Monday, September 9, 2013

Writing, Blogging, Books and Balance

For years, most of my Thursday posts have featured books I have read and enjoyed. While I have loved giving shout-outs to titles and authors whose work I enjoy, the burden of reading and writing this material for the blog has gotten overwhelming. Meanwhile (for all of you other author-bloggers out there), I have not seen any measurable return in terms of my own book sales. 

Lately, I've also been struggling more than usual with balancing promotion of my upcoming novel with completion of my next manuscript. Maybe it's the unusual amount of freelance work I've picked up this fall. Maybe it's missing my eldest son, off to college. (Tuition bills are one reason I tend to accept all the aforementioned freelance work, btw!) Regardless of the "why," I still have to try to realign the scales.

So, for the fall, the "how" is going to be a commitment to just once-weekly blogging (Mondays) and to allow myself to just read for fun at night without the self-imposed pressure of having to write about books. Meanwhile, I full intent to FINISH the book I am writing by October 25th. New deadline. The first, missed, date was August 30th.

Here's hoping the second deadline is the charm. Are you doing any realigning this fall? Got any good advice? Spill, okay?

4 comments:

Patti said...

I took four months off from blogging because I found it hard to strike a balance, so I'm going to try it again, but only once a week as well.

Stasia said...

Hope the new schedule works for you, Patti!

Misha Gerrick said...

I know what you mean. I do a lot of different stuff, so my days are pretty full.

I wouldn't be able to read against a deadline either.

Good luck with getting into a more comfortable groove. :-)

Stasia said...

Thanks, Misha!