I’ve had a very profound realization lately. Want to know what it is? I’ll share a little secret with you. Lean closer to the screen and I’ll whisper it to you…
Writing is my JOB.
Whoa! I know, right?! When did that happen?
Sorry about that, I got a little carried away. lol But seriously, it did just kind of hit me a few days ago that writing is literally a job for me now. I wake up at six in the morning, work until my kids wake up sometime around seven. And then I resume work at nine, after I take my three-year-old to preschool until I pick her up at noon. And I’m always jumping back to work on one thing or another throughout the rest of the day.
Yesterday I literally worked a full eight hour day. With my one and a half-year-old clinging to my side and my three-year-old running around half the day. It was a crazy but awesome day.I had a lot of self-doubt when I started out on this self-publishing journey. At the beginning of 2010 I didn’t really know of anyone who was self-publishing, much less anyone who was having any success. I could only make a few pennies for all I knew. And after I did self-publish, I made just a few pennies, for a really long time.
And then something changed a few months ago.
Suddenly I was climbing some carts, gaining some rankings. Suddenly I was like “Woohoo! I’m going to make a few hundred bucks this month!” And suddenly my jaw is hitting the floor as I look at the numbers, do the math on royalties, and still can’t believe what I’m seeing. Suddenly I have days like today where I’m #2 in contemporary fantasy for Kindle and steadily around #8 in YA fantasy.
Suddenly I’ve realized- I’ve done it.
And with that very humbling, very awesome success comes a lot more work. Just keeping up with my email requires a lot of time during the day. And it’s amazing. I love hearing from fans, from people who’ve enjoyed Branded, Forsaken, and Eden. And I love the connections I am making.
But the thing that drags me down occasionally is realizing that sometimes taking care of the job part of my writing gets in the way of my actual writing. I spend as much time on the business, email, promotional, whatnot side of things as I do on the actual writing. And some days it gets, I don’t want to say frustrating cause that’s not the right word, but, well, some days I wish I could just ignore that side, and just write.
But one thing that I can say is this: I LOVE my job. I’ve wanted to be a writer since I was writing epic Harry Potter fanfic’s with my best friend at thirteen. I always thought being an author would be the coolest job I could ever ask for. And it is. It seriously is.
And I can’t thank you all enough for letting me turn my dream into my job.
5 comments:
I am so happy for all your recent success. The stories you craft are brilliant and masterfully told. And your design work? Just as stunning. I am honored to have gotten to know you over this past year, and I wish you nothing but the best. :-) Just don't forget me when you're hanging out with JK Rowling and Stephenie Meyer.
=) Congrats! Don't forget you also do cover art too. Amazing cover art. (I have gotten nothing but complements on mine.)
What an inspirational post! Congratulations and keep up the good (fun!) work! I hope you get to continue doing it for a very, very long time.
That is awesome Keary! You are an inspiration to all of us. It's so great to see hard work and passion pay off. And I totally understand the frustration, it's a tricky thing to ballance the networking with the writing and not to mention reading (not enough hours in the day) lucky it's full with the things we love! I have just added Eden to my cart so consider that another stat for you! x
It seems like a welcome trade-off though — during its annual developers conference keynote earlier this month, Apple said Low Power Mode in iOS 9 can extend your iPhone's battery life by three hours.
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