My Next New Release

by Linda O. Johnston

   My third Superstition Mystery, UNLUCKY CHARMS, will be released on October 8. 

   I'd have thought that eventually having another book published would start feeling old.  Not!  I've been writing mysteries and romances for a long time, and I'm nearly as excited as I was with book one.

   I know a lot of writers who are just getting published for the first time, and some who are going the self-publishing route.  Others, like me, are long-timers who are primarily traditionally published.  Why do any of us do this?

   Well, for me, it's because I have stories inside me that are hollering to get out.  I always wanted to write, even as a kid.  As I got older, went through law school, got law jobs... I started actually doing it: writing short stories first, then novels. 

   And the rest of you here who are Midnight Ink writers as well as readers?  I've talked with friends, and just as we all write something different--though a lot of us write mysteries or thrillers or whatever-- we all seem to have different reasons, though many are similar.

   Mostly, it's because we have to.  It's who we are.  It's what we want to do with our time and our lives, perhaps in addition to all the rest like day jobs and family and whatever.  But our writing is insisting that we get it down on the page, edit it, then send it out for the world to read. 

   Then we get our work critiqued, which can be hard when people don't like our offspring.  But does that stop us?  No!  And do we all get rich from our writing?  I wish!  But since writing is what we do, who we are, we keep at it. 

   And loving it.