How to discover new authors

How do you discover new authors? Do you go to bookstores? To libraries? Do you read reviews? Do you subscribe to a newsletter? Or do you go to an outdoor store? Yes, I did say "outdoor store." While it seems an unlikely place to look, we've done very well at one outdoor store.

 

Bluff Mountain Outfitters in Hot Springs, North Carolina, caters mainly to area hikers and thru-hikers on the Appalachian Trail, which conveniently follows the sidewalk in front of the store. They carry trail foods, clothing, maps, souvenirs, and all the usual outdoor store stuff. But they also have a small but excellent selection of books by regional authors.  You'll find the well-established writers such as Lee Smith, Robert Morgan, and Sharyn McCrumb. But we've also found writers that were new to us. First it was Vicki Lane, I believe sometime before her second book came out. Her fifth Elizabeth Goodweather novel is due out this coming Tuesday, October 18, and she has long since joined the ranks of "established" writers.

You can find out more about it here. We've read every one up to this point and have enjoyed them all. We're looking forward to the latest.

Our latest find was Rachel Keener.

We discovered her and her first novel last month returning home from visiting our son and his family. My wife read it first and assured me I would like it. I'm not quite finished with it, but I can say, this young woman can write. If her second and subsequent novels can maintain the quality of the first, she will eventually join the pantheon of Appalachian writers. Her second novel is out and we plan to order it, just as soon as we finish reading Sharyn McCrumb's Ballad of Tom Dooley and Vicki Lane's Under the Skin.