Is being an author work – or is it art?

Hmm.

Readers might consider a much-loved book to be an artistic creation of the author’s mind and imagination, the spinning of a tale that comes from profound or exotic inspiration, travels or experiences. When I was a kid and read books that opened up the world to me with adventure, romance, history, action, and more, I figured authors had to be a breed apart, individuals who had lived more than I could hope to, people who were well-educated, distinguished and so very much smarter than I was.

Mind you, I planned to get as smart and educated as they, but while reading their books, I settled back to enjoy learning about how people lived and loved in historic and modern England, how gunfighters were not always bad guys, and how Encyclopedia Brown could solve the trickiest mystery. And he was just a kid!

I always figured I could write as good or better a book as many that I read, but never quite got around to getting it done (beyond taking the huge leap to send in one MS to Harlequin back in the day).  Upon receipt of the (vastly-deserved) rejection, I threw that idea back in the closet.

It wasn’t until I found and got hooked on M/M around 2007 that I found a new reading love – one that pushed me to write, this time for real. The first three books just flowed out of me, which I found amazing. It wasn’t until I ran headlong into my first editor (I had an editor!) that I realized how much work went into crafting a book suitable for publication. And how rough my product was.

Suddenly I was looking at my brilliant creation as a work product, something that took a boatload of effort to get from its humble beginnings to a saleable item for which people would pay hard-earned money, and my book had to go through an entire process to ready it for the customer. As I’ve written more and changed publishers, the process has gotten even more professional, especially for me. Working with pros inspires me to become better, each time.

Ultimately, I’ve realized how much work goes into writing. Sitting down at the computer is just the beginning step. It takes discipline to write, especially when I’m not feeling very creative – so I like having deadlines. The support of the writing community is helpful, since writing in and of itself is a solitary venture.

Joining Loose Id has pushed me that much farther to excel, to do more and do it better. Having a supportive group of pros along the path makes it easier to turn my labor into my very own work of art.