I feel hungover. I woke up with one of those double-barrel diamond-splitter headaches that seems to touch every fibrous tissue and crackling nerve within one’s cherished meat castle. I haven’t imbibed a single drop of alcohol over the past 24 hours, however.
Yesterday my debut epic fantasy novel, SAVAGE LEGION, was officially released into the world. All paths to publishing a book are long, but I feel like this one racked up near-lethal mileage. To say nothing of the years I spent writing the first draft (which means the fiftieth draft, the one you submit), the book was accepted by the publisher over two years ago, and in that span of time they were merged with another publisher, my editor was unceremoniously let go, I’ve written the first draft of the follow-up, and I’ve aged eons.
So, did the destination live up to the journey? Yes, and no. We didn’t shatter any sales records, but you know what we did do? We got the book out to readers, and it is exactly, precisely the book I wanted to write. That’s an amazing accomplishment, and one authors (and publishers) lose sight of far too often. It’s easy to feel like approximately one million books are released every week, and you were a drop in an indifferent ocean. The fact is, most novels are never published. I daresay most novels are ever finished. For every person that tries to write a novel with the intention of publishing it, I doubt one in a ten thousand succeeds, probably more.
If you saw your novel reach shelves/screens, you accomplished a titanic feat.
Hell, if you finished writing your novel, you achieved a glory unknown to most.
What did I take away from my launch day specifically? A few things…
1) More people posted and talked about this book than any previous book I’ve released. So many of them posted pictures of their copies. That is tangible, significant progress in my career. If I make that kind of gain every time I publish a book (which presupposes my writing and finishing more books, which is also a key ingredient here) I will get to where I want to go professionally. That’s just math.
2) More than one person who isn’t my agent, wife, or mother has read the book and loves it. REALLY loves it. That’s everything. If there is one person who truly loves your book, there are many, many more who will. You just have to get it into their eyeballs.
3) Launch day is, ultimately, just another day. It’s another stop on the tour. My second novel in this series, SAVAGE BOUNTY, is scheduled to be released exactly one year from yesterday. We still have a lot of work to do. We have to keep word-of-mouth about SAVAGE LEGION spreading, keep that ball rolling uphill. Everything I was doing before launch day I have to keep doing. The path winds on.
I am filled with gratitude towards everyone who took time out of their lives and/or money out of their pocket to support this book, however you did it, or are doing it. If you’ve already picked it up, do please take the time to review and rate it at places like Amazon and Goodreads.
If you’ve yet to secure your copy, you can order it through Bookshop to support your local, independent bookstore (that’d be my preference). You can put it on your Kindle by going to Amazon. The audiobook edition, wonderfully narrated by Lameece Issaq, is also available through Audible, Apple Books, and Google Play.
The Savage Rebellion keeps on rolling.