With the release of my second full-length book, I had anticipated the process to get easier. Ha ha, my poor deluded past-self. I had no idea it just gets harder.

How wide-eyed and innocent I was, thinking that the more you do a thing, the more adept you become. I bought the whole “practice makes perfect” lie.

Here’s why releasing books is different than making the perfect chocolate cake or learning to throw a fastball.

The stakes are higher: If you get good reviews and have decent sales the first time, the only place for you to go is down.

There are new tasks for the second book: Not having much of an online presence before, not having to redirect people back to your first book, all things a newbie author doesn’t need to fret about.

Book fatigue: All my supportive and loving friends will come out and support me once. But really, they have lives, and their main purpose isn’t to keep up with my publishing schedule.

The covers, oy the covers: Choosing artwork for my first book was easy because I didn’t have to think about matching it to anything else. Thank you, Marianne Nowicki, for your genius.

Me working on the next book:

Nevertheless, I’m forging ahead. All these books are ready to go into the queue, and they’ll start to get pissed off if they don’t come out on the schedule I promised them. (Non-writers may not understand this, but this in no way indicates delusions.)

This week, I present STANDING UP. Mike and Jill’s story is fun, funny, sad, and angsty. Just like publishing a book.

That gives me an idea.