I published my first novel

[HundredMileStare]

I just wanted to post this here. Firstly because I am so proud of myself for finishing the damn thing and secondly to encourage others that if I can do it, you can do it too. I wrote it while working 40 hours per week and being a single mum to DC. I got up at 4.30am to put in 30mins and I sat in my car on my lunch break and typed into my phone. I became the characters completely and would think in their heads while I was driving to work. It took about a month to get the words down and another 2 weeks to get it edited and cover sorted.

It's a dark romance written to market and it went live at 11.30pm last Saturday. No marketing, no ARCs, no ads. Since then it's been like watching the Grand National, climbing higher and higher in the rankings until I broke the top #1000 books. There was wine that day, I can tell you.

Now I am 10k words into the sequel. This week has been a struggle getting words down because I've been utterly addicted to checking my sales and goodreads rating (4.17, I was terrified and still can't quite believe I wrote a decent book.)

I've made a pact with myself this week that I am only allowed to check at 1000 word intervals.

I just wanted to post and encourage others to keep writing. There is no high quite like it, and I am determined to do it all again and put another little brick in my 'book house'.

Congratulations, that is truly a big achievement and very inspirational.

Have you self published this? If so, what made you decide on this route to publication?

Wishing you all the very best, I know how difficult it can be to find the time to write sometimes especially with work and children in the mix.

@Daphnesmate thank you so much!

Yes I self-published. I did briefly research into the trad-publish route but the whole process seemed hugely long and drawn out, and I struggled to find any advantages. I was really scared by the marketing aspect, but I read that trad-publishers still expect you to do your own marketing anyway so I wasn't really sure what they were offering that I couldn't achieve myself.

My goal is to spend my time doing what I love, but also making enough income to replace my full time salary.. I figured the best way to do this was by following the 20booksto50k method, read Chris Fox's "Write to Market".. and the book has pretty much marketed itself. If you have a genre that is hungry enough, a good cover and a hooky blurb, and a book that hits the tropes and meets readers expectations then I think self-publishing is a no brainer

This is my VERY limited personal experience/ opinion of course.

Well done, OP, but don't get bogged down with number checking and weird market-related books. It takes the joy and artistry out of it all.

Well done! How impressive, OP. It must be an amazing feeling.

Impressive! What did you price it at?

Congratulations! What a brilliant achievement. I always plan to get up early and write but never quite manage. Your story is good motivation! Wishing you every success.

Thanks all 

@IrenetheQuaint it's priced at £2.99 for Ebook and available on KU. About 3/4 of the income generated so far has come from KU as lots of readers in my genre are subscribed.

Congratulations. Really impressed with your discipline. Best of luck.

Congratulations! Can I ask whether you self-edited or did you pay for a professional input? You've inspired me.

And also, I'm on KU and looking for a new read so please post a link or DM me

I would also like to know a bit more about your book in terms of support with the production of it. If you don't mind doing so, p.m me the link or title of your book, I would love to take a look.

I'm a tad embarrassed to link it as it's quite "steamy" and hits a very specific niche haha!

To answer the questions though.. I did the first round of editing myself. I really recommend Grammarly, you have to be careful because it tries to change things that are correct but it caught loads of obvious things.

Then I listened to it out loud and caught a lot more, things like I'd said "breath" rather than "breathe" which can be tricky to catch when you're reading.

Then I have an arrangement with a lovely author in the same genre as me and we edit each others work. It took her about a week from start to finish and she caught things like "it's not clear who said that" etc.

Then I published. Of all the reviews so far no one has said it needs an edit. Maybe my genre is more forgiving because it's on the erotica side of romance.. and if I move to contemporary I will more than likely pay for an editor but I am very happy with how it turned out.

Regarding the production.. I used kindle create to format the ebook and I have an amazing cover designer on Fiverr who made it for $30... i bought the image from DepositPhoto and she edited it and added text in the font/ colours I asked for.

Well done!

Have you published under your own name?

How long is the book?

I accidentally lost my own book when I was at 27k words due to a computer failure & was so upset I couldn't re-write it. I tried & got to about 10k but it didn't flow.

That was a few years ago now & I feel like trying again so this has been a great thread to read today!

@JurassicGirl I used a pen name because it's really not something I would want linked to my professional life haha! And it's 60k words, it's the first in a 2 part series.

I can't even imagine how horrible that must have been please do try again though! It's honestly the best feeling finishing it. I really recommend scrivener with dropbox, mine syncs automatically every time I close the app or exit the book so even if my phone/ ipad/ laptop gave up the ghost I wouldn't lose much progress.

I self-published a couple of books and found checking sales completely addictive.

Just wanted to say that editing your own book is completely different from having a professional editor look at it, though.

Well done OP, nothing quite like achieving a life’s ambition.

I have a DS (15) who is writing a book. He has written about 10,000 words and has now decided the story at the beginning needs to be changed. He is also doing grammar editing as well and seems to be caught in a loop where he wants to write for teenagers but thinks his writing language is too advanced and so has to dumb down a bit. I’ve told him to just write his story and a publisher will probably advise what age his book will be aimed at for now.

I could be entirely wrong as this is not my field at all. I’d appreciate any advice from you or any other experienced writer’s here.

Also can I ask how many drafts you wrote before you published? What was the process for your book writing from it's inception?

This is great, well done! I think you've inspired me to go for it!

Oh wow, congratulations!

I’ve told him to just write his story and a publisher will probably advise what age his book will be aimed at for now.

You are wrong, sorry! The first thing an agent (publishers don't deal directly until an agent's sold it to them) would ask is, "Where does this fit on a bookshelf in a shop?" You know those Amazon pages where they say, "The customers who bought X also bought Y?" That's what he needs to be thinking about.

Young Adult (YA) is a huge market at the moment. A 15 year old isn't going to be writing adult fiction, no matter how clever he is, so he should be aiming at the upper end of the YA market.

As for drafts, it will depend. As many as it takes until the story is straight is the honest answer. If he submits to an agent it's likely she will edit it and then when it goes to an editor (hopefully) she will edit it again. He has to be accepting of criticism and not take it personally; few books remain the same from submission to publication.

And it's very common to change the beginning. Once the book is written you actually understand the characters, the plot and the motivations much more clearly so it's very common to go back and do a rewrite.

Could you please message me the link? Congratulations.

Well done OP. How much of the 2.99 do you get in profit?

Hollow thanks very much for the advice. Like I said I know nothing about bookwriting/publishing. Does both the agent& editor edit the book? This bit confused me If he submits to an agent it's likely she will edit it and then when it goes to an editor (hopefully) she will edit it again.

Please message me the link too, I'd love to read it