Take Two: Finding Joy
With a repaired audio link thanks to my first commenter!
Audio news first! My suspense novel, The Deepest Lake (an Amazon Editors’ Pick and CrimeReads Best of May selection) was published last month. If you’re looking for a copy, shop your local indie or click here or here or here. Have you already bought ten copies? Let me know and I will name a saintly or devilishly handsome character in some future novel after you. (Kidding-not-kidding? This book bizness is tough!)
I have extra news if you love audiobooks—and I really, really do love them, especially for road trips or listening as I cook, or sharing a listen with my hubby so we can pause it constantly to discuss, which would drive a lot of people batty.
First, the reviews for this audio version have been especially glowing. Many listeners are applauding the two narrators, Susan Bennett, who voices mom Rose, and Rebecca Quinn Robertson, who voices daughter Jules. For the first time in my career, I had a say in selecting the narrators from a range offered to me, and boy, that was fun. Let me know (privately) what you think!
Second, the audiobook is on sale. Only until July 1, you can get it for 50% off ($12.50) at audiobook.com, using this special link.
At Audible.com/Amazon, the price is also very reasonable: 30% off!
My first-ever review in a major Canadian big-city newspaper
Can you believe it took all these years? I’ve been reviewed in Japan and the Philippines, but Canada’s big city publications were holding out on me. Thank goodness it was a good one or I would have gone into hiding and cut all poutine from my diet. An excerpt, below.
Coaching
Is summer your time to finish or revise a novel or manuscript?
I have openings for monthly coaching and full manuscript developmental editing. Read more here and contact me if you’d like to share some pages and learn more. Because I am lining up my full summer schedule, I’m offering a 10% discount for those booking before July 1 for a summer package to be used July-September.
This month, I am super grateful for these two recent interviews:
By Deborah Williams, in The Rumpus, in which we discuss the confinement (and liberation!) of genre and staying in one’s lane (spoiler: I can’t).
And by Leslie Lindsay in Fugue Journal, in which we discuss whether writing is truly cathartic and consider the danger of workshops that retraumatize their participants, among other things.
The Joy of the Middle: Finding writing contentment wherever you are
When my first creative book, a travelogue called Searching for Steinbeck’s Sea of Cortez was published a million years ago, I was already working on the first chapters of the next book—not because I knew it’s good to be in the middle of one new thing to distract yourself from the sales and review outcomes of the last thing, but only because a new idea had called to me.
When that book—my first novel, The Spanish Bow—came out, I was again in the early stages of the next thing, and so the pattern has generally gone for most of my career until recently.
Last year, I set myself a new goal. I wanted the next book drafted and submitted, maybe even accepted, before the current latest book came out. And so it has gone. The Deepest Lake was published in May, and the next suspense novel, What Boys Learn, already accepted in proposal form, was handed in as a first draft to my editor, three weeks later. (Still awaiting notes! The writer’s life is defined by its many waiting periods.)
I thought this was a clever plan. Only now do I recognize its flaw. I now find myself not in the middle of something, which is my happy place.
When you are in the middle of a writing project, deeply in the middle, you are living in an established world, with characters you know, writing in a voice that has become familiar, wrestling with themes that continue to emerge as you explore.
When you are in the middle of something, you are less likely to be envious when other books get on lists or other authors get interviewed, because you are in the midst of your own love affair, even if it is a tumultuous one.
Why am I pointing out the obvious? Because when we are in the middle, it’s not obvious. In the middle, we often wish desperately to be done. We are obsessed with watching the wordcount increase, we are hungry for someone to read the whole thing and judge it as worthy. If we have redrafted several times and are in the middle of seemingly endless revisions, we often get sick of our own prose. It may seem like a signal, but it’s not. Everyone (except maybe narcissists) gets sick of their own pages or voice at some point.
Given how we fail to appreciate the very best stages of writing, I thought I’d write a post to remind you –and myself!—that wherever you are, it’s a good place.
If you’re in the beginning, as I am once again: A great place to ask yourself, what do I care about most? What is worth all the hours ahead? What needs saying? What can only you—based on your experiences, your obsessions, your unique perspective—say?
Or maybe you aren’t looking for a challenge, you are simply looking for joy. Something to spark your curiosity or lighten your step. You get to choose. No forms to fill out; no permissions to be sought. That’s the best thing about being back at the beginning. It’s your show. (By the way, some people ask me if it ever gets easier, starting a new book. My answer is, “No, it doesn’t!”)
If you’re in the middle: I’ve already said why it’s good, but I’ll say it again. You have created a world! You have a foundation! You’ve proven your stamina. The path has been chosen and it may still branch out in difficult ways, forcing you to make hard decisions. But you will. Just keep going!
If you’re near or at the end of a first draft: another favorite place of mine, because now you can do a full print-out, or send the book to your e-reader to re-read in a different format or font. I hope you’ll treat yourself really well, maybe even schedule a few days of quiet time in a new location. Now you get to read from page one to the end, and see what you’ve got. Be kind to yourself and be demanding of your pages! (And when you’ve learned how to do both simultaneously, please let the rest of us know.)
If you’re in the endless revision zone: This can be grueling, but it’s where some of the best learning happens, and where the wannabes are separated from the stoic survivors. Others will quit here. You. Will. Not.
If you have finished and not yet started anything new, this is a wonderful time to catch up on all the reading you put off while working on your own draft. For fun, during one of these post-submission quiet periods, I once pulled a dozen favorite novels off my shelves and re-read only the beginnings, one after another, as a way to re-open my eyes to diversity and possibility.
How long have I managed to remain in this blissful, don’t-need-to-work-write-or-create zone? Only a week.
I wish I could offer some mindful, Buddhistic final comment about how we writers should be just as happy when we aren’t writing, but the truth is, I’m not. I am happy—more alive, curious, and hopeful—when I am writing; I am happy when I am helping others write. That’s me.
The only fitting quote that comes to mind is Dolly Parton’s: Figure out who you are and do it on purpose.