Summary

The author, Adonis Richards, recounts the personal and emotional journey of writing and self-publishing their first book, "Confessions of a Hopeless Creative," amidst struggles with doubt, anxiety, and the challenges of the publishing industry.

Abstract

Adonis Richards shares the intimate story of how they overcame personal challenges and the daunting process of publishing to release their first collection of poems. The journey began in 2016, marked by depression and uncertainty about the future. Despite initial fears and the complexities of the traditional publishing route, Richards found solace and success through self-publishing via Kindle Direct Publishing. The process involved months of editing, title selection, and battling the fear of imperfection. Ultimately, encouragement from their grandmother led to the book's completion and publication in March 2020, during the pandemic. The experience taught Richards the importance of self-belief and the value of personal vision over external advice, culminating in a sense of profound accomplishment and the anticipation of their second book's release.

Opinions

The author initially doubted their ability to connect with readers and was overwhelmed by the expectations of selling and promoting their book.
Traditional publishing was seen as prohibitively expensive with low royalties, and publishers' aggressive marketing tactics were off-putting.
Self-publishing through Kindle Direct Publishing was perceived as a user-friendly, cost-effective, and accessible alternative to traditional publishing.
The process of editing and finding a suitable title for the book was fraught with procrastination and anxiety, exacerbated by the fear of failure.
The author's grandmother played a pivotal role as a source of inspiration and practical advice, encouraging them to publish despite perceived imperfections.
The act of publishing the book, regardless of commercial success, was considered a significant personal achievement and a validation of the author's identity as a writer.
The author emphasizes the importance of filtering advice and staying true to one's vision, learning to balance external input with internal conviction.
Despite the emotional rollercoaster, the overall experience was enriching and has set the stage for future literary endeavors.

Writing my first book

Image credit to amazon

A discussion on how I wrote my first book.

I remember the feelings of doubt creeping in. the constant fear of my words not resonating with others or even connecting in any way shape or form.

I remember hearing the whispers of what I should be doing in selling and promoting my book. They were all in good faith, yet they breathed down my neck like a monster preparing for his kill on an unsuspecting lost traveler.

I remember calling my grandmother and asking her for advice, and her saying “ just do it, hit publish”.

And I remember the relief I felt when I received that email that my first collection of poems was approved through Amazon publishing.

wait let me backtrack….

The journey

This journey started in late 2016. I was finishing undergrad and lost. My soul was filled to the brim with depression and anxiety, And I struggled to find out what to do with my life. I had no real confidence in anything.

No understanding of what I wanted to do with my life and struggling to adjust to back home living.

I didn’t have much, but a dream.

A faint dream, a dream of writing my way out of the hole I was in. However, I didn’t believe this dream could be a reality. So I shelved it. A collection of poems I had, sitting in a google doc file accumulating over a few years up until 2019. Just waiting to be shared with the world. But I lacked the courage to publish. In fact, I had no idea how to publish.

The process was killing me and I struggled with the confidence of even performing my poetry, let alone putting it all into a book. So I just went researching and looking for answers as if I were a child lost in a forest thick with fog

I remember seeking out publishers and their ridiculously high prices for little royalties and thinking, this isn’t going to propel me to my vision as a writer. None of these companies are going to give me remotely anything close to the bang for my buck. On top of that, they kept calling me to see if I still wished to publish with them. After a while, I decided to seek my own route, devoid of the middle man. Therefore, I began researching self-publishing.

It was a short process that brought me straight to Kindle direct publishing, It was painless, cheap, and easy to navigate, therefore making my life so easy on the publishing part.

but then there were my poems. I had this heap of poems that weren’t edited or even looked at for a while.

And I also struggled with the process of a title. I remember just wishing to rage quit when it came to even find something that remotely coincided with what I was pushing for. I still had to edit my poems, then come up with a name, I kept pushing back the date. I wanted to publish in late 2019, but the agony of editing and the fear of failing swallowed my anxiety-filled soul.

But then, like a flourish of inspiration, I discovered a title Confessions of A Hopeless Creative.

One that fits the description of my life perfectly. These poems are my confessions, my story, and I’m a hopeless creative.

The hopelessness derives from me aimlessly wandering through the wonders of life optimistically falling apart. Thus, Confessions of A Hopeless Creative was born.

At first, I was going to label my book, The skin I’m in. It was inspired by two of my good college friends that had the same idea for an event at the school. However, that had copyright infringement all over it. So, there I was, stuck attempting to find a title for a book I struggled with making, at the end of 2019. continuously procrastinating and promoting a collection of poems that centered around my journey through anxiety and depression. And I wallowed in the misery of self-publishing and lack of confidence.

However, I did have a working title, so I made progress.

I spent months attempting to edit, and get editors and talking to people about the process and it became a spiral of emotions and doubt that pushed me nearly over the edge.

I began to feel that writing wasn’t my dream. Because it wasn’t perfect. because I wasn’t doing it this way or that way or even at all.

And then, in March of 2020, in the middle of a pandemic, I called my guru. My inspiration, my saint. My grandmother. She was the expert on all things literature, and she told me to just publish the book. that typos are found in every piece of literature, That there’s no such thing as a perfect body of work.

And there is was. all the doubt, all the fear, all the anxiety I felt had washed away. All of the months of hesitation and the collapsing of my own psyche. it all washed away, I had made my final edits.

Then I hit the publish button and viola.

I became a published author.

At that point, whether I sold 1 copy or a thousand copies, I felt accomplished. screw my two degrees, screw making it out of my hometown briefly. this was THE accomplishment. I was a published author, and nobody could take that away from me.

The lessons

I learned a lot throughout the process. The most important lesson is to take people’s council, but not all of what they say. As a person who cares a lot, I can easily allow other’s thoughts to penetrate my image of something and terrorize it. thus, creating an altered image that was never there, to begin with. The process of making this book was just that, listening to others about something that was uniquely crafted for me. this was my project, flaws and all.

I loved this process, the ups the downs, it was all worth it. As of now, I’m preparing to release my second book and I can’t wait. Hopefully, this story can reach others and propel them to take that leap as it did me.

You can find my book via amazon by just searching Confessions of a Hopeless creative or clicking on the link.