THREE SUPER COOL THINGS happened to me today!

Three Super Cool Things happened to me today!
To start the morning off, I received MY FIRST BAD REVIEW on amazon.com. And I survived! No worries! It’s all good.
But at first, it wasn’t (all good). The moment I read it I wanted to delete everything. The book, my author page, the good reviews, MY FIRST BAD REVIEW! My life. Everything. “Take it away, I can’t do this! I’m not ready for bad reviews. Not after I just sent my book out to three ‘real’ review sites. Oh, my Goddess, I’m going to be smushed and pulverized! I cannot do this!
I mewled to my hubby, lying in bed next to me, “I got MY FIRST BAD REVIEW.”
I think he hugged me and talked me off the ledge. I don’t remember exactly; it was all a blur.
MY FIRST BAD REVIEW went like this, “Seriously? The sister and her husband take out a new mortgage on the family home so they can buy a car and go on vacation, then simultaneously decide to stop paying the property taxes. These characters are TDTL.”
And that was that. Whoever it was disliked the villains so much they couldn’t read the rest of the book.
Then I blinked. And I took a deep breath. And I read the review again. Whoever it was gave it one star. But then, to emphasize how horrible a review they truly wanted to give, they entitled it ZERO STARS.
And then I realized that MY FIRST BAD REVIEW was The First Super Cool Thing that happened to me today. It proved to me that I had successfully done my job as a writer. I made the person who wrote the review feel something.
This fragile revelation did not come easily. I grasped that wispy victory after I blinked and began breathing again. Then I lost it by the time I came downstairs to make coffee. So, I showered and washed any negativity down the drain. The fragile revelation returned. I was okay. For a bit.
As my morning evolved, panic set in again. On the drive to work I called my sister. She made me laugh and reminded me about a famous author who was rejected hundreds of times before being published.
I thought about the few bad songs Elton John has written. (I’m on an Elton John Kick lately. Captain Fantastic and the Brown Dirt Cowboy is set on replay in Spotify and in my Brain.) Yes, even Sir Elton has received bad reviews.
The self-doubt returned later in the day as prepared for my SECOND COOL THING OF THE DAY. I drove to Thistle Dew for my weekly critique session with my Herkimer Diamond critique partner, Alee Drake. As soon as I walked in, I blurted out, “I need your help,” and told her about MY FIRST BAD REVIEW. ALee reminded me, like Jeana, that lots of people get bad reviews. Brush it off and be a writer.
So, I had a great critique session with ALee and then headed home to cook dinner for the hubby. While the beef stew simmered on the stove top, I continued with my promotion of Ten Bucks and a Wish. I fought the urge to go on Facebook and post something to the effect of, “EVERYONE GO TO AMAZON AND WRITE ME AN AMAZING REVIEW EVEN IF YOU DIDN’T READ THE BOOK! PLEASE! HURRY!”
Instead, I continued joining review sites and FB pages that my friend and fellow author MJ Compton suggested I reach out to. Because that’s what famous authors do (as they set out to become famous).
I headed over to Bookbub.com, a site my publisher Debby told me about. I figured I would set up a reader account, since I’d heard they only feature authors who have more than one book.
Then Part 1 of my THIRD SUPER COOL THING OF THE DAY happened.
I’M ON BOOKBUB!!!! My book is, too! I had to claim my author page, and I’m waiting for their approval on that. But yeah. I’m on Bookbub.com.
Wait. It gets better. As I’m fooling around on Bookbub getting to know it better, I did a search on Ten Bucks and a Wish. The search results included a few other books as well. The cool thing about it is that Ten Bucks and a Wish was situated on the page of listings RIGHT NEXT TO JUDE DEVERAUX’s  As You Wish!!
That means absolutely nothing as far as standings, ratings, or merit goes for my book. It was just a random listing. BUT the FACT that my published book was situated next to JUDE’S BOOK was SUPER COOL THING NUMBER THREE PART 2. Jude Deveraux was one of the first two romance authors I read. I wore Jude’s books out I loved them and re-read them so much. And now I am an author with a book shown next to hers in a random search result. Life is sweet.
So, to the person who gave me a bad review: Thank you for taking the time to download my book, begin to read it, then vent your distaste about my villains. I will cherish your review forever.
To Dave, Jeana, and Alee, thank you for talking me through MY FIRST BAD REVIEW.
To Jude Deveraux, thank you for your inspiration and the great stories you shared that made me want to become a romance author. I’m honored to share a random search page with you.