M.B NOVELS®

There is a particular kind of reaction I get when I tell people how many books I have published. Usually, it starts with silence. Then: “Wait. How many?” And when I tell them, they look at me like I have just casually announced that I own a small country.

The funny thing is that people tend to be impressed. They hear “I published another book” and immediately understand the achievement. I imagine they imagine the writing, the editing, the cover, the printing, the logistics, the terrifying moment of actually putting it into the world. They say things like, “How do you have time for that?” or “I could never do that,” which is flattering, even if the honest answer is that I also occasionally wonder how I have time for that.

People outside the publishing industry don’t seem particularly bothered by the idea of publishing a lot. If anything, they find it exciting. Another book? Already? That’s incredible.

Then you talk to people in the industry, and suddenly it becomes a little strange.

There are certain invisible rules about how often a writer is supposed to publish. You release a book. You promote it. You let it breathe. You wait like two years. You build an audience during that time. You write the next one quietly somewhere in the background. Eventually, another book arrives, and the process repeats forever.

There are good reasons for this. Books need time. Readers need time. Marketing needs time. A publishing career is not a race toward seeing how many ISBNs you can collect before your thirties. But I have never been particularly good at treating creativity like a scheduled corporate meeting.

I happen to write quickly. I have a lot to say. I also happen to publish practically everything I write. Sometimes I finish one project and immediately have another one knocking on the door like it has been waiting for me to stop being difficult. I don’t want to spend three years pretending I am not working on something because the previous book is still technically “new.”

There is also something wonderfully ridiculous about being a writer who publishes frequently in an industry that sometimes seems deeply committed to making writers (and readers) wait.

I understand the strategy. I understand the market. I understand that more books do not automatically mean more readers, more sales, more recognition, or more success. Publishing more is not inherently better. You can absolutely publish too quickly, burn yourself out, dilute your work, or release something before it is ready just because you are addicted to the feeling of having something new in your hands. Publishing more means editing more. Proofreading more. Designing more. Formatting more. Ordering more copies. Paying for more things. Answering more emails. Making more graphics. Explaining to people that each book is a different genre and premise.

But yes, there are downsides. My bank account would probably prefer that I discovered a walk in the park. My sleep schedule has filed several formal complaints. And every time I say, “I think I want to publish another book,” there is a small part of me that would like to shake me by the shoulders and ask, “Have we learned nothing?”

The other side of publishing frequently is that every book makes the next one feel possible. As you learn, you get faster. You become less afraid of the parts that used to terrify you. You learn what you actually care about in the process. You learn what kind of covers you like, what kind of readers you want, what mistakes you never want to repeat, what parts of publishing you secretly enjoy, and which ones make you want to disappear.

You also stop treating publication like a once-in-a-lifetime event. It becomes less about waiting for permission and more about building a body of work.

I think that is where the industry perception starts to become interesting. Because there is something slightly suspicious about a writer who keeps producing.

We’re often encouraged to think of books as rare, precious objects that require years of suffering before they are worthy of being released. The tortured manuscript. The agonizing wait. The enormous buildup. The one perfect book. I don’t really believe in that. Not because I think books should be rushed. I don’t. But because I don’t think slowness automatically makes something better. Sometimes, a writer simply has a lot of books in them.

I would rather respect the pace of the work than force myself into a publishing schedule that looks more respectable from the outside. But right now, I have stories I want to tell, and I would rather have the problem of having too many books than the problem of wishing I had written more.

There is a strange kind of privilege in being able to look at your own career and say, “Actually, I’m not done yet.”

So yes, every book I publish probably adds a year to my life. Not literally, unfortunately. Publishing does not come with a complimentary life extension program. But every book takes something out of me. Time. Money. Energy. Sleep. Sanity. Occasionally, the last functioning part of my brain.

What a way to go.