To a writer, bringing a book into the world is sometimes far more painful than birth. First, if you do it professionally, it can take years from first draft to publication. Second, you constantly worry about it once it’s in the world, i.e., is the world being kind to it, is it being accepted for who it is, will it get snatched (pirated), etc.?

However, you’re also exceptionally proud of it and confident you’ve given it a good start in life so it can stand on its own. You want to draw people’s attention to it because you’ve given “life” to something beautiful and far more immortal than you are.

The book, of course; I mean the book.

(If either of my kids reads this, of course I felt the same way about you. I swear.)

What Did I Mean About “Professionally?”

I’m aware of writers who set goals of a book a month to be published. I do not jest. There were publishers in the middle of the last century who did just that — publish a book or more a month. They had dozens of writers “on contract,” and they had a specific formula, actually several of them: swashbuckling adventure, monster-laden sci-fi, grotesque horror, steamy romance and some outright porn.

When paperback books were first introduced in 1935 and it became quicker and cheaper to produce books, publishing exploded, and readers wanted more and sooner. These “pulp” publishers supplied the books. Writers got the “formula,” and the rest was their imagination. Anyone who’s read Harlequin romances understands this concept of formulaic writing.

Lest you think this was all roses and puppies, the writers got paid very little and got no percentage of the publishers’ profits. Plus, this type of publishing gave writers a bad name. Some of what was produced was beyond lurid; it was meritless. Writers who later achieved success quite often hid their association with that sort of dime-store novel publishing.

The current digital age may have brought us back to “pulp fiction.”

Now, I’m no literary snob. I write genre fiction, after all. Some of these book-a-month writers are ultimate professionals, and they have to publish this way to be a full-time writer and make enough in royalties to pay the bills. I worked hard for a pension that I knew would let me pay the bills and devote my time to writing — and publishing. Frankly, producing a book a month is beyond me, so hats off to those who can.

(Perhaps another time I’ll rant about the fact there are now ads circulating on social media “teaching” you how to use AI to “write” a book that you can sell with no writing effort on your part. Again, that’s for another day.)

Some of my books have taken me 20+ years to get to the point where I’d even consider publishing them. That’s because I research, sometimes too much, but since I write historical fiction, research is important. My debut novel, A War of Deception, I started in 2009; it was published in 2017. I followed that with the four-book series, A Perfect Hatred. I started writing that in 1997; the first book in the series, End Times, was published in 2018. You get the picture. I think the shortest time for me between rough draft, rewrite, edit, and publication was a little over two years, for the collection of short stories Spy Flash III: The Moscow Rules.

Wasn’t This Post About a Book Launch?

Yes, it was. I digressed; it’s a writer thing.

On Saturday, June 24, book 3 (TREACHERY) of my 9/11 series, Meeting the Enemy, will launch. (Started in late 2001; book 1 published 2022, by the way.) It’s a rather low-key launch, compared to the cake decorated with the book cover of A War of Deception and punch launch of my debut novel.

Even before COVID pretty much shut down in-person book events, the trend had become to have your launch on-line. Going live on Facebook and offering little gifts and prizes throughout the day was the thing. The problem is, even though I’m a raging extrovert, put me in front of a camera and I’m a gibbering mess. Also, the cutesy posts with prizes rather reminded me of the games played at a baby shower. Let’s be frank; I wasn’t at all good at this. I envy those who can express themselves with eloquence without having a visible audience; I’m not one of them.

So, low key launch.

However, to celebrate the launch of TREACHERY, I’ve got a couple of giveaways upcoming.

1. Starting on June 25, both A War of Deception and its mini-sequel, the novelette, A Face in the Crowd , which had been on sale in June, will be FREE through June 29. (Click on either title in this paragraph to download them for free between 6/25 and 6/29.)
2. You can also enter to win one of five copies of a Meeting the Enemy-related short story, “It’s in the Blood.” This giveaway starts on June 24 and runs through the end of the month, June 30.

The short story, “It’s in the Blood,” I adapted from a scene in Meeting the Enemy book 2, REVENGE. It was a scene the editor recommended cutting since it didn’t really advance the story. Indeed, it sort of slowed the denouement’s arrival. However, the editor and I both liked the scene, so I set it aside and eventually reworked it as a short story. So, on June 24, click on “enter to win” above and toss your name in the hat. You can also check my various social media accounts for the link to the giveaway.

At Least, Tell Us About TREACHERY

Compared to books 1 (TERROR) and 2 (REVENGE), which were action-packed, TREACHERY is more a behind-the-scenes type of action. You know, plotting nefarious plans, meetings of the principals, spymasters working out ways to thwart corrupt even evil politicians.

In this novel, I get to explore my loathing of meetings, developed from 30+ years of being in too many of them. And office politics. Little did I know I’d have to master that, and my character Mai Fisher gets to handle that in a way I couldn’t. She also gets to say in meetings things I censored myself from saying because, well, I wanted to retire with my pension. However, in the last few months before I retired, I was more outspoken than usual, and I was pretty outspoken anyway.

We also see Mai, who loves operating out in the field, chaffing not only in her undercover assignment as Katherine Burke, CIA Chief of Staff, but with bureaucracy overall. Something I can also relate to.

TREACHERY primarily exists to set up the final book of the series, RENDITION, which comes out in December 2023. Of course, it’s fiction, based on fact, and tempered by my paradigm of self. Homework: Look it up.

A Bit More Rambling

With the publication of TREACHERY and knowing there’s only one more book in the series, I’m starting to get that feeling I always have after one of my books comes to life: Is it any good? Have I done the best I could have done? Did I leave something out? Does everything makes sense?

That’s not imposter syndrome. It’s merely a flawed perfectionist wondering if I got it right. I’m not the only writer who feels like this on publication day. Now, I’m talking about finding typos the day after publication. Despite all the eyes on a manuscript before it gets published, those are inevitable. I try not to take that personally. Sometimes I succeed.

What I mean goes back to the beginning of this post. When my book goes public, it’s much like when you send your kid off to college, smiling and waving while worrying if you prepared him or her or them to face the world. If the kid succeeds or fails, society will look to the parent to compliment or to blame. In that way, publishing a book you’ve written, shed tears and blood (figuratively) over, is like putting yourself in full view of the whole world, and you can’t control who sees you or what they think of you.

So, you shrug that off. You simply move on to the next book, and that’s exactly what I’ll do.