Looking Forward & Back
As the year comes to a close I find myself on the brink of a new stage of my writing journey. To this point in my life I have always written yet most of those words have traveled only as far as the Save Drive on my computer. With my debut novel, Housebroken, being selected for publication through Kindle Scout, I am now about to enter a realm of being a published author.
I have no blinders on as far as what this might mean regarding my day-to-day life. One published book does not mean its time to quit the day job. From the many authors I follow, twelve published books often doesn’t accomplish that. But it does force me to look at my writing in a new light, to “step up my game,” so to speak, to ensure I’m putting out enough material to eventually (one day far in the future) be able to support my family solely off of my psychotic creativity.
Who knows, I might not ever get there, but it won’t be on account of me not trying.
Trends are changing with self-published works, with Amazon’s Kindle Unlimited as well as other vendor’s seeking new ways to approach the market. My feeling is that the publishing world is still finding its feet in this new day and age, discovering what works often through trial and error, and that’s not a bad thing. There will be more changes, traditional publishing crossing paths with self-publishing, and for the first time I will no longer be a bystander but in the mix.
In the meantime I’ve completed the first part of a series I initially wrote as a screenplay. It’s a novel very different from Housebroken, set in the jungles of Venezuela, titled The Creation. I’ll be starting the second book in the series January 1st and should be publishing both in 2015. I also have a ghost story I’ve been dabbling with that is looking to become novella-length if not a full length novel. My goals, with Housebroken scheduled for release March – April time frame, is to consistently put out 2-3 novel-length works each year.
It’s an ambitious goal considering I’m not a fast writer. I’m very much a perfectionist and have no desire to put out lesser works in an effort to write faster. Balancing family life, a full-time job, a band, church callings, school, and my constantly shifting mental state, means I’m in for a fun 2015. The truth is, I couldn’t be more excited.
Thanks for joining me on this journey, for your support on the sidelines, for the cheers and encouragement and even those cute little death-threats. It all keeps me going. Here’s to a 2015 and entering a doorway which has, to this point, always been closed. Don’t believe yourself when you think you can’t. Just open the door and force yourself to walk through.
