This is a really engaging urban fantasy, set in a futuristic version of Toronto where technology and genetic engineering have progressed substantially. It doesn’t read like a dystopia or warning on these advancements. Instead, the futuristic setting is treated like interesting world-building, and a way for the author to free herself from the everyday drudgery of current Toronto, if she chooses. It’s a nice balance of accurate Toronto and fantasy Toronto.
The story follows Voya, a young witch, trying to complete her Calling in order to receive her powers. When, at first, she fails, her ancestor gives her a second chance to complete a trial: Voya must destroy her first love. But the consequence of failure this time would mean that every witch in Voya’s family will be stripped of their magic.
The magic system is rooted in family and ancestral magic. There’s a large cast of characters, but each of them feels distinct and memorable. It is YA, and normally I don’t love YA books anymore, but this one felt fresh and not too juvenile. The writing blends different elements of storytelling well. First, there’s the intimate character storytelling—Voya’s connection with her family, friends, and love interest. Next there’s the larger community story—how Voya and her family fit into the community of Black witches in Toronto. All tied together with the larger socio-political commentary—how racial inequality, transgenerational trauma, wage disparity, and social injustice would be felt and experienced in this future version of Toronto. It balances all of this, while never feeling like a heavy or disjointed read.
Why I think you might like the Blood Like Magic Duology:
The emphasis was on character development and character relationships. The relationships really propelled the plot and the story.
Magic but not too much magic. I love a world where the magic has limits and where reality plays a part. This one was especially cool though, because there was magic, reality, and futurism. So, when magic couldn’t solve something, maybe technology could!
Reluctant heroine. Voya really struggles to believe in herself and struggles to make decisions. She has to learn to trust herself as the story progresses, and make others trust her as well.
Mistakes have consequences. The fallout from book one is felt for a long time in book two and the characters have to find a way to move past it without magically fixing everything.
Friendship theme. Voya does have a romantic storyline, but she also has strong friendship and family bonds that drive a lot of her decisions.
Duology! If you, like me, are easily overwhelmed by a trilogy, but you also often want a bit more than one book, then Duologies are the new best thing!
The textbook answer is that there is no right or wrong time of day to write. Most authors I know are balancing jobs and families and dozens of other things while trying to write their novels. So usually, they write whenever they can find the time.
I’m sure you’ve heard this answer before, right?
But this answer makes me feel uncomfortable, like I’m teetering on the edge of a chaotic non-creative abyss. It doesn’t work for me that way. I can’t just “find time to write”. I can’t just cram it in at the end of the day or wait until I have free time or until I feel like it.
Nope. No way. No how.
I need routine. I live and die by a schedule, and I have my life scheduled down to the half hour. Yep, that’s right. Every half hour of my life is spoken and accounted for. Now, that doesn’t mean I don’t relax regularly and give myself grace to change things up from time to time if I feel like it. In fact, I have giant blocks of time set aside for “me time” or “family time” etc. And if something important comes up, or someone I love needs something, I’ll drop everything and help them out.
But for the most part, I follow my pretty, colourful schedule in my excel sheet. And it works for me. So right now, I have three mornings set aside for writing from approximately 9 until 12.
Now, the key is to treat those blocks of time like a formal commitment, or a job. If someone asks me if I can do a zoom meeting at 10am on a writing day, I say “no, sorry, I’m not available at that time.” These writing blocks are not flexible. They are unyielding and essential, like sleep, or formal employment where I’m expected to be at a certain place at a certain time. I just can’t change it.
Trust me, holding fast to this boundary and being unapologetic about it is half the battle. But that’s how I balance multiple projects, jobs, and priorities without letting any resentment eat away at me.
One thing that’s important, is that this schedule may need to change from time to time. Say you get a new job, or certain changes in your personal life mean you need to adjust. No problem, I say to myself. Take a deep breath. Schedules are meant to be re-written.
When I wrote the Quiescence Trilogy, I didn’t have days available during the week. So, I wrote all weekend every weekend. Then I got a Saturday afternoon job too, so suddenly I had Saturday morning, and Sunday all day to write.
Those were wild times, but I made it work.
Now I’m writing a new book and using my 3-morning a week schedule. It’s working, and I’m happy with the progress I’m making. I definitely miss having two whole days in a row to write, but maybe one day I’ll be able to swing that again.
