Friends and readers alike
might be aware of the fact that I’ve written another novel. I’m hopeful that this one is better than the
last one, but I once again find that a completed novel has put me on a
collision course with New York City.
Later this month I will
head up to one of the larger writers’ conventions in Manhattan, much like I did
in 2011. My goals are similar to the
ones I had six years ago, though not identical.
Obviously, I am there to learn.
The classes look great and I’m very much looking forward to taking the
time to step out of my own comfort zone and learn from professionals in the
industry and my peers. I’m looking
forward to meeting other writers and meeting some new people and
networking. I’m looking forward to
pitching my novel as well.
My main goal in 2011 was
to take my first real steps into the world of writing and publishing and not
feel out of place. I feel like I
accomplished that-like I fit in amongst my peers. I felt welcome and like I belonged. That was a very significant thing for me at the
time as the bulk of that book, The Geography of Home, I wrote while we
lived in Hawaii, which was pretty far away from a great many things. It was nice to step into that world and not
feel out of place.
In my heart, I think I
knew that book wasn’t good enough. The
industry has changed a lot. The book
garnered some interest and I had five agents ask to take a closer look at
it. They all passed in the end, but it
was a learning experience. They were all
polite and complimentary and I’ve been in touch with some of them since. One of the agents, who was from Jersey of
course, told me, “Listen, if it were 5-10 years ago, I might have taken a
chance on this as I really like your voice.
But I just can’t go there today.”
Honestly, I still take
that as high praise. I considered
revisiting it, and, I have a good eight chapters written of what could have
been a sequel/expansion, but I decided to put it away for good later that year and
I think it was the right choice. I’ve
looked at certain chapters again once or twice.
There are a few chapters I still really like and wish I could share
someday, but my time working in that world with those characters was at an end.
I took a break from
writing anything, but soon enough the characters living in my head started
calling out for attention, as they are prone to do. Oddly enough, ideas always seemed to pop up
while I was at church. Many of my
initial notes and ideas are written on service leaflets. I try not to overthink the fact that
inspiration came in those moments.
In addition, I revisited
some older ideas that I’d shelved but none of them thrilled me. Over the next year I found that there were
what felt like three distinct stories calling out to me, each of them very
different. I spent time on each of them,
but one simply wouldn’t let me go. It’s
a quirky little story that became a novel that I’ve called The Last Good Day
and it’s dominated my creative time for over five years. These characters have been knee-deep in my
mind and in some ways have been bossing me around for much of that time. At over 83,000 words, my time as their
primary shepherd is done. I had an
amazing team of beta readers who made the novel much better. I’ll be working next week with a professional
editor for a second time to tighten a few things up and then it will be time to
pitch.
The pitching process is a
little like a very short job interview and it’s kind of fun in its own
way. It usually results in one of two
responses:
a)
Yeah, not for me but, good luck
b)
Ok-Send me ___ number of pages and some
other stuff and I’ll look at it.
And then generally, one
hears back. Last time I left NYC with
five “yesses,” meaning the agents/editors wanted to take a look. If I leave New York this time with that in my
pocket, it will have gone very well indeed, but it won’t be promise of
anything.
Regardless of how it
goes, it will be the ending of something.
Perhaps it will be the beginning of a next step with the book. I’m hopeful as I still believe in this story
and its characters. I only hope I haven’t
done them a disservice by having them be written by me, instead of a better
writer. That said, there’s little I can
do about that now. But it will be the
ending of my time all alone with these characters. If someone likes it enough to move it
forward, then it will be the start of a whole new process, a whole new chapter,
one in which I will remain knee-deep in the world of The Last Good Day. There will be edits galore and many other
steps and the opinions of people I don’t yet know to contend with, and that’s
all for the good. I’ve had them all to
myself for long enough.
And if no one likes it
enough to take that chance, if no one wants to move it forward, then it is
probably the end for this book, for now.
While I believe in it and genuinely feel that it could find an audience
in the “Young Adult/People who love them” market, that’s not an area I’m
experienced enough in to navigate on my own.
I’m not interested in self-publishing it at this point, though I’ve considered
re-branding this blog and moving it to its own server and releasing it in
installments, like Dickens used to do in the newspapers. That’s likely the first and last time that
Charles and I will share space in the same sentence. But, those kind of decisions are likely months
away. I’m realistic though. One only must walk through Barnes and Noble
to figure out how many books there are being published, even in this
market. There’s a lot of content out
there and print/shelf space is limited.
Honestly, it’s time for
me to get back to some of those other voices in my head, who’ve grown louder
now that Avery and Angela’s story is written down. I believe in it and hopefully one day soon I’ll
be able to share it with you. I’ll do my
best.
I feel a little proud
that I’ve done all this, I guess. It was
a significant amount of work and time and I feel good that I’ve modeled certain
things to my children. It’s been a lot
of late nights and I’ve filled four handwritten notebooks before I sat down to
type it all. I always wrote where I was
writing from with each entry in the notebooks, and reviewing them has been
fun. Parts of this story were written
in, among other locales: San Francisco, London, Edinburgh, Cleveland, Buffalo,
Florida, aboard the Cape May-Lewes Ferry, Philadelphia, and of course,
Wildwood. The story is very much a time
and place one, but I’ve written it all over the world. It always seems to come back down the shore
though.
Someone once told me that
they thought these writer’s conferences were like “Author Fantasy Camp” where
we plunk down our money and get to pretend we are “real writers” and “part of
the industry” for a few days. I always
felt that was a rather cynical view and I told him so. In my experience, the people I’ve met, the
friends I’ve made both through conferences and other writing communities, those
of us who write don’t write because we want to.
We write because we must. There’s
little choice in the matter.
We write because to not
write simply doesn’t compute. We fill
notebooks and church leaflets and random scraps of paper on a regular basis
because that is simply how we are wired to navigate the world. As such, we seek out others of like
mind. We feel called to improve and
share our work because we must. It’s a
passion, yes, but it’s also simply who we are.
I could no more stop writing than I could choose to stop letting my
fingernails grow. I actually find a
great deal of comfort in this. In the
end, I suppose it doesn’t really matter if I ever get published or “make it” as
a writer. I’m not doing it for you. I’m doing it because I must.
Back in 2011 at my first
big conference, I was sitting at a big round table as the opening keynote
speaker started his presentation. He
asked everyone to look around and see how different everyone was in the packed
room. And so, dutifully, we did. And then he started asking us questions to
which we were to raise our hands if it was something that applied to us. I don’t recall them all but my hand and those
of many around me went up more often than not.
The one that really stuck
with me was when he asked, “How many of you have had a moment where, as you
were writing, your characters rebelled against you and said, ‘yeah, that’s not
what I’m doing here?’”
Pretty much every hand
went up. That was an experience I really
thought was unique to me. That was the
moment I knew I was in the right place. These
were my people.
I don’t know what the
future for this novel is, at all. I like
it. My Beta team was encouraging. My 12-year-old daughter likes it. Regardless, as Peter Brady once sang, “It’s
time to change.” One way or another this
process will change. Maybe it ramps up
or maybe it joins its predecessor on the shelf in my office. I believe in it though. And I’m ready.
And I can hear the
excited chatter of the other characters in my head, Freddy Pinkerton most of
all. He’s been trying to bust loose for
years.
That might make a decent
working title, actually. More on that
later. For now, stay tuned. Thanks for reading.
