Giving Myself Permission
7/24/2021
Whenever the question was asked, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” Amid my classmates’ answers of: fireman, teacher, mommy, race car driver, and veterinarian, there always came my unwavering answer - Writer.
It wasn’t anything anyone ever took seriously. The response was always the same, “That’s nice, but what are you going to do for a living?” While my life wasn’t completely absent of support it was limited and often conditional. I was allowed to spend my free time writing if I was still focused on achieving the required day job to keep a roof over my head, food in my stomach, and a car on the road.
I never stopped writing, but I was always writing for me or writing for free. Dating myself here, but the internet was new as I was coming into adulthood. Fan culture that is so common now: fanfiction, fanart, Discord chats, and the like were brand new. For me, someone who had resigned herself that writing would always be a dream and never something achieved writing fanfiction was an outlet that I didn’t know I needed. Finding community with individual fan sites and archives of stories was a dream come true. There were people like me in that “the end” and rolling credits didn’t mean the end of the stories. While I will admit to some sneaking around, sorry/not sorry Mom, I “published” my first fanfic when I was 16. - No, I will not give you any more information on it, leave me to my shame of outrageous, unbelievable characters and happenings.
I kept writing fanfiction through the years, falling in and out of different fandoms depending on the whims of my muse’s attention. The older I got the more layered and complicated my writing became and the more discipline I had to focus on writing and improving my pieces. About two years pre 2020 nonsense I got reconnected into a fandom of my youth and the skill of the people I was writing blew me out of the water. I was reinspired and I attacked every writing challenge with reckless abandonment. I am nothing if not dramatic (I swear the good kind - like the girl that tells the stories to entertain a crowd, not the “start a fight” type). Most of my stories were weighted and heavy, full of angst and pulling the reader into their “feels” as they say.
The fateful challenge was issued in the form of an anonymous comment to one of my secret social media handles: Romantic Comedy. Can you write a romantic comedy with the following prompt (more to it, but that’s for later)? - My first thought was no. I could write romance, but I didn’t write funny. I am not the funny one. But this was the hardest challenge I’d ever gotten and I didn’t want to back down. I started outlining, a sure sign of my lacking confidence, as I often just sit down and start writing. I always outline an end to the beginning then write beginning to end. It helps with plot holes. The piece became all-consuming between researching, writing, and editing it took me over a year to complete.
After it was done the feedback was nearly unanimous (you can’t please everyone) this needs to be a book. I balked because I wasn’t good enough to be an author my talent stopped at writing fan pieces. Writing wasn’t a dream I was allowed. I didn’t deserve it. What possessed me on that July day to print, hole-punch, and put the 400 pages into a binder I couldn’t tell you, but it was in my hand and I wanted it to be real more than anything. Sorry to the guy at the office supply store who found me crying by the self-service copier. I said the words out loud that I was going to make it happen, but I was only sneaking hours here and there to work on it. Then 2020 happened and suddenly I wasn’t working 14 hours days and 6 days a week. I was working one job and from home. My evenings were mine and I began to edit in earnest and after hacking at it for a few months, I sent it to my cousin and she enjoyed it.
I could have gone the traditional publishing route, but this isn’t a traditional book and when you start mixing genres it makes literary agents nervous. I started researching self-publishing and found a community on TikTok with other independent authors that offered tips and tricks of how to publish and what to avoid. So that brings us here to the present.
So after all the disheartening blows that I’ve endured over the year, all the self-doubt, inaction, and lack of time, I finally said yes to myself. Yes, you can commit your free time to editing and tweaking to make your book better. Yes, you can tell people that are going to publish a book. Yes, you can spend money to get a cover made. Yes, you can reach out for help to make the book successful. Yes, people want to read your book. Yes, you can do this. You are allowed to do this. You are a writer.
Am I excited about this book - Absolutely; Am I absolutely terrified - Yes.
Hazzah, I will be able to hold my book in my hands, but now you will all know about the things that are in my head. It’s the writer’s dilemma in a nutshell.
“Sweet Tales With Spice” came about because while this is a slow-burn romantic comedy with drama it also has some sexual situations and all the swears (I had a computer program check there’s a lot). My first book “Love Is…” is sweet & spicy and I hope you all love it.