All in all, it doesn’t really matter what time of day you write or how often. But I do think a consistent schedule is an indispensable tool to help with motivation, energy, focus, and pacing. Not every writing session will be amazing, but if you stick with your routine, you should hopefully meet your writing goals!
Have you ever read a high fantasy novel and wondered how to pronounce all those made-up words? Yeah, me too. So here’s a handy pronunciation guide for the fantasy terms in my debut trilogy, The Quiescence Trilogy.
Before we get down to the nitty gritty, I want to say that I actually love letting readers find their own pronunciations. I love listening to people sound out the weird words in their own garbled gibberish. Everyone has their own interpretation, which is fun! And I like to think it gives them a sense of ownership over the story too.
However, in this world of audiobooks, I suspect nobody wants a narrator who pronounces words differently every time. And since I need to record the narration, I figured I could share my personal pronunciations.
So here is the official audiobook pronunciation guide for The Quiescence Trilogy. Feel free to ignore it and keep going with whatever pronunciations you prefer 🙂
In the previous posts, 12 Tips for New Indie Authors Part One and Part Two, these were the eight things I shared from my first year as an Indie Author:
When I set out to write my first novel, I did it utterly and completely for my own happiness. I wrote a book I enjoyed writing. I didn’t try to game the system, trick readers, or anticipate trends to write an instant bestseller. It wasn’t to get famous or sell a certain number of copies. I did it because I wanted to, and I enjoyed it.
Now, I realize my reasons may not be the same as your reasons, but the one thing I’ve always tried to remember is that I’m doing this for myself. That makes it a lot easier to do the work, to handle the rejection letters, to cope with the mean reviews, to find joy in each step of the process.
I knew I was writing a book I enjoyed, and I trusted that if I enjoyed it, at least one other person out there would enjoy it too, and that was enough for me.
Obviously I did hope a lot of people would like it. I even entertained the occasional fame daydreams – I’m only human – and yes, I strove to produce a quality book that would sell a good number of copies and make me some money. But the root goal always remained the same: to have fun writing and publishing a book. Everything else after that was just a bonus.
I recommend you do this for yourself. Be authentic, have fun, make mistakes, and enjoy every step of the messy process.
10. Don’t let people tear you down
I got my first 1-star reviews recently. Actually a few not-so nice reviews arrived in a row. Hopefully one day I’ll have so many reviews coming in that I won’t have time to read them all, but for now, I like reading them – even the mean ones. I like to see if people have any good suggestions or valid critiques.
Some reviewers are great, they offer positives and negatives, and give actionable feedback. But most people just get off on tearing other people down. They like to be vitriolic and act as if your book personally affronted them. That’s fine, I guess. If that’s who they are – people who like being nasty because it makes them feel better. I mean, there’s a word for people like that – in fact, there are several great words… But I’ll save them for my next villainous character descriptions.
Early on in the publishing process, I actually challenged myself to tear apart my book and envision all the mean critiques someone could lodge against me. I think it was a good exercise, because a) it actually prompted me to address a few issues before I published, and b) it helped me develop a coping strategy. Now I have a ready response to make myself feel better in case a reviewer hates my book. I can shrug them off, or I can say, “yeah they have a point, but here’s the reason why I decided not to address that issue in this book”.
There will always be people who don’t like your book, or who don’t like you. It’s a rite of passage to get nasty reviews, but as long as YOU like your book and you’re proud of your work, that’s all that matters.
11. Read a LOT
Another tip you see a lot in the Indie Author vlog-blog-o-sphere is that you need to read. Admittedly, this is a tip I didn’t believe at first. I was arrogant, and completely convinced that I was already a super awesome writer, who didn’t need to work on her craft. Reading more books would only take my time and distract me from writing my own books.
It’s true, reading takes time. Everyone is always saying “I wish I had time to read” while sitting and binging TV (admittedly, also a good way to learn about storytelling). But, trust me, you have time to read. You just need to prioritize it a bit more.
There’s a difference between reading to read, and reading to learn how to write. When I read fantasy books now, my mind works in a different way than it did before. It analyzes the plot, characters, and world building, trying to see why I find some books more satisfying than others. I revel in beautiful language, taking note of unique vocabulary and stylistic choices.
More than anything, I use reading as a way to give my brain a break. When I feel creatively drained or just unenthused about my own work, but I don’t want to be “unproductive”, I immerse myself in someone else’s story. It’s a respite from the responsibilities of my own creative world for a while. And getting excited about someone else’s creative project is often enough to jumpstart my own creative engine. And you might discover an author who’s voice inspires you or challenges you to be better. I especially encourage you to read other Indie Authors. It’s good to support each other! And it’s good to see what other people are doing in your niche.
