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Utopia PR laughs its way into the Indie Pennsylvania library collection

Published by Adam on April 14, 2021
Indie Pennsylvania logo

I’ve lived in Pennsylvania for a large portion of my life. I grew up in Bucks County, going to school at the Council Rock district. I left for college in Washington, DC, where I later got a journalism job. Then, my wife and I moved to Australia for a few years. Pennsylvania pulled me back to Philadelphia. It’s a great commonwealth.

This is a long way to explain how delighted I was to learn that my new dystopian satire novel Utopia PR is now part of the Indie Pennsylvania library collection curated by Biblioboard through its Indie Author Project! My other novels are also part of the collection previously known as SELF-e. Here’s a brief description of IAP:

The Indie Author Project (IAP) is a publishing community that includes public libraries, authors, curators, and readers working together to connect library patrons with great indie-published books. IAP has helped hundreds of libraries engage their local creative community and assisted in getting more than 12,000 indie authors into their local libraries. Most importantly, the project has worked with top curation partners and librarians to identify hundreds of these as the best indie eBooks available to readers—so they can be sustainably circulated to library patrons with confidence.

indieauthorproject.com
Utopia PR in paperback
Find my book at Barnes & Noble in Philadelphia!

In other exciting news, I found out just yesterday that Barnes & Noble will soon be stocking the Utopia PR paperback at its Rittenhouse Square location in Philadelphia, plus a couple other stores in the region! This is thanks to a new B&N policy allowing its stores to locally curate what’s in the store.

As a self-published author who spent many hours in B&N stores growing up, this is a big deal for me! You can also of course order my humorous sci-fi novel on the Barnes and Noble website from anywhere in the country. You should also be able to ask your local store to order a copy for you if you’d prefer to pick it up.

More of an independent bookstore person? I recently opened a storefront for all of my books on Bookshop.org, which shares part of its revenue with local indie stores. My bookshop also includes lists of novels that influenced me and other books that I recommend. Be sure to check it out!

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The Wanderer visits the library…

Published by Adam on August 25, 2018

Maybe you wouldn’t expect to find a couple of gunslingers holed out in a library. However, in a town taken over by the Red Stripe Gang, the library might just be the best place to plot one’s next moves.

The “library scene” from The Wanderer and the New West

That’s a scene from my dystopian western novel, The Wanderer and the New West. You can read a piece of it in the picture above.

I’ve always loved libraries, that temple-like space where one can find a new book and–gasp–take it home for free! Growing up in Bucks County, PA, my favorite section was the 741s. I assume you’re up on your Dewey Decimal System? See, that’s where they kept all the comic book collections, including ancient tomes like Superman: From the ’30s to the ’70s (for the record, I read this in the late ’90s).

That’s why it’s so awesome to see my novel popping up in various libraries across the country. It’s thanks to the great Kirkus review (a favorite mag among librarians), my book’s distribution on library platforms like Overdrive, and most recently, an appearance at the 2018 American Library Association conference in New Orleans, courtesy of Booklife by Publishers Weekly.

The Wanderer and the New West at the 2018 American Library Association conference in New Orleans.
The Wanderer and the New West featured at the 2018 American Library Association conference in New Orleans, courtesy of Booklife.

As an indie author trying to get noticed, my hope is that readers will find my novels in libraries (eBook and print!) and give ’em a try. If they love one of my books, maybe they’ll recommend it to a friend! Sales are great, but I’d much rather know that more readers are getting a chance to enjoy the words I’ve written.

If you can’t find my novels in your library, please request them! You can refer librarians to this post or the official page for The Wanderer and the New West if they need more information. Please let me know in the comments below if you found my books in yours!

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Divided We Fall Gets Some Library Love

Divided We Fall Gets Some Library Love

Published by Adam on May 8, 2018

Big news for library lovers! SELF-e by Library Journal selected my dystopian sci-fi novel Divided We Fall for a select pilot program with library eBook distributor OverDrive.

