Once the Bemidji author discovered do-it-yourself publishing, there was no stopping her. Sletten has churned out 20 books, including a historical women’s fiction novel titled “The Women of Great Heron Lake” which recently won a silver medal in the Readers' Favorite Book Reviews and Award Contest.
Sletten has churned out 20 books, including a historical women’s fiction novel titled “The Women of Great Heron Lake” which recently won a silver medal in the Readers' Favorite Book Reviews and Award Contest.
“I usually enter the contest to get the reviews and see if I can use it for promotion,” Sletten said. “So when September rolled around, I decided to check out the results. I was just happy to get second place. It’s a great promotion thing.”
It’s also validation of her writing talents, which actually goes back to her college days. Deanna was studying accounting at Bemidji State University, and her English professors suggested she might be pursuing the wrong major.
“They asked me, ‘Why aren’t you writing?’” she said. “That kind of put the spark, because I always thought of stories but I never thought that was something you could make a living out of. It made me think maybe I could write something.”
Sletten, whose books are mostly romance novels and historical fiction, grew up in California, but her family moved to Northome when she was 15.
“My dad decided he had to have a farm up in Northome,” she said. “That came out of nowhere. We had traveled through Minnesota several times but never lived here.”
After graduating from Northome High School, she worked various jobs while studying at BSU. Later she got a taste of writing early on when she was a reporter for The American newspaper in Blackduck, and also did some freelance writing.
Parenthood also provided a chance for Deanna to write. While she and her husband Sid were busy with their two children, Michael and Deborah, she began writing freelance articles for Minnesota Parent and other parenting magazines around the country.
“It was the old days of freelancing when you’d get paid upon publication,” Deanna said, “and that whole $100 would come to you. Then I stopped writing again and was working, raising kids. But the whole time I was writing books, even though I didn’t know how I was going to publish them.”
She found out how to do that in 2011, self-publishing her first novel, “Memories,” and offering it on Amazon. Two more books followed quickly. All of them had been mostly written in earlier years. Sletten’s expectations were muted, but sales were solid.
“I was told that most (independent) published authors would make about $500 in their lifetime,” she said. “That first year I made $5,000. So I was like, ‘I think I can do this.’”
Her fifth book, titled “Maggie’s Turn,” hit the top 100 at Amazon, and prompted a call from a publisher.
Books by Deanna Sletten sit on the shelves in her office, along with awards from Lake Union Publishing for selling over 50,000 copies of her book’s “Finding Libbie” and “Maggie’s Turn.” (Annalise Braught / Bemidji Pioneer)
“I ended up publishing three books with them,” Deanna said. “But after a while they kind of forget about you and move on to someone else. So I got the rights to my books back and I self-published those. I’m actually doing better with them self-published. It was a learning experience to work with a publisher.”
Her latest work is titled “The Ones We Leave Behind.” It’s about a family torn apart and trying to put the pieces together after being separated for decades. A main character is shocked to learn that not only is her maternal grandmother alive, but she’s just been released after decades in prison.
“I don’t even know where I got the idea,” Deanna said, “but it popped into my head, what if a family member was in jail for all those years and you didn’t know it. Especially like a grandmother. The more I thought about it, it was like, ‘Oh, this could be a story.’ And 120,000 words later it was.”
Sletten says the historical fiction books require a good deal of research and can take several months, while the romance novels take much less time. She prefers to write late at night, averaging four to five hours per session.
Author Deanna Sletten sits at her desk at her Bemidji home overlooking the Mississippi River. (Annalise Braught / Bemidji Pioneer)
“When I started writing, our house was busy and I had to do it at night,” she said. “But now I just prefer it. I try to write almost every day when I’m working on a project, because otherwise you get out of the flow and it’s hard to get back into it.”
She’s been told she has an easy-to-read writing style.
“I’m more character driven, so when I write I really delve into the characters,” Sletten said. “Most of my readers feel like they know the characters so well that it’s someone they’d like to live next door to or someone they’d want to be friends with. Those are really nice compliments.”
More information about Deanna Lynn Sletten’s work can be found on her website at www.deannalsletten.com. Her books are also available on Amazon.
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Do it yourself: Bemidji author finds success in self-publishing - Bemidji Pioneer
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