My mentor sessions have resumed and I am taking a break from a meeting at work to share this.
Last year was remarkable for me, I published books that people actually read and felt compelled or moved by them so much so that some called me to discuss what the book did to them. I mean, for any writer or Creator to simply have that kind of feedback is a great accomplishment.

And what next?

My mentor asked me what I had in mind this year after publishing the  books and he started with three questions that I believe every young writer who is breaking into print needs to ask themselves.

1. Why do you write?
2.  What do you expect to achieve out of publishing?
3. How will you go about achieving or realizing 1 and 2?

The Currents Series saw three books released via Amazon Kindle last year. I have not made record sales because I am more into the writing and have done nothing much to market the books or make then available for purchase here in Kenya. It all comes down to shipment costs versus distribution here and I will admit I suck at it.
It’s exactly where I would love to start on this year. If my desire is to be vastly read then I have to vastly distribute my books and that is what I am working on and it does not help that my mentor is into Business Administration. I am taking a crash course in how to market and sell and he’s not giving me a break or allowing me to doubt myself.  I am grateful for that.

The three questions all mean something to me because for years I have approached publishers only to hear that am not what they want.
It’s always more like can you write this for us first then we can talk?

For a creative do you know what it’s like to be put in a production line?

I will tell you it kills you inside. You produce to please and you are rewarded with money, but a part of you dies every time you numb your inner voice for cash and fame.

So, I will tackle the first question and it may come off as Romanticism but whichever way you take it, this is where I stand when it comes to writing:

I write books so they live long after I am gone. It would wound me to my core to have a reader pick my book only to forget it after they’ve closed the last page. I write so these words crawl up your spine, delve into your veins and stick on you like a memory too real and alive to be ignored or forgotten. I would not want my stories to fade like magazines, each issue is quickly forgotten the moment it hit the shelves as the next one is being produced. I write to live long after these fingers and this brain are unaware of the music of my soul.