If we want a long-lasting career writing fiction, we have to step back from what we’re doing once in a while and re-evaluate. Both in what we’re writing and how we’re approaching our author platform, branding, and social media.

In the years from 2009 to 2017, I wrote an average of five to nine books a year. I was publishing at a frantic pace, both traditionally and independently under a couple of different pen names. I was running myself into the ground, all the while not fully writing the bo...