Writing in the gaps

Before kids, my writing time looked something like this: set aside a dedicated block of time (minimum four hours preferred), keep a stack of reference books and copious notes handy, write, reflect on writing, take a short break, repeat. Granted, most of that writing was seminar papers and a dissertation prospectus, but looking at it from this distance, I'm envious of all the time young me had for writing.

When my first child was born, that schedule disintegrated. Instead of planning my own schedule, I was suddenly at the mercy of a seven-pound tyrant who ate and slept according to some arcane schedule I couldn't quite grasp. For the first couple months, I was vaguely convinced I was going mad: I was sleep-deprived, overly emotional, and what little writing I managed to produce was so clearly inferior to what I'd done that I wondered if I'd lost brain cells with the delivery.

It did get better. I learned to write in the gaps, in the forty-five minute snatches of time when he'd nap, in the early evening after he slept. Of course, once he got old enough to really follow a schedule, we added a second child, and four years after that, a third. My youngest is now three and in preschool (hallelujah!) so my stretches of time have gotten longer and more predictable, but I still struggle with balance--with giving my whole focus to my children and then switching that whole focus to my writing. Some days I succeed. Other days (many other days), I don't. Like right now: while I'm typing away to meet a self-imposed deadline for this post, I failed to monitor my potty-training son, who just announced that he's "pee-pee." (That makes, for those keeping score, the third accident today.)

Oldest kid at 1, taking advantage of his mom's distraction to decorate the house with tissues

I am not the primary breadwinner in our household: we decided early on that while my husband pursues tenure at a university, I would stay home full-time and teach part-time and write in whatever cracks of time were leftover. This meant that in the early years of our marriage I did almost no creative writing, until I reached a point where I realized this was not simply something I wanted to do, but something I needed to do, a part of me I needed to reclaim from the wilds of mommy-land. Until recently, writing was an unpaid labor of love for me, which meant its priority ranked below parenting, teaching, other community responsibilities (but not, to my mother-in-law's chagrin, below housework). Though now that I'm on contract, I still struggle to shift my mindset, to remember that I'm entitled to the time to write--in fact, I'm contractually bound to that.

But there's never enough time for all the things I want to do--and the time I do have is frustratingly elastic. Hours when my son is at preschool or the kids are sleeping speed by; hours when I am home with the three-year-old seem to crawl by.  Before my first child was born, a good friend took me aside and warned me, “One of the hardest parts about being a mother is the boredom.” I looked around me at her comfortable home; at her two blond-haired blue-eyed children looking at a picture book near our feet; at the quilting project slung half-finished over the sewing machine; at the partially constructed puzzle on the floor–and I didn’t believe her.

Then I had my son. Once the initial shock and exhaustion wore off, I started to wonder if maybe my friend was right. Sure, there were those exalted moments when I snuggled my cheek against his, when I watched the tiny play of movement across his face while he slept, when we read books together and he laughed–but in between those moments were other, less exalting events: countless iterations of diaper changes, settling–again–in the chair where I seemed to nurse endlessly, and even, sometimes, trying to play with my son. Although he was fascinated by the colored blocks I offered him, there was only so much interest I could sustain in them.
 
It does get easier as they get older: their interests become more complex, they can sustain real conversations, and few things have been more thrilling than seeing my older kids get lost in books that I also love. But the time I spend with them is still not fully my time--it's time borrowed away from the stories I could be writing, the books I could be reading.

I wouldn't trade away that time, frustrating as it can be. I remember hearing a story about J.K. Rowling, whose child had asked her what she would choose if she could only do one: be a mother or a writer. She said she'd be a mother--but she'd be grumpy about it.

That's me, too. I'm a better mother because I'm a writer, because my brain has something to do when it's off the parenting clock (or, let's be honest, sometimes when it's on), because I have goals beyond making sure my kids survive.

