Interview: Nathan Shuherk

His TikTok account Schizophrenic Reads dominates nonfiction book reviews on the platform. He's also a small-town influencer.

David Banks: Boop. Okay. Recording in progress. Let me get the questions that I just sent you. Okay, first thank you for doing this. I was wondering if you could start by describing your TikTok account. And what got you started in that?

Nathan Shuherk: Yeah. So I'm on what's called booktok. But I'm a nonfiction account, which is like a niche inside of a niche. And I focus almost entirely on nonfiction. And those videos can range from like reviews to lists of books that fit a certain “vibe” or category. Every once in a while I just like to read a passage from a book that I really liked. Sometimes these reviews are endorsements, sometimes they're just more standard reviews. Each video has its own format.

So sometimes I like to say I'm a book recommender as much as I am a reviewer. I believe there's like a little bit of departure between me and like an actual like media critic. I'm pretty comfortable with the title of “influencer” as well. I talk about nonfiction, and I'm kind of one of the largest accounts in that little sub genre. So now I've got a a pretty sizable following on Tiktok and Instagram, and that's where I post thoughts on books and pictures of books and videos on books, and all those silly little things.

David Banks: What what got you started on Tiktok? What was it that you're like, “I'm going to make a non fiction booktok influencing account.”

Nathan Shuherk: It was early in 2021. So I think I was just bored from the pandemic. Just not leaving the house much, not doing anything. And I decided to start making a visual reading journal for myself. I didn't start to join a community or become a big account or anything like that. I just wanted to find a new way to keep track of what I was reading, because I read 100 to 150 nonfiction books a year. So there's just constantly things I'm reading about or thinking about. And I just wanted a fun way for me and just my friends —the people that I was close with— to keep track of all the shit that I was reading and I find GoodReads, which is the most common book social media platform, to be… It's not very good. So I just wanted something new. I joined Tiktok to basically only do that and within about 5 videos, I started gaining a decent following. I think, after about a week of doing “booktok” I had like 5,000 followers. and was just like, very quickly, like, “Oh, this could be like a thing.”

It’s been 2 years that I've been doing that. And I still don't really totally understand what makes a viral video, or how to grow an audience, or, you know, what I should do in each video. I'm just still making it up as I go, and just, for the most part, having fun saying the shit that I want to say about books.

David Banks: Can you attribute anything to your success?

Nathan Shuherk: Yeah- I'm in a sub genre, so I'm not really competing against that many people, so the the pool is small for people who go to TikTok to find nonfiction, book content. So that's definitely one of it. A lot of it was, you know, especially early on, I made just a lot of content. I was reading so much. So I would make maybe 2, 3 videos on a book. I also don't have a traditional job since I'm disabled. So I just had all the time in the world to just come up with ideas and craft little scripts for myself. I think my success is partially to do with just being one of the very few creators, and then—I don't know, I think I'm decently good at communicating my ideas and my like feelings towards the book.

People found me that way, and I've never had huge viral videos. I don't get tens of millions of views, but I get consistently tens of thousands of views. So I think it just keeps my audience kind of consistent- the same people coming back, and just like steady growth, more than some meteoric rise, and then, like no one really cares what I do after that cause that happens a lot, too, on Tiktok. Someone will gain 500,000 followers in a week, and then they don't make any good content for the next 2 years. I just make consistent content that people tend to enjoy.

David Banks: So you described yourself as a as a big fish in a small pond —a niche within a niche— but you're also a fairly significant influencer in a small town, right? What is that like and, if you could judge this, how do you think it's different from living in New York City or some other larger city?

Nathan Shuherk: Yeah, it's a weird thing. I'm in Fishers, Indiana, which is a northern suburb of Indianapolis, and the opportunities that get sent to people with not even a tenth of my following [but who live in a bigger city] is crazy. They get asked to go to book publishing events, they get asked to meet authors in person. They get asked to do all types of like promotional and event planning type things and I've really never been reached. I've been reached out to by one conference that it was a young adult romance thing, and they just knew I was in the area. So they're like, “Yeah, you can come… speak?” And I'm like this has nothing to do with me. I'm not who your audience wants to see.

So that's kind of just the thing— there's just not really opportunities in Indianapolis. We don't have a vibrant literary scene. I think living in the Midwest, but specifically Indiana, there's just not that much out there for me. But I have been reached out to by local businesses. I've been reached out to by a Mexican restaurant because I have 100,000 followers, and I live five minutes away. And they're like, “Hey, can you promote our food?” And it's like I… No. I'm sure your tacos are great, but, I think most people just follow me, for, like depressing book recommendations. I don't think that many people are that interested in hearing my thoughts on, you know, a new form of guacamole.

David Banks: Have you felt pressure to move to a larger city for this work?

Nathan Shuherk: I would absolutely love to. I mean, the problem is, I live on disability. So basically, the way that I get housing is, you know through my parents in some way, so they ultimately get a say of where I live. If I made a good living off of doing this influencer thing, which is extremely hard to do, [I would move].

And not only would I have to get a good enough living to provide for myself. But I also have to pay for health insurance, which, being disabled, is incredibly arduous. So for me I don't consider actually moving away to be much of a realistic thing. It's definitely a fantasy. I would do it in a heartbeat if I could afford it. But for the most part I'm probably trapped somewhere in Southern Michigan or Central Indiana, just because I need to be close to where my family would like me to live.

