On Completing Another Novel

I need to speak to other authors about how they feel after they finish writing a book. No doubt many have written about it – that’s what writers do. But I’d like to add my own experience to the discussion.

Having just completed my third novel, “The Cure,” I expected to be both relieved and elated. During the past two years, I’d spent countless hours typing away or just thinking in front of my computer. I’d attended numerous workshops where colleagues critiqued my work and sent me back to the storyboard. But my relief on completing “The Cure” didn’t measure up to my depression and anxiety. As I saw it, the fun part of the work, the writing, was over, and now I faced the time-consuming and unenjoyable job of trying to get the novel noticed by the public.

I’ve never been interested in, or good at, salesmanship. I am a rank amateur in using social media and am intimidated by the hundreds of new books that twitter past me in an hour. I’ve attended lectures, used tutorials on line, once even paid a person to do postings for me, but I’ve yet to find much success in getting my novels seen widely. I know from talking with other self-published authors that I’m in good company.

But the larger piece of my distress was facing the challenge of what to write next. To start again from the beginning requires deciding on a genre, coming up with an idea for a good plot, and developing characters that are interesting. If I’m to live with imaginary friends for the next two years, I want them to entertain me. Especially as other people may never get to meet them. Having wrestled with ideas for a few weeks, I managed to sketch out the beginnings of a plot and put a few lines of a first chapter on paper. Once again, I’m having fun. And in my “retirement,” having fun, staying healthy, and producing a product of which I can be proud are more important than fame and fortune.