Briar WestThere are moments in life worth celebrating.
They aren’t flashy. They won’t change the world. But you worked for them.
And for me, this is one of those moments.
All the Pieces We Hold is officially available on Amazon in both Kindle and paperback. And as I sit here writing this, another milestone still feels a little unreal: more than 50,000 Kindle Edition Normalized Pages have been read across my books.
A year ago, none of this was on my radar.
I wasn’t tracking page reads, checking rankings, or planning release calendars. I just wanted to publish a book. One book.
For years, I’d carried stories around in my head. I’d start writing, stop writing, and promise myself I’d come back to it later. Maybe I’d finish one eventually. Maybe I’d be brave enough to let other people read it.
What finally got in my way wasn’t a lack of ideas or time. It was hesitation—the kind that always finds one more reason to wait and somehow convinces you there’s no rush.
Anxiety and avoidance helped, of course.
They gave me plenty of reasons to keep putting things off.
Between a full-time job, homeschooling two kids, keeping up with appointments for a medically fragile dog, family obligations, laundry that somehow reproduces overnight, and everything else adulthood throws onto the calendar, there was never a shortage of reasons to wait.
I used most of them.
For a long time, writing happened in the margins. Early mornings. Lunch breaks. An hour here. Thirty minutes there. Whenever I could find the time.
Eventually, I stopped waiting for my schedule to clear.
I published All the Quiet Things in September 2025.
Then Unwrap Me: 31 Nights of Festive, Filthy Fun in November 2025.
And now, All the Pieces We Hold.
Three books.
Three.
Even now, that catches me off guard.
Sometimes I’ll walk past my bookshelf, see my own covers staring back at me, and stop for a second.
Those stories lived in my head for years.
Now they’re sitting on a shelf in my house.
Readers have highlighted passages from them. They’ve messaged me about characters I created, and they’ve spent hours with people who started as nothing more than an idea in a notebook.
That never gets old.
And while I’m grateful for every sale, every review, and every page read, the part that means the most to me happened much closer to home: my kids watched all of it.
They heard me talking through story problems while making dinner. They saw me revising chapters after work. They watched me wrestle with formatting, cover decisions, publishing deadlines (most of which were entirely self-inflicted), and all the behind-the-scenes pieces readers never see.
Most of all, they watched me stick with something.
They watched me keep going when it would have been easier to put it aside.
I hope that’s what stays with them years from now.
That it’s okay to care deeply about something. That big goals are usually built one small step at a time. And that sometimes the only difference between a dream and a finished project is deciding to keep showing up for it.
Looking back, most of the progress happened in ordinary moments.
It happened in the hour I carved out after work when I was already tired. It happened while sitting in a waiting room during a vet appointment. It happened on the nights when the dishes still needed to be done, the kids needed something, your inbox was overflowing, and the manuscript was the last thing you felt like opening.
Those moments don’t feel significant while you’re living them.
They feel ordinary, small even.
Most of the time, they don’t feel like progress at all.
But looking back now, I can see that books aren’t written in giant bursts of inspiration. They’re built from hundreds of small decisions made over and over again. One chapter. One editing session. One problem solved. One page finished before bed.
Eventually those pages start stacking up.
Then one day you’re holding a finished book in your hands.
Then, somehow, you’re holding three.
I still haven’t completely wrapped my head around that.
As grateful as I am for the books themselves, I’m equally grateful for the people who’ve been part of this journey.
If you’ve purchased a book, borrowed one through Kindle Unlimited, left a review, shared a post, recommended one of my stories to a friend, subscribed to my newsletter, or simply followed along while I figured all of this out, thank you.
Every message, every comment, every page read, and every recommendation has meant more than I can adequately put into words.
Writing is usually a quiet process. Most days it’s just me, a blinking cursor, and whatever story is demanding my attention that week. Publishing can feel much the same way, especially as an indie author.
Then a reader reaches out.
Someone highlights a favorite line.
Someone tells me they stayed up too late because they couldn’t put a book down.
Someone connects with a character the same way I hoped they would while I was writing them.
Suddenly, it doesn’t feel solitary anymore.
It feels like a conversation.
That’s my favorite part of all of this.
I have no idea what this journey will look like a year from now, and honestly, that’s part of the fun. What I do know is that I wake up excited to build this little corner of the world I’ve created. There are stories waiting to be written, characters waiting to meet you, and more than a few ideas scribbled into notebooks that are patiently waiting their turn.
For now, I’m just grateful I finally stopped waiting and started.
At the moment, my husband, E.M. West, and I are juggling edits, outlines, deadlines, and more Google Docs than either of us would like to admit.
We’re currently working on Thirteen Kinks of Halloween, the second book in our Holi-Spice Collection, while also deep in edits for If We’re Still Single, which we’re hoping to have in readers’ hands later this year.
If anything, things have gotten busier.
My notes app is a disaster, my notebooks are overflowing, and there are more story ideas on my desk than I could possibly write this year.
But before I dive headfirst into the next manuscript, I wanted to take a moment and sit with this one.
A year ago, I was hoping I could publish a book.
Today, there are three.
More than 50,000 pages have been read.
Readers I’ve never met have spent time with characters who once existed only in my imagination.
That’s worth pausing for.
Some of my favorite moments haven’t been the big ones. They’ve been the unexpected emails, the first review from a stranger, seeing a page-read spike after a release, or getting a message from a reader who connected with a character the same way I hoped they would. Those moments add up.
They become a career, a body of work, and proof that all those late nights at the keyboard were building something real.
So thank you for being here.
Thank you for reading my books, sharing my posts, recommending my stories, and cheering me on from wherever you happen to be.
I don’t take any of it for granted.
The support, encouragement, and kindness I’ve received over the past year have made this journey far more rewarding than I ever expected.
I’m excited about what’s coming next.
But today, I’m celebrating this.
Three books.
Fifty thousand pages read.
And a writing life that finally exists outside my imagination.
I’d say that’s a pretty good place to be.
Ready to read All the Pieces We Hold?
You can find it on Amazon in Kindle, Kindle Unlimited, and paperback formats.
I can’t wait to hear what you think.
If you’re not quite ready to leave yet, come join my newsletter. You’ll get sneak peeks, exclusive excerpts, giveaways, release news, and occasional glimpses into the wonderfully chaotic process of turning notebook scribbles into books.
https://crewfiction.com/briar-west
With so much love and gratitude,
Briar