Silent Susan Emerges From Book Cocoon

Some bloggers do it daily, some weekly and others sporadically. And I have been Silent Susan for a while. Lest you think I wasn't writing, I was. The deadline for my new book is something I took seriously so that my time had to be focused on the editing, tweaking and finalizing of Face To Face.What amazed me was learning how few authors actually meet their contractual deadlines. IF I had one piece of advice for would-be authors, it's this: Meet your deadline. That's part of a contract and if you don't take the obligation seriously, you send a message to your editor and publisher that is not positive.

But meeting my deadline meant focus, focus, focus. I also had to be on the road for varying speaking engagements and one family celebration in Chicago so I planned around these dates. That meant that, while at home, I didn't have lunch dates or dinner plans and I didn't see plays in San Francisco. I did work out and exercise daily and watched my usual amount of TV and read my three daily papers as they were sources for content. I took breaks to see movies and attend the Mill Valley Film Festival but my nose was "to the grindstone" for six months.

My longtime friends know that I become Esther Sequester and allow me to retreat and reappear. They never come up with the patronizing "I know you are so busy". BUSY! NO! I'm not busy.. Doing busy work is not what an author does. There are days that I am in my office being busy...blogging, conference calls with clients, interviews with the media, drafting press releases or answering email. I might even be "busy" clearing and cleaning my desk. But the days that I am writing a book are not busy; they are all consuming. The reason is simple. The end result is a book that is going to engage audiences, set a context and share strategies that will be helpful for readers and be a valuable resource as well as an eminently readable one. That is an awesome responsibility that I take seriously.

I was writing and hopefully you will get to read the results in October, 2008 for Fireside Books. But for now, I am back in my life and blog!