It all started in the summer of 2019. For the prior couple of years, I had rekindled my love of reading, and I had this grand idea that I wanted to be an author. Now, know that I do have a background in journalism. I’ve been published in a lot of magazines and newspapers, and I wrote a few short stories throughout my life, but never published an entire a full length novel. (I did try to write one growing up — on a FLOPPY DISK!). I thought: I like writing. I work in marketing. I need a new hobby Why not writing? I got this. This is gonna be fun!
Wrong! Everything I could have done wrong, I did do wrong.
I sat down at my computer one day and just started typing whatever came to my mind. I didn’t tell anyone I was writing a book, not even my own husband, because I didn’t know what would actually come from this. I had a vague story idea and what direction I wanted to go in. I wanted to write about a character who wasn’t your typical super hunky badass. I wanted a mysterious morally gray character. And, of course, there had to be a pug in there somewhere. I didn’t want a full on romance (my grandma reads my books!) but I know it’s pretty much required in some fashion for urban fantasy stories so there’s a very small, almost non-existent sub plot. The actual plot though? Yeah, I had no idea.
So, on nights and weekends, I continued plugging away. The original manuscript finished at something like 120,000 words, way too long for a typical urban fantasy. But by now I’m starting to think, “Wow I did it! This could really happen!”. I began doing some research and my initial reaction was, “Holy shit balls, Batman! It costs $2,000 to publish a book?” Well, everyone’s costs are different, but the average cost to have a professional editor read through a manuscript of that size plus a having a professional cover designer create the book cover, it would have ended up costing me close to $2,000 to publish. And that doesn’t include all the marketing that needs to be done to get people to actually read the book! (In reality, it probably would have cost me a lot more because there would have been so many changes to the manuscript, I’d need a second read through.)
So what did I do? I cheaped out and did my own cover and hired someone on Fiverr to “edit” the book. My “not-really-an-editor” editor made a few grammatical edits, added a few comments, and I thought I was good to go. She said she enjoyed the story (pretty sure that was a lie) and here I was on cloud nine thinking I have the next NY Times Best Seller on my hands!
Are you laughing yet? Because you’re about to. Check out the evolution of book covers. *smacks head with palm.* It’s embarrassing how badly I had no idea what I was doing. I got so angry with myself after the first cover (clearly I didn’t miss my calling as an illustrator), I ended up deleting all the files and throwing out my only copy because I hated it so much. I had to ask my sister in law for a photo!
So now, like every new naive author, I’m asking myself, “Why is no one is reading my super amazing book? Why am I not a NY Times Bestseller yet?”. One initial reviewer said something like “Is this why kidnapped women fall in love with serial killers?”. I’m not even sure how that pertained to the story. So I finally discovered the wonderful world of Facebook author groups and got some feedback. I redid the cover, hired a second editor, and tried this again! Rinse, wash, repeat. I ended up doing this a THIRD time last year with a new cover and editor!
Why am I telling you all this? Surely by now you’re thinking, “Why the hell would I ever want to read this disaster?”. Well, I accepted the fact that Adrian’s adventure wasn’t my best work. I took a break from the Black Sheep series to write Zulli’s story because I was so emotionally burnt out and I needed a fresh start, some assurance that maybe I could make this work if I did things the correct way. I decided to invest that good chunk of money in the NightFly series, and while I’m still waiting on that NY Times Best Seller invite, it’s definitely written a lot better and it’s where I found the most wonderful fans and readers. Last year, I invested (again) in editing the Black Sheep series with my current editor. She really helped me clean up a lot of the dialogue and run on scenes to help me better grow and develop the characters in the story. If I had been starting this series today, I’d probably change a lot of things around but I kept the plot as it is so as not to confuse readers halfway through the series.
I finally had the motivation to complete the last book, How to Revive a Dangerous Deceitful Trickster. I had been sitting on about 10 chapters for almost a year, writing and rewriting so many times I thought I might never finish it. Then as I was writing a scene, Rezith had an “Ah ha!” moment, and suddenly I did too! The story was lacking because it was no longer Adrian’s story to tell, it was Rezith’s. I hadn’t written from any other character’s point of view in the series, but it just made sense. I knew exactly how I wanted this to end, and what I had been dreading for over a year, was written in a single week!
Rezith’s story is an emotional one. You’re not quite sure about him in the first two books, but this is his time to shine. He’s become close friends with Daphne (No romance there, I promise. I mean technically, Rezith would have been like a 40 year old dude if he was in his original body). You dig deeper into why he did what he did to Adrian, and discover more about his personality and inner thoughts. He ended up becoming one of my favorite characters, going from this grumpy pants mysterious entity to a real loveable guy.
If you haven’t read the Black Sheep series yet, give it a shot. I promise it’ll be worth it to read this ending. There’s also a tie in with Zulli’s story, and some alternative viewpoints that shed light onto her situation that you don’t find in the NightFly series.
Oh, and I also may have left things open for a follow up series on Rezith (wink wink).
