From the very beginning, I envisioned success as selling enough books so I could keep getting published and continue to write what I wanted to without compromising.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
The conclusion I came to was that even if I couldn't sell books, I still liked the process of writing.
For me, just being published feels like success.
My first novel was turned down by half a dozen publishers. And even after having published five or six books, I wasn't making enough money to live on, and was beginning to think I'd have to give up the dream of being a full-time writer.
I had always presumed that my first book would be published, but I never dreamt that I would write 15 bestsellers and have this wonderful life in America that I have entirely built for myself.
Some say I'm an overnight success. Well, that was a very long night that lasted about 10 years. But while I do, of course, now feel the pressure having had books that have been very successful, I just know I have to concentrate on writing for myself. I can't worry about genres or markets or what might be commercial or not. That never works.
I'm not an overnight success. My early publishing history, through my first five books, was unfortunate in many respects, typified by a couple of short anecdotes.
I'd sold the book first. Actually to a paperback publisher. I had nothing. I just had the idea.
Why I have had such a huge career and why I have sold over four million books, is that people can do what I share with them to do.
My self-publishing adventure led to my work being picked up by a traditional publisher and eventually hitting the bestseller lists. That led to two more bestselling novels.
I came into book publishing without any particular impulse to be in book publishing.