Happy New Year! 🥳🎉🎊🎆

To everyone reading this, I wish you a very happy new year and health, wealth, and happiness for 2025!

2024 was an exceptionally special year for me, there were lots of exciting things happening within my family. Engagements, weddings, and babies in abundance! And of course, If Wishes Were Horses was released in August followed by my book launch in September.

So now that it’s been four months since the release of my book, I bravely thought it may be a good time to talk about reviews…..

Like them or hate them, they’re part of life if you’re putting your work out there into the big wide world. You will be judged. But you wrote a book for people to read, so it has to be expected; everyone has an opinion, and it would be a dull world if we all liked the same things.

I’m well aware that not everyone will enjoy my book—some may even hate it, and that’s okay. I don’t like reading romance, fantasy or poetry particularly, but I respect those authors and the talent they possess in their chosen genre. I don’t like jazz music or rock and roll, but I respect those musicians and the ability and skill they have to create music in that field. Suffice it to say we all have different interests and tastes.

I will say this however: it’s not easy to write a book; it’s an organic form of creation that can take years to complete. When I’m writing, I think about the project every day. I’m always thinking about the plots and the characters and how they’re all woven together in the storyline. The hours spent writing a book are unfathomable, not to mention the sacrifices that have to be made. It can be difficult sometimes if you know what you want to say in the story but you can’t translate it into words to put down on paper. Sometimes it can take hours to just squeeze out one measly sentence. 

And then finally the day arrives when you actually finish your book which feels amazing. It’s a massive achievement, but then the hard part begins.

What lies next for your unread novel and the couple of thousand hours that you dedicated to it? Will anyone actually ever read it? It’s especially difficult if it’s your debut book because no one has a clue who you are or what your book is even about. Will your book even get to print? There are literally hundreds of thousands of authors trying to get a publishing contract, so as you can appreciate, it’s no easy task.

So for the people out there who dislike my book, no problem. I’m fine with that, and thank you for your feedback - I’m aware I won’t please everyone. I don’t think there are any authors in the world that haven’t had bad reviews; I know it’s inevitable. But all I ask is that you just take a moment before you get carried away on your keyboard to make it constructive and realistic, and I will do my best to take it on board for my next piece of work.

Until next time.

xWendy 🙏🏻 🙏🏻 🙏🏻

Post Views : 6