At least I'm in good company...

I don't know how much my old heart can take!  The road to publishing success is way more emotionally grueling than I ever would have imagined!  The numbers change hourly - damn technology.  I find it's like a mild addiction - that need to go and check the numbers and see where I'm at when nobody's looking.

Well, I think my boss has caught me a time or two but is being mildly tolerant right now.

So today when "The Christmas Cottage" disappeared off of Amazon's Top 100 list for Contemporary Women's Fiction, I decided to do some research.  Lo and behold, there were some pretty impressive names that were also surrounding me in the numbers on that list - even when we weren't in the Top 100!  Books that show up as being in the top 10 on one list are in the 100's and 200's on another!  

Finding myself on the Top 100 (and I mean I am nearing the 100) was very exciting and I had to make myself stop obsessing (a little) about why I'm not getting closer to the top.  Why?  Because the top is filled with some AMAZING authors!  Who am I to compete with the likes of Nora Roberts, Danielle Steel, Debbie Macomber, Susan Mallery...I mean, I am NOBODY next to these women!  That Fifty Shades of Gray woman is all over the damn top 10 and that kills me - I can't even read it!  

But as you go down the list you find authors who are little less known but who have multiple, wonderful books and you know what?  It's kind of cool to see my book in the same category as these writers.  I have to remember that I AM an author and there's nothing wrong with me!  I have a book that is climbing the charts, I have talent, I have skills, I have stories to tell and it's okay for me to be in the company of these other super talented authors!

So I will continue to ride the emotional roller coaster with the numbers (I still want those 100 Likes on Amazon by Christmas!) and I'd love to get in to the top 25 on one of those lists and really, it would be a freakin dream come true to see my book listed on the same page as one of my writing idols.

It could totally happen...