Time for My Thank You Tour

It has been exactly one week since my debut romance Fate’s Arrangement released, and what a successful release it was. Already, after one week, I have sold three times as many books than I did with my first novel, Finding Ada. This release was also one that left me feeling a mix of emotions.

I am, first and foremost, thankful for everyone who contributed to my success so far. My ARC reviewers, most of whom I have never met face-to-face and met for the first time a month before my novel’s release, have been angels! Ladies, your reviews have made me glow with pride, and I am eternally grateful to you for your willingness to give a relatively unknown author like me a shot. I am thankful for my Twitter and Facebook followers who have not only bought my book but generously retweeted and shared my posts. I am thankful for my parents and parents-in-law, who, much like those parents who peddle chocolate bars at work for their kid’s school fundraiser, tell everyone they know (and even people they don’t) how awesome my book is. I am thankful for my husband’s support. Though he has yet to read anything I’ve published, he has always shown his support by ensuring I have time to write and by letting me bounce ideas off of him. And I am thankful that my children allow me to write (most days). May our daily naps never end.

In addition to my gratitude, I am still amazed that I managed to take Fate’s Arrangement from a completely blank page to publication in nine months. While I am proud of myself for accomplishing what is a great feat for me (especially after taking eight years to publish Finding Ada), I was left feeling burnt out after all was said and done. Writing and revising was the easy part. I have been honing those skills for years. The difficulty was in learning the marketing tricks (and I am not done learning) and putting my new knowledge into practice. It stretched my mind and forced me to think, strategize, and act in a way I never had before. I am an introvert, and through this process of reaching out to reviewers, friends, family, and the social media world at large, I have been forced to act like an extrovert. This caused me great discomfort at first, but I am gradually getting used to it. Nevertheless, it did take an emotional and creative toll on me.

For three days straight, I did not want to do anything aside from sit on my butt and watch Netflix. I didn’t even want to cook. Thank goodness we had left-overs filling the fridge. This was frustrating for me because I had another novel in the works, but my brain had so turned to mush from the work put in to the book release, that I could not even begin to think about how to start my next novel. Thankfully, three days was all my poor brain needed to recalibrate and recharge. By Monday night, I was writing feverishly again, feeling good about my progress. Now, with a little luck and a lot of determination, my goal is to get this next novel out before the end of 2018. But first, I will take it easy and enjoy the Christmas festivities, and I hope you will too.

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!

Megan Elder Evans