12. Take it seriously
This might be one of the most important things I’ve discovered in my life. Take your dreams seriously. As a musician, author, and all around artsy weirdo who doesn’t fit into society’s cookie cutters, I have encountered endless streams of doubters and naysayers, as well as artistic aspirationals who are full of excuses about why they don’t do the art they claim is important to them.
When I was in grade 12, heading off to do my undergrad in music, the number one question people asked me (with skepticism and a healthy dose of pity on their face) was “oh, what are you going to do with that degree?”
I’ll tell you what I’m going to do with it: WHATEVER I WANT! Whatever I dare to dream is possible!
Okay… calming down now…
You know what I’ve realized, I absolutely do NOT need to justify my dreams to anyone else. They are my dreams and if I want to achieve them, I will. It all begins with me taking them seriously, because nobody is going to take them seriously unless I do it first.
I believe in my dreams. I believe they have value and worth and I believe I can achieve them. My dreams deserve my time, they deserve my effort.
This dream I had, of publishing my own books, well I took it VERY seriously. I wasn’t content to just crank out the first draft and be done with it. My dreams deserve the best of what I can offer them. Absolutely nothing less. Yes, it’s a lot of hard work, but I don’t see any other option. My dreams deserve to be taken seriously. And yours do too.
And now here’s four more things I learned this year!
5. Build a small but strong support group
You know the list of acknowledgements at the end of every book? The whole part where the author lists people, gushing like they’re delivering a dramatic Oscar acceptance speech: “I couldn’t have done this without you” and “your support means so much to me” etc. Well, there’s a reason every book has that part. And it’s not just because every author has already secretly written their Oscar acceptance speeches.
Just because you’re an indie author, doesn’t mean you have to do everything all by yourself. Make use of the community around you, especially at the beginning. Most of your friends and family will be super excited for you when you publish your first book, but that excitement will dwindle a bit as the books go on, and that’s normal and fair. It doesn’t mean they’re not still supportive, it just means they don’t have the bandwidth to maintain the same level of enthusiasm after the novelty has worn off a bit.
So ask yourself, who are the people who are 100% invested in this for you? The people who want to beta read every single draft, who want to listen to you talk about the book for hours. The people who offer feedback and immediately buy 6 copies of the book to give to other people.
Those are the people you need the most. Cheerleaders, critique partners, beta readers etc. Rely on those people, and make sure they know how important they are!
6. Time or Money?
Ah yes, the money question. I could probably write an entire blog just on budgeting and the money aspect of being an Indie Author, but right now I’ll keep it simple. If you’re worrying about how much this endeavour will cost you, the answer is: it’s up to you.
Ask yourself what you have more of, time or money? If you have more time, then you can take on more tasks yourself, thereby reducing your expenses. If you have no time, you may find yourself outsourcing and paying people to do other tasks. Neither of these is right or wrong. It completely depends on you, your budget, and your time. Make the decision that’s right for you.
I spent a fair bit of money on publishing book one, and then reduced my expenses on book two and three because I knew what I was doing and I could do it more efficiently. This goes back to trial and error and bandwidth a bit. What do you have the time/bandwidth to do? And what expenses are most likely to have a good Return on Investment (that return could be literal cash income, or fans/followers, or it could be new skills or knowledge you acquire).
My advice is: respect your own time and try not to spend money unless it has a good ROI. Easier said than done, I know. But if you keep these things in mind as you move forward, hopefully it will help you. And remember to pace yourself. This is a marathon, not a sprint.
7. Watch out for scams
Okay so this is pretty obvious. But what’s not obvious, is how these scams present themselves. There’s an awful lot of blind trust expected in this industry. Instances where you’re asked to pay upfront for a service, with no concrete guarantee of a good ROI. Or people reaching out on social media to offer you their “expert” services.
My advice is to just be wary. Do a lot of research before spending your money. Some scams are malicious, designed to drain your wallet. Other scams are just genuine services that frankly don’t work. So you might try them once, realize they suck and then never do them again.
There are a lot of people out there who like to prey on people trying to follow their dreams. Things like Vanity Presses. I submitted my manuscript to one before I realized it was a vanity press. When they responded, I got excited that someone wanted to publish my book. Then I did some more research and realized it was a bad, bad, bad idea and I didn’t follow up with them.
