Invite Readers into Your Writing Space with a Where-I-Write Post
Your existing readers are already invested. They’ve read your work—whether on Substack or in book form. They want to hear from you. For existing readers, a peak inside your writing space will feel like a warm invitation. Maybe you’ve already done a version of this on Instagram, but Substack gives you a chance to do a deeper dive into your beautiful chaos.
Don’t just share photos, though. Tell a story around your writing space.
In Where I Write: a Minor Ode to a Blue Velvet Chair, I mention several of the places I’ve spent time writing, from a hotel cafe on the Upper West Side, to the closet of a small apartment in the building I managed in the Castro, to a Paris flat where the concrete floors in the apartment above were being dismantled with a jackhammer.
I show readers my current home office (where I don’t write), and then I take them into my my living room, with a photo of the worn-out blue velvet chair where I’ve written many books, the chair that has moved from home to home for nearly two decades, the chair where I’m sitting now as I write this post.
A Substack I love, , has a post titled A Peek Inside Our Writing Spaces, which includes (whose Substack is an excellent example of a warm, inviting author newsletter).
Getting personal works extremely well on Substack, and what is more personal than your writing space? A single photo will say a lot about you. The story you tell around that photo will say even more. Substack isn’t just about attracting readers—it’s about making personal connections. Showing where you write, mess and all, is an excellent way to do that.
By the way, “Where I Write” offers an opportunity for multiple posts, because you can also post about places you wrote in the past—your college apartment, a writing residency, a motel room…anywhere.
A Personal Story with a Literary Tie-In
Ideally, your Substack author newsletter won’t only pull in readers who are also on Substack, and it won’t only attract people who have already read your books. It will also cast a net on the internet that attracts readers who’ve never heard of you.
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