Why I’m Not Worrying About How My First Book Does

One thing that I’ve learned about myself as an autistic adult is that I need to keep a lot of goals “secret” if I want to achieve them.

If I talk to people about my goals ahead of time, my brain will take that action of having talked about what I want to do as the thing itself being achieved.

And once my brain goes, “Oh, well, nice one! Job done!” I lose all motivation to do it at all.

I made that mistake with the first book I tried to write.

I talked to people about it.

And pretty soon, my interest in the writing itself fizzled out.

No matter what I did, I struggled to wrangle my brain into gear. It was so hard to find even the smallest smidgen of interest.

And what I did write was bad.

Because I felt like I was cleaning an already clean house.

It felt pointless.

And while I’m very committed to craft as a writing, I do think that I need to have some leeway in what I’m working on.

For years, I’ve been telling others, “If you don’t enjoy writing it, no one else will enjoy reading it.”

And nowhere is reader enjoyment more important than in full-length fiction novels.

Because people read fiction for fun.

If it’s not fun, they’re not gonna read it.

Okay, yes, not every book is for everyone, but the biggest disservice I can do to the story I write is to get in its way.

For the people who my book is going to be a good match, I want it to be an easy read.

One thing in my favour is that I have a history of writing long articles which people tell me didn’t feel like a 16-minute, 17-minute or even 24-minute read.

I’m well aware of my tendency to go off on tangents, and I’ve long since decided to lean into it rather than shy away from it.

It’s not for everyone and that’s okay.

I’m working hard to make sure that the people who are going to read it, will enjoy it.

(There, see? I just went off on a tangent again.)

“Ugh, don’t remind me that its not a one and done thing!”

That’s what a fellow author working on her debut novel said to me last night when I’d said “bestsellers don’t just happen”.

I followed that up with a tangent on how if you want writing to be your career, you’ll need a back catalogue because most authors don’t even start to make money until around book 4, 5, 6 (if that).

And the ones who make a living writing books, have a healthy back catalogue of work readers can choose from (we’re talking easily 10–20 published books).

The bottom line is that most writers don’t even make minimum wage from their writing.

And this isn’t new or news.

The publishing industry has never been so sharply divided. In the week when the erotica writer Sylvia Day signed a staggering eight-figure two-book deal with St Martin’s Press, a survey reveals that 54% of traditionally-published authors and almost 80% of go-it-alone writers are making less than $1,000 (£600) a year.

— Alison Flood, “Most writers earn less than £600 a year, survey reveals” (2014)

Trying to run any kind of meaningful survey on what authors earn is a tortured exercise, yet author organisations do these surveys regularly, in part because they have to.

Without data, how would they advocate for their members?

They need that evidence, however flimsy, to be able to say, “Look, writers are earning less than ever before. Respond to this emergency!”

Having been a professional writer for the past 20+ years, I know what the job looks like day-to-day. 

This is an advantage I have that many new writers don’t have.

Even on the days when I’m not writing fiction, I’m still writing. 

I easily average 50k words a week, because writing articles and copy takes so much less mental capacity than writing fiction.

During this year, I’ve been tracking my fiction word count and I’m currently sitting at 116k (I’ve also edited 124 fiction chapters), but in that same time I’ve easily written triple that amount of non-fiction words.

I’ve also worked with SEO since 2009 (this was the infancy of semantic search and the online landscape has changed a lot since then) and I’m well aware of just how hard it is to stand out in the abundance of content we have access to.

And if you’re selling books, you’re doing a lot of that online.

Especially as an indie author, online is your main channel because you have neither the time nor the connections to do the other kinds of marketing publishers bring to the table.

And as in life, so it is online: success comes to those who…

• define and know what success looks like, and
• can do the day-to-day work over a long period of time even when no one is looking.

Becoming a writer has less to do with whether you can finish one book, and more to do with whether or not you can consistently do that over an extended period of time.

Can you finish two? Five? Sixteen? Can you finish 29 books?

Or are you going to get bored somewhere around book seven and go do something else?

As someone who’s finished one novella and one full-length novel to date, I have no business comparing myself to more established authors, or even authors who are published with traditional publishers.

It’s only detrimental if I do that.

And there’s also no point in me getting overly attached to how some other indie authors became a success.

How someone else achieved success is what worked for them, and if they ever try to turn around and sell How They Did It as a formula for you to replicate that success, run the other way.

How they did it isn’t how you’re gonna do it.

Because success is a combination of putting in the work, being in the right place at the right time, and just pure luck.

Some people write one book and are never heard from again.

My husband had a girl in his class at school, who’d transferred into the BBA program from the archaeology program. The reason? She hadn’t realised that being an archaeologist “wasn’t like Indiana Jones”.

Some people don’t figure out they don’t like it until they do it.

Because the bottom line is that writing is a job like any other.

You have to show up even on the days you don’t feel like it, when it’s boring, when you’re tired, when you’re grumpy, when you’ve got a million other things to do.

I struggled through so many edits this year when I had zero motivation to sit there and do it. But it needed doing, so I did it.

What I’m saying is, if you can show up day in and day out year after year, it’ll eventually start working.

Because just like you get better at your job after doing it for several years and earn better pay and more interesting work, so you improve as a writer and grow your back catalogue as an author.

The more books people can read from you, the more you’ll sell.

But building that takes time.

We are like butterflies, who flutter for a day, and think it is forever.

 — Carl Sagan

I love nature because it makes me feel small. 

Like being out on the ocean and seeing nothing but water on every horizon.

It’s awe inspiring.

Some people freak out when I start talking about how we’re all just little specks in a vast universe.

They find the mere thought of it terrifying.

I find it freeing.

Because if I’m just a little speck, what I do (and how fast I do it) doesn’t really matter in the big scheme of things.

If I only got to write one book that would make or break my career as a writer for the rest of my life, I’d be screwed!

Putting that much pressure on one book (my first one, no less) is what *I* find terrifying.

I’d rather get 100 chances to fuck up, but make progress every time. Write 100 books that are less than perfect, but learn something from each project.

Because in the end, I get to do the thing I want, which is to write.

I’ve sat with my own uncomfortable feelings and have come to terms with my mortality. I’ve defined what success looks like for me; and that’s the day-to-day work of writing.

So, I write every day.

I write for my blog that is read by a few strangers every month.

I do my freelance writing even when my pitches get rejected.

I write for my Patreon even though there’s no one there (and I dread the day someone signs up because it means I lose my little secret hidey-hole where I build up my confidence to do things out in the open).

And I keep chugging because tomorrow’s another day and I get to write again.

When one book isn’t gonna make or break my career as a writer, I’m not worried.

I got time.

I can do it again.

I can write more.

I can make mistakes again tomorrow.

I’ve already got 20+ years behind me as a writer, and I’ve got many more ahead as a fiction writer, so there’s no hurry. 

I’m not here to write the next bestseller, I’m just here to do my best and have fun while I’m at it.

Every day I get to write, is a win for me.

And, as per a previously coopted definition, I’ve now gone from Writer to Published Author because I’ve already made one sale.

And that means I’m already half-way there to being an Established Author.

All the love, all the power ❤️‍🔥

---