Thank you for being a part of The First Wave: Listen to The Letters Below
The Letters: To My 21-Year Old Self, To All Survivors Who Have Written Me & To All Readers to Come
I poured my whole heart into these letters, just like I did my book. This recording doesn't exist anywhere else. It's not a neatly packaged interview or a curated reel. It's what I needed to say before this book left my hands and I wanted the people who showed up first to be the ones who hear it. Give it a listen. I’d be honoured to hear your thoughts & reflections afterward.
You just listened to something I've never shared publicly before. Thank you for being here for it.
If The Letter stirred something in you, if you found yourself thinking of someone, or feeling something you haven't had language for, or simply knowing that this story needs to travel further than it has - here are three things you can do right now that would mean more to me than I can adequately express.
Share The First Wave with four people: Not a mass post. Not a story that disappears in 24 hours. Four specific people, the friend who has been quietly carrying something, the colleague who works in this space, the family member who would understand, the person whose name appeared in your mind while you were listening. Word of mouth is how books that matter actually reach the people who need them. A publisher can buy an ad. They cannot replicate a text from someone you trust that says "I think you need to read this." That text, from you, to four specific people, is worth more to this book's future than almost anything else. The link is simple: www.marleeliss.com/firstwave
Join my Launch Team: If you're someone who believes in this work - whether you're a friend, a family member, a collaborator, a community member, or simply a person who listened to The Letter and thought I want to be part of getting this into the world, I am looking for your help! The Launch Team will be a private group of people who want to support this book in a more active way. It's not a job or a commitment that will overwhelm you. It's a community of people who care about re-imagining justice, about survivors having access to their options, about a world that chooses healing and who want to show up for this moment together. What that looks like in practice: early access to news and content before it goes public, specific asks when the moment calls for them (sharing a post, leaving a review, helping spread the word in your own community), and the knowledge that you were part of something that mattered from the very beginning.
I don't take lightly what it means to ask people to give their time and energy to something. I know you have your own work, your own life, your own things that need you. So I want to be honest: I am asking because I genuinely need people who believe in this, and because I think being part of a community doing something meaningful together is its own kind of gift.
If that's you, I'd love to have you on the team!
(A short form - just your name, email, and number in case we create a WhatsApp Group
3. Pre-order the book.
I want to tell you something I don't say in interviews.
When I was writing the letter to my twenty-one-year-old self, the one you just listened to, I kept thinking about what it would have meant to her to know that one day, this story would be a book. That it would be published. That people would read it and feel less alone and maybe know something they didn't know before.
That future only becomes real if enough people choose the book before it exists.
Pre-orders are not just an industry metric. They are the mechanism by which a publisher decides whether a book gets a front table at Indigo or a quiet corner no one finds. They are how a story that deserves to travel, actually travels.
If The Letter moved you. If you found yourself in one of those three letters - as the person who didn't know there was another path, or as the survivor who deserved more options, or as the future reader I was speaking to directly, then pre-ordering is the most concrete way to say: I want this to reach the people who need it.
The book comes out February 9th, 2027.
Pre-orders open soon. When they do, you'll be the first to know - because you're First Wave. Stay tuned!