Welcome to Tales from the Pit. Michael Swaim here, going unscripted for the intro, which is unusual for this pod, and I'll tell you why.

I'm in a weird state right now, y'all. I'm between things in terms of my mood meds. I'm on three things right now

Lymictol aka Lamotrogen I'm on clamipramine I'm on resperidone it's quite a

cocktail I don't know that it's right for me. I'm having every day some panic attacks, some issues, some runaway worry,

and Hidonia inability to enjoy things that I used to enjoy. It's scary stuff but I know it will pass and I like

hearing people talk frankly about mental health because it makes me feel

less alone so hopefully if you're out there on

that journey this makes you feel a little less alone. It is a tough road trying to

find exactly the right mood meds if you have a physiochemical issue because everyone's brain chemistry is so different we know so little about the brain.

Anyhow, I kind of wanted that out in the open because I struggle with my sentences a little bit in this episode and that's why I was very

nervous while recording even though I've done thousands of podcasts without being nervous for many years.

I'm now nervous doing them until this issue gets sorted out.

So yeah, be gentle.

I think Jason brought a lot of great information to the table though, and as warned in the

body of the episode, I'm going to go ahead and start off with a

reading from my novel my novel the climb that just came out I'm recording the

audiobook right now so here's one of the early portions of the novel and then we'll get into a conversation with author

Jason Pargan about the business of book writing and I guess the only trigger warning you need is that it might suck some of the

glamour and romance out of writing books for you especially if you're someone

aspiring to be a book writer. Consider this Upton Sinclair's The Jungle

but for books. We're going to get into it. It's going to get messy. We'll talk about what you have to do to sell your book nowadays.

And in really any creative field, what you need to do to get your brand out there in this new reality we all live in

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