Why book releases make you lose your mind...

The blog was blank for the week...

And it's all my fault. 

*hangs head*

My excuse? 

Well... a while ago I thought it would be a REALLY good idea to release two books within five days of one another. Not really sure if this thought occurred after a few glasses of wine or if I really was of sound mind when I made said decision, point is, we're lucky I still know my own name ;)

Book releases can easily take a calm, controlled, happy-go-lucky person, and send them to the madhouse. Things always seem to go wrong, from uploading the wrong file (yeah totally done that before), to forgetting what blog I'm supposed to be guesting on, to forgetting to upload files to createspace for print (yeah, been there done that too).

Anytime you release a book, it's absolute madness. Will people love it? Hate it? Hate me? I've done over 24 book releases and I still want to puke every single time a new book comes out. If I'm being completely honest, theres something absolutely terrifying about hitting #1 on the New York Times because you seriously wonder if you will ever do it again. There are always expectations, ones you put on yourself needlessly, or your publisher puts on you, or even your readers. And as an author you want so badly to make sure you aren't letting anyone down--even if its at a cost to your own sanity and health.

So my blog post? Totally forgot about it, but Im almost glad I did because now I get to give out some advice to authors everywhere---both new and old. It never gets easy. But I think if we wanted easy, we'd be doing something else entirely, don't you? The things that terrify us the most are the ones we need to be doing. When you put a book out there you're going to get rejected--you can't please everyone. Publish it anyway. We do what we do, because we love it. The deadlines, the blood, sweat, tears, all of it.

I may be stressed--but I wouldn't change it for the world.

My book series, Ruin, is all about doing things afraid. It's about conquering your demons and living---I think sometimes I need to take a dose of my own medicine!

Until next time!
Hugs,
RVD