When Things Look Better on Paper Than They Do in Real Life

 

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Earlier this year, a publisher I am friends with shut down her company, suddenly making several books go out of print. Because I knew this publisher and she is aware that I work for a different publishing company (Twisted Dreams Press), we had talked about the fate of my books. She wanted to know what I planned to do in order to get them back into print. In our conversation, I mentioned that I was starting a new imprint at Twisted Dreams Press called Dreamweaver Press, which was slated to debut on June 1, and I mentioned that I’d be happy to help her authors get their books back into print. Additionally, I agreed to take over the many anthologies that were either already published or scheduled for publication.

 

And because this is A LOT of books to get back into print, I knew that I would need to create a publication schedule for all of them.

 

The authors of this press received this invitation to sign with Dreamweaver and I have been working with the interested authors ever since. Part of this task involves discussing a date to re-release their books.

 

The main goal of Dreamweaver Press is to republish books that have gone out of print. Because I am in that boat too, I decided to add some of my books to that list. But the priority at the very beginning is put on other authors, not me. My books can wait. I want to put THEIR books first.

 

And in order to have everything sorted out with all of these books, I knew I would have to create a publication schedule so that I wouldn’t lose focus on where we were with certain books.  

 

So, I created the publication schedule. And when I did, I knew that there would be some challenges to keep that schedule at the beginning, but I was willing to take on those challenges. After all, the challenges I anticipated would be a learning experience for me as a publisher, and I could use those lessons to strengthen the press moving forward.

 

Little did I know that the challenges related to the publication schedule would have a lot more to do with real life than with the press itself.

 

When I created the publication schedule, I decided that I would start the process for getting the next book published on Mondays. Unfortunately, for this most recent Monday, I had two things on my mind: My article deadline and my son’s graduation. (I am still a freelance writer!) And both of those things took place on the same day! (Thank goodness the graduation ceremony was in the evening! I spent the first part of my day taking care of finalizing my article, submitting it, and waiting for a confirmation from my editor that the article was received.) So on Monday, June 8, I was only thinking about those two things, instead of “The Next Book to Be Released By Dreamweaver Press” – which was an anthology.

 

The first book published by Dreamweaver Press was released on schedule.

 

The second book published by Dreamweaver Press was released on schedule.

 

The third book to be published by Dreamweaver Press? It probably won’t be released on schedule.

 

And my forgetfulness about starting work on it on Monday is not the only reason why!

 

Apparently, I didn’t have everything I needed to upload the files for publication.

 

I was aware of the book slated for release on Monday, June 15. It’s the re-release of the anthology The Stranger At My Window, a book which recently went out-of-print. And while I was certain that I had everything I needed for this re-release to happen, I realized at the last minute that there was one more thing I had to do before this book could be republished: Update all of the contributor bios.

 

This anthology was first published in May 2025. And a lot can happen for a writer in one year, which is why any publisher of an anthology should always double check with writers to see if their bios need to be updated if they are going to republish the anthology at a later time.

 

The thing of it was, though, is that I should have asked all of those writers if they needed their bios updated on Monday, and not on Thursday, which is what actually happened. On Thursday morning, I was ready to upload all of the files for publication – until I realized that, oops! The writer bios needed to be updated! This is a must. I want to ensure that every single book I publish through Dreamweaver is something that the authors can be proud of and that it has the best quality possible. I would not accept anything less. I was with a publisher in the past who was okay with publishing books filled with typos and inaccurate information, and that won’t happen with me. Every book published by Dreamweaver Press will be of the best quality possible.

 

And if I wanted to republish an old anthology, I would have to make sure that all of the writer bios were updated!

 

I was kicking myself for forgetting about this very important step before the book can go to press. (It’s been a week of forgetfulness, folks. On the day of my son’s graduation, he had to keep coming back into the house when it was time to leave, because he kept forgetting things. And I have kept forgetting things all week too!) But I understand that mistakes are going to happen in these early days of the new imprint. So I am not going to continue to wallow in anger at myself for screwing that up. I had a good self-bashing, then I got back to work!

 

So I contacted all of the writers and let them know the situation. Because I was the creator of this anthology when I compiled the stories for the first edition, I had everybody’s email address.

 

And while I was at it checking to see if I had everything I needed in order to republish a book, I decided to do the same for another anthology which I plan to publish. This is one that was originally scheduled for publication by the old publisher, but now that the company shut down, it is one of the anthology projects which Dreamweaver Press acquired. For this anthology that I plan to publish on June 22, Tales from the Hearth, I was dismayed to discover that I didn’t have everything I needed in order to publish it.

 

The manuscript is edited, but I didn’t have the cover or the writer’s email addresses. I was not the creator for this anthology, and the person who was the creator is not available to contact for the email addresses, so I tried another approach. Since I am on Facebook, I looked all of the writers up on there. The good news is that I am Facebook friends with all of the writers. The bad news is that not all of them included their links on their Facebook profiles. This was bad because I prefer to contact people through their website contact forms, not through Facebook Messenger. (Except for people I am actual friends with; we chat in Messenger often.) But I still rolled up my sleeves and contacted ALL of the writers in the other anthology through Facebook Messenger asking them to send me their bios AND their email address. (An email address is good to have if you are working with someone!)

 

Then I waited.

 

Fortunately, all of them have been responding to my message and have provided the information I needed for the book and my files. I am so grateful to them all for being okay about reaching out to them through Facebook Messenger rather than email. And I’m grateful that they have replied so promptly, too! (Thanks, everyone!)

 

Now if only I can get the cover for that other anthology. Then I will have everything I need in order to publish it.