At the end of the day, the more successful you are, the more scammers will come crawling out of the woodwork. So in a way, it’s kind of nice to get a lot of scuzzy messages. It means they think you have a level of success they can glom on to. So try to take that as a win, and just don’t let them actually glom on.
There are a lot of support groups on facebook and other platforms where authors share their experiences. Definitely join as many of those as you can. You don’t have to interact with anyone on them really. But you can benefit from access to their knowledge and learn from other authors’ mistakes.
8. Play the Long Game
It’s easy to get discouraged in the first year when you don’t immediately achieve bestseller success, or when you realize you worked insane hours and earned pennies, so your hourly pay rate amounted to something like $0.50/hour.
But I realized something very important. I realized that I will be a published author for the rest of my life, earning income in a gentle trickle for the rest of my life. And the bulk of the work involved in publishing the first book is over now. It’s a HUGE investment of time upfront, but the payoff is indeterminate.
Hypothetically, let’s say I earn $1000 per year that the book is published, and let’s say I live for another 60 years. That means the book could earn me $60,000, which is a fairly respectable salary for one year of work. And that’s only one book. The insane amount of work I did was actually to publish three books.
So let’s be simplistic and multiply that number by 3. Now I’ve earned $180,000 for one year of work. Which is a very nice amount, I think. The only drawback is that I have to accept it on a weird fluctuating payment plan, determined by other people’s whims and interests. And of course, I will keep doing marketing work in future years, so it’s not quite this cut and dry.
But the bottom line is that I’m in this for the long haul. I’m not going to evaluate my success after one year. It’s a lifelong journey and I’m going to reap the rewards of being a published author for the rest of my life, and then my estate will reap the rewards until my copyright expires 50 years after I die. Yay!
12 TIPS FOR NEW INDIE AUTHORS – PART THREE COMING SOON
(As with my first novel, this post kept creeping up there in word count, so I’ve split it into three posts! Haha I do that a lot!)
It’s been a year!
Alright so technically it has been a year and a half, but as we bid farewell to 2022, I have achieved the initial goal I set for myself: to publish three books in the span of 12 months.
I thought it would be nice to share 12 things I learned in my first year as an Indie Author. One for each month of the year, or one for each of the 12 days of Christmas… whatever you prefer!
1. It’s a lot of work, but a lot of fun!
It probably goes without saying that being an Indie Author is a lot of work. You have to be the writer, the editor, the typesetter, the marketer, the salesperson, and everything in-between. There is a reason why the traditional publishing industry exists – most writers don’t have the time or the resources to wear all of these different hats.
Of course, me, I love wearing hats – the more the merrier. Bring on the hats.
The important thing to remember is that this will be an unbelievable amount of work. But if you’re anything like me, you will simply adore all of it. You won’t mind putting in 16-hour days, in fact, you’ll actually want to put in those hours!
But if you’re not really jazzed about the prospect of wearing so many hats it makes your head sweat, you might prefer to pursue traditional publishing. Or, if you’re in a strong financial position, you could still go the indie route and just outsource lots of work. However, one of my favourite perks of being an indie author is that it gives me all the power (POWER MUAHAHAH!). I like having all the control, and frankly, outsourcing work means giving up bits of control…
(Don’t touch my hats!)
Yeah, I’m not a great delegator, but maybe you are. I hope so, for your sake.
I can tell you, though, that having this much control over my creative dreams and investing my time and money in myself is the most satisfying, rewarding, engaging, and exciting work I have ever done. And as you may recall, I love to work, so this is saying a lot.
2. Figure out what you have the bandwidth to do
So, given that being an Indie Author is an unbelievable amount of work, you also need to be practical about how you spend your time. I like to pretend I can do all the work all the time, and all by my lonesome.
Wrong. So wrong!
It is impossible to do everything all the time. I know I’m only human and I know I can’t do everything. All through this process I’ve made decisions about what I do and don’t have the bandwidth to undertake myself. For example, cover design is not a skill I have. My stupid workaholic control freak brain wanted me to go get training and become an amazing cover designer, but my practical brain put its foot down. (I know, right? My brain has feet. So cool!) So I hired a cover designer, and she is amazing!
Another example is typesetting. I researched how to properly typeset a book and I was all prepared to do it myself, but that would have taken a lot of time and likely led to a lot of frustration and nit-picky work. So, I decided to invest in Vellum instead.
