Today I send my novel, Barry’s Cherries, to the company that I’m using to self-publish. It’s a weird sensation. Everything in me wants to kick the book out the door, but I’m having trouble concentrating on what’s left to do.

I do not want to sit on this book any longer. But getting everything done for it is a huge emotional experience. I wrote the novel last spring and worked on edits for the next several months. There were huge lapses when I didn’t work on it, but I had some good excuses not to. Finally, a year later, I am fighting to get it out the door with all the i’s dotted and t’s crossed.

I’m anxious to set the next stage of the process in motion, but the book represents so much of the last year to me that it’s almost painful to part with. I’ve basically been procrastinating this week in doing things that should have been done last year. Like naming chapters. However, I set a deadline of the end of March and I’ve been moving towards that each day. It’s good to have deadlines.

Doing this alone gives a very “without a net” feeling to the whole process. I’m going to attempt another couple of blog entries about the “home stretch” as I am able to check off the steps I’ve completed. In the meantime, if you’d like to check out my writing, you can download my first novella for free.

It would also be great if you’d like to throw a buck or two my way to help with the publishing of Barry’s Cherries. As you can see, I’m a little shy of my goal. (There are donation buttons in the right sidebar for PayPal and Amazon.) (UPDATE: Just buy my books.)

PS–I’ll be revealing the artwork later today so stay tuned.