But I think I'm also a better writer because I'm a mom. Writing has made me less precious about my writing time, which makes me both more flexible and better at time management--I can do in an hour now what took me two or three hours before kids. But more than that, nothing in my life has been so frustrating, agonizing, joyous, or surprising as parenting. And that deeper emotional range informs my writing in ways I couldn't have imagined before I began writing in the gaps.

This post is part of a parenting blog hop, part of Aliette Bodard's awesome brain child, something she began with several UK writers and graciously allowed a few US writers to crash. You can see the other posts here:

• Leah Moore: On Being a Creative Parent
• Patrick Samphire: Scenes from an Exhausted Land
• Aliette de Bodard: The Myth of Entire
• Fran Wilde: Parenting(Creating).FailMode
• Joyce Chng: Writing and Mothering: A Burning Path With Nice Morning Glory Flowers
• Jim C. Hines: Balancing Writing and Parenting
• Stephanie Burgis: Parenting, Creating, Being
• Janet Walden West: Kids, Writing and the Myth of Sacred Time
• Tracie L. Martin: This is Parenting/Writing Life…#ParentingCreating

ICYMI: A beginner's primer on writing a book

Once a month, I post at a literary blog called Segullah. While some of the posts are about religious topics, many are not: one of my favorite things about the community there is the group of smart, literary women who post and who frequent the comments section.

Last week, as part of the quarterly "How-To" theme, I posted some tips on writing--and querying--a book. The post was designed primarily for people who aspire to write but aren't very far on their journey. I thought I'd repost here, as I think the information is helpful.




Step One: Write


As far as writing, you simply have to start. Carve out time, even if it’s only fifteen or twenty minutes. Write. I’ve taught writing to a lot of college students, and many of them want to know the secret to writing well. But there is no secret: just practice. I tell them, write a lot. And read.
Neil Gaiman was once asked the trick of becoming a writer. His answer is pretty near perfect: “the only way to do it [write] is to do it.”

Step Two: Find readers

Any good writer will tell you that good writing isn’t possible without good readers. Once you’ve got something written (or even as you write), let it sit for a while, and then find people you trust to tell you how to make it better.

Step Three: Learn about your Craft

Becoming a good writer isn’t just about writing–it’s also about learning to make your writing better. Good readers can help. But you’ll also want to learn about the craft of writing; I heard LDS author Janette Rallison recommend that new writers not send out their work until they’ve read at least one book on craft. Some of my favorite craft books include Anne Lamott’s Bird by Bird, Stephen King’s On Writing, Robert McKee’s Story, and Janice Hardy’s website, Fiction University (not a book, but oh-so-helpful).

Also, go to writing conferences. LDStorymakers‘ annual conference is next month, and it’ s a great place to meet other writers (including potential readers), agents, and editors. (I met my agent there last year). Emily and I will both be there this year. If you write for children or young adults, SCBWI (The Society for Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators) has local and national events and conferences. Not only are conferences a great place to learn about the business, but there’s a synergy that comes from being around people with your same goals that always motivates me to work harder.

Step Four: Revise

The more I write and teach writing, the more convinced I become that the best writers aren’t naturally good writers–they’re good revisers. Very few of us nail our vision on the first time through, and those people, as Anne Lamott reminds us in Bird by Bird, generally aren’t people we like very much anyway.

Step Five: Decide on a Publishing Path

These days, there are lots of different ways for writers to put their work out there. Some choose to self publish, via Createspace or any number of other methods. That can be a great choice, especially for people who want full creative control over their manuscript. But it isn’t, as it happens, a path that I personally know much about.

Another option is publishing with small or regional presses (like Covenant, Deseret Book, Cedar Fort, Jolly Fish Press, and many more). Most of these presses will take submissions directly from authors, so you can start submitting as soon as your manuscript is done.

