Rachael Herron (RH Herron)'s Blog, page 7

Karen White is the New York Times bestselling author of more than twenty-five novels, including the Tradd Street series, Dreams of Falling, The Night the Lights Went Out, Flight Patterns, The Sound of Glass, A Long Time Gone, and The Time Between. She is the coauthor of multiple bookswith New York Times bestselling authors Beatriz Williams and Lauren Willig. She grew up in London but now lives with her husband and two dogs near Atlanta, Georgia. The Last Night in London is her most recent release. 

How Do You Write Podcast: Explore the processes of working writers with bestselling author Rachael Herron. Want tips on how to write the book you long to finish? Here you’ll gain insight from other writers on how to get in the chair, tricks to stay in it, and inspiration to get your own words flowing. 

Join Rachael’s Slack channel, Onward Writers!

Transcript:

Rachael Herron: [00:00:00] Welcome to “How do you Write?” I’m your host, Rachael Herron. On this podcast, I talk to authors about how they write, what their process is and how their lives fit together. I’ll keep each episode short so you can get back to writing.

[00:00:16] Well, Hello writers! Welcome to episode #245 of “How do you Write?” I’m Rachael Herron, thrilled that you are here with me today. Today on the show, we are talking to Karen White on how to leave yourself clues along the way as you are writing. This is one of those things that I love to talk about to think about. It was kind of a revelation when I started writing that you could be leaving yourself clues along the way. Sometimes we know it, sometimes we don’t know it. So, stick around for the conversation. You might hear in my voice, that it sounds a little bit different. Of course it does. It’s going to sound different for a long time. [00:00:52] Right now, I’m coming to you from an Airbnb in Tamasca, Oakland, and it’s a lovely little Airbnb. It’s fantastic. It has two bedrooms, which is great because then my wife gets one bedroom for all of her stuff. She likes to lay her suitcases out and get everything out, whereas I like to be a little bit more compact and I’ve decided that maybe two bedrooms is the way to go. This Airbnb is particularly nice because I’m at a desk. I have a whole desk. Also, it has a front little patio and a veranda, which is kind of surrounded by this enormous fig tree and, what is the other one? Some kind of a plum tree and a lemon and it’s on the second story and it really feels kind of tropical and wonderful to sit, just surrounded by greenery on this big, long veranda, with a beautiful table. So as soon as I finish recording this, I have decided I’m going to go out there and do a little bit of reading. Because, I don’t think any of us take enough time to read on the veranda, do we? [00:01:56] One of the things that broke my heart a little bit about leaving our house, which we did on Monday, and Tuesday, two days ago, is that at the very last minute one of the very last things I gave away on Craigslist was our hammock. And I am a hammock girl. I love a hammock. I love to be in a hammock. I love to be reading, well, the number one thing I like to do in a hammock is read. The number two thing I like to do is do fall asleep while reading. And it is not one of those things that I prioritize. And I only did it once this year in 2021 since taking the hammock fabric part out and hanging it up for the season. I did it once and maybe only for 20 minutes and I was in a hurry and I was doing other things around the house and getting things ready. I regret that and I want more time outside with a book, chillaxin. So, I am thinking about prioritizing things.[00:02:55] For the last four months and approximately one day, I prioritized moving. I also prioritized working and working, work is something that I am good by now at prioritizing, even when it doesn’t feel good, I just do it. That’s fine. But we decided to move and four months and one day later, we had sold the house and we’re completely out on Tuesday. We left the keys