Publishing your first novel can be an emotional roller coaster. You’re exhilarated by the culmination of years of heart-wrenching work. You’re terrified that the product of all those years of heart-wrenching work won’t be well received (or even worse, it’ll be drowned out in the sheer volume of books published every year). You’re overwhelmed by the insane logistical chaos of getting everything ready for the big day.

Before I started preparing to launch my book, I thought I’d done my homework. I’d read the guides, listened to the podcasts, watched the TikToks, you name it. But what those resources didn’t prepare me for was just how much longer everything would take than I had anticipated.

It’s a helluva lot harder to plan a publishing timeline than you’d think.

Shit takes longer than you expect

From editing to cover design to printing, everything about the publishing process is much slower than you might imagine.

My editor ended up doing a deep dive into my text and going through three rounds of copy edits with me to ensure we got the highest quality possible. I’m glad she was willing to give the manuscript such a thorough workover, but it took much longer than I had planned for.

My cover design also took several weeks. While my designer delivered the initial concepts within a few business days, I didn’t account for just how long the back and forth would take during the editing phase.

Like most autistics, I’m extremely detail-oriented. I also have hyperphantasia, which means that when I put in the cover order, I had a really specific image in my head of what I wanted the design to look like. And I was motivated to make absolutely sure we got everything to my specifications.

My designer delivered in spades:

I am thrilled with the result, but the process of me critiquing and them editing over and over until it looked how I wanted wasn’t exactly…