TheBanyanTree: Being a Publisher

[Monique Colver]

Lessons I've learned in the past week:

1. Publishing is even more fun than writing.
2. Writing is the easy part.
3. As soon as you publish, you'll want to change something, if you look at
the final product. So I'm not looking at it, except for the cover. I don't
open it. Besides, the cover is the pretty part.
4. There's always one more thing to do.
5. You can't hesitate to tell people, "Buy this book!"
6. There will always be people who, having read on FB numerous times that
one is writing a book, will then ask, "Oh, you wrote a book? What's it
about?"
7. 95% of people know someone who's mentally ill, or knows someone who
knows someone who is.
8. If you worry about what people will think, get over yourself.
9. I should write more.
10. Publishing a book is like a full-time job.

When I first realized my book was out there on Amazon, for anyone at all to
read, I was overcome with a feeling that I can only describe as . . .
nauseated. I felt sick to my stomach. People would be able to judge me,
based on what I wrote in this book. I was supposed to be excited, people
said, but I didn't feel excited. I felt . . . nauseated.

I have determined that this is the proper response.

After all, an easier, faster, and cheaper way to accomplish the same thing
would be to walk outside without any clothes on. But there are no royalties
in that, so publishing a book turns out to be better of the two options.
Still, I've exposed myself to the world, with a bundle of faults, and all I
can do now is pretend that I mean to do that. (That, and I'm told I could
go to jail for annoying the public, and since I've spent my entire life
avoiding jail . . . )

It doesn't look so bad if you meant to do it.

Honey isn't very steady on her feet these days. She topples easily, and on
the wood floors she's prone to sliding off her feet so she's laying instead
of walking, belly on the floor. Instead of being embarrassed, she just
looks at us as if to say, "I totally meant to do that." And that's the
trick. Pretend that what's you meant to do all along, and no one will
notice what's really going on.

Still, there's nothing like having a book up on Amazon.

You should write one too.

Monique
www.anuncommonfriendship.com