A fun thing we’re doing on Facebook and free posts on Patreon is where we’re going back and looking at the books I’ve released in past January’s, and it’s made me think about my start in general.
When I first started writing, I had no frame of reference of how other authors did it. I didn’t know anyone who wrote and had never talked to anyone in the author world. I didn’t even follow anyone online because I only had Facebook at the time and only had five friends (all family lol…which was why I never used it).
I barely posted (because family is nosy and I’m slightly paranoid lol).
I didn’t know how to follow people.
I’d never even thought to look up what my favorite authors were doing.
When I finally started working my way into author groups and meeting authors online, I was amazed at how different everyone’s process was.
Some people write out of order!!
Some people don’t have a movie in their head!!
Some don’t even talk to their characters?!?!
How?
I was commenting on a post the other day and teasingly told another author that their plan to write their book out of order gave me hives. (They knew I was teasing and weren’t upset.)
But that’s the amazing thing about having a creative job and being your own boss…everyone does it differently. Everyone’s goals are different. Everyone sees success different. I love it.
I have a good friend who’s a baby baby author and every time we “talk shop” and I answer a question, I have to remember to preface my advice with, “This is how I do it but I know other authors who do it differently.”.
They’ve heard that from me so many times they probably hear it in their sleep lol, but I want them to figure out what kind of author they are and how the process works for them.
I think that for me, not knowing other authors gave me more confidence because I didn’t know everything that I was doing was wrong lol. But I know that everyone is different and some don’t want to start out completely blind.
So this is my long winded way of saying that my door is always open to questions about how I started or my current process. If you have any questions please feel free to find me on Facebook or email me. There are other ways but those are the avenues that I check most often.
I hope you are having a productive 2024, and I hope you get your plans laid out so you can have a great year.
