Alexandra Do Nistor's Blog

Day 54 of wanting to give up… but choosing not to
Today’s thoughts come from something that has been bothering me for a while.
Trying to survive as a new author on social media is already difficult. Not even “becoming popular” — just surviving in the noise is hard enough. And lately I’ve been watching something that honestly discourages me more than any bad review ever could: the public fights.
Booktok creators attacking each other. Authors retaliating against reviewers. People dragging each other through comment sections for the whole internet to watch.
And I keep thinking… who is this for?
Readers don’t deserve to watch grown adults wash their dirty laundry in public. Authors who supposedly rely on these spaces don’t benefit from it either. The whole thing starts to feel less like a community and more like a spectacle.
I have also seen another side of the industry that surprised me: some authors reacting aggressively to honest reviews. A reader doesn’t love your book? Suddenly they become the enemy.
I experienced a small taste of that myself. I once rated an author’s book two stars. I didn’t even write a review because I didn’t want to publicly tear someone’s work apart. Shortly after, that same author left a one-star rating on my book without reading it.
Moments like this make you pause and ask yourself where exactly you belong.
The truth is, I don’t feel like I belong in the most toxic corners of online book culture. My work, my voice, and my values sit somewhere else entirely. I write stories shaped by folklore, feminism, and the complicated history of women’s power and survival. That space doesn’t always overlap with the loudest parts of the internet.
Because of that, I’ve decided to step back from TikTok. I still have one scheduled live event at the end of the month, but after that I will probably close that chapter for a while. The platform may work beautifully for some people, but for me it has become exhausting.
Instagram, on the other hand, has been a much healthier experience so far. With a few modest ads I’ve managed to bring in new ARC readers through Booksprout, and the conversations there have felt far more constructive.
But more importantly, I’ve realized something else.
My energy needs to go back where it belongs: the writing itself.
After publishing my first novel independently, I’ve learned a few things.
First, if I want my work to stand in the same room as the writers and readers I admire, I likely need at least hybrid — if not traditional — publishing support.
Second, readers will never see the enormous amount of work behind a book. And that’s okay. Their job is simply to read the final product, not to applaud the process.
Third, Daughters of the Moon has become something unexpected for me: not only a debut novel, but a kind of sacrifice book. Until it finds its way into a professional publishing environment, I won’t push it aggressively anymore. The story deserves to shine, not to stumble over the limitations of one exhausted author trying to do everything alone.
Fourth, patience matters. With persistence, I believe I have a real chance of finding an agent interested in my paranormal romance manuscript. That might become the door into the traditional market.
And finally, something I remind myself of tonight:
In one single year, I wrote two novels.
I also translated one of them into another language.
That is not a small thing.
So yes — today was another day when I felt like giving up.
But this is Day 54 of wanting to give up… and choosing not to.

This is day 35 of me wanting to give up but chosing not to. The bad luck just continues to follow me and sabotage my evey plan, thought or idea. Tomorrow I have my first bookclub and my book is to be discussed. I wanted to have a signing with it and surprise the club with a signed paperback version of Daughters of the Moon. Unfortunately, that's not going to happen. Let me elaborate.
Firstly, I am an author without a physical copy of her book. When I published, back in January, I ordered 3 proof copies that never arrived and Amazon eventually suggested I cancelled the order. I had to find out through readers that the book's pages weren't numbered.
Then, an opportunity arose with the visit of a friend that agreed to bring me author copies from Romania, that I ordered at the end of January, to be delivered on the 9th of february - my friend was leaving on the 11th. The books never arrived. Why? The couriers delivered my package across Europe, through 4 different countries, instead of directly to Romania. Amazon Customer Service had no justification or solution for that so I had to cancel the order. The books arrived on the 14th, when my friend was already in Vietnam.
But don't think I gave up! Noooo! I needed the books so I came up with a back-up plan, just in case. So i searched for Printing shop in Da Nang and found a few. Even though it wasn't Tet (the Chinese New Year) yet, all of them were closed! we couldn't find a single printing house open on the 10th of february, although it was still a working period.
Anyway, a couple of them answered the phone. One told us they couldn't promise they could deliver by Feb 27, while the other one said it can be done. So, naturally, we went with the one that said it could. We just had to wait out the holidays. On Monday they said to send over the manuscript and the cover. Done. I thought they would start work. On the 25th they called to tell us that they don't actually print proper books and that the glue they have won't hold!! I went mental! They waited until then to tell us! I screamed in a pillow for 10 minutes until my voice was gone. The amount of bad luck I'm having with this is destroying my mental health and I am not ok.
I should give up. But I won't. Not just yet. A little more...

