I'm Not Famous: I'm Working

"I keep forgetting that you're famous," a friend said recently, causing me to do a combination coffee-spew / snort laugh that made random passersby look askance at us.

"I'm not," I said. "But my clients are."

If you're reading this blog because you labor under the misconception that you're reading the words of a famous author, I am humbly sorry to disabuse you of that notion. You obviously have me mistaken for someone else.

I wish I could give credit where it's due.
Sadly, I don't know who took this,
but I love them for it!

I am patently not famous. I pump my own gas. Get my own groceries. Muck my own stalls. Clean Move the clutter around in my own house. Anyone who recognizes my name does so only because they have read some of my clients' books.

It's true, I have been chased followed into the restroom after speaking at writer's conferences, but this is generally from a misunderstanding on the part of the stalker attendee who thinks that I am going to stop all biological functions for the duration of the conference. That doesn't mean I'm famous. It merely means some people have serious boundary issues.

Crime writer & actress Marguerite Ashton kindly featured me on her Criminal Lines blog recently. There I spilled about how I got my first book gig by nearly killing someone (not a method I would endorse, but it worked for me).

Fortunately, no other writing projects have involved life-threatening instances, though I did write a book once while in the midst of a "Your husband has a brain tumor and needs brain surgery, that's why he has no short-term memory, forgot he had a daughter, and thinks aliens are attacking the planet" crisis. When you're under contract, you can't let little things like medical malfunctions get in the way.

I'm not famous. I'm something far, far better for a writer: I'm working.