Within the next day or two, I will be releasing my second novel on Amazon. I’m excited. And a bit scared.

I’m excited to have finished a project I started about twenty years ago. Yes, it took me that long to get through this one. Not that it’s a novel of epic proportions, it’s just a novel I started back when I first thought about writing. Then, life happened and the story was shoved in a drawer, forgotten for many years.

After I completed my first novel, I found the partial manuscript and thought I would give it another try. It was a project I had started and I couldn’t leave it unfinished, although there were many times when I thought I should abandon it and move on to something else.

Then…finally…it hit me what was wrong with the story and what I could do to make it better. Or, at the very least, reignite my interest in it so I could finish the writing, revising, and editing stages and move on to the self-publishing piece. The realization caused a complete overhaul of the story but I think it was worth it.

Now, it’s ready to be published and I’m scared about sending my book out into the world. Is it ready? Did I do all I could do to make it an interesting story? While I don’t know the answers to these questions, I realize I need to have faith that I have done my best and the logical next step is to send my creation on its way to meet its fate…and hope for the best.

Which leads to the most exciting part. It’s done! I can now move on to my third novel. A story that is fresh and new and allows me to do what I love. Writing. No revising (yet). No editing (yet). Just writing. Just putting words to paper and seeing where the characters will take me. They never fail to amaze me.

While I’m excited and scared at the same time, there is nothing about this journey that I would change. Well…maybe just a few revisions here and there.