Day 13 of wanting to give up, but chosing not to.
This marketing thing is draining me. No matter the strategy, no matter what I do, it feels like I'm going backwards.
Just noise in a void.
My Romanian book is out. I decided to do a giveaway.
People either have difficulties engaging or I'm doing something wrong.
It is beyond my understanding how I can't convince people to engage with any post of mine beyond a like.
I want to give up. I chose not to, because my book is good. I need to feel I did everything I could for it.
Then I will give up... but with some dignity... and not today.

This is day 5 of me wanting to give up, but chosing not to.
The reasons for wanting it remain the same. The reasons for chosing not to, on the other hand, are incresing.
So, today I'm chosing not to give up because I found a beacon of hope on Tik Tok through and amazing woman that hosts live events and invites indie authors to speak. I registered and got my own space to talk about my book. I received kindness, and empathy and so much support that I started crying. It's hard to break the algorithm, but I'm glad that I managed to find this tight little community that decided to offer me a chance. I am so grateful!
And then, to make my day even better, I received a message on gr, from a consacrated indie author, with a lot of succesful books in her portfolio, letting me know she read my book and that she not only liked it, but wanted to know more about me, what inspired me and how I came up with the stoy.
Things like this keep me going. Things like this make me chose not to give up.
My book is out there, no take backs! And people are reading it. Yaaaay!

This is Day one of me wanting to give up, but choosing not to.
I want to give up because I'm not "social media influencer" material and I don't want to be one.
I want to give up because it's more of a hassle to convince people to buy your book than it is to write one.
I want to give up because the lack of support from people around me broke my heart.
I want to give up because I don't know what hurts more, the lack of support or the fake support.
I want to give up because I feel that I need to become a circus animal to promote my book.
I want to give up because the social media algorithm is sabotaging me and, regardless of my efforts, my content still doesn't reach the right people.
I want to give up because the marketing part of it is draining me and taking all the joy out of life.
I want to give up because after 2 weeks since launching and 2 months of preparing the launch online, I only sold 3 books.
I want to give up because of all this frustration, disappointment, pointless work and heartbreak. But not today. I will, however, count the days that I feel like giving up.

I discovered that I don't neceseraly have a style and that I'm writing from personal experiences and worlds I imagned along the years.
Daughters of the Moon is thought to be a trilogy. The first part of the Moonborn Chronicles. The second book would continue de story, introducing an ancient secret cult, the Solomonari, descendents of Solomon's advisors, keepers of knowledge, but also hidden magic and supernatural bonds. They Solomonari are the ones that bring the Calusari to life. Their story would be the third and final volume in the Chronicles.
Separately from the Chronicles, I decided to have some fun with some dark romance. Since I've never read anything in this genre, what I'm writing now, has not been influenced by any other author and it brings to the table a supernatural universe, Romanian mystic creatures and a lot of hot scenes.
Stay tuned for more news on that and maybe some insights here and there.

Most indie authors are broke. We can't afford much marketing and we barely afford an editor. Which is also my case.
If for Daughters of the Moon I managed to afford the services of an editor, for the Romanian version I don't have that kind of money.
So, I'm trying to do it myself. But doing the job of two people can become seriously overwhlming.
That's how I found myself reading the same chapter over and over again, looking for mistakes I might have made, or diacritical marks I might have missed, not to mention the proper times, ultil I couldn't look at it anymore. I read the same word more than 20 times before I realized it was missing a diacritical mark.
Should I mention I have 40 chapter in my book?
And here I was, thinking I was going to go through it as fast as possible and launch it alongside the English version.
How naive was I on a scale of 1-10?
Live and learn. I got my work cut out for me. I just wish I had more time to work.
But reality calls, the children need me, there's food to be cooked and clothes to be washed.
But get this... I am never bored.
I never relax either. But I can always find 10 minutes to work.
Social media? Not my favorite cup of tea. But the readers on there? Those are my people and there's no other way I could connect with them.
So, wish me luck and fingers crossed, that my kind of people find me.

Months ago, I thought the hard part was writing my novel. As life tends to laugh in your face many times, I had to come to the excruciating and painful conclusion that that is not the hard part.

The hard part is to join social media to do the marketing, after you've done your best to stay away from these platforms.

I was like a lovely granny with only a Facebook account and posting pictures of my family for my friends to see.

But marketing your own book comes with a lot of challenges. And yes, you have to work full time on it and it requires you to do the job of at least two people.

So, apart from being the mother of two lovely children, a wife to a Vietnamese husband, and recently relocating to Vietnam, I had to go through this journey alone.

I had to find out the hard way how out of touch I really was with social platforms. How difficult it still is to navigate these systems and how hard I am working everyday to give my book a fighting chance.

So this is me, the Alexandra behind the book.
A messy mom, trying to make her childhood dream come true.

I am Alexandra Do Nistor —the author—you just haven't heard of me, yet. Alexandra Do Nistor