However, I knew fairly early on that I wanted to try for a traditional publisher (which typically refers to one of the “big five” publishing companies–Penguin Random House, Macmillan, HarperCollins, Hachette and Simon & Schuster–as well as to smaller but more established mid-size presses, like Norton, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, Hyperion). Part of this stems from a sense of legitimacy: I’m also a part-time English professor, and I knew that landing a book deal with a bigger company would garner more respect from my colleagues. (Which maybe isn’t the best reason for deciding on a publishing path).

But publishing with a traditional publisher means, more often than not, that you also need a literary agent to represent you because these publishers won’t take unagented submissions. Finding an agent can take time–months or years, in some cases. It took me two manuscripts and nearly four years to get an agent. Good places to start looking for an agent include Agent Query, Query Tracker, and Writers Digest’s Guide to Literary Agents. I also like looking at the acknowledgment pages of my favorite books to see which agents represent those authors I love. However, just because someone says they are an agent doesn’t mean they are a good agent: you can also check places like Publisher’s Marketplace that report agent deals (which requires a subscription and is self-reported, so not always accurate) and the forums at Absolute Write (where writers report their experiences with different agencies) and Preditors and Editors.

Step Six: Send Query Letters

A query letter is essentially a cover letter for your book: it explains what your book is about and what your qualifications are as a writer. Whether you opt for small presses or finding an agent, you’ll have to write one. Some of my favorite resources on writing queries are here and here and here.  Even when you’ve written a query, try to get several different pairs of eyes on it, including people who haven’t read your book.

A word of warning: querying is rough. Even authors who go on to be successful have lots of rejections. In my most recent round of querying, I sent close to fifty queries. I was relatively successful (I had requests from just over half of those queries), but even those requests mostly turned into rejections. (You can read more on my take on querying here).

Step Seven: Wait

Once you’ve sent out queries, it takes time to hear back from agents and editors. If an agent does want to represent you, they will typically set up a time to call and talk about your book and their plans for it (known in the industry as “The Call”).

Once you accept an agent’s offer, the agent typically asks for still more revisions before sending your book out on submission to editors. This looks a lot like querying, except that you have less control over what happens: your agent acts as an intermediary, sending the materials out and getting the responses from editors. In my case, my editor called or forwarded me the information every time an editor passed on my book (which was 11 out of 12 editors, in my case).

But if you’re lucky, one day you  might also get the call you’ve been waiting for–where your agent calls to say, “We’ve sold your book!” (In my case, to Michelle Frey at Knopf books).

Then you celebrate–and wait some more. For edits, copy edits, proofs, and eventual publication. Most of the Big Five publishers buy books 18 months to 2 years out from their publication date. (My book sold in February. It won’t come out until Fall 2016).

While this post is long, it’s also only a fraction of the information out there on the process of publishing a book. But for anyone interested, I’m happy to answer questions about the process in the comments!

IWSG Wednesday: Enjoying the Ride

It's another first Wednesday, so time for another Insecure Writer's Support Group post! This month, I've been thinking about the importance of enjoying the writing journey.

 

In a lot of ways, I have a lot to be grateful about in my writing journey. In the last four months, I signed with an agent and sold my debut novel (The Blood Rose Rebellion, due out in 2016 from Knopf). I signed my contract last week!

These are milestones I worked a long time for, and I'm thrilled to have reached them.

But.

Something funny happened around the time I signed my agent. I'd looked forward to that moment for so long, I think I had it in my head that I'd be happy as a writer when that happened--that I'd feel validated, that I'd stop worrying if my writing was good enough.

Guess what? That didn't happen. Sure, I rode a euphoric high--for about three days. Then, suddenly it was that elusive book deal that I needed to confirm my happiness and give me confidence.

But even that didn't prove entirely true. Selling a book opened up a whole new realm of worries. (How can I help market this thing? What if readers hate it? What if I don't sell out my advance?) I still struggle to sit down and write. I still write words and re-read them and think, "this is terrible. I'm a fraud." And I half-expect someone to come by and revoke my contract. 

The truth that I'm slowly discovering is this: you have to write because somehow the writing itself satisfies you. If you write for any other reason (to sell a book, to hit a best-seller list), it will never be enough, because there's always some elusive goal beyond the one you've just hit.

