All the reasons you should immediately pre-order my debut novel BE WELL.

Seriously, pre-orders are so important for authors like me. Let me explain why.

It’s finally here! I honestly can’t believe it. Here I am, telling you the biggest news I have ever shared as a creative writing person.

My debut novel Be Well, which is out June 23, 2026 from Heliotrope Books, is now available to pre-order from your favorite online retailer.

Whether you prefer to buy books from Bookshop.org (P.S. same!), Barnes & Noble, or Amazon, you can now pre-order Be Well from any of them and have it delivered by June 23 or very soon after.

Here are the links:

Pre-order Be Well from Bookshop.org

Pre-order Be Well from Barnes & Noble

Pre-order Be Well from Amazon

This is the kind of graphic design I do at 11:35 p.m. on a Monday night. Points for enthusiasm at least.

If you want to learn more about the book and read some of the wonderful reviews it’s already received from some incredibly smart people, please go check out www.sarahflocken.com/books.

But I know it’s not enough for me to just tell you to pre-order my book. Unless you’re a huge book person, an author yourself, or in publishing, you probably don’t really know why authors are always asking you to pre-order their books. What’s the point of ordering something when you can’t get it for another couple of weeks or even months? Life is short and delayed gratification is overrated!

The TL;DR answer is: because the way things are in publishing right now, it helps us look good to bookstores, future publishers, and acquisitions editors. It also helps give us a chance at bestseller lists, which is good for our future writing careers. More pre-orders of my debut novel now = more of a platform for my future books later.

The longer answer: See below. Listicle time!

Why pre-orders are so important for authors

1. Pre-orders help bookstores and other booksellers determine if a book is worth stocking. If a bookseller looks in an online distribution system and sees that there are a lot of pre-orders for a book, they might think “Hm, this author seems popular, maybe I should put their book in my store. Maybe I should even face it out on the shelf!”

2. Pre-orders count as “first day sales,” which get authors on bestseller lists. If you’ve ever wondered how books end up as “instant bestsellers” or get on things like the New York Times or USA Today bestseller list within days of publication, it’s all about pre-orders. Every pre-order counts as “first-day” sales, which is especially important considering that you have to sell 5,000-6,000 books within your first week of publication to make the New York Times or USA Today bestseller lists. Furthermore, those sales have to be from a variety of sources, and they have limits on how many of them can be from Amazon (which I did not know until very recently). While it’s not critical to your success as an author, if your book is on a list like one of those two, that leads to more sales in a fantastic snowball effect that makes everyone happy.

3. Pre-orders make authors look good to future publishers and acquisitions editors. Good pre-order numbers = better sales numbers, which makes an author look good when their next book is out on submission to publishers. I’m already in the process of revising the manuscript for my second book, and I would love to have some great sales numbers to back me up next time I go out on submission.

But yes, all this to say: I’m really friggin’ excited that you can pre-order my book now. Please do so if you can. If you want a signed copy, come to an event where I’ll be speaking and signing books!

This is what comes up when you search for “free stock image, online shopping cart” at 11:41 p.m. on a Monday night. May absurd stock photography never die or be displaced by AI. Photo credit: Shutterstock.

Speaking of, if you live in San Diego, Orange, or Los Angeles, CA, I have book tour dates coming up, and I’m working on some in other cities. More on that later.

How’s that for a cliffhanger ending?