Illustration (and an early RG cover idea) by Katie Rodgers

Let me start by saying that I have been "writing a book" for most of my adult life. How many of these books have I finished, you ask? Up until a few months ago…none. Or…one, actually, but it was so terrible that I don't think it counts (it was an attempt at a girl-moves-to-LA-and-makes-poor-dating-choices rom-com thing that ended up being just sort of an accurate reflection of my actual poor dating choices at the time and was thus less "oh how cute and entertaining" and more "oh Jesus, that's sad").

When you want to write a book - and that's probably the one thing that I have wanted most in the world for as far back as I can remember - it's always there with you, that nagging sense of incompletion and guilt. "Today," you say to yourself, "is the day I start writing for real." You make promises to yourself that from now on, you'll write ten (or five, or two) pages every single day, and then…you don't. Life gets in the way. Years pass, and your book is still sitting there on your laptop, unfinished, and now transformed into a source of anxiety rather than something you're excited about.