Hit 500 Subscribers on Kit! Here’s what moved the needle for clean heroic fantasy

Hey everyone! I’m thrilled to share a milestone that felt so far away when I first started: my newsletter just crossed 500 subscribers on Kit!

A massive thank you to @Thomas Umstattd Jr. for the incredible guidance across the Novel Marketing ecosystem. Going through Send Your First Email Challenge gave me the confidence to launch, and diving into the Author Email Academy completely reshaped how I view list growth, engagement, and reader connection. Whenever my growth hit a plateau, the monthly Patron’s Q&A allowed Thomas to spot the friction points and help me pivot.

For my fellow fantasy authors testing out promo builders, I ran campaigns on both BookFunnel and StoryOrigin. For me, BookFunnel consistently outperformed StoryOrigin for my specific genre (Clean Heroic / High-Adventure Fantasy). YMMV.

As allowed by the Celebrations Board rules, I’d love to share my reader magnet with you all! This cover was created by 100Covers (thank you for the discount code) and used the Patron Toolbox Design Brief Drafter and Cover Analyzer to guide the discussion with 100Covers.

Bound by Law. Driven by mercy.

To save a life, the mountain’s greatest holy warrior must risk breaking the Law he was born to uphold.

For years, Rezo has been the Law made flesh. Clad in an immaculate white tabard and wielding a divine warhammer, he is the mountain capital’s living standard of righteousness. Yet in the quiet hours after unanswered prayers, he knows the truth: the man beneath the tabard is suffocating.

Until he meets Nadia.

Suffering under a fatal mountain malady, the mother of Rezo’s brightest student carries a quiet grace he hasn't felt in decades. But to cure her, Rezo will have to step out of the shadows of the Cathedral and into the crosshairs of the Law itself.

If you enjoy clean, high-adventure fantasy, you can grab this free story at tedatchley.com/join.

Keep building, learning, and testing. The strategies taught here really do work!