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My Double Life By Freida McFadden

April 26, 2022 | By Women Writers Women Books | Reply More

My Double Life

By Freida McFadden

I lead a double life.

On Friday, as my colleagues and I are getting ready to leave the hospital at the end of a long work week, we discuss our plans for the weekend. One person is driving out to a local waterpark with their kids. Another is going to the beach. Someone else is working the weekend shift. Then it’s my turn.

“I’ll probably just laze around,” I tell them. “Binge a little Netflix, maybe go out to dinner. I don’t have any specific plans.”

Except, of course, I’m lying.

The truth is I don’t have time for Netflix and chillin’ (that means watching Netflix with ice cream, right?). Because I’ve got a book that’s going to be published in just over a month, and I have to make some final edits. Or else I’ve got another first draft of a manuscript that I’m finishing up. Or I’ve got to beef up my advertising.

But I can’t say any of that. Because nobody I work with has any idea that I have published fifteen books on Amazon over the last decade.

Not just that, but the majority of people I know in real life have no idea about my publishing career at all. I don’t tell the folks from my bridge group or my moms of kids with ADHD group. It is my deep dark secret. The only people who know are close family, Internet friends, or a few of the people I met through a writing group that I attend once a month.

When I do tell people, they always think I’m weird for keeping it a secret. If I wrote 15 books, I would be shouting about it from the rooftops! I don’t shout from any rooftops. I occasionally tell people over coffee, but that’s it.

As such, I’ve never interacted with readers in the way that many other authors do. I’ve never done a book signing. I’ve never gone to a writers’ conference. I always turn down offers to participate in book club meetings where the readers are discussing my books. But I do personally answer every email I receive!

As writing becomes a bigger and bigger part of my life, it gets harder to keep my secret. I’m often biting my tongue to keep from blurting it out in random conversation. Hey, did you try that new Italian restaurant? Also, I wrote a book! But I must have more self-restraint than I do when it comes to sticky toffee pudding, because I rarely tell anyone.

So you may be wondering why. Why oh why would I keep my blossoming writing career a secret? Such a great question. And here’s why:

I’m a physician and I do not want my patients to know. Would most people be cool with their doctor writing psychological thrillers? Sure, probably. I’m not writing dinosaur erotica, after all (yes, that’s a thing). Then again, I have to say, I don’t know how I would feel if I knew my physician wrote a book in which a surgeon’s patients are systematically murdered. I might feel a wee bit nervous. So I’d rather just take that out of the equation.

Nobody ever reacts the way I want them to. When I first started telling people, I imagined this incredible reaction. Wow, you write books? You are the coolest person I’ve ever met in my life ever. But I never get quite the response I want. It’s more like, Oh. That’s very interesting. I’ll have to check one out. But they never do! And then it’s awkward. So awkward.

The contents of my books are private. Okay, that sounds ridiculous since I put them on Amazon and sell hundreds of copies every day. But those readers are people who don’t know me. My books are a window into my thoughts, and I don’t like the idea of people who know me in real life having that window into my thoughts. And what will my coworker say about the fact that the evil husband in my latest book has the same name as he does??? Again—awkward!

When I told a friend about my writing career and the fact that I keep it to myself, she commented, “How are you ever going to sell books if you don’t tell anyone that you write them?” And therein lies a very common misconception. Real life friends and family will never buy your books in large enough numbers for it to matter. Occasionally, they will purchase your books. Even more occasionally, they will enjoy them and write reviews on Amazon. But don’t hold your breath for it.

I can always tell people. I can never un-tell people. Once I decide to go forward with “coming out” about being an author, that’s it. Everyone will know, until the technology comes out to erase their memories. And I’ve heard that won’t exist until at least 2028.

That said, after Covid hit, I started telling more people. There’s something about a life-threatening pandemic that makes you reevaluate some of your life choices, and I decided maybe it wasn’t worth leading a secret life. Also, my children know and they both have really big mouths.

About Freida McFadden

#1 Amazon bestselling author Freida McFadden is a practicing physician specializing in brain injury who has penned multiple Kindle bestselling psychological thrillers and medical humor novels. She lives with her family and black cat in a centuries-old three-story home overlooking the ocean, with staircases that creak and moan with each step, and nobody could hear you if you scream. Unless you scream really loudly, maybe.

To hear Freida talk more about herself in the third person, visit her website: https://www.freidamcfadden.com\

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