Cover Reveal, Guest Post, and Giveaway: Aunt Sookie & Me by Michael Scott Garvin

I had the great privilege of reading an advanced copy of Michael Scott Garvin’s upcoming second novel, Aunt Sookie & Me, and I couldn’t be more thrilled to be revealing the cover of this delightful book here at The Novel Approach.

Poppy Wainwright is the sweet Southern belle who charms readers through this story. Aunt Sookie is the ornery and sometimes irreverent woman who gives readers a laugh or three along the way. And Annabelle? Well, Annabelle is a goat.

And among the laughs, as is Michael Scott Garvin’s signature style, Poppy’s story will tug at your heartstrings.

So please, enjoy Michael’s cover and guest post, and then be sure to enter for the chance to win a print or e-copy of the book.

Welcome, Michael!

And so, I am left wondering, do all authors feel as I do?

When their second novel is complete, do all writers wake with a sense of anxiety about the impending release of a second novel? Are all writers excited, but with a slight tinge of nausea – giddy, but with a sense of dread churning somewhere down deep in their stomachs?

My debut novel, A Faithful Son, was a success by all measures – for this I am forever grateful, but nothing has prepared me for this phase.
I am left asking myself a litany of questions.

Will readers warm to the irreverent cast of southern characters?
Are all my t’s crossed and i’s dotted?
Will the book sell?
Will the reviewers be kind? 

Can I market it successfully?

Of course, in my typical fashion, I didn’t do myself any promotional favors with my odd marketing choices. With A Faithful Son, I was instructed by some in the industry to put a brooding, hot hunk on the cover – I opted out. Now don’t get me wrong, I love perusing all the many striking covers with hot shirtless studs standing on a sandy beach, or a brawny beefcake working on a construction site wearing only a seductive smile and a tool belt. But I fear those images are not in my writing future.

Alas, Aunt Sookie & Me arrives to bookstore shelves in a few weeks with an image of a goat – yes, the barnyard variety – adorned with a halo of wildflowers. No glistening bulging pectoral muscles, just your pedestrian, petting zoo goat.

I truly hope readers will enjoy my novel, despite its absurd cover. Maybe, there’s an untapped well of readers who are searching for such a novel? Who know, maybe, there are hundreds of thousands of avid gay readers out there who are anxiously waiting to spend their hard-earned money on a novel about goat! Nonetheless, enjoy Aunt Sookie & Me!  It was a labor of love – a complete joy to write. It is a rollicking romp of a ride through the South in 1968. The tale includes feisty debutantes, cantankerous old women, a corpse buried deep below a vegetable garden, a flamboyant ice cream man, the grand society ladies of Savannah and, yes, an ornery goat!

The Giveaway

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