The Imposter Syndrome

When the F* Up Fairy Visits

A few weeks ago, I put forth my belief in the existence of mischievous little gremlins that exist somewhere in the digital world and pop up once an author hits the button that says, "Publish Your Book." And at that moment, these publishing gremlins get in there, omit words, scramble words, misspell very obvious words, and honestly do everything to make it look as if the author is a dimwit and hired a toddler to edit their book.

I admit, the thought of these publishing gremlins gets in my head and totally lives rent free there.

"But Em," you may say. "Couldn't it also be equally possible that you just missed all thirty-five of those totally obvious edits? After all, you didn't pay $5000 for an editor for that book. Maybe you are a dimwit and did hire a toddler to edit your book."

I still say that is impossible. (I can say impossible in several languages if you'd like.) Because how blind do I need to be to miss the sizeable mistakes I am finding right now? I'd need a guide dog!

"But Em," you may counter. "Isn't it also plausible that the F* Up Fairy visited your manuscript too?"

Ah. Yes. Good point. You're smart. The F* Up Fairy. Yes. That's my close runner up behind the Publishing Gremlins. And the F* Up Fairy is ten times worse than the Publishing Gremlins. Because the F* Up Fairy brings along the Imposter Syndrome. And, oooohhhhhh UGH, is that a horrible thing to have.

Have you heard that term before? The Imposter Syndrome? If you haven't it's quite....Complex.

Google AI defines it as "the feeling of not being good enough and always failing is often associated with imposter syndrome. Imposter syndrome is characterized by persistent self-doubt and a fear of being exposed as a fraud, despite having a history of success and achievement. People with imposter syndrome may feel like they are not truly competent or worthy of their accomplishments, and they often worry that others will eventually realize their perceived inadequacies."

For me, as I'm editing my books for audiobook format, I am visited by that persistent self-doubt of the Imposter Syndrome, the one of not being competent enough.

Editing anything you've written does really undermine your perceived intelligence, your abilities, and whether or not you're actually good at this whole "writing" thing. It embroils you in self-doubt and as you're editing, listening to your own words and all of the stupid little publishing gremlin edits that strangely appear every five pages, you really start to wonder why anyone would bother reading or listening to this crap and begin to think of how much better of a writer everyone else in the world is because you are sooooo positive that nobody else has this many stupid little F* Up Fairy mistakes.

Am I really that incompetent? You begin to wonder.

With some little stupid error every five pages as I've spent the last week training Virtual Voice how to read my book, I honestly start to wonder.

Is writing, and being an author, just something that puts you into a vicious cycle of thinking your work is wonderful, your characters are awesome, and then some stranger somewhere makes a random comment about someone else's work (someone you don't even know) and then you start obsessing over your own writing because you're editing it again and you find a mistake and suddenly you think the whole world has focused on that one mistake and your whole work is crap and....and..... and......

(Authors are quite crazy, aren't they?)

Be it publishing gremlins or the F* Up Fairy, Imposter Syndrome is real. But there is a difference between your insecurities speaking loud and you feeling that way because you know your writing is really crap and not really yours. My writing is 100% me. I know its quality. I know its storylines. I know its character. I know how much I put into it, and how much I work on it before it even gets to you and those pesky gremlins. The sad fact remains -- I am only human and humans do make mistakes. Heck, it all depends too on what decade you grew up in and how you were taught. I'm learning that with grammar right now. (Insert face palm here.). It really is difficult to teach old dogs new tricks.

But here's the thing. I am always learning. Always growing. Always improving. And becoming an insecure perfectionist in my writing and editing processes is a total thing for me now. I'm not embarrassed by the story, the characters, or the content. What makes me feel the worst is finding errors in my work because I know there are perfectionist readers out there. The pressure is on and nobody is perfect. But I still feel embarrassed when I find them and my confidence tanks to zero.

I don't know why or how the Publishing Gremlins happen. But they do. I don't know why the F* Up Fairy visits, all drunken and disorderly, and makes words disappear with the tap of her wand, but she does. All I can do is fix it when I find it.

But I am very hopeful and 98% confidence that the F* Up Fairy and Publishing Gremlin's hold over Portrait of an Unlikely Affair and The Legend of CùSithGrim is over because not only have I been over them with fine tooth comb (for the 147th time) but I also listened to them for audiobook, with a different voice than I listened to before. I know they are golden before I hit that "publish" button (but I can’t guarantee what happens *after* I press that button, that’s the 2% doubt.)

Why? Because I very pointedly went over each and ever word, punctuation mark, and tone. And I taught that new voice how to say the words in the correct way I want them said. (OK, granted that is false security because it still says them differently 80% of the time. I soooo need Mike Rowe to narrate my books.)

In all seriousness, just to give you an example, let's look at the word "does." Sounds simple with four letters -- d. o. e. s. Does. You know what the common way to pronounce that word is? As the verb -- does. Right? You want to know how the AI said it? As the noun 'does,' the plural of female deer. I told it to say it the verb way. It still said it the noun way. After five minutes of me trying to tell it to pronounce it as a verb (Does. No, not DOES, does! DUZ, duhz. Duzz!!!! 🤦.), it finally pronounced it as a verb. I found other words where the AI used the less common pronunciations for and no matter how many times I told it to say it differently, it wouldn't so I just went back and changed the word in my manuscript. (So there. Ha. 😛 I'm childishly sticking my tongue out at it now.)

So Imposter Syndrome and all now firmly in place, I am proud to announce that The Legend of CùSithGrim, book 2 of the Portrait of an Unlikely Affair series, is now available on Audible. The Ghost of Oscar, book 3, is up next, and once again, every five pages there is an annoyingly obvious error that I know couldn't have been there before. (Gremlins. It's gotta be gremlins. So far, no signs of the F* Up Fairy yet...fingers crossed there won't be.)

"Hey Em," you ask. "When are you going to get the audiobook out for The Mysterious Happenings at Greenwood's Castle? It's selling like hotcakes right now, and that reviewer did mention your editing incompetency. Perhaps you can make more Publishing Gremlins and F* Up Fairy excuses there while correcting whatever things you totally screwed up on."

Ah, yes, thanks for asking. The Mysterious Happenings is currently my personal best seller at the moment, and I should totally take advantage of the momentum. But, the voices aren't right for it yet. I really want to get it edited and released for audiobook but until the 'right' AI voice is there (or I strike it rich and can afford the perfect voice actor) it's on the backburner for now in getting my books on Audible. Could've Been Something is also another one of those "I need the perfect voice" for. In fact, I'd love to have a real live person do all of my books, and prefer real people voices over AI (cuz, after all, I'd bet a real live person would know how to pronounce 'does' the first time.) But, with thirteen books and about $10,000 to produce with a real live person... I don't have that yet. Someday. But not yet. I do live in California at the moment and the cost of living is ridiculous compared to other states.

Ugh.

So, that's the update for you -- Portrait of an Unlikely Affair and The Legend of CùSithGrim are both out on Audible now, both sitting at $9.99, priced a great deal less than other audiobooks because I wouldn't charge more than that to listen to a convincing AI voice but I still have to make royalties for the story. Next week, I should have The Ghost of Oscar finished and out on audiobook.

If you still prefer reading over listening, you can catch all thirteen of my novels on Kindle, paperback, and Kindle Unlimited at Amazon. You can also find them on your Kindle and Kindle App. Lots of places.

There is always an adventure in an Em Brooks books -- Let's start one today!!