Oh My! What Have I Done?

Writing the children's book was difficult, but it was a normal part of my creative process. And the story was screaming to get out. So I kinda had to do it.

I'm now in talks with a potential illustrator. She's very good, I think. The question is whether she likes my story enough to invest her talent in it. I hope so. But getting through that will be OK.

And I think in general, the actual production process ( turning the text and illustrations into a book) will go well enough. I'm used to managing the production process of a wide variety of materials, so it will be cool.

So why is my heading screeching at you? Why am I hyperventilating?

Because yesterday I emailed a friend of mine asking for ideas to get the children's book as widely marketed and distributed as possible. And she sent me a ton of ideas - and all of them were very good. The problem is that the list highlighted the huge amount of work I need to do before the book launches, and after the book launches. As a soon-to-be self-published author, I'm coming to the realisation that marketing is the harder ( and thankless) part of the job.

And the reality is that, if the book is not marketed well right from the beginning, it doesn't matter how well the text and illustrations tell the story. Few people will hear about the book and before you know it, my siblings will be using the copies I forced them to buy as placemats on their children's breakfast tables.