Panic at the Keyboard

The more I think about publishing the more I feel like I can’t breathe.

I have pretty much finished two books, and have a bunch of other stories at different stages of the process.

Basically all I need to do is send them to editors.

So why haven’t I?

Panic.

Once it’s out there I can’t take it back, once it’s out there my name is forever associated with it, once it is out there and available to the public then I am an author.

You know when you have an argument with someone and later you think, “Oh, I should have said that!” or “I should have done that!”

Have you ever handed in an essay at school, an exam paper or even the answers for a pub quiz and then thought, “Oh shit, I should have put that!”

You hand in that essay or exam it done, you’ve handed that in and whatever grade you get you’re stuck with. The answers to a pub quiz might be the difference between winning a prize or not but your life does not end, this isn’t ‘The Hunger Games’, one wrong move doesn’t mean that an arrow goes through you.

In case it’s not clear – I have never read nor watched ‘The Hunger Games’, I have no idea if there are arrows and if any go through anyone.

But if I get the right editors to look over everything, if I get a cover designed and format everything right and then, put it out there. It’s like a text, I can’t undo that.

That word that carries over to the next page without a hyphen to break it up? It’s stuck there. The page numbers that are aligned on the inside corner instead of centre or the outside edge? They’ll stay there. That plot hole that unravels the whole thing? That’s unfilled. That spelling mistake on page 64 will forever be misspelt. That question about the conversation on page 197 that you don’t have an answer for? Always a mystery. That discrepancy in the timeline that you thought you’d fixed? Forever torn open.

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My facebook page’s name is http://www.facebook.com/taylorcorriganwriter

The only thought I had was, “I can’t say author because I’m not an official author yet, I don’t have something to refer people to when I tell them I’m an author, so I’m a writer.”

Maybe subconsciously I was telling myself that I’d always be a writer, maybe I was letting the fear pick the name, maybe the thought of having my name associated with something that could be ripped to shreds by someone was too much for my anxiety to take.

Maybe I just panicked.

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