I had planned to write a post celebrating my journey. Today, ‘Uff Yeh Ladki’ completes six months of  its digital publish. Instead, here I am. Irony?

So what brings me here with a continuation of my old post?

Self doubt, of course.

I know I shouldn’t; but I do obsess over the ratings and reviews. Incidentally, yesterday when I was browsing through my books, I noticed that one of my novelettes got its first rating on amazon. A one star. The reviewer has said nothing about the story but bashed me as a person and as a writer.

My immediate reaction was to shut down my laptop and stop editing the novel that I promised myself to publish in December this year.

I am drowning in self-doubt as I write this post. I know nothing about writing. My vocabulary is limited and my imagination sucks. I am not good enough.

My brother came to my rescue again and insisted that if I stop writing, I will never get better. I think he is just being nice and supportive.

My first ever novel draft is currently at a 67K words and 30 chapters. I was supposed to be contacting fellow bloggers for a book tour and perhaps a few advance reviews.

But now, I think I am going back to being just the plain, boring and oft frustrating software developer.

Shabana Mukhtar