The addition to SELF-e Select on OverDrive means that Divided We Fall will be available free to 40,000 libraries and schools in 70 countries for one year. Also, Library Journal will promote my book in its magazine.

Divided We Fall reveals insurrection against a dystopian government that keeps a Watched list of its own citizens. Agent Eve Parker must arrest her fiancé after he loses his memory and becomes a revolutionary named Seven in a fight against the government. However, when she learns more about the President’s plan to broaden citizen surveillance, she begins to question just who is right.

Here’s more information about the pilot program from the email I received this week:

We have some exciting news! As you already know Divided We Fall was chosen by Library Journal as a SELF-e Select book, digitally placing it in every library participating in the SELF-e program on BiblioBoard, supporting nationwide discovery by new readers.

We are reaching out because Divided We Fall has now been selected for an even more refined collection, the best of the best, SELF-e Select on OverDrive.

SELF-e Select on OverDrive is a new one-year pilot project in partnership with industry leader OverDrive, who support a network of 40,000 libraries and schools in 70 countries. Beginning June 1, 2018 OverDrive partner libraries can enroll in the program at no charge. Following their enrollment libraries will offer the full SELF-e Select on OverDrive collection to their users for 12-months. After the conclusion of the program in July 2019, participating authors will receive usage data from BiblioBoard. As part of this collection, we will also be doing special advertising and promotion for your book with Library Journal, bringing more exposure to your book.

Pretty cool! Please look out for all my books in your local library. If you can’t find them, please request them from your favorite librarian!

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Bender Novels Featured in SELF-e Indie Pennsylvania

Published by Adam on May 14, 2016

Now free at your library!
Now free at your library!

As a local Philadelphia author, I’m thrilled to announce that SELF-e is now featuring my novels WE, THE WATCHED and DIVIDED WE FALL in its Indie Pennsylvania collection.

SELF-e is a curated collection of self-published works by Library Journal and BiblioBoard, and is available to participating libraries across the county. Because I’m from Philly, my books will be featured prominently in the Pennsylvania Indie collection. When you visit a library in any state that has BiblioBoard, you can access eBooks of my novels on library computers or on your personal mobile devices by downloading the BiblioBoard app from the Apple, Google or Amazon app stores. Since you’re getting them through a library, the books are free to borrow, though the app includes a Buy link if you’d like to add the eBook or paperback to your personal bookshelf.

I’m excited to make my books available to new readers! If your library supports BiblioBoard, please let me know your experience finding my book. And if your library doesn’t have it, ask them to look into it!

And don’t forget, you can also get WE, THE WATCHED free by joining the Underground, my monthly mailing list for fans.

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Library Journal tags We, The Watched in SELF-e

Published by Adam on March 5, 2015

SELF-e logoI’m excited to say that my dystopian novel We, The Watched will join SELF-e, a select list of self-published eBooks curated by Library Journal and Biblioboard!

This means my novel will soon be available to libraries all over the US through BiblioBoard Library. The first Library Journal SELF-e curated collection is expected to be available to libraries in mid-2015.

We, The Watched will also soon be available to readers throughout my home state of Pennsylvania in the Indie PENNSYLVANIA module as a highlighted selection.

The idea behind SELF-e is to expose notable self-published eBooks to readers around the country who are looking to discover new authors. Libraries can make ebooks available for free with no requirement to return the book and no multi-user restrictions.

Hugh Howey, author of the sci-fi series Wool and a major advocate for self-published work, has had some great things to say about SELF-e.

“The number one challenge any author has is building an audience,” he says on the BiblioBoard website.

“Once they have an audience, they have an opportunity to grow their work We, The Watched by Adam Benderprofessionally. Librarians can be a powerful marketing force for emerging authors, especially if they can promote the books without fear of success. The SELF-e approach to curation combined with simultaneous user-access will encourage books to be discovered and even go viral.”

In We, The Watched, an amnesiac struggles to conform in a surveillance society he doesn’t remember. Resistance is heresy and punishable by death. But some seek to ignite a revolution.

You can buy the novel in print and eBook from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Apple and other major online bookstores.

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