Finnian Burnett

Yep. That’s me. An Award-Winning Novelist. I’m pretty sure I speak it in all caps, too. See, I submitted my little novel to the Elisa Rolles LGBT Rainbow Awards and guess what happened? I won three. Yep. Number one in one category, number two in another, and honorable mention in yet a third. Am I stoked? Yeah.

Not that this really changes much. I’m still living below the poverty level. I’m still trying to get my homework done on time. I’m still trying to figure out how to market my book so people will buy it. And I am still fighting tooth and nail with the second book. I swear that for every thousand words I write, I go back and delete eight hundred. Despite my power of positive thinking that I have been trying so desperately to practice, I am still floundering on that one. The editor who worked on Man Enough sent me an email the other day asking how it was going and I told her that it was going badly. She emailed me back that she was sending me good vibes. It helped. I wrote well that day. Maybe it was just the centering from knowing someone was sending me good thoughts. Or maybe she helped me focus my own good thoughts. Either way, it helped. I need to figure out how to do that every single day on my own. So, that’s where I am with that. My goal for the next week is to maybe spend a few minutes of each morning (maybe during morning yoga) just focusing positive thoughts and maybe some visualizations on Andy’s Song.

In the meantime, I am now an  Award-Winning Novelist! Boo-ya! I am kind of coasting on the excitement of that. I did scream (loudly) when I found out, causing Lucretia to come tearing in with her hand over her heart thinking I was dying or that I had seen a snake or something. I then forwarded the email to my mother, my stepmother, and my publisher. (That’s telling, isn’t it?)

Well, being an *A*ward-*W*inning *N*ovelist definitely comes with some responsibility. I have a responsibility now to get the word out there about Man Enough. I have a responsibility to finish Andy’s Song so I can move on to the next novel that is already pushing at my brain. And I have a responsibility to be absolutely fabulous at all times. (That’s the easy part, at least.)

So, keep your eyes open. Who knows? Maybe soon you’ll see me strutting across the stage of the Ellen show or Oprah’s new show. Hey! It could happen!