So, my advice to you is to figure out what your own limitations are. Definitely push yourself to try new things! But be strategic in how you spend your time (and money). What can you do and what can’t you do? Or no, not “can’t” I don’t like that word. So, let’s say, what should you do and what shouldn’t you do?
And remember that this is a long journey. You may end up doing different tasks as you get better and more efficient at this.
3. Trial and Error
There are a lot of vloggers, bloggers and Indie Author authorities out there who will tell you the right way and the wrong way to do something (I guess I am guilty of that too… sigh… sorry). But it can be quite stressful trying to follow everyone else’s guides and rules. I got all worked up about trying to make sure I did it the “right way” and then I was disappointed when I didn’t immediately sell a gazillion books.
Over time I realized that some of the “surefire” tips I was following simply didn’t work for me. Maybe they will work later or maybe they only work for people who publish in a very specific niche genre. Who knows, really? But I realized that there is no guaranteed, surefire strategy. So all you can do is trial and error.
Try a little bit of everything (within reason and still respecting your budget), assess its success and adjust. Keep researching new strategies, and keep trying new things. And remember that everything will change as you publish more books. What didn’t work on book one, when no one knew who you were, might work amazingly well on book 3 or 4. Don’t be afraid to try new things, and don’t be afraid to stop doing something if it isn’t working right now.
4. Building an Audience Takes Time
The number one recommendation I encountered on the Indie Author vlog-blog-o-sphere was to “build my author platform and audience”. It was always presented to me as if it were step 1, the crucial starting point, without which you could not hope to be successful.
But here’s the thing. Nobody wants to follow you if you have nothing to show them. Nobody cares about an author who hasn’t authored a book. So how the heck are you supposed to build a following before publishing your book?
But if I can’t sell books if I don’t have a following, and I can’t have a following if I don’t have books, then gah! Where do I start?!
Well, I realize now that it was my error to assume that “building an audience” was step 1. In fact, it isn’t really a step. It’s not a task you accomplish, it’s an ongoing development and conversation with a growing, changing community. It takes time to get your name out there, to find your readers and to get reviews.
It. Takes. TIME.
So don’t worry about it too much. Just have fun. Do some more trial and error. Be authentic and cherish the members of your audience that already exist. Who are they? Why do they care about you? Maybe these questions will help you to find more of them.
12 Tips for new Indie Authors – Part Two Coming Soon
A lot of people talk about inspiration like it’s some magical, elusive thing – something we must be lucky enough to have bestowed upon us. They talk about talent like it’s the only feasible explanation for why certain people excel at an artistic discipline. It couldn’t have anything to do with hard work…
No, definitely not…
In my experience, being an artist is a LOT of hard work. But it is also messy and a bit chaotic. Just as painters might get covered in splatters of colour, you could say writers get covered in splatters of random words, ideas, and images.
But, it’s easy to use “lack of inspiration” as an excuse for not having the courage to dive into that chaos – the chaos of your own creativity. But I have never liked the idea that my creativity is dependent on some external force or some fickle muse. Instead, I take inspiration from anything I can: chance interactions with strangers, interesting sights both manmade and natural, the weird questions we ask ourselves during the day, etc.
Sometimes one moment will spark an idea, other times it takes years and several different inputs to feed into one thought. But in a way, I’m always searching for interesting things in my life. And I’m always trying to wonder what else is possible.
Look at My Pretty Idea Journal
Several years ago (eek almost 15 years? That can’t be right!) I found this pretty notebook when I was travelling with my mom. I remember trying to convince myself I didn’t really need to buy the silly journal. It was an unnecessary expense and it was just a notebook, after all…
But… but…
It was the perfect size! And it had a fun design that made it look old-timey and a bit magical.
Fortunately, despite me trying to pretend otherwise, I think my mom could tell I really wanted it, so she bought it for me (thank you momma!).
Since that day, I have carried this journal almost everywhere I go. I use it exclusively as an idea journal (i.e., no to-do lists or work notes). Any time I have a random thought relating to a creative project, I immediately jot it down in the book. And personally, I feel like the messier the journal is, the better. The chaos of creativity, and all that. So, I scribble random thoughts in the margins and draw arrows connecting thoughts across the page.
I also believe that writing with a pen on paper is satisfying and restorative. My dad bought me a Cross pen for my birthday one year (just a basic ballpoint, nothing crazy). It has a good balance and it feels nice on the page. So, now I only use that pen to write in my journal. It’s a fun little ritual.
