Ever wondered what the writer does once the book comes?  Think they lay in bed doing whatever one does in place of smoking, since smoking is all passé (I don’t smoke anyway), but you get the picture…you’ve worked up to the big climax, it’s HERE, the book is out…release…now it’s time to just bask.  Right?

Um.  Wrong.

Here’s how it goes for me.

Tuesday: I hit as many local bookstores as I can (assuming I’m not otherwise engaged-lately, Tuesdays have come with previous engagements) so I can sign stock, leave bookmarks, talk to the booksellers.  Booksellers…they are my friend. 

Come 6pm, after I wrangle my little ones home and feed them, I stumble to PC, check email.

Then…from Tuesday and until, oh say… Friday, with random periods for break to eat, sleep, pee, take kids to sitters, etc, this is my life.

Check Google for:

Reviews… are people liking it? Hating it?

Check Amazon for:

Ratings…yeah, they don’t necessarily mean much, but still, I’m obsessive so yes, I’m checking.

Check Mrs. Giggles site…I LOVE her, did she read it? Did she like it? Did she hate it?

Check the pirate sites…I spent fricking months busting my ass on that book, please don’t let them be stealing from me already.

Check the blogs…are people talking about it?  Are people reading it? Are they hating it?

Check my email…has anybody emailed me?

Check my email again…has anybody fricking read it?

Check my mailbox…there is supposed to be a check.  Right?  Um.  It’s not there.  Do I email my agent? Come on, I need to pay for the ads, the contests, whimper, I need to pay my bills…

Login into facebook on the offchance that somebody is talking about it there.  Nope. Sigh.  But I’ve got bazillion friend requests, so I clear out those.

About this time, assuming it’s night time and the kids are in bed, I might stumble to the cabinet and get a rum and diet coke.  THEN…

I begin to…

Check Google for:

Reviews… are people liking it? Hating it?  Come on, people, it’s late, surely by now, somebody has read it, right?

Check Amazon for:

Ratings…yeah, they don’t necessarily mean much, but still, I’m obsessive so yes, I’m checking.  Oh, no…the ratings are dropping already?  How am I ever going to hit the big lists if this keeps happening????

Check Mrs. Giggles site…I LOVE her, did she read it? Did she like it? Did she hate it?  Choke.  No.  Review.  She doesn’t like my stuff anymore????

Check the pirate sites…I spent fricking months busting my ass on that book, please don’t let them be stealing from me already.  &#^@^@.  These people say they love my work, talk about it all the time and how much they enjoy it and this is how they show their appreciation-they fricking sabotage my career by stealing from me…whimper.  Where is that rum and diet coke?  Screw it.  Where is my strawberry wine?

Check the blogs…are people talking about it?  Are people reading it? Are they hating it?  Hey!  Somebody mentioned my book.  It’s in the TBR pile.  But still… hey, I exist!!!

Check my email…has anybody emailed me? Oh.  Lookie here…smile.  This reader picked it up because she liked the cover…and it turns out she couldn’t put it down.  I’m breathing again.

Login into facebook…and I find the most touching note from a reader I think I’ve read in…years.

Bliss?  No.  Not likely.  The days after a book comes out can be majorly stressful, but getting those notes from readers, seeing people talking about it blogs, those are the things that pull me through.  And when I sit back down in my chair on Monday, and get to work on the next book, those are the sort of things I’ll be thinking about.

So… you want to know which book I’m stressing about right now?  It’s called BROKEN.  And it’s pretty aptly named.  The characters of it are…well, pretty much broken…and they are trying to pick up the pieces of their lives when they find each other.

Shattered

Quinn Rafferty is working as a bounty hunter and bail bondsman in St. Louis when a new neighbor catches his eye. He’s tempted by her beauty—but he knows from experience that anyone desperate enough to live in his building is damaged goods. Besides, he has his own soul to mend before he can worry about anyone else.

Desperate

Sara Davis is on the run, but not for the usual reasons a woman goes on the lam. She’s not an abused wife, and she’s not a criminal. But she does have a plan for her future. And as much as she finds herself attracted to her gruff, tough neighbor, she can’t risk telling him the secrets she’s hiding. There’s just too much at stake.

Driven to desire…

But Quinn must get closer to Sara when she turns out to be the target of his new missing persons case, and he discovers that there is something more complex and dangerous to her than he thought. Now, both Quinn and Sara will have to expose their true feelings—as well as their fragile hearts—if they hope their love will survive…

If you’d like to read more about it, and maybe salvage my sanity, convince me that I do exist and check out my work, you can read an excerpt of BROKEN here at my site…and right now, if you buy BROKEN during release week, you can be entered to win a NOOK, the new ebook reader from Barnes and Noble.