When we start writing, we often start with a grand idea. A plan. An aspiration. When I was in high school writing my first “novel” (it was 40 pages in Word), I wanted to write this epic romance novel. I named it “Chapter One” and had this female author get sucked into the world of the story she was writing in just after her divorce. She went on grand adventures, fell in love, and ended up coming back to the world and writing the story of her adventure. The book was crap, but I like the concept enough to try it again later.
Now, over twenty years later, I look back at that first manuscript idea and am fond of it. And of the young me who just needed to write a novel. That’s all there was to it. I had dreams and ideas of being an author someday (I had since I was a child) but had no idea how in the world it was going to turn out. Or how to get there. Or anything about it.
When I grew up, I gave up that dream. I sort of wanted to write a book in college, but I had no real ambitions beyond that until 2009 when I met the owner of Divertir Publishing as I was working as a karaoke host in a dive bar. That started me down the path toward being an author.
As a kid, my expectation about authors was that they did all the things everyone always depicts in movies: hang out in a cottage somewhere, writing brilliance, and sending it off to a mysterious “editor” while solving crimes. Wait. That’s Murder, She Wrote.
As someone in the industry now, my life isn’t so different sans the whole solving crimes issue. Of course. And the money. I’m disabled, so I mostly spend all day writing because I don’t have a day job, so it’s less glamorous than I imagined. But here we are. I am living the dream. To some extent, anyway. The dream is still real. My novel comes out in January. I am still marketing it and doing pre-release review requests (also, you get the first two chapters for free if you sign up for my newsletter!). I am living the dream.
I am, however dubiously lucky in the sense that I am sort of living the author dream but I am also physically disabled and unable to work, so my husband and I live in significant poverty. It’s less Walden Pond than you might imagine.
E. Prybylski has been in the publishing industry as an editor since 2009, starting at Divertir Publishing and eventually partnering with her close friend Richard Belanger to begin Insomnia Publishing.
Ever since childhood, E. has been an avid reader and writer of fantasy. The first chapter book she remembers reading is The Hobbit, followed swiftly by most of Anne McCaffrey’s Pern series. In high school, she perfected the skill of walking while reading without slamming into anyone. Mostly.
When she isn’t reading or writing, E. is an active member of the Society for Creative Anachronism and has a B.A. in European history from SNHU. In addition to her many historical pursuits, E. is a musician of multiple instruments, a cat mom, and a loving wife to her husband, J. E. also speaks out for the disability and chronic illness communities being a sufferer of chronic migraines and Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome.