But it doesn’t matter what kind of idea journal you have. It could be the notes app on your phone, or a bunch of scrap papers held together with a paperclip. All that matters is that you have someplace to put your ideas, someplace that works for you.
I do like the permanence of a notebook, though. That way I never accidentally delete an idea, or overwrite one on a whim, only to regret it later. I also think there’s something liberating about the pen to paper process. And I like holding the physical book full of all my precious treasures and secrety secrets.
Revisit Your Ideas and Don’t Rush Inspiration
Sometimes, after I jot down an idea, I don’t have anything more to add right away. Other times, I start writing and then more ideas flow one on top of the other and I can fill a whole page with character descriptions, world building, and questions about plot.
Inevitably the momentum will slow down though, and I’ll close the book and let everything simmer for a while. Sometimes only a few hours or days. Sometimes weeks or years.
But, every once in a while, I pick up the book and leaf through it, re-reading all my random notes. And I get a nice little endorphin rush seeing how many fun ideas I have, waiting for me to come play with them.
And that’s what they do – they wait. They lurk in the back of my mind, percolating until one day I have room for them to spring forth and claim my attention.
The Relics of Illayan, for example, was sparked by one completely random and goofy thought I had nearly 15 years ago (seriously? 15 again?). I pictured a fancy medieval goblet filled with a glowing potion. That potion had the texture and colour of molten gold.
And then I thought “heh… cool.”
I know, right? Seriously intellectual work going on here.
But that’s it. That’s how the entire story began. And if you’ve read the trilogy, you know that this golden potion is not exactly the main focal point. So, you see, it doesn’t really matter how small, random, nonsensical or downright dumb your idea is. It just has to plant a seed in your brain. Then it’s up to you to decide how, when, or if you want to tend that seed and cultivate your inspiration out of it.
When I was a child, I was always playing make believe with my friends, writing stories about anthropomorphic animals and acting them out at recess. Then, when I was about 9 or 10, my teacher invited me to read one of my stories out loud for the class. I remember this day clearly in my mind (or what my mind chooses to believe is true). I remember reading with such animation and comedic gusto, that the entire class was in hysterics. My teacher was crying she was laughing so hard.
In retrospect, this was it. This was the moment I knew I should be a writer.
But for whatever reason, it took another 15 odd years before I really understood it. In all that time, though, I never really stopped dreaming up story ideas. I wrote and self-published a children’s picture book one summer because I was bored at work. I remember my friend looking at it and saying, “Oh my God, Kathryn, this is what you should do!”
But friends are supposed to say that sort of thing, right?
I drafted some more children’s book ideas and sent them around to publishers and agents, collecting a fun little stack of rejection letters. Fortunately, being a classical musician, I have learned to appreciate the art of the rejection and I don’t take it too personally. But since no opportunities were arising in this direction, I moved on to other activities.
Teacher, Composer, or Writer?
Burned out from my masters in business, I moved to New Brunswick to teach cello. The benefit of living in New Brunswick is that I had a lot of quiet time to recuperate and get my creative energy back. During this time, I wrote some more projects for fun, including my first musical. I obsessively wrote an entire book and all the lyrics in roughly one month, and somehow still didn’t clue in to the simple truth…
You see, right around this time, I started to doubt myself. Despite the fact that I was already a professional cellist and composer, I didn’t think I had enough training in order to write the music properly. If I wanted to be a real composer I definitely needed a masters degree in music. So off I popped back to school to learn all the magical things that would somehow equip me to be a truly successful artist.
[Insert mirthless laughter] Oh, how naïve I was.
One does not learn how to be an artist at school, one learns how to be an academic. And in a graduate music program, one often learns how to judge and criticize all other artists and sneer down from a great lofty height of one’s own erroneous self-importance.
But I digress…
Another Masters Degree – Gotta Collect them Beanie Babies
While I was at The University of Toronto, studying to become a very important composer, I dealt with writer’s block for the first time in my life. I could not, for the life of me, bring myself to care about my thesis composition. So instead, I started writing one of the many stories I’d been carrying around with me for years, waiting until I “knew what I was doing.”
I sat down, thinking, “Eh, why not? Why not just start writing and see what happens?”
What happened was this: I could not stop writing. My thesis deadline crept ever closer, and no music was written, but pages and pages of story planning, character descriptions, and plot outlines poured out of me at an intoxicating speed. It was, quite simply, the best.
