Nervousness

There’s currently 67 days until my debut novel, The Witch Laws: Book One of The Moon Magic Chronicles is released. To say I’m nervous would be a grave understatement. I’m shaking.

I’m gonna be honest here, I’m so ridiculously scared about this launch. I’ve had positive comments about the book from the lovely Anne (Immersed in Books), but I still have those little knots in my stomach which are floating up to my brain. 
Having my debut book out is nerve wracking. I can barely breath when I think that in just over two months, people will be reading what I’ve written on their Kindles. I’ve always been frightened of negative feedback – my brain is hot-wired to zone in on negativity and obsess over it. But, that’s something I’m working on, and by releasing this novel, I think I am finally beginning to accept that not everyone will like it.  It’s going to be a ridiculously difficult process, but with the support of my family, I can maybe make it.

Over the last month, I’ve scoured the internet, seeking advice on how to promote a self-published book.
I’ve drafted several different press releases touting the novel, ready to email to publications around the country. Mainly because I’ve got links around the north of England, from where I spent my childhood, the county I attended school, and the place I currently live.
I’ve set up an author profile on Facebook and I’ve even started amassing my own Street Team (which makes me feel incredibly grandiose, even just typing that). I’m being more active than I have been for a long time on Twitter and Instagram (spammy comments for those awful Instagram accounts notwithstanding), and I’ve even become Goodreads Official. I’ve set up a mailing list, I’ve set up a new email address from which I’ll send out any new correspondence. But so far, my only subscribers are, well, myself. Which is, well. It doesn’t feel particularly optimistic.

All my life I’ve tried to be a glass half empty type of person. If you expect the worst, you can never be disappointed. But I’ve always secretly been a glass half full. I get excited about stuff, I expect the best, even while some part is telling me not to. I’ve been trying my absolute hardest not to check the pre-orders tab on my Amazon Author Dashboard, even when knowing that I do and it’s still at ‘6’ that my heart will sink. The first few days after the book went on sale, I was gobsmacked and stunned that I’d had 6 pre-orders already, but almost 3 weeks on, it’s still at the same figure. Does that mean I’ve failed already?

I mean, I know that’s completely irrational. I know that. I’m ridiculously happy that I’ve even pre-sold one book, and that I’ve got one positive review. It’s waaaaaay more than I could have ever dreamed of, and that secret glass half full side of myself is dancing in the street, right now. It’s that other side, the side I’ve been told to portray to the world that is wilting in strange disappointment.

When I was a kid, I was told that to be proud of myself was to be big headed, unattractive and vain. If even five year old me expressed the opinion that I thought I looked pretty, I would be sneered at by my parents and be told that I thought too much of myself. If I expressed pleasure at an exam result, I would be mocked for being too brainy. I was kept down at heel, never allowed to be happy with myself. Made to believe that I had no talent, was ugly and would never exceed at anything. As an adult, it’s not easy reconciling with the fact that, you know what, I am happy with this book. I think it’s decent, that the plot is interesting and the characters engaging. I’m happy with the cover, which I designed on Canva. I’m happy with the maps – which I hand drew and then managed to translate to digital by myself.

The problem is, is that I feel embarrassed by stating I’m happy and pretty proud of the book cover, maps and contents. That’s where my issue lies. I’ve not sent out any of the press releases, because I’m embarrassed that I’m promoting myself. I need to get over that hurdle. I need to get over the embarrassment of promoting the book. That’s why it’s not had any more pre-orders since that first week. Because I’ve not been posting almost half enough as much as I should be doing at this point. All because of a misplaced embarrassment and feeling of shameful guilt for being proud of something I’ve created.

So, that ends now. The embarrassment. The shame. It stops now.
This book is a good book! I should be proud of it, and from now on, I damn well will be.

Sally.