If you are enjoying it and it’s a goal for you don’t give up! Keep going.
I’m not even certain I will give up. I find the act of writing therapeutic at times.
Originally I really enjoyed it and was hoping I could make something of it. This was in the infancy of the internet and I submitted stories to publishers and had lots of rejections. It was easy to believe my own stories were good and my prose compelling but I was obviously biased. So what I did was type up maybe four stories that had been published and threw mine in with them, all anonymously. I asked friends and family to read them and tell me which one they liked best. I didn’t stop trying until they picked my stories. This made me feel like maybe I was good enough.
But due to the rejections, I kind of gave up. Years later I picked up a book I had started and read through it. I decided even if it’s a complete disaster I’m going to finish it because I want to check it off my bucket list that I had actually written a book.
By then Amazon existed so I didn’t need to actually get it approved by a publisher. They’ll publish any old crap. LOL. At first people were buying it and I got a few reviews and they were all positive. I sold about 50 copies in maybe a few months but after 90 days it dropped off of the “new” list and just stopped selling. That was my first book, started when I was pretty immature. I think I got better.
So the second book I think was MUCH better. I wrote it much quicker so it was more coherent and I was really excited. But things had changed at Amazon and I’m not even sure if there is a category for “new in the last 30 days, 60 days, 90 days,” anymore. Anyway, it wound up selling two copies in the first month and I want to say two more copies since. My grand total for both books is something like 63 sales in maybe 10 years.
But in between then and becoming disillusioned I wrote two more books. I have an editor (not her real job) and she really loves my books but she struggled to get the third one back to me because she didn’t like the ending. I asked her to make a suggestion. Of all my friends and family that read it they are about 50/50 on the ending. I guess my editor didn’t feel comfortable giving suggestions, just an opinion. So it languished for a couple of years.
The last one was a bit different for me and she absolutely loved it and got it back to me right away. So now I’m just running through them both to get them ready and waiting for cover art. Then I’ll put them up and walk away unless some brilliant new idea comes to me and I can’t resist it. Time will tell.
If you are enjoying it and it’s a goal for you don’t give up! Keep going.
I’m not even certain I will give up. I find the act of writing therapeutic at times.
Originally I really enjoyed it and was hoping I could make something of it. This was in the infancy of the internet and I submitted stories to publishers and had lots of rejections. It was easy to believe my own stories were good and my prose compelling but I was obviously biased. So what I did was type up maybe four stories that had been published and threw mine in with them, all anonymously. I asked friends and family to read them and tell me which one they liked best. I didn’t stop trying until they picked my stories. This made me feel like maybe I was good enough.
But due to the rejections, I kind of gave up. Years later I picked up a book I had started and read through it. I decided even if it’s a complete disaster I’m going to finish it because I want to check it off my bucket list that I had actually written a book.
By then Amazon existed so I didn’t need to actually get it approved by a publisher. They’ll publish any old crap. LOL. At first people were buying it and I got a few reviews and they were all positive. I sold about 50 copies in maybe a few months but after 90 days it dropped off of the “new” list and just stopped selling. That was my first book, started when I was pretty immature. I think I got better.
So the second book I think was MUCH better. I wrote it much quicker so it was more coherent and I was really excited. But things had changed at Amazon and I’m not even sure if there is a category for “new in the last 30 days, 60 days, 90 days,” anymore. Anyway, it wound up selling two copies in the first month and I want to say two more copies since. My grand total for both books is something like 63 sales in maybe 10 years.
But in between then and becoming disillusioned I wrote two more books. I have an editor (not her real job) and she really loves my books but she struggled to get the third one back to me because she didn’t like the ending. I asked her to make a suggestion. Of all my friends and family that read it they are about 50/50 on the ending. I guess my editor didn’t feel comfortable giving suggestions, just an opinion. So it languished for a couple of years.
The last one was a bit different for me and she absolutely loved it and got it back to me right away. So now I’m just running through them both to get them ready and waiting for cover art. Then I’ll put them up and walk away unless some brilliant new idea comes to me and I can’t resist it. Time will tell.