I blasted through an entire outline and then forced myself to stop. I returned to my music studies a little bitterly and composed my final thesis. As the degree ended, I realized I didn’t want to be trapped by institutional learning anymore. Neither of my masters degrees had been as rewarding as I’d hoped, and I was tired of learning what I was told to learn, and writing what I needed to write in order to pass courses. I wanted the freedom to choose and create my own dreams.
I’m Not a Workaholic, You Are!
This period of time, I refer to as my “Wtf is Wrong with You” period. This was the period of my life where I was finishing my second master’s degree while working a part-time job and a brand-new full-time job, and somehow still working on my novel in the back of my mind. Yes… I don’t know what is wrong with me, but I’m working on it.
With the master’s degree finished, I launched myself back into the novel (still working two formal jobs and freelancing as a cellist and composer… because, you know, I like to have a really light workload). Part of me wondered if I really had what it took to be a writer, to follow through on the project all the way to the end. After all, anyone can plan a book, but a writer needs to sit down and actually write it.
Needless to say, I did follow through on the project and it has been one of the best decisions I’ve ever made. It was an enormous undertaking, but – and this is not an exaggeration – I have loved every single minute of it.
I still work as a composer, cellist, conductor, teacher etc. And I love that work, I really do. But writing stories and being in charge of the entire process with absolute creative freedom is something I never want to stop doing.
Part of me still thinks musical theatre is the best blend of all my interests, and I am working with a collaborator on a new musical right now (working with Morgan-Paige Melbourne on a musical titled, Between Fires, funded by the Canada Council for the Arts)! But I have an entire notebook full of story ideas calling to me. So this whole being an author thing… well, I think I’ll keep doing it 🙂
So, How Do You Know You’re a Writer?
I believe we show who we are as children, and it takes growing up to learn how to understand. But at the end of the day, I think you have to ask yourself, “is there a love of storytelling in me?”
If the answer is yes, then you are a writer. It’s up to you decide how that manifests in your life.
After much consideration, I’ve decided to start a blog where I can chronicle some of my experiences becoming an author and balancing that work with my other responsibilities and artistic pursuits to achieve success. I especially want to share some tips for other Canadian authors, since most of the resources I’ve found are written from a US perspective.
To begin, a little background info on me.
As you may already know from my bio, I am also a professional composer, conductor, and cellist. I have a Master’s degree in Music composition and another Master’s in International Business. I think there’s an undergrad and a graduate diploma in there somewhere too.
You see, I used to collect university degrees like Beanie Babies, only to discover that, like Beanie Babies, their value did not increase as advertised. Now, I find myself with an expensive collection of degrees that no one cares about. Even I have trouble pretending they’re worth what I spent on them.
But maybe I’ll elaborate on that another time…
For now, all you need to know is that I have always been a multitasker, struggling to choose one path at the expense of all the others. I have always tried to balance multiple jobs, multiple dreams. I love music and I love business – I love composing, performing, conducting and teaching; I love leading, organizing, drafting spreadsheets, and strategic planning. I love a lot of things.
But – and here’s the important bit – I have never loved anything nearly as much as I’ve loved writing and publishing my first trilogy. Every single step of the process has been exciting, engaging, rewarding, and fun. It has given me a new perspective on everything I do. I’m no longer satisfied to toil away at work that isn’t satisfying and empowering. Much as I love hard work, maybe now I want to feel rewarded and contented in my career, instead of exhausted and distracted.
In 2021, I attended an artist presentation led by the Ontario Arts Council. One of the presenters said something that changed my entire outlook on my career. He said the most important question you need to answer for yourself is this:
What does success look like to you?
The question seemed so simple, so obvious. But over time, it started to nag at me, haunting me and daring me to be honest with myself. It’s easy to get bogged down and stifled by other people’s definition of success – or worse yet, society’s definition. Ugh. But in order to move forward, I needed to answer this question for myself.
So here it is. Success to me looks like this:
I make a comfortable living, working entirely on creative projects that inspire and energize me, setting my own schedule, working hard and efficiently so I can enjoy plenty of rest time with loved ones and appreciate the magic of my fleeting life on this Earth.
That’s it. Pretty simple at the end of the day. And this journey of becoming a writer has brought me so much closer to my goal.
Now, hopefully I can share some insights and tips to help you get one step closer to your own definition of success.
