Want to be an author? There are a few things you should know ...

So you wanna be an author? OK, well, let’s just get a few things straight first, shall we?

This is going to be a LONG haul. Yep, pull up a seat, because I’ve got some insider information for you. Oh, and just in case you think it only happened to me, the lovely Joanna Trollope is quoted as saying – quite crossly to a journo who interviewed her – that it had taken her 20 years to become an ‘overnight success’. (Quite right, too. That put him in his place.)

So what are my credentials, and what about digital vs traditional publishing – and hush, what about the money? Well, here’s the first bit: those acquaintances who don’t know me terribly well – and whom I hadn’t driven to wanting to stab themselves in the eyes with chopsticks when I mentioned my on-going  journey – have said, ‘Oh, I’d like to write a book!’ when they’d found out about my (eventual) publishing success.

‘How long did it take you?’ they’d excitedly ask me like a child on Christmas Eve. I’d look them straight in the eye and say, ‘Six years – maybe seven if you count the time crying’.

Usually, they’d back away slowly.

So from penning my first few scribbles in 2009 to finally being published in 2015 ... according to my dodgy maths, that’s about six years. The germ of it started back in 2003 when I picked up Allison Pearson’s fantastic novel, I Don’t Know How She Does It, and read it in about a week. I’d just had my second son, and felt the book had been written, ‘for me’. After a while, a tiny voice in my head said: ‘Maybe you could write a book too?’ So please, reader, if you’ve got that teeny voice egging you on in the same way, DON’T LISTEN to it.

Just go and pour yourself a green tea and get over it.

Because once you cast that spell on yourself (‘Mmmm, hubble, bubble, toil and trouble, I think I can write a book…’), beware! You’ll start to see published debut novelists everywhere: on the TV, in magazines, at your local airport, in the queue for the toilet at David Jones. And you’ll be a tortured mess.

But that’s exactly what I didn’t do. I’m a journalist by profession and was juggling a toddler, a new born and some part time work at the time. After that we did a few crazy things like move out of London and then emigrate to Australia, because really, I was a bit bored of building Lego aeroplanes - and that’s when inspiration hit. Frustrated that my creative outlet was being used to organise Tupperware drawers and not remotely able to bake like other Stay At Home mums, not keen to re-train, let’s say, to be a paramedic, I started to do what I had always done. Type. And type.

And didn’t stop. OK, I did stop when people needed feeding and stuff like that, but there was a bit of forgetting to collect children from school when the typing flowed. My best friend at that time was the word count.

In the meantime, I was also trying to cook, answer ridiculous questions in my children’s homework like, ‘if four x = 33, then what does 1xy pineapple equal?’ WHO CARES? This question has never, ever, come up on any form I have filled in.

I was lucky enough to secure an agent (from the UK) the first time round. She loved my writing, loved the book. Finding a publisher, however, proved harder. By then there was the tiny problem of an economic crisis. When you’re in the business of selling anything and a recession is on, you’re going to go for the sure thing. Debut authors can be risky. Me and agent one parted company on good terms.

By this time, we had returned to the UK, so the book took a backseat. Re-planting a whole family back to the UK after five years abroad takes supreme effort, the ability to locate foldaway umbrellas in a heartbeat, and vats of patience. So my writing brain was engaged elsewhere. But still ‘the book’ would tap me on the shoulder at night when I was creeping round the house ‘shushing’ toddlers to sleep, and demand to know what was going on.

I used the services of a book doctor, who gave me a – let me remember – 17 page analysis of my book. I swallowed two extra strength Nurofen and re-read the tiny last sentence, the one after all the ‘constructive criticism’. It said: ‘You can clearly write.’ Thank goodness for that.

After a while, I felt it was ready to go ‘out there’ again and I spent the next 12 months looking for an agent. It’s the book equivalent of blind dating. No, make that blind speed-dating, where you have to kiss a lot of frogs. You send out three chapters and a synopsis and then you W-A-I-T. The rollercoaster ride began. Each time there was a ping on my phone, I would leap up, forgetting sometimes that I was, say, at the gynae, and check it. I had several agents ask for the full manuscript, and each time my heart soared. One agent asked for the full book after three hours. It was a high adrenalin ride. Would this be the one?

In the end, I did secure a wonderful agent and not long after a publisher. But this Prince Charming took a LONG TIME to get that glass slipper matched. My book is published both as and e-book and paperback.

The landscape of publishing has changed so much over the last 20 years. When I was a little girl – OK, maybe when I was a grown woman even in my 20s, and 30s - publishing meant paper; books; bookstores. Today, all that has changed, so let’s get onto that second point: has my success with my book been because it’s available as an e-book as well as paperback? Well, I think it helps.

Anyone can download it and start reading it the minute they want. No getting in car, parking, finding change for meter down the back seat, entering bookshop, buying book, going home, avoiding eye contact with anyone at home who might ask for help with irregular French verbs and flinging ourselves on the sofa to read. Nope. Today you can take that entire journey virtually with the click of a button or mouse. So I think availability of ebooks makes them successful.

That’s not to say that traditional, paper books are on their way out. Even though the phenomenal surge of e-books sales has slowed down, as figures show year-on-year growth easing, it is still here to stay. And it looks set to stay alongside actual books. Indeed the feel of a book, and - whisper it, as it’s an odd fixation of mine - the smell of a book, new or old, can’t be replaced with a screen. There’s room for both markets. As an author, that’s great for me and for the reader, ensuring there’s a choice of road to travel down, no matter what the vehicle.

And finally, you’re probably wondering if I can show you the money? Well, um, not really. That’s the kicker.

You’d better be in this for the love of it, less so for the moolah. A very recent UK report revealed that the top 5 per cent of writers earned close to half of all the income received by professional authors in 2013. Many authors earn under the minimum wage (that’s approx  Aust $19,000).  Basically, while the likes of JK Rowling earns around US $14million a year, most jobbing writers earn far, far less.

The gap, it would appear, is getting wider. Publishers might not give you an ‘advance’ any more on a book, either – especially in e-books. Instead, you will earn a royalty with each book, but the rate can vary. Many writers, therefore, haven’t given up the ‘day job’ yet.

So like I said, it ain’t easy. So if you still want to write a book, then take a deep breath and dig in. It’s a long way to basecamp, but you’ll be glad - if a little tired - when you get there.

 Kendra Smith has been a journalist, wife, mother, aerobics teacher, qualified diver and very bad cake baker. She started her career in Sydney selling advertising space in the late 80s. She has lived and worked in London and Sydney, working on Cosmopolitan, OK! Magazine and the BBC’s Eve as well as freelance for Woman & Home, Delicious, New Woman, Prima Baby and Junior.  Find her on www.aforauthors.com and www.kendrasmith.co.uk or follow her on Twitter  @KendraAuthor.

Kendra has released a book, 'Jacaranda Wife' which you can buy here. 

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