Waiting is pretty easy when there are a million things to do...

A small note on my (hopefully) epic journey into the scary world of publishing:

I'm currently paused in my quest. I'm hoping to get a response on the query that I sent in for critiquing, and in the meantime I'm dealing with the eight hundred other things that are vying for my attention in my personal and work life. My soon to be six year old's birthday is the last day of the month. Her dad will be visiting, and my birthday is the next day. I want to have nothing to do that day, so I'm frantically trying to do EVERYTHING before then. It never works, but it's a nice dream. I can see myself relaxing in a clean house, alone, with absolutely nothing that must be done.

Then back to unpleasant reality. In the real world, I've got tonnes of stuff that I MUST do, and another tonne of things that I SHOULD do. It would take a birthday miracle to dig my way out of it all. Sadly, I do not believe that miracles are very common. It's a bird! No! It's a plane! No! It's Captain Pessimist to the rescue, deflating any chance of dashed hopes!

Well, while I'm talking about worst case scenarios, just in case I never manage to publish anything, I would like to take this chance to thank two people who helped me finish writing my first book. First of all, Ashley read along in chunks as I wrote, and she was a great source of motivation. Secondly, my brother, who causes me general stress and for telling me that my story is "boring". (He had only read the first dozen pages, and later he explained that he may have felt like that due to his resentment at me bullying him into reading it in the first place.) Really though, there's nothing like a nice bit of negative criticism to make me more stubborn!

The Beginning...

On something of a whim, I decided to start a blog. Why? Because I've got too much time on my hands? I wish. Because I talk too much and everyone I know is tired of listening? Probably, but that is not why either.

It's because I enjoy writing. Writing is fun, and it passes the down time at work. I work out stories in my head when I'm having trouble sleeping. It relaxes me. It entertains me. It's improved my typing speed to something that my high school typing teacher could only dream of.

The trouble is, I actually finished a book. About a hundred thousand words later, I seriously wrote the last line and everything. The plots are wrapped up, the loose ends are tied, and it is done. (Except for some editing, of course.) I've never actually done that before. Then I wondered what to do with it.

I have had vague thoughts for a long time about publishing, but they were always in the "if I win the lottery" category. They lingered somewhere between fantasy and almost impossible in my mind. However, as it became clear that I would really finish my novel, I decided that I really would try to get it published.

That is where my peace and serenity ended. Suddenly, my formerly relaxing activity has become an anxiety ridden study in masochism. However, I made my decision and I'm going to make a fair attempt. I think I need to, or I will regret it later.

I don't know if anything will come of it. I'm a pessimist by nature and nurture. In light of that, on a regular basis I remind myself that almost certainly my book will go nowhere except into complete obscurity. And that's fine, but I've decided that my attempted journey into the scary and shadowy world of publishing deserves at least a blog, so here we go...