Where You Been... A Writer’s Journey... Part ONE

I haven’t blogged in a long, long time. From late 2006 until mid 2010, I often blogged as often as daily and had lots to say and people to converse with but first Twitter and later Facebook became my place to converse, interact, talk books and stuff... But today I felt like blogging, talking about books and stuff. I’ve been published for thirteen years now and I’m sure me and others thought I would be long gone. Early on I got local support but online was sketchy. I was in several yahoo groups that were very popular at the time and there were many authors in those groups who became very famous... as such I learned a great day from where I was perched, more by observation than interaction. In early 2007, self publishing was looked upon with disdain, even by those who had themselves started that way. The be all and end all was to get a deal... I was kind of weird in that I never sought a deal, I just wanted to write and gain readers. I was odd. Many thought my writing too literary, thus to them boring. Also, I didn’t have lots of drama between black lovers and egads, was that and is that still a thing. For more than a year I wrote and sold books as best I could by by 2008, I got offline and took it to the road, literally. I attended festivals, went to book clubs, traveled to libraries and a few bookstores. It was hard, exhausting and FULFILLING. I was gaining readers, one small group at a time and I loved it. But by 2009 I was tired and feeling almost defeated. But it never occurred to me to stop writing. By then I had five books in print and they sold in dribbles but they sold. But early in 2009 I was working on my sixth book when someone suggested I print my blog in book form... I was, like, huh? But I trusted the person and figured I had nothing to lose. I took those posts that got the most interactions and a book was born... I was astonished that people actually payed 9.95 for something they could read for free. Hundreds of people... black people, white people, people...

Of course the new input people had was, “Girl, you need to stop with the romance and sexy stuff and concentrate on non fiction, that’s your thing!” I was thinking, why can’t I have myriad things. Ramblings, restored my confidence and I picked up Mrs. Black, a manuscript I had been working on for months with renewed fire. It was book five of a series that readers loved but hadn’t really caught fire. Black’s Obssession, Cinnamon’s Universe, Brown’s Possession had all done okay, especially Cinnamon’s Universe, a book about a woman’s infidelity, but no big sales. And mind you, these were all print books. Ebooks were not a thing yet... at least for me and most writers I knew. But I was off the road and my passion was renewed, so I wrote... this book changed my writing life...

I was advertising with online book groups by this time. Ads were very inexpensive. For less than $25.00 you got a full month on many sites, an interview and even a discussion. It was wonderful and Mrs. Black was the first book that got on the amazon bestsellers lists and generated conversation beyond me promoting or every now and again... someone else. There were cool forums for AA books and I was in there. It was heady because I was starting to find my niche... I was discovering that older women, people who loved positive stories about black people would purchase and read me... whew, I could write nonfiction and fiction. And a funny thing happened, someone reached out and asked if they could publish Mrs. Black... I gave it thought but they told Me Cinnamon would have to be ten years younger, at least (she was fifty and SEXY) also, there would have to be amped up drama because after all black peoples equates drama... I said, thanks but no thanks. That wasn’t of interest to me and... I will always leave money on the table before compromising ME. That will become something I’ll discuss more in the coming days... my saying thanks but no thanks. Next post I will discuss short stories and a brief thing called amazon shorts, that again changed that game for me as an author and entrepreneur willing to take chances. #JustLOVE