The Four Supporters Every Author Needs

I loved to pretend I was a lone wolf— the type of DIYer who could figure out anything on her own if she just efforted hard enough. After all, there are enough Instagram teachers, free YouTube videos, and Substack newsletters to educate us for lifetimes. While they all help to an extent (and thank you for subscribing), DIY-ing a book can rarely get our stories to match the vision we hold for our stories.

Creativity is an act of co-creation.

You are the spider and they are both the web and everything that gets pulled into it. Now this blog is not some twisted, creepy tale about eating your readers for sustenance. That would be so rude. But it is about the energy and creativity-sustaining support we need as we go through life.

In my experience as an author (and with more book babies on the way), I have found there are four types of supporters that every author should seek to surrounded themselves with for their survival and longevity.

Our biggest supporters are our Fans. They are the ones who laugh at our sometimes-lame attempts at wit and often believe in us more than we believe in ourselves. They’re the friends, family members, and social followers who show up for us, even when we’re convinced that we are creative shit. They cheer us on, remind us who we are, and let us know that they’re waiting for us to cross that finish line. They show up at our book launches, share our social posts, and give glowing 5-star reviews…even though not always deserved.

Sometimes we tell ourselves that these Fans don’t play a crucial role because their support always seems to trend positive. My dear friend, Kristyna, is the prime example of a Fan. She is often one of the first people who I have invited in to read any of my words. It’s always vulnerable and incredibly scary, and yet each time I know she is going to come back with the most genuine, enthusiastic response possible. It’s the first glowing review of a crappy draft, but it loops in my head enough and bolster me through each round of writing, rewriting, deleting, and rewriting again. I can wholeheartedly say that Perfectly Queer and my upcoming holiday romcom would not be in this world without her.

Like a guide into the depths of the dark ocean, the Divers of your writing journey are those who take you deeper, often into places that you would not have gone on your own. These are the book coaches, writing groups, collaborative ghostwriters, and sensitivity readers. If you’re working with an agent or developmental editor, I would add them to this category as well.

Like the Fans, the Divers want us to succeed but they also know that what we truly seek rarely lives at the surface. There is more to explore and our work will be exponentially better because of their feedback and guidance. They motivate us in a different way than the Fans. Sometimes their words carry a different weight because they’re a balance of both what is working and what needs to change.

Divers ask the questions and challenge us to think through what it really is we’re trying to say and how we’re wanting to show up. They are also our bridge to the reader… that very important person who occasionally disappears from our writing radar. Our Divers advocate for them, like the scuba guide who reminds us that coral is a living organism and we shouldn’t lose sight of it and accidentally step on it.

We may think the Divers are non-essential, as we shove a snorkel into our mouths and tell ourselves that we can do enough alone. But they take the writing journey deeper, from “that was a nice experience” to “that was one of the most memorable experiences of my life.”

Oh, and the Diver’s name is never Claude. Claude is the shady person who looks like a dive instructor (but likely stole someone else’s credentials) and is leading you into a space you will struggle to get back out of. More on that tragic operation later.

For us creative, wild pony types who love to write and never re-read, who eschew grammar and also refuse to look up the word ‘eschew’ to make sure we’re using it correctly, and who are happily prancing on to our next project, the Detailers of our lives are our wranglers that reign us in before we fall off a cliff.

The Detailers are the editors (line edit, copy edit, and proofreaders), industry experts, and I’d include sensitivity readers here as well, who elevate the quality and polish of our words to give the readers what they deserve.

Because the truth is that sloppy work can often feel like disrespect to a reader who is not yet a supporter. They don’t see (or sometimes don’t care) about the amount of effort we’ve poured into a piece or how our brains love to swap letters and skip words. The Detailers are our caretakers who make sure we don’t get dinged in reviews because of the friction that errors create for readers.

We’ve worked too hrd to let missing, misused, and missspelled words sync your battleshoop. (See how annoying errors feel). Detailers are a necessity for any book that is going to be published. Necessity. Do not skip.

Becoming an author is so much more than releasing a book, particularly if you’re new to the publishing process in the past few years. The industry is rapidly changing and authoring is both easier (looking at you, self-pub) and harder (AI market saturation and the economy) than ever.

Asking a new person who has never met you to throw down $20-$30 for your debut book, when there are millions of options at their fingertips, can feel defeating. The Trailblazers shovel some high-quality trail mix in our faces and tell us to keep going.

These Trailblazers are other authors, either seasoned in their craft or just a few steps ahead of where we are. They link arms with us and pull us up, instead of dragging us down. They are literal lifesavers for those moments when our cookie starts to crumble and we wonder why we ever embarked on this book journey in the first place. We forget about the cheering from our Fans, we forget about the motivation from our Divers, we forget about the delicate care of our Detailers, and we doom-spiral into the overwhelm.

Trailblazers have held my hand through being hounded by unscrupulous PR agencies and scammy emails offering representation and movie deals. They have offered words of support through negative reviews that criticize my skills or very existence. They’ve advised on where to invest my resources and what to skip, depending on my budget. They generously shared what worked well for them and what was a total waste.

More than that, Trailblazers reflect back our feelings as they arise through each stage. They understand because they’ve been there too. They know the highs and the pains, the incredible surprises and the crushing rejections.

The Trailblazers hold space for us inwardly and outwardly. They feel like lifeblood to the process and, someday, we will join them as a Trailblazer to help someone new.

Who wants to write a book that nobody will read? Who wants to tell a story when there is nobody to listen? Becoming an author is a process of co-creation. As much as writing is a ton of solo, introspective time, it also cannot be done in isolation.

My wish for each author is that they find their four types of support throughout the experience so that the memory they take away is not simply the book itself, but the community who created it.

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