Blog Entry: Full-on Crazy
Entry posted on July 28, 2010, 7.21 pm
Categories:
A Most Improper Magick, Chocolate, Eating, Hot Chocolate, Publishing
Here's the thing about having a lot of author friends, people whose novels were published long before mine:
I have seen Publishing Crazy. To be specific, I have seen Publication Day Crazy. And I always, always shook my head over it. Of course, I didn't do it in front of them - I was their friend, and they were suffering! - but I shook my head to myself. I said to myself: if I ever get published, I will not succumb to Publication Day Crazy. I will be happy and zen and centered. I will remember that this is all good! I will not be crazy.
You guys will have already guessed the ending to this story.
My book will be out in the UK in four days...and I have sooooo succumbed to Publication Day Crazy. Every time I think about the fact that A Most Improper Magick will officially be out on Sunday, my breath speeds up to hyperventilation levels. (Which is crazy! It might not even be in bookstores yet by that point. I won't have author copies by that point. Sunday is only a day, not a TERRIFYING EVENT. Right?)
Every time I look at the space on the bookshelf where my book will appear (and of course I do this, with pinpoint accuracy and unstoppable magnetism, every single time I visit my local library or Waterstones), I feel sick with panic. This is real. What if EVERYBODY HATES IT????? (It doesn't even matter that I've gotten some really nice reviews. What if they were ALL, EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM, FLUKES?)
Yesterday I realized that a period (full stop) had accidentally been replaced by a comma, incorrectly, at one point in the first chapter of my book...and I had a full-on meltdown. (EVERYONE WILL THINK I'M A GRAMMATICAL KNOW-NOTHING WITH NO SENSE OF STYLE! OTHER WRITERS WILL BURN MY BOOK!)
Back on Monday, I was planning to cut down on chocolate this week and start a new regime of healthy eating.
I am in full-on Publication Day Crazy mode...but even I, it turns out, am not quite that crazy.
Today I ate half of a large chocolate-chocolate-chip cookie and drank a strong dark hot chocolate. (Heat one small cup of milk on the stove. Melt in four squares of really excellent dark chocolate. Drink. Experience heaven.)
It helped. But I am still crazy.