I am trying to move into Indianapolis just to get a little closer to, you know, a center of more people. But being a big fish in a small market is nice because I do get reached out to by like the Indiana Humanities has reached out to me and the Indiana Writer’s Society. I'm in talks with them to do a little event here and there, and it is kind of nice that I will probably form a lot more strong relationships over the course of being who I am in this area. Other than just being like just one of you know, 50 book influencers in New York, or something like that. So I think it'll be good long run, just because it'll be nice for relationships. But right now it kind of sucks to just not have the same opportunities as everyone else.

David Banks: And, as you say that, have you thought? Have you given a thought to making yourself more of a Hoosier? More of an obviously “Indiana” product?

Nathan Shuherk: Yeah, I'm starting a book club here in Indianapolis, for, people in the city, it's through a bookstore here so I am trying to slowly cement myself more within, the Indiana landscape. I'm working on a book which will heavily feature my life in Indiana, and when that comes out I'll be even more firmly kind of cemented within the the Indiana Literary community and I just keep growing my social circle or my network— whatever weird word we're using for this type of relationships.

I think it'll become easier to expand beyond just doing digital stuff, cause I would love to be more involved in person. But at this point it's mostly just posting an Instagram story of a local bookstore. I'd love to be more involved. But it's also just weird, because I follow, or I am friends with Indianapolis influencers, and they get invited to so many events but because I do books I'm not really sought after for that, because I think a lot of my following comes from all over the country. It comes from Europe. It comes from South America weirdly enough. But because I don't have just like a super localized following. I don't have the same opportunities. And hopefully, just over time. I'll gain a little bit more prominence in the physical environment that I'm in, because I think it would be enjoyable to explore that side of influencing more. Most of my influencing stuff just comes from a publisher out of New York sending me a book, and I talk about it, and that's kind of like the end of that whole thing. But I would love to make it more involved, and, you know, do more things locally.

David Banks: and speaking of local. Other than a Mexican restaurant, have you been asked to advertise anything else?

Nathan Shuherk: Yeah, I've been asked for like a few Barnes & Nobles in the area. That's books, of course. There's been a couple of other businesses, like a coffee shop would love me to come, take a picture for Instagram of a book and a cup of their coffee and stuff like that. So you know, those those types of things are nice. For the most part though, I don't just like go around like loudly claiming I have a large following. If I'm in an independent store or a pop up shop market I'll just take a picture and tag people just so it helps their little thing along.

I did get asked a little while ago to promote this traveling company that's called the Edgar Allan Poe Speakeasy , and they just set up a bar that's Edgar Allan Poe themed and does a play-performance-bar thing all across the country. They had a pop up one in Indianapolis a few months ago, and they reached out to me to come do a private tour and film, a video. They just wanted to give me the experience and wasn't gonna pay for this national campaign that they were doing. So yeah, I said, no to that. But yeah, there's there's been weird things like that.

I get a harassment level of emails from companies asking me to do advertisements. It's it's really annoying. But the ones specifically for, my local Indianapolis thing, have been all somewhat chill, they're a lot less adamant that I take their brand deal, or whatever.

So yeah, the speakeasy, a Mexican restaurant, a coffee shop, and the Indianapolis Library, who actually was one of my former employers. I don't think they knew that when they reached out to me, and they asked me to come, do a series of photos, you know, in their library, and I just felt weird about it being someone that I used to work for. I don't think they like remembered me, or looked me up enough to know that I used to work there so I just never responded to those emails. It happened a while aback ago, before I was getting out in public very often, and I just felt weird about it. , I was like, I don't wanna promote this new branch that you're opening up in South Indy that I will never go to.

David Banks: I always like to imagine that libraries are the coziest, most adorable things to advertise for.

Nathan Shuherk: Yeah, I know. I think it would be a fun experience but I think just knowing the behind the scenes of how rough library work is —librarians do a lot of really good important work. And, I think they just wanted me to do like an architectural review of the new library they were building— and I was like, no, this helped your brand, but it doesn't really help the workers. It didn't really help the community. It just let people know that a branch was opening, and that's not the promotion that I really want to do.

But there is a bookstore in Bloomington, where, the Indiana University campus, the main campus, is located which is about an hour away from me. I think at the end of the year they're gonna do a little pop up table thing for some of my favorite books of the year, so I'll be able to go down and sling some books for them, and that'll be a nice opportunity. Just, you know, meet some people and stuff like that. I'm always willing to like travel as much as I can afford to. Little mid Western shops and help out local independent bookstores and do those types of things which is as good as influencing is gonna get for me, I think.

David Banks: I don't know if this was a joke or not, because I think it'd be possible, you're thinking of starting a hype house in Southern Michigan. What draws you to that area? I guess I want you to tell me why I would think that would be a joke because, no one would joke about a hype house in LA, right? That's where they belong. But also the biggest, the most watched hype house of all time is in Almaty, Kazakstan- fun fact from a Globalization Studies director, that studies that kind of thing. But yeah, I don't know, what do you make of that sort of geography of places where young adults perform on on their phones?

We go on to have a really great conversation about the importance of the Midwest in the coming climate catastrophe, the role of community in doomsday prepping, and how Nathan’s schizophrenia diagnosis influences his work. For all that you have to subscribe!