page has to deliver on the promise the ad made. The email sequence has to build the right kind of relationship with that specific reader. One weak link and the whole chain breaks.
This is what I teach. Not isolated tactics — the whole system.
Facebook ads are a big part of what I do. I've spent years learning to navigate the platform's constant changes, its gotchas, its quirks. I helped my latest client grow her revenue 5x in twelve months, largely through ads done right. But ads are just one lever. What I actually understand is how fiction readers discover books, evaluate them, and decide to buy — and how to build your entire marketing around that reality instead of guessing.
There is no golden bullet.
I tell every author I work with the same thing: I'm not here to tell you what you should do. I'm here to help you figure out what you want — and then build a strategy around that.
Do you want to replace your day job? Build a modest income that funds your writing life? Create a backlist empire? Write one series and market it brilliantly? Go wide? Stay in KU? Hit lists? Build a quiet, sustainable readership?
The strategy is completely different depending on your answer. And most of the advice you're getting treats every author like they have the same goals, the same resources, and the same definition of success.
In The White Space Post, I write for authors who want to think for themselves. Who want to understand why something works, not just be handed a template. Who want a real strategy built on their actual goals and values — not what the indie world at large says you're supposed to want.
What's Inside
Every issue is built around two anchors:
Beyond that, each issue includes one or two additional pieces drawn from whatever is most relevant and useful that month — not filler, never padding, just what you need to know right now:
Every issue is written by hand, printed on real paper, and shipped to your door on the 1st of each month. It's deliberately not digital. In a world where every author is drowning in tabs, emails, and Facebook group posts, this is something you'll actually sit down and read — probably with a cup of coffee and a pen.
I'm not asking you to say "yes."
I'm asking you to say "maybe."
Because you're new to my world, I'd like to offer you a free 1-month trial of The White Space Post. All I ask is that you cover the cost of printing and shipping — which comes to $[X.XX].
If you love it — and I think you will — your subscription will continue at $[XX]/month. If you don't, cancel anytime. No hard feelings. No hoops to jump through. Just send me an email.
But I want to do more than that. I want to make this an absurdly easy decision. So I've put together a few things you'll get instantly — and that you keep forever, even if you cancel.
Free Gift #1
[Describe this bonus. Ideally this is your most substantial offering — maybe a video workshop or mini-course on Facebook ads for fiction authors, or a comprehensive guide to building your marketing system. Explain what's in it and why it's valuable. Be specific about what they'll learn and be able to do after consuming it.]
Free Gift #2
[A practical resource — a PDF, a worksheet, a swipe file. Something they can use immediately. Maybe it's a template for running blurb tests, or a collection of high-converting blurb structures broken down by genre, or an email sequence framework.]
Free Gift #3
[Something that ties into your philosophy — a worksheet or guide that helps authors identify their actual goals, values, and priorities before building a strategy. This reinforces your "no golden bullet" positioning and shows you practice what you preach.]
Free Gift #4
[Access to your private community — a place where subscribers can share results, ask questions, and connect with other fiction authors who are thinking strategically about their careers. Monthly live calls where you do ad reviews, blurb critiques, or strategic hot seats.]
What Authors Are Saying
Common Questions
Each issue of The White Space Post is sent to the print shop on the first business day of the month. If you start your trial on, say, March 15th, your first issue ships on April 1st. For U.S. customers, expect delivery in 3–7 business days via USPS. International shipping takes 2–4 weeks.
Because you already get a hundred emails a day. This is something different — something you hold in your hands, sit down with, and actually read from start to finish. The physical format is part of the value. It forces me to be concise and curated, and it forces you to slow down and think. That's when the best strategic thinking happens.
If you write fiction and you sell (or want to sell) your books directly to readers — whether through Amazon, wide retailers, or direct sales — yes. The principles of reader psychology, market positioning, and strategic marketing apply across genres. I draw examples from many corners of the fiction world, and the strategic frameworks work whether you write romance, thriller, sci-fi, fantasy, literary fiction, or anything else.
There's no shortage of courses teaching you how to upload to KDP or set up your first ad. What's harder to find is someone who helps you think about how to apply all of that to your own business and goals — not someone else's "system." That's what this newsletter does. You don't need a backlist or a budget. You just need to be serious about building something intentional.
Email me. That's it. You'll find my personal email address in every issue. I'll process your cancellation promptly and courteously, and you'll keep all your bonus materials forever.