Don't call this a comeback

So it’s been a minute. Or 10. Or truthfully more like 2,102,400. At least we think that’s how many minutes there are in 3 years, but let's be honest, math isn't exactly our strong suit. We’d love to sit here and tell you that we’re BACK and we’re BETTER THAN EVER. But that would be a complete lie. Mostly because we’re not quite sure what we’re coming back to.

I mean, blogging isn’t even a thing anymore, right? At least that’s what the Regulator tells us. Did we mention that while we went on this weird hiatus she was keeping tabs on the publishing world on our behalf? Yes, that’s right. Every time one of you sold a new book, hit the NYT list or optioned movie rights, we’d get an excited text with a link to the tweet or a snapshot of your book in Barnes & Noble. And we’d exclaim about how we knew you once upon a time when blogging was cool, Obamas ran the world and giving away a Kindle and hosting online writers’ conferences earned you instant internet street cred.

And here we are. We tried to quit a million different times, a million different ways. When we left our first beloved agent. When Lisa got a promotion. When we got a terrible Kirkus review that was so bad we couldn’t read it without squinting. When we left a second amazing agent. When Lisa landed her dream job. When Laura got a new dog. When our kids started staying up later than 7 PM. The thing is that our lives changed slowly but completely and somewhere along the way writing stopped being fun. It started to feel like work. And not the nice, rewarding, cushy desk job kind of work. Nope, writing felt like the back-breaking, soul crushing, manual labor kind of work. 

So we stopped.

We told ourselves we weren’t good enough. We found satisfaction in day jobs and motherhood and new friendships. We tried really hard to give up.

But there was this book rattling around in our heads and like career bank robbers we told ourselves that this was it. One last heist. If this book doesn’t sell for 6-figures in a pre-empt, we’re done. Over. Calling it a day.

We started writing. And it was hard. And it was work. But it was less Iron Man, more 5K race training kind of work. Work that was filled with goals, accomplishments and a rush of endorphins with each finished chapter. We told ourselves we’d start fresh. New names. New agent. No baggage. One. Last. Heist.

And it actually sort of worked. Sure there was no 6-figure advance, but we landed the most amazing agent two washed-up sister-writers could hope for and a book deal with our dream publishing house and the smartest editor we’ve ever met.

After four grueling rounds of edits, two new (old) names and one kick ass cover, NOW YOU SEE HER will be unleashed on the world this June. And we’re happy and proud and hopeful. And scared. Really scared. Because we haven’t done this in a long time. And this book might not be good enough. While we were busy pretending to quit so many of the writers we debuted with have been writing and publishing and touring. 

So, don’t call this a comeback. At least not yet.