Last year I put my foot on the literary starting line, lowered myself into position and waited for the pistol to signal it was time to run. Now, I don’t know how many months later, the famed and fabled publishing finish line is within my sight, almost close enough to touch. Just a couple of good long strides and I’m there. Victory! Applause! Confetti raining down like the blood of the enemies who stood in my path.

The fear. The worry. The griping of the guts. The sudden loss of hair.

I’m calm. I’m not panicking. I’m not. Who’s nervous? Why? What did you hear?

In simple terms, I’m nearly done with my first publication. The edits are done. The proofs are done. And my work is currently being formatted for Ebook layout, etc. Promotions will be starting soon. And I have a release date, and it’s not very far from now. March 08th, 2016. Not only is it not far, but it’s rapidly gaining on me. This is becoming a reality faster than I’d expected. I even have a hashtag (#SoulBroker). I wanted my hashtag to be #pleasepleasepleasepleasepleasepleasepleasepleasepleaseplasereadmybookthankyou. But for some reason my publisher wouldn’t go for it.

So all that’s left to do is fret and fuss and drive myself nuts thinking about all the stuff I hadn’t really had the time to think about before now. I may have mentioned this before, but when I first dreamed of becoming a writer, I pictured something akin to Thoreu’s ‘Walden,’ living by a pond in the woods, with nothing but nature and my typewriter. Just me and my work and nobody else. I imagined solitude and anonymity.

Hahahaha! Boy was I wrong. Now it’s promote! Promote! Promote! It’s schedule a book signing, talk yourself up and spread the word. It’s advance read copies and amazon reviews and trying not to shudder in fear whenever you hear that someone might actually read your work.  The further along this process goes the more I contemplate purchasing land in a swamp somewhere just so I have a viable rock to hide under. But unfortunately, until I make the New York Times bestsellers’ list, I won’t have the capital to purchase said swamp, and by that time hiding underneath my comfy little rock would be pointless.

So from this moment forth, all comfort zones get expanded or utterly abandoned, and I couldn’t be more petrified. I actually think I am more worried to succeed than I am to fail. That may seem counter-intuitive, but when I think about my release date, I don’t think, “What if I don’t make any sales,” I think, “Crap, what if I do?” I guess I got into a comfortable niche in my writing where I would write a story, send it in to a company, get rejected and then go back to the same grind with another story. After a while, I got used to the cycle and now that I’ve broken out of it, I have no clue what to expect. It’s all foreign waters under a starless night. If there’s a waterfall up ahead, will I even see it? Probably not, but in the end, it’s probably better  than being stuck in a loop for the rest of my life. So here’s hoping for a safe landing.  I hope everyone will take that journey with me.

And for those of you that are interested, my story, Soulless, is currently available for pre-order on amazon at: http://www.amazon.com/Soulless-Soul-Broker-Book-1-ebook/dp/B01ATYM5XQ/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1453305363&sr=1-1&keywords=9781944281083

You can also add it on Goodreads at: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/28637495-soulless?from_search=true&search_version=service

It will also be available on paperback, Nook and all other ebooks formats through Smashwords, on the aforementioned released date. That’s March 08th for those of you that don’t want to scroll back up to check.

I will keep everyone update as the book becomes available through other outlets.

Thank you everyone.