Small Accolades Mean More Hard Work...

This morning, I woke up, checked my email and opened the Post Gazette online to find my book was reviewed in the Arts & Entertainment section. It was a glowing review—one that spoke to my willingness in taking chances with my characters and tropes. For an author, this is golden. We all receive our fair share of negative reviews, so when someone “gets” my story, it’s better than winning the lottery.

HERE’s the thing though.

It may look like getting a write-up in the PG or any other small achievements I’ve made are EASY.

Listen to me: they’re not.

Most days, I still hear no or that idea won't work or do it again.

In this day and age of everyone wanting to be an Internet celebrity, we are beginning (have begun?) to see a rash of craziness. The need to be a celeb is rampant. To want it quickly is even more rampant. Hideous shootings, people scaling buildings, and sex tapes to name a few.

Then, there is a monsoon of people wanting to be bloggers, influencers, writers or what have you…

So everyone is setting up shop in some way, seeking their five minutes of fame and somewhere in all this shtick, the amount of work needed to do anything is lost.

My grandmother would call it elbow grease. She worked for several decades as a secretary and office manager. My “bubbie,” as I called her, worked hard, and I will never forget the retirement party her staff held for at the end of her term. As a young girl, my bubbie’s work ethic made an indelible impression. As a secretary (which is what it was coined back then), she was an intrapreneur. She tried to be the best she could be, moving her agency and department forward, inserting her best effort and hard work into every action.

I’ve been at this writing thing since 2010. For close to seven years, I’ve been typing and trolling the ‘nets, attempting to carve out my own corner. There have always been and always will be, better, bigger and badder fish than me. BUT, I like my space and I’m proud of it. Back when I first penned my first blog, my mom was my only reader. Gradually, I reached a broader audience, but not without lots and lots of work.

AND education. Conferences, online courses, workshops, and research.

What makes it all more complicated is the ever-changing landscape of the Internet. Several hours per week, sometimes per day, are often focused on best practice in self-publishing, self-promotion, marketing, and social media verticals.

Back in 2012, I spoke at Spark and Hustle with @ToryJohnson, and I was asked, “How do you get close to someone like Tory?”

I mean the golden egg is to “know” a celebrity, Right? Have a celeb endorse you on your path to fame ---

I forget my exact words, but they were something to the effect of networking on the web is like in real life. IT can’t be ME, ME, ME. In other words, don’t ask too much but give more than you take.

In any given week, I hear from a lot of people. They want to be bloggers or authors. They want something instantaneous and fast.

It happens for a small percentage of people, and when it does...it takes a lot of hard work to HOLD ONTO IT!

So even when you have a day like today where something so amazing happens, one would believe, I put my feet up and made myself a mimosa.

Actually, I hit my desk (on a Sunday) and put in a little work.

To #bookbloggers with love,

Releasing a book is more than pressing a button.

It's way more than even writing the book.

It's like taking your beautiful, newborn, fragile, and delicate baby, bundling them up, and handing her off to daycare. Except YOU, bloggers and reviewer, are daycare workers. Readers are other visitors/parents/relatives/friends. And well, the book is the baby. ~ R

...It's so hard not to drive bloggers insane with instructions (quite similar to when you leave your kid for the first time). Seriously. Use this teaser, please share my book at this time but not at that time, email me if you get any questions, call me if there are any emergencies, and please, please, please take care of my baby with kid-gloves. These hardworking and often underpaid bloggers do their best to promote our babies. I imagine they want to kick us (or just me) in the shins often if not all of the time.

Anyway, with pressing the button looming, I wanted to say THANK YOU in advance to all of the marvelous bloggers and reviewers out there. Like Eileen, the first person to watch my son, you are the first to receive To See You, and please don't think it goes unnoticed how well you take care of her.

Special, special thanks to Angie and Jessica's Dreamy Reads, Totally Booked, and Maryse for their GORGEOUS early previews of To See You. If you have a chance, head on over and stalk them. They deserve it. 

And to EVERYONE, all my readers, bloggers, and reviewers—new and old—I can't say I love you enough.

An Ode to My Readers

(I'm back to rambling instead of doing what I should be doing) Last week, I shipped my fifth book off to the editor.

Earlier this week, I wrote a prologue for book number six.

Does that make me an expert? A seasoned author? I don't know––

But every morning this week, I took pause. Time to reflect on my writing career, the romance industry as a whole and what we can be doing better...as authors, mostly myself.

My books have seen medium success. More than that, I have a really amazing group of readers. I talk to most of them. Ask them, and they will tell you. If they message or email, I write back. If they write reviews, I like them. It was easy with one book and one reader and with each release, it takes a little more time. BUT this is something, I will never give up.

Listen carefully, I'm going to share my biggest trade secret:

Readers make it all happen.

Whether they blog big time or for small peanuts, tweet, share on Facebook and/or simply leave reviews. Without readers, we are nothing.

Meeting a new reader, reaching a brand new pair of eyeballs is like grabbing the holy grail for an author. It's why we don't spend all day in our robes, eating donuts and writing books (that's only 50% of the time). We get online every day and chat, go to signings and hand out swag and smile for photos and sign kindle covers, and do giveaways.

Does my time on email and social media drive my family bonkers? Yes.

Do my eyes feel like they're going to cross at the end of the day? Yes.

Do I still love what I do? Yes.

Do I dream of my books making it big time? We all do. We just lie and say we don't.

This week among all the riffraff and chatter (low sales, new strategies), it was suggested I write "something en vogue" or join KU or every other theory as to what I could be doing to be more successful. Which is why I took pause...because what does SUCCESS mean?

Absolutely, this is my business––100%––and I have to sell books, make a profit, pay my assistant (because she is away and crap, everything is falling apart).

BUT still success can't just be in the number. It is but it isn't I told myself.

If it were only in a number, I wouldn't write what's in my head but rather what is expected.

If it were only in a number, I would NOT answer emails and messages and send signed books to Colorado when a reader cannot make a signing.

If it were only in a number, I wouldn't worry about Mandy (my first reader) and her health. Seriously, I do.

If it were only for a number, I wouldn't have created these stories and the ones to come. Stories from my heart and my head.

Hence,

Readers make it all happen.

SO, as I start book number SIX, I take pause and think to myself of all the blessings, the good parts, the highs and forget the lows because of the readers. They may be few, but they're mighty and growing.

Thank you. ~R