Why getting published is like shedding a (Viper) skin

Fifteen years ago, I was medically overweight, and now I’m not. I lost two-and-a-half stone and I’ve kept the weight off ever since, thanks to that miracle cure of eating a bit less and moving a bit more. (It really is that simple and that difficult.) My current body, older and creakier though it is, feels more like me than the younger but chubbier body ever did.

       But there was a time – quite a long time in fact – after I lost that weight, when I didn’t quite believe I could get into a size 10 or 12 and shopping was— confusing. My hipbones felt weird. I wasn’t too sure of my perimeters. (Note, I didn’t say boundaries, as I’ve never been very sure about them.)

       I felt more vulnerable. A bit more naked, somehow.

       That’s what it’s been like for me becoming (cue trumpets and bunting) A PUBLISHED AUTHOR!

       Authors, to me, are mythical beasts. Proper writers. Wise and clever and different to us mere mortals. And while I’ve aspired to be an author for decades – while I paid my money and did the MA and spent hours beavering away at the computer actually writing – some part of me didn’t feel good enough. I didn’t really believe it would happen for me.

       Going through the long process of writing, sending it out, dealing with rejections, finally (finally!) getting an agent and a publishing deal often felt surreal. Luckily, talking to other writers (I’ve just self-edited ‘fellow writers’ as it still feels odd to claim that) online, in Facebook groups and on Twitter, helped me realise that it wasn’t just me—those fun feelings of being found out, being an imposter, being a big fat fluke etc are pretty common. The support of my lovely colleagues at Viper Books often kept me going through the darker times.

       So, no surprises, just before publication, I had a BIG wobble. Sobbing, shaking, the works. It felt overwhelming.

       I’ve never felt so exposed— and this from a woman who got her kit off for a living to pay her way through university as a life model.

       If you’ve ever seen the film Marathon Man, Dustin Hoffman apparently prepared for a gruelling torture scene by staying up for 72 hours and running miles. His co-star, Sir Laurence Olivier suggested ‘Dear boy, why don’t you just try acting?’

       I feel a bit like Dustin here. Although I’m taller. If I were a better writer, I might be able to create different scenarios using my imagination and words alone, but, as it is, I use some of my bleakest experiences and rawest emotions in order to write. Method writing, like method acting.

       So not only do I fear being judged as a writer – for how I write – but also as a human being.

       I’m now taking baby steps towards being the thing the world now says I am. I look at my book. I love the black and pink cover. I pick it up. I talk about it. I Tweet and post pictures of it. My baby.

       I don’t know how long it will be before I feel like an actual author. But each milestone – my first festival; my first book club; my first podcast – helps me to shed the old skin and move into the new phase. And one day I hope I can say, without wincing in self-doubt:

       I am a writer. I am an author. I am a published author.