What I wish I'd done when I first started writing.

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 I published my first book with the Wild Rose Press nearly ten years ago now. It's been an amazing journey. I have learned and grown so much! Here are a few things I wish I would've done when I first started writing.


Start a newsletter and social media before publishing.

I wish I would've let more people know I was writing. I was a little shy about it. It also took me a long time to figure out how to write a book, so partially this was because I wasn't sure I could do a good job. But having a group cheer you on, follow your journey, supporting you spiritually is such a blessing. I see other authors just starting out with their friends cheering them on.

Realized this is a business, not just art.

When I first started writing, I was creating stories that were personal, deep and complicated. Now I wish I had just written stories that were more marketable. So many people ask me what I write and often I can't exactly say. If I had started with a business mindset, I think I would've been further ahead.

Staying in the same genre.

Because I read across multiple genres and have a pretty good grasp of their tropes, I didn't know that writers did the best if they "stayed in their lane." My first book was a romantic suspense mystery. Then nit was a rom-com. Then it was a small town romance. My readers were all going, huh? The readers who liked PG-13 suspense, didn't necessarily follow me to my rom-com and I'm sure I've lost readers when I switched to historical after that. 

Chosen a better pen name.

My name is not easy to spell. It's got not one, but two extra Es. I see all sorts of iterations of my name. Oh, well.

Not gone with a pen name for my YA fantasy.

This one was a hard choice. I wanted to start something new and fresh since I'd already "ruined" my own name. But since I write clean/sweet romances and YA fantasy is still considered clean, I probably shot myself in the foot.

Been more consistent on social media.

Life will get crazy. I'll neglect it for a while. Pick it back up. Neglect it for a while. Then a rough patch in my life will run me over and then I'm too scared to pick it back up and try to revitalize a dead account.

Started with self-publishing.

I finished The Swiss Mishap way back in 2012, but I didn't know anything about self-publishing on Amazon or elsewhere. I wish I had just put it out there. Amazon was in the gold rush phase. Now, 10,000 books a day are published and it's easy to get lost unless you already have an audience.

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