First, the big, exciting news: Wolf Bound is officially up for preorder! Release day is Friday, November 15th!
Okay, now the blog post.
So, once upon a time, when I was just a kid who wanted to be a writer, I thought it was just a question of writing the books and everything else would just . . . you know . . . happen. Like magic. A few years passed, and an older and wiser (and, yes, a little more jaded) Kayla learned about agents and querying and publishing houses, and began to suspect that she was never going to be able to do all that, so she was probably never going to actually become an author. Poof, there went all my dreams of becoming the next R. L. Stein/Madeleine L'Engle/Robert Jordan/Brian Jacques/well . . . I guess you get the idea.
Fast forward about ten years when I stumbled over a reddit post talking about how awesome! and amazing! and easy! it was to get into self-publishing. Did I suddenly jump on that train and ride it all the way to the pot of gold everyone was talking about back then? Alas, no. It took me about five years of mulling things over before I actually got started writing, and another four years before I was ready to share anything that I'd written, but here I am, now! So, now that it's finally happening, now that I'm actually publishing my book, what have I learned? How have I grown from this experience? What will I do differently next time?
Lesson 1: You have to write the book you have to write.
Does that make sense? No? Let me rephrase and give some context. When I first learned about the world of self-publishing, the advice I heard from every direction was "write to market." I tried. I really tried. I researched what was hot, what niches were underserved or too small to be worthwhile. I looked up keywords and comp titles and covers and the rest of it. And then could not write a single word. I was completely paralyzed trying to figure out how to write the perfect, to the market book.
I had to let that all go. I didn't manage to write anything until I decided that I was going to write something with only myself in mind. The audience is me. The market is me. I hope other people read and enjoy my books! But I can't write if I'm thinking of anyone other than myself.
Lesson 2: Don't work with friends and family.
Okay, this one was probably obvious to everyone except me, but sometimes I need to learn my lessons the hard way. Anyway, now that I've learned my lesson, let me pass it on to you. Your friends are your friends, not your editors. Your family is your family, not your marketing team. For the love of all that is holy, if you value these relationships, you'll keep them separate from your professional life.
Lesson 3: Burnout happens. Learn to ride the wave.
And, to add to this, burnout happens in different ways and cycles and can't be fixed with the same prescription each time. For me, burnout came through and torched my entire life for about two years. It wasn't fun (LOL, understatement) but I survived, and now I know I can survive again. I like to think I've gotten better at recognizing the warning signs. Knowing I need to pivot or step back if I keep staring at walls when I'm supposed to be working.
Lesson 4: You gotta have some fun!
Today, after spending hours (and hours and hours) going around in circles with Ingram Spark and Amazon and Barnes and Noble and Kobo, I needed a whole damn vacation. Sadly, I also needed to stay here so I can be an adult and go to work tomorrow. Solution? I got on Canva to design a logo for Berring College, which led to designing mugs for my characters to buy at the campus bookstore. Maybe it doesn't sound like fun for everyone, but I've always been good at making my own fun. Maybe one of these days I'll figure out how to actually sell these mugs! But, even if I don't, the point was to take a step back and do something a bit silly and fun.
So, there's my lessons learned so far. I'll probably have three new lessons by next week, but I've been learning (lesson number five?) that I can't skip steps. I always have to go through it to learn how to do it.
Oh, and here's the new "official" Berring College seal. And a universal link, in case you want to preorder Wolf Bound!