 

My plan to get the TSAMW anthology published looked good on paper, and now it’s just a matter of waiting for real life to catch up. We’ll see if I can still get it out by Monday!

 

I realize that I could just go ahead and republish one of my own books on Monday just to keep the publication schedule consistent, but I don’t want to do that. I want to put the other authors’ books first. I want to work on getting OTHER books back into print first. Mine will be back out there in their own time.

 

So what have I learned from this mishap? Two things:

 

1.  We all make mistakes and sometimes we forget things. It happens.

 

2.  It’s a good idea to create a system in order to prevent certain mistakes from happening again. My forgetfulness is not something I have any control over, but I CAN control planning ahead, which is what I will do from now on. This will mean that I’ll include a reminder in my dayplanner for EVERY Monday to start the process for releasing the next Dreamweaver Press book. Mondays MAY be a Release Day for Dreamweaver Press, but it’s also a day I need to start working on getting the NEXT book released!

 

Yes, we all make mistakes. We’re only human. But it’s important to LEARN from our mistakes and think about what we can do in order to avoid making that mistake again. Hopefully, for this particular case, a pre-set reminder will work!

Writing Goals and Weekly Goals

 

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At the beginning of the year, most writers come up with one or more writing goals for them to accomplish in the new year. I’m one of those writers, but sometimes, I will create a weekly goal for myself as well. These weekly goals don’t happen every week; just when there is a reason for them to happen.

 

Like this week. I usually have just ONE weekly goal, but this week, I had two.

 

I have a short story that I wrote some time ago which I wanted to submit to an anthology call. That deadline was coming up, so I knew I needed to spend some time revising that short story so that I could submit it in time. I decided that my weekly goal for this week would be to complete revisions on this short story.

 

I started working on the revisions for this short story on Monday and, because I worked on it every day, I finished the revisions on Friday. I was happy with this new draft of the story, so I considered the revision stage for it complete. After I fixed it up and gave it a final read, I submitted it and the story was accepted for that anthology. Yay! Not only was I happy to complete revisions on that short story and achieve one of my goals for the week, but I was also happy that the story was accepted.

 

My second weekly goal was to fill in all of the boxes for this week in my planner. To give you an idea of what that means, here is a random page with all of those boxes.

 

This may not seem like a VERY important goal to anyone, but it was important to me. After I had two VERY productive days of filling in those boxes at the beginning of the week, I decided, why not take on the challenge to fill in all of them for the whole week? So I did.

 

And I totally SMASHED it! 

 

 I’m so happy that I was able to achieve that goal this week. There were a few rejections, but also a few acceptances. Yes, those extra things may have been more of replacers and not so much a show of what other work I did on those days, but they ARE a part of my workday all the same, so they still count.

 

Having a writing goal for the year is great, but weekly goals can really help strengthen a yearly writing goal as well. Even so, my weekly goals sometimes hinge on deadlines and what needs to be done NOW. Writers can use weekly goals to help them achieve their yearly goal, or do what I do and use them to meet deadlines, complete activity on a writing project, or keep the writing going strong.

The Importance of Getting Started Early to Meet Deadlines

 

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February is such a short month. This was the thought I had at the start of the month. Yes, February may seem like a regular month to some people, but a month can go by fast, which is what this month did.

 

And this is why I started on my February deadlines early.

 

I have an article due at the end of every month, and I have found that if I start working on this article at the beginning of the month, and work on it as often as possible during the month, I will have it ready to submit by month’s end.

 

Recently, I had one month to write an article for Able News. Instead of thinking “Oh, I have time,” I got started on that article ASAP! (That article required interviewing people, so it’s a good thing that it didn’t need to be rushed.)

 

The point is that the shortness of February served as a good reminder to get started on meeting deadlines as early as possible. Instead of thinking “I have a whole month to write that, I have time,” it’s a good idea to get started with writing that thing you have a deadline for as soon as you are able to. Don’t wait your time out. Spend that time doing something proactive in order to meet your deadline. Draft an outline, do some research, start prewriting your piece. Start thinking about your writing project so that you will be thinking about it here and there as the days pass.

 

One other deadline that I have is for a book. Because I would like this book to release in December, the publisher I am submitting it to let me know what month I need to get it to them. Before I received this news, I was hard at work revising this manuscript. When I shared the method I am using to have the manuscript ready in time, the person I shared this with said, “Wow.” He asked why I was doing so much work on it each day and I explained that this method will ensure that I am able to meet the deadline to submit it. It’s a method that works just fine for me, and it’s one I’m glad I started using early because it’s just the right process to meet that deadline.

 

With a gig I had recently (and will have again soon), my deadline to turn in my work was every Monday by 10AM my time. I’d spend the week working on the new assignments I had lined up for me and turn them in on the following Monday. I would wake up early on that Monday (which I started to refer to as “Deadline Day”) and start getting my work sent in first thing. I made it the first task on my list every Monday morning so that I could meet that deadline. (Sometimes, I went without my morning coffee in order to do this!) This practice ensured that I got my work turned in on time every Monday (and so that I could get paid on that same day!). I didn’t sit around and relax on those mornings, thinking, “Eh, I have all the time in the world to meet my deadline.” I really didn’t. So I made it a priority to do that FIRST every time Deadline Day rolled around.

 

If you have a deadline, don’t wait to get started working on it. Start doing what you can to meet that deadline right now, no matter how little that effort may be. Any effort you make to start meeting your deadline will get you on the path toward meeting it, and it is a positive step in the right direction. The time you have available to meet your deadline will allow you the extra time you need in case there are any detours you run into along the way. The best part about starting work on your deadlines early? You just might get your work done early, and have some extra time to make any changes or corrections before your own Deadline Day.