Tell me a about yourself. What got you started in writing?
My name is Nirit. I'm 44 years old.
I'm a life coach, a nutritionist and a spiritual mentor. In my mid-twenties I
got sick. For many years I was confined
to bed by an incurable illness. I lost my 30's. I was 100% handicapped. I lost
basic capabilities of the human body. For years and years I could not sit, stand,
walk, talk, I could barely breathe. I suffered a hand and a leg paralysis, blindness
in one eye, bladder incontinence, lack of sensation in my body, cognitive
problems and so much more when it came to disabilities.
I was basically a corpse. I was a dead
person with a beating heart. There is nothing worse than being trapped in your
own body. I got crazy amounts of steroid infusions every few weeks. I was
hooked to a monster cocktail of sleeping pills.
At some point I felt I was on the
verge of losing my sanity. As far as I was concerned, I had two options. Either
to commit suicide or to pull myself out of the hole I was in.
If you are reading these lines, you
probably realize that I chose the second option. But that is a story for a
different interview.
What leads to the second part of the
question…
The years of rehabilitation were
unbearable. I had to heal and rebuild myself and my life from scratch. I totally
lost my former life. I did not know where to begin.
I still had many physical limitations.
I was not my own person yet. I could not do whatever I wanted whenever I wanted.
I longed for doing much more than I could. I was frustrated and bored.
One of the things I missed most was
using my brain and my cognitive abilities. They were atrophy over my
"death years". In my essence I'm a very creative and a full of ideas
person. I wanted to express myself after
so many years of silence and destruction. It was time. I wanted to be heard!! I
wanted to create.
I believe that when the student is
ready, the teacher arrives. And so came into my life the "teacher"
that connected me to the Amazon world and taught me what I needed to know so I
could get started. It was a totally new world for me and I had to learn a lot. The
idea of writing children's books appealed to me and pulled me in right away. Since
I don't have children myself (yet!), that was also a consolation for me, to
write to children and to reach out to them. It felt right. I've written 30 stories
in no time. I've published 11 of them on Amazon. Almost all of my books
were #1 Best Sellers.
The idea of thinking of something (a
story) and then to solidify it into a book, was magical to me.
For me, to write children's books is
not only a way to express myself and to share my creativity with the world, it
is also a major way to be a part of the cycle of life again. To touch
children's lives all over the world with my stories, means the world to me. Sometimes I read the reviews to my books and I
literally have tears in my eyes…
You are welcome to take a peek at my
children books here…
How do you schedule your writing time? When do you write?
Unlike many other authors, I don't
have a writing schedule.
I'm working from home, so I write on
and off all day. It's also depends on what other things I need to do each day
other than writing. So it changes.
I really to try to balance my writing
with everything else going on in my life. This is one of the major lessons I've
learned throughout my struggle …
How and where do you write? Do you
prefer a lap top or some other method of getting your words down?
I write everywhere! Whenever
I can! Whenever I want! I really don't have a system I'm following. It's more
like "free style" with me.
Mostly I write on my
computer at home. I can't go around with a lap top since it's too unwieldy for
me. I write a lot also on my smart phone! Yes I
do! And after, I copy-paste it to my computer. This allows me to write
anywhere, anytime. For example, my husband and I went recently on holiday to
Berlin. The flights were perfect time for me to write. As I mentioned before, I'm
not carrying my lap top with me because of its weight. But my cell phone is
always with me and accessible to me. So I just pull it out and put my thoughts
in the "notes" section. When I get home I copy what I wrote on my
phone, and transfer it to my computer. But still, my major writing is done on
my home computer.
What's your favorite part about
writing? Your least favorite part about writing?
My favorite part about writing is when my thoughts are
embroidered shape and all the details are connected and forming a beautiful
story. When that happens, and I feel the flow, it's a peak moment for me.
My least favorite part is when I'm stuck. When that happens, I
feel helplessness and I'm always breaking my head with "where will my
inspiration come from next?" And it
always does … I worry for nothing … But I still don't like it!
How did you come up with your book
idea? How long did it take you to write your book?
I'll be referring to my NEW HOT
release "Zigi the Alien and the Laughter Journey".
This fresh and
funny book is the third in the "Zigi the Alien" series.
The idea for this series came from
the same source all my book idea comes from … life! This time it was a TV show that inspired me.
Someone on that TV show wore a costume of an alien. The Alien character was so
cute and friendly. I totally fell in love with this alien on screen. As I watched the show (there were a few episodes) I started thinking "maybe I could write a
book about a cute, friendly and harmless alien"…
On a different TV show I
heard the name "Zigi". It caught my attention right away, so I
embraced it too. I still didn't know, at that point, what my alien would do. But
that was a minor problem hahaha.
And a whole series was born!
It took me few weeks to write this book.
During the editing process I re-wrote major parts of it. That took few more
weeks as well. The illustration part took 2-3 months. There are other parts,
like preparing a landing page for the free gift for the kids, preparing the
free gift itself, and other things ... So all the parts together can take me up
to 6 months to produce a children book.
What types of marketing do you do to
promote your writing?
For me, marketing is the most difficult part of this business.
It doesn't matter how awesome the book is, if it will not be market well, it
will not sell.
I tried so many things. Some worked better than others. Some
didn't work. I tried doing Press Releases for my books. I've learned (the hard
way) that PR doesn't bring traffic to digital books. I tried a blog tour. That
didn't work for me at all.
There are many free and paid promotion sites that promote books.
Most of them will not promote if they are not paid (for guarantied promotion).
So it depends on the book and how much money I want to invest in its promotion.
But these sites are great (like freebooksy…)
I also do social media promotion. Mainly Facebook. I'm
registered to about 300 groups for this purpose. For twitter, pinterest and
other social media, I hire sellers from Fiverr or Upwork sites to do the
promotion for me.
There are bloggers that review my books and post the review in
their blog. That helps too. I don't have a winning promotion formula yet. I'm still looking
for one!
Nirit, you may also want to check out my yearly updated marketing book, Marketing Your Book on a Budget. Lot's of FREE advertising ideas!!
What are you currently working on?
Do you have a new book out?
Yes, I do have a new book out ! As I
mention on question no.4 , The book's title is
"Zigi the Alien and the
Laughter Journey".
It was actually published just last month (November 26th). You can find it here.
I'm
currently working on a very "big" and special book. "Big"
because of the book's concept. It's not
a children book. It's my "life work" book. It's a life changing book.
This book
reveals my personal story. I bring my knowledge, my experience, my insights, my tools, I share my credo. I'm pursuing it to help people who want to help themselves HEAL. The book is very
different from other therapeutic books out there. What I was missing in self-healing books when I was sick, I will give to YOU in this book, with much love, to
the world. I'm working on the book diligently. So now, children's books will be
on low heat for a while …
You may want to check out my children's book a "Fairy's Fairy Tale Kingdom" story at: http://amzn.to/1ePkh7t until you see something else new from me.
Do you have a project on the back burner? Tell me about it.
I have many projects on the back
burner.
I'm working on the fourth "Zigi
the Alien" book. Telling you about it will be a spoiler, so I will just
say that it will be another AWESOME Zigi book!!
What would you tell a beginning
writer who wants to publish but doesn't believe he/she has enough talent?
As the Nike's add says : JUST DO IT !
If you want to write,
just write. If you want to publish, just publish. Things have a tendency to get
along on their own.
What's the worst thing
that can happen ??
Even if you do
something and fail it, I believe that it is better to regret a chance that was
taken than to regret not taking the chance at all.
***
Thank you, Nirit!
Learn more about Nirit and her work:
My Facebook page :
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