The Drug of Discouragement

There are so many things stacked against an author.

First there's writing your book. There's no time for it. You've got writer's block. All the creative ideas are gone. You have to critique other books so people will critique yours.

Then there's getting your book published. Queries are of the devil. Agents block your way. Publishers take forever. Nobody wants the manuscript. Someone else's book is always better than yours.

And finally, you're published. But now there are no sales. You have to blog and facebook and tweet just to remind people you're alive. You give hours of your time away so you can sell a book. You have to go out of your comfort zone to be a salesman.

Wow. No wonder authors are often grumpy people. In the midst of all this, the dream and allure of publication turns into, "Why am I writing another stupid book? This is pointless."

Oh writer-friend, get yourself to a writer's conference.

I find that I need a writer's conference every six months. The motivational high I get from one tapers off in the following four months, and by month six I'm lagging. But once I get there, the speakers and the experiences of other writers rub off on me, and suddenly I find I can do it again. It encourages me to know we're all going through the same thing. And then I see that my efforts aren't so bad, that maybe I'm even doing better than some.

Discouragement is a drug, and it debilitates your psyche. But you'll need help coming off it. Plan on a writer's conference. Don't know where to go? Check out Shawguides, a wonderful site with more conferences than you have the time and money to get to. I promise you'll leave encouraged. It's so worth it.

To Be Read or Not To Be

That is the question.

Do authors really care about making money? It would be nice, right? I would love to get a $750,000 advance, buy my dream house, make millions off movie deals, and settle nicely into a comfortable writing schedule with no pressure.

But that's not what motivates me, and I bet it's not what motivates you, either.

What motivates us is being read.

We are motivated by that pivotal moment when the reader gasps aloud with our character, when our character's feelings become so real that the reader cries along with them, or fears for them, or is moved by them. We are motivated by readers who think about our book and our characters long after the book is over, who dream about our characters, who beg us to write more because they refuse to believe that these characters could be OVER, that they are nothing more than figments of imagination who only existed for a few pages.

I would love to have career as an author. Right now it's a hobby. And an expensive one, at that. But I'm thrilled that in the past few days, thousands of people have downloaded my book. Thousands of people are reading my book. And I hope they are falling in love with my characters. I hope they are feeling just a bit of the emotional connection I felt while I wrote the book.

If you haven't snagged it, Perilous is still free. For now.

http://www.amazon.com/Perilous-YA-Suspense-ebook/dp/B0045JLQCI