COST TALKS and PIRATE TRAP by Matt Cost

Pirate Trap arrives Wednesday. March 27th. Much like a C-section, the birth of my book has been predetermined. A year ago, it was just an idea trickling around in my being, but it is about to become a reality. A living, breathing, entity of setting, plot, characters, twists, and turns.

And just like that, I am at the final stage of a writer’s duties, having traversed the entire spectrum of the creation of a book—idea, research, write, edit, market—and now, promotion. This is the chapter of development that is similar to the raising of the child. It is time to introduce Pirate Trap to the world and hope that friendships and respect develop.

Promotion. This is the part of the job that gets me out from behind my computer screen, up and off my butt, and out to visit the general public and introduce them to my book. At this point, three parts of the marketing campaign come to fruition.

Podcast and radio interviews. I have had two so far, one was Sunday Tea with V and the other was for Big Blend Radio. Check out the links to listen to those and more will follow.

Reviewers who have been sent ARCs (advanced reading copies) of Pirate Trap will now be weighing in with their thoughts on the merits of my newborn. This is out of my hands. I hope that they see the beauty of my creation and heap praise, maybe even a tad of adulation, but it is no longer up to me.

The second phase of marketing coming to bear at this time of promotion is that of book talks. In this case, I am calling them COST TALKS. Over the course of April and May, I have arranged twenty-two such events. These are mostly in Maine, and mostly at libraries, but there are a few exceptions to both rules.

These COST TALKS will be me sharing the evolution of Pirate Trap from idea to promotion. The trials and tribulations, the good and the bad, the essence of creation. I will read a short passage (very short). And best of all, I will get to interact with real-live human beings. Not Zoom nor AI nor telephone nor text. Real people.

The most essential part of a Cost Talk is interaction. Audience participation. Question and answer. Comment and criticism. So, please, if you are in the area of one of these COST TALKS, please stop in, weigh in, and have some fun with me. I was just kidding about that criticism part. Don’t really do that.

There will be more COST TALKS in June and July. Check my website for places, dates, and time. Then, in August, they will rev back up with the release of City Gone Askew. COST TALKS. Write on.

 

About the Author

Matt Cost was a history major at Trinity College. He owned a mystery bookstore, a video store, and a gym, before serving a ten-year sentence as a junior high school teacher. In 2014 he was released and began writing. And that’s what he does. He writes histories and mysteries.

Cost has published five books in the Mainely Mystery series, with the fifth, Mainely Wicked, just released in August of 2023. He has also published four books in the Clay Wolfe Trap series, with the fifth, Pirate Trap, due out March 27th, 2024.

For historical novels, Cost has published At Every Hazard and its sequel, Love in a Time of Hate, as well as I am Cuba. In April of 2023, Cost combined his love of histories and mysteries into a historical PI mystery set in 1923 Brooklyn, Velma Gone Awry. City Gone Askew will follow in July of 2024.

Cost now lives in Brunswick, Maine, with his wife, Harper. There are four grown children: Brittany, Pearson, Miranda, and Ryan. A chocolate Lab and a basset hound round out the mix. He now spends his days at the computer, writing.