5 reasons why I do not like my own book

My, oh my... where do I start?

Yes, I did self-publish a book. Yes, I am incredibly proud of myself for writing it. Yes, it is available on Amazon. And yes, I think it's not that great at all.

No, I'm not looking for people who'll tell me I'm wrong. I have had about half a year now to realize I absolutely rushed through the process of writing and editing it. As I mentioned in my previous story it was more of an outlet to all the crazy emotions I had at that time and I just wanted it to be out there. I was so excited to become an author that I didn't care that much about the process of it. I just wanted something amazing to happen to me and it did. I became a self-published author.

However, looking back I definitely see a lot of flaws in this book and to be honest I cannot wait to write another just because I want something better to be out there. Which is not a good sign since that's exactly what got me in trouble in the first place but this time I promise to actually spend some time on it!

The thing is that I'm a fast writer. Well, I'm a fast talker and I put the words super quickly on paper as well but it doesn't mean that as soon as I speak (or write) I instantly regret some things that I have said. Or how I put them in the sentence. I start looking for better ways to say it, I start overthinking and basically it's always a circle of self doubt for me. In the end I'm never happy with what I write. That's why editing is so hard for me. I could read the same sentence about a million times and each time I'd change the sentence thinking there's a better way to put it into words. I guess the fact that English is my second language does not help at all.

Since I promised you a review though, I'd like to give you some legit reasons why my book is kind of terrible. So here I am, writing 5 reasons why I do not like my own book.

1. Lack of footnotes- originally I wrote the whole thing with a bunch of amazing and in my opinion kind of funny footnotes that explained everything to the outsiders. Inside jokes, explanations of the terms like "au pair" or "LCC" and my fabulous commentary on favorite spots in DC where the plot was happening. I thought they were completing the book perfectly but for some reason I couldn't include them in the PDF I sent to my publisher (or the agency that helped me self-publish, I don't know how to call them). After asking them about 10 times if they got the version with my footnotes and getting no response, I finally gave up and tried to convince myself it was fine without them. Now I really regret that I settled for something I knew would be bothering me in the future.

2. Illustrations- the original illustrations are awesome as you can see one of them below. Yet again, the agency that was publishing my work didn't do a great job with putting them into the book and they ended up looking not that good. They kind of looked out of the context or just very badly planned. The graphic design of this book was absolutely terrible and the illustrations were the biggest issue. I had an image in my head of trying to make everything more interesting but the publisher (again, not a real publisher) clearly didn't get the idea. While I'll always be very grateful to my amazing friend Courtney for making them for me, I kind of wish they weren't included in the book just because they didn't serve their purpose. Everything looked kind of ugly (not Courtney's fault, blame the book's graphic designer).

3.I'm such a drama queen- the reason why I can't even read my own book is because I'm the worst drama queen of all. I can't listen (or read) to myself! If I really get into my emotions I start being so depressive that I wish I could detach myself from my mind because gosh, how much can you hate your life? And if that part of me starts writing and winning at the same time... oh, boy! It's just too much. As I said before, this book was an outlet for a lot of emotions I was gathering for over a year but in the end it's a whole freaking novel focused on me complaining. I don't know what's worse, that I actually published that thing or that I'm already trying to write another one?!

4. Not enough- personally I think that if I spent a bit longer writing it I would come up with more interesting writing material. In the end I wrote it, I published it but very often I keep on thinking "Damn, that's a good story, I should've put that in the book." A lot of those stories are about my host family. I have so many examples of how awesome our relationship was at some point, how much I loved those kids and how funny but kinda inappropriate my host dad was. Instead I focused too much on writing about the most negative person in the family- my host mum. If I could rewrite that book, I would include way more positive stories about them! As I said before, I rushed through the whole process too much, it's just my nature. With the next book I really want to make sure that there will be no more regrets regarding forgetting to write about something important.

5. Not including more descriptions of the surroundings- my trips are always full of adventures and fun things to talk about later. I think that if I focused on them a bit more and generally on more descriptions of the places I've traveled to, the whole book would be better as a whole. I focused too much on the things that were happening and not on the places where they were happening. If I included more scenery descriptions I think the reader would be able to get more into what was going on.

Self publishing a book is not easy. Not at all. However, I have learnt a lot and I'll use all that knowledge in order to publish my next book (probably in 2021). I definitely know I'll never use a self-publishing agency again. They charge you money for something you could easily do on your own and then they just find ways to charge you even more. I do appreciate them for helping me with publishing my book but I can't stop the feeling that I could've done that better on my own. I learnt from my mistakes, that's for sure. Whatever I say about this book will never change the fact I am honored to call myself an indie author and that's the kind of pride no one will ever take away from me. Do I wish this book looked completely different? Yep! Do I wish it looked exactly like in my head and become a bestseller afterwards? Most definitely! That didn't happen though and that is okay. You know why? Because “Green Card Marriage'' is my bad pancake. Every single one after that will just keep on getting better. This book started a whole cycle of writing for me and I never stopped ever since. I learn every day. I become a better writer every day. It's a whole process and this time I'm taking it slow.