Recounting My Writing Journey - Chapter 5

Clairvoyance / 2022

Hello all! Happy Saturday, and happy St. Patrick's day tomorrow! To those of you who are new to these posts, welcome. If this post interests you, you can scroll down for more. To those who have come back for the next chapter, welcome back! 

So far, we've covered my debut novel and the two other books I published in that series, as well as a poetry and short story compilation I put out as those books were in the works. Today, I'll cover two books that I wrote simultaneously that helped me get out of that series comfort zone. 

Since my debut novel released in 2017, I have worked hard to release at least one book every year. 2021 is the first (and so far, the only) year that I didn't reach that goal, but I was still plenty busy! Between September of 2019 and March of 2021, I worked on drafting a realistic fiction romantic comedy style novel that is still yet to be released. (More to come on this book in the future). By the beginning of March 2021, I had finished the very rough draft for that novel. When I finished it, I was pumped! I immediately got to work on writing Clairvoyance, based on a dream I'd had earlier that year, that I had talked about at length with my husband on one of our long weekend drives. The words seemed to fly from my fingertips, and I made a habit of writing for at least thirty minutes every. single. day. Those thirty minute times that I squeezed in after work would often turn into forty-five minutes or even an hour as I was just in my zone. 

Within a month, I had finished my first draft.

Then, I started in on the multi-faceted editing process, which was pretty similar to what I did with Emerald Shadow. I read, re-wrote, cut and added things, line edited, sent out for beta reading, edited again, and proofread. 

This book was different than the others I had published previously, for a few reasons.

Clairvoyance was the first novel that I published outside the Azure Light collection, and the first light science fiction piece I have written. In this story, I explored the adventure of a girl who can read minds. I wrote about her complicated family dynamics (and those of others in the story). I wrote about my character's imprisonment, and the corruption of those who had captured her. This story had a much different feel than that of my other novels. 

This was the first time I created the art for my cover. This was not as easy as I thought it would be. I had been looking to get into digital art, and finally had the means to do so. I really thought about the concepts I wanted to portray with my cover and used different textures and drew out my character in her jumpsuit to do so. Although I went with a fairly simple design, this process was a springboard for me to learn more about digital art, graphic design, and what it takes to make a professional looking book cover, all of which are ever evolving lessons for me as I continue to practice and improve. 

Clairvoyance was also the first book that my husband didn't read before I published it. In fact, I usually read bits and pieces to him that I'm excited about as I write, or at least talk about the story nonstop. When I had him read Emerald Shadow, I ordered him a proof copy prior to publishing, and he helped me comb through it with a red pen. For Clairvoyance, I wanted to see what he thought once the book was completed. When I ordered my author copies, he picked his copy and read it as if it were any other book he might have purchased at the book store. I sat awake at night for about a week as he read, and I couldn't wait until I got his feedback. His keen eye caught a handful of errors that were missed throughout the editing process, so I was able to get those fixed thanks to KDP's flexible file uploading and republishing.

As difficult as it was waiting for feedback, doing it this way was so helpful to me, because I was able to get a different perspective from him than I normally do. It took a level of bias out of the process, which was hugely helpful. When he was finished, we had long discussions about the things that had worked for the story, just like we do with other books we read together. He, and others who have read my work, still tell me that Clairvoyance is my most polished, most cohesive piece yet. This is what we want as writers, right? To have someone be able to tell the growth that we've made? For me, this is a huge deal. 

Now, as far as marketing goes (both leading up to release day and after), I didn't do much that was new. I talked a lot more about my books - especially this one - leading up to release and after it was out in the world, and I think this was hugely helpful for me to gain the confidence necessary to say, "I'm an author." This was also helpful for me, because it gave me the space to develop my "elevator speech" regarding my books. I had to learn how to summarize the story and entice potential readers in the span of a sentence or two. 

Later, I would do more marketing for Clairvoyance when I released its hardcover version, but that's a later step in the journey. 

Next week, we'll explore how I wrote, edited, and published my first children's book, What I Do Know, and what I learned from that process. Hope to see you then!