I was reading a blogpost by one of my Twitter peoples yesterday. The post itself was about the path taken to publishing her latest book but there was a part of it, one that made me pause and think.

At that point I was afraid of putting all my eggs in one basket. I’d seen indie writers work endlessly on series that didn’t sell well. I didn’t know how Fluency would be received, but considering I was starting from zero, I assumed that it would not sell.

Now, I’ve been working on my House Valerius series for, well, more years than I care to admit. And during that time, there’s been very little work outside the series. While I haven’t taken any steps towards publishing yet, the quoted section above could easily apply.

Now I tend to agree with Jen and that planning for the worst (even if hoping for the best) is probably the wisest course. So taking that assumption (yes, I know the adage) as correct, then what does that mean for all that time invested?

Despite my usual tendency towards pessimism, I’m refusing to say that time was wasted. Even if nothing ever comes of the series, it’s still been worth it to me. Frustrating as it has been at times, it’s still given me a lot of pleasure writing that world. And the years working on it has (I hope) made me a better writer.

Still, it does make me wonder if I should be diversifying a little. Lately, I have tried writing other pieces, other genres, other worlds. Originally I was doing that with the notion that I should try stretching myself, experiment a little. Now I’m thinking I should do more with them, so that I have more than just the one string to my bow as it were. I may even incorporate that into my goals for November. So watch this space, I guess

Anyways, to wrap things up for the time-being, I’d like to thank Jennifer Foehner Wells for her initial blog that sparked this one. I’d urge anyone who likes science fiction & space opera to check out here work and, if it should help, my review of her book Fluency is here.