No matter what, bad timing can mess up anything.

Whether it’s the beat of a song, the pacing of a story, walking with another, or coughing, bad timing can cause disastrous results…okay, sometimes the results can also be hilarious, as blooper reels can attest.

Then there is the timing in relationships: You meet the right person, but it’s the wrong time. You aren’t ready for him, and he isn’t ready for you. That can be sad, at the time, but later you both know it would have turned out horribly if you had both given in and gone with your heart when the gut was right all along.

But this post is also about publishing a book. Publishing a book is very, very easy. Hundreds of thousands do it every year in the U.S. The questions, though, are these: Is that book ready for publication? Is the author ready with a marketing plan?

Is the book ready for publication? Other than your friend and mother, has anyone read the book with a critical eye? Did you pay someone to find all the things wrong with the book? What can go wrong? Well let’s list them, shall we?

How about: punctuation, correct word spelling, main characters whose names change halfway through the book, convoluted plot lines that never make sense even on a cosmic level, messy and/or inconsistent interior layout, a cover that is missing key elements.

So don’t get in a hurry to “publish”. Next, just because a book is published does not mean it somehow magically will sell. Unless you tell people it is available, how will they know to buy it? So marketing is key and that is another subject for another time.