You have to believe in yourself (or at the least, believe in your close friends' and critique partners' assessment of yourself on days when your own belief flags), because there will always be external forces that both love and hate you. And no outside approval will make up for your own failure to believe in your gifts.

In the meantime, I'm still here--and still writing. 

Reaching for a Dream

I was eleven years old when I decided I wanted to write.

I was in Mrs. Klein's fifth grade class, in a small rural school just outside Bozeman, MT. We were assigned to write daily journals before we could go to recess and, surprisingly, instead of resenting the work, I began looking forward to it. I wrote poetry (mostly very bad) and observations (mostly mundane) about my life--and Mrs. Klein told me I was good at it.

I'd been telling stories since I was little, mostly accompanied by pictures of women in dresses so long that their trains flowed off the page. But this was the first time it occurred to me that I might actually *do* something with those stories.

I wrote my first short story in sixth grade; I wrote longer ones in seventh and eighth grade--including a truly awful novella that only my sister remembers (all I remember is that the main character had the winning name of Killadee and the villains were the Dethka). This led to a derivative fantasy trilogy in high school that I revised in college and sent to approximately one place: Tor books. Shockingly, I never heard back.

And then life got in the way: I went to graduate school, I married, I wrote a 300 page dissertation on women's rhetoric, I had kids, I started teaching college writing classes.

About four years ago, I realized that if I wanted to realize that dream I'd had of writing a novel, I had to start. Otherwise, it would only stay this vague hope. So I started writing creatively again. I went to conferences and workshops. I read craft books. I started a writer's group (something that had saved me with my dissertation).



I wrote a middle grade novel and queried it. I had a few requests, but the novel itself was flawed and I couldn't figure out how to fix it so I put it away. I wrote another book and started querying.

This time, the story was very different. In December, I got an offer from a terrific agent (Josh Adams). Over the winter break, I revised my book and wrote up synopses for two possible sequels. In January, we started submitting the book to various editors.

Editors, in general, seem like very lovely people. Most of the rejections I got were kind: either it wasn't right for them or their list, it was too similar to something they'd sold, they weren't looking for a trilogy, etc. A couple pointed out things they didn't love about the manuscript: my agent said that was a subjective opinion, and we kept trying.

My agent was wonderful--positive and encouraging when I wasn't feeling so positive after a string of rejections (because let's face it, no matter how kind the rejection, it still means one more person who doesn't want to publish your book).

About three weeks in, he said he was getting positive vibes from a particular editor. I wasn't sure what exactly those vibes consisted of, and I was raised by my mother, who was raised by her mother--and so my default belief is pessimism: if I expect the worst, I can be pleasantly surprised, but I won't be disappointed. So I wasn't particularly hopeful.

I knew the odds, too: lots of authors don't sell their first book on submission. A good friend is debuting next year with her fourth book on submission.

And then we hit the last day of our submission window. (My agent had asked the editors to get back to us with a decision by this day, and to his credit, they all did). A few more rejections trickled in, and my confidence, already waning, began to seriously deflate.

Then my agent called, late in the morning, to say  he'd been speaking with another editor at this particular publishing house about a different project--and they'd essentially given away that an offer was coming. Which it did--at the very end of the day.

About two weeks later, this showed up in Publisher's Weekly:

Needless to say, I'm thrilled! While some parts of it went down really quickly--I wasn't on submission for all that long (though it felt like an eternity while it lasted)--it also feels like it's been a long time coming. It's been more than twenty-five years since I decided I wanted to be a writer.

I'm also very humbled--and grateful. I know that there's a fair amount of luck that goes into getting a publishing deal (not all good writers or good books get picked up). I also know that I owe my current project to a long list of wonderful friends and readers--people who helped me revise the book, who encouraged me when I needed it, and so much more.

Now I just have to survive the revisions--and write two more books! (And hopefully many more after that).