Doing It All

The other day I bounced around the Internet and stumbled across an article on Nora Roberts. Can’t say that I’ve ever even read one of her books, either under her real name or her pseudonym, J. D. Robb. But the article on her was very interesting. So much so that I went to her website to read more.

The woman will boggle your mind.

She’s published 165 books. Shoot, I was stunned just by the amount of work she has coming out this year alone: three hardcovers, seven mass market paperbacks, and three trade paper reissues. On her website, she states: “Lifetime Television will be making four of my novels into Lifetime Original Movies and they will be airing on Mondays in February.” According to the Arizona Daily Star article, “Each book published under the Nora Roberts name since 1999 has been a best-seller; there are 280 million Roberts books in print. She is published in 35 countries. Her books sold 12 million copies in 2005, according to Publishers Weekly.” She averages six books a year.

How in the heck does she do it?

She says she works eight hours a day, minimum. In her office. She looks on her writing as a job, not a hobby. She doesn’t wait for the muse to hit. In addition to planting her butt in front of the computer to write, she works out in the morning, spends time checking email and logging onto Internet fan sites and reading posts on the on-line boards, and also, of course, working on galleys of upcoming releases. And she has a family, a husband, and the family’s bookstore.

Well, dang, girl. Color me lazy. I do believe I’ll mosey on down to the local bookstore and take a look at her latest book.