Beth Duke of Delta on Life, Lessons & Legacy

We recently had the chance to connect with Beth Duke and have shared our conversation below.

Beth, it’s always a pleasure to learn from you and your journey. Let’s start with a bit of a warmup: Have any recent moments made you laugh or feel proud?
My new novel, Anywhen, just received a top medal for General Fiction in the 2025 Readers’ Favorite International Book Award Contest. I am especially proud of that. They’re sending me a medal I can wear around my neck, which I have threatened never to take off. It’s how people will know me in the grocery store.

Can you briefly introduce yourself and share what makes you or your brand unique?
I’ve been an author for many years, but a professional author since 2019.
I began writing short stories when I was living in Florida and missing my home state of Alabama. I made the mistake of seeing the movie Sweet Home Alabama, which my companion loved, and I wanted to walk out on. I don’t think it’s a coincidence I immediately started penning stories featuring the Alabama I love: warm, intelligent, welcoming people; gorgeous mountain scenery, The Alabama Shakespeare Festival, The Marshall Space Center, rich Native American and African American history. My six books all feature something I want the world to know about Alabama, woven into what I always hope readers will find engaging fiction. It’s been extremely rewarding to have people reach out after reading my novels and tell me they’ve been inspired to visit places I’ve introduced.
My heart is full and happy since moving back in 2008. My husband and I live at the end of a mountain ridge—the best “writing retreat” in the world. My mom and our children live in Alabama as well, and I am very grateful for that.
Because of my books, my mother calls me “Alabama’s Ambassador.” That may not be accurate, but each novel is a love letter to my home state in some form.

Great, so let’s dive into your journey a bit more. What relationship most shaped how you see yourself?
I am mother to a son and a daughter, each of whom have taught me more about myself than anyone or anything else. It’s an enormous privilege to see your own sense of humor, your adventurous side, your love of learning reflected in your children.

Was there ever a time you almost gave up?
My third novel found its way to a high-profile agent in New York City, who contacted me and told me she couldn’t put the manuscript down. She loved it. She said, “This book deserves to be read by the world.”
And it has been, on a larger scale than I could have dreamed—except not through that agent. She basically broke up with me after a year, leaving me at an all-time low after such huge expectations as an author. I went on to receive a publishing deal that I found insulting; the money was not remotely commensurate to what I’d been led to seek.
All that ultimately led me to publish the novel through Amazon’s KDP, which was the best business decision I’ll ever make. My career was launched by hundreds of thousands of sales of It All Comes Back to You. I am an extremely vocal advocate for independent authors now, particularly in the current publishing market.

So a lot of these questions go deep, but if you are open to it, we’ve got a few more questions that we’d love to get your take on. What are the biggest lies your industry tells itself?
I think the publishing industry tells itself it’s still in charge of separating the wheat from the chaff, that it is alone responsible for making or breaking authors. That’s simply not true; too much has changed over the past decade. In this age of online sales and publicity, in an open marketplace, readers are responsible for deciding what is or isn’t a great book.
As I’ve said, I believe in becoming an indie author by choice, in working for yourself rather than a publishing house. There is a caveat, though: authors must create a quality product with professional editing and cover design. If you can produce a book that looks perfectly at home on Target’s Book Club Fiction shelf, you’ve done it right.

Before we go, we’d love to hear your thoughts on some longer-run, legacy type questions. Are you doing what you were born to do—or what you were told to do?
I truly feel I’m doing what I was born to do. Putting things into words has always been joy to me, whether a guest editorial or a song parody or a ghostwritten tribute for someone’s birthday. It took me a long time to stop putting things into nonfictional words and realize I could combine wordsmithing with my imagination to earn a living as a novelist.

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