Crystal Aura Gaze

I’ve been reflecting on my time writing books, which is a period in my life that I will be moving forward from. It’s always possible that I will come back to it, but I am letting it go for the time being.

I always do have a lot of stories in my head. I may still write short stories on my blog. A storyteller is a part of my personality, but it doesn’t always have to manifest as a book author. It can come out in many other ways.

I spent ages twenty-four through thirty writing novels — I published a total of four novels, including a sequel. I also recorded two audiobooks out of them. It took a very large chunk of my time — and I was so happy to dedicate that time to doing something I was so passionate about.

My greatest pride in book-writing is how much my family and friends supported me. I didn’t expect so many of them to purchase my books and read them.

My greatest setback was failing to capture a large audience. I did a lot of paid promotion but ended up spending too much money on something that didn’t fully pay off. I struggled with self-promotion — the hardest part of book-writing in my opinion.

I did have a fair amount of strangers show interest in my books, but not nearly on the scale I was hoping for. At the same time, I felt extremely mixed about how public I wanted my books to be.

The reason why I struggled so much with self-promotion is that my stories felt so deeply personal to me. On some level, I don’t actually want too many people reading my books.

Book selling is increasingly difficult in a world that has lost interest in reading. Most people in the USA have not read more than one book in a single year. People would rather spend their short attention span on thirty-second reels and TikToks.

I also know that I am a mediocre book-writer. I’m definitely not anywhere close to a professional. And that’s perfectly okay because I don’t have an English degree and I didn’t attend any formal education in becoming an author.

But a talent that I do have is the fact that I was able to write four books, let alone one book, even if they were short ones. I put aside time and energy in my days to focus on this single task. Beyond that, all of the editing, formatting, and publishing work that I did completely on my own. That’s something I can be proud of.

It was all completely self-motivated. Nobody was telling me that I had to write a book. I set my own deadlines and I stuck to them. And it feels really good to do something that you want to do – and not what is expected from you.

Currently, I have reached a point where book-writing takes more than it gives back to me. I feel like it served its purpose when it was needed. It helped me get through many difficult times in my life, especially losing my Mom during that period. I know that she would’ve been my #1 fan if she were there to read my books.

But the best thing about publishing books is that they will always be there. I will still do free book sales from time to time. So if you are interested in reading them for free, please comment or email me, and I will let you know when the next free sale is.

I still like revisiting my books from time to time, and as I get older, I will continue to go back and reread them. These stories are still very much alive in my head and will live on forever. On some level, it all feels real to me, real characters and plot lines that exist in a parallel universe.

I have found massive success in horoscopes and tarot readings, which I will continue to focus on. I’ve also been enjoying putting more time into arts and crafts, like crochet, cross stitch, and embroidery. It feels great to get away from screens and the internet. Moving forward, I have many more things coming in my future that I am excited about.