It started as a love for books. Then it was a love for the authors who wrote those books. All the love had slowly turned into a hobby for writing poetry and for storytelling. Now, I am a published, professional writer. Funny, I’ve only ever written those words down in my childhood diaries. I can’t express how excited I am to have accomplished this. Let me tell you how I did it.
So quarantine sucked, sorry to state the obvious. But also, being locked inside my house made me write a lot more than I normally would. Being forced to only pay attention to how and what I write sparked a serious realization. If I want to write and edit for the rest of my life, then I need to start taking this “hobby” of mine seriously. It’s time I stop brushing off the one thing that sets my soul on fire. I love to write, so why not do something with it? I have all this time now, so why not accomplish the number one item on my bucket list? So I did. I think when you choose to believe in yourself you can do anything.
I researched, watched videos, spoke to other writers, consulted social media platforms, and in the end, I decided I would self-publish my book using Kindle Direct Publishing, an online self-publishing forum offered by Amazon. I did everything completely on my own; no editor, no marketing campaign, no agent, just me. I compiled all the short stories and poems I wrote over the course of my childhood and over the course of quarantine in order to create Gin & Juice Boxes.
The book is about a little girl who is an old soul, can you guess who that might be? I’ve always felt different from the people around me because of my call to write and because of my inability to connect with things that other people my age are interested in. I’ve always ached for my future; that’s always where I wanted to be because I thought that would be the only time I felt like my age. But when I decided to write a book about who I am, what I dream about, what I cry about, the kind of coffee I drink, and the people and places I love, I realized that I am exactly where I need to be. I realized that this was the best thing I had ever done for myself.
