No Turning Back

After years of talking about being a writer, I finally decided to do something about it.

In January, I self-published “No Turning Back” on Amazon. I had worked on it for several years: pulled it out, put it up, pulled it out again. Finally, I had a few people beta read, and they gave me great feedback. They also made me believe the story was worth telling. Then I decided if I was going to go for it then I just had to do it.

I set myself a deadline, and I worked towards making sure I had everything ready for that deadline. I wish, now looking back, that I had been a little more flexible with my deadline. I should have probably talked the book up a little bit more than I did, promoted it, marketed it. But overall, I think the release went well.  And what was better was that people talked to me about it: what they liked in the book, what they didn’t, how Kaia’s character frustrated them but seemed so real.

I had several authors from various writer’s groups I’m involved in spread the word. Being a writer means being part of a big community, and writers are great at helping out their own fledglings. Something I’ve learned recently and really love.  It’s great to know there are so many people in the same journey as I am.

So now Kaia is out in the real world, and people react to her in different ways, some predictable and some not.

From I hate her to What a strong woman–there is conversation about the characters that lived in my mind and were put down on paper. And I think that’s pretty effing cool! I’m figuring out how to juggle promotion, writing, editing, and publishing my second book (not to mention family, day job, and exercise). Writing is time consuming, and it’s not nearly all writing. In fact, about 50% of it is other stuff. At first, I hated the other stuff, but now I’m finding ways to like it.

I’m realizing if I want to tell my stories, and have people react the same way they did to Kaia, Patrick and Asher in “No Turning Back,” that I have to put in the work. A lot of hard work, even when I don’t want to. It will be worth it in the long run.

♥♥♥