I do best with plans at the horizon. I am utterly energized and enthusiastic about them. You should have seen me in the six months after I got my book deal. I wanted to research all of the possible conferences, book festivals, literary prizes, and reviewers. I did maybe mock up 30 designs for covers using stock photos. And I looked through probably 10,000 stock photos on the internet to make them. Because it was a two-book deal, I owed my editor an outline last year. I enthusiastically cranked it out and felt invincible .
But suddenly, the pub date is closing in on me. It seems like there’s nowhere’s near enough time. This week, my daughter is home sick with a cough and a fever. I’m sick as well (but no fever and I still need to teach). Every day it seems as if I’m slipping further behind schedule…
Now that the book is less than five months away (four and a half??!?) I feel a mild panic. I’ve lost the invincible feeling I have when these things are at a distance. These days, I feel totally overwhelmed and pretty much unequal to the task. But the thing about having a book coming out is that the book is coming whether I’m ready or not.
It reminds me of being pregnant. I felt like I would never be ready. I felt like I needed another 9 months. I was sure it was going to be a disaster. But the baby couldn’t stay inside my body indefinitely. The baby, like the book, would be coming out. As an extrovert, I joined every moms group I could find. But debut novelist groups are much harder to track down. I am so grateful to my fellow Debs. They have provided a lifeline of perspective and sanity among the hysteria.
So this is my journey at the halfway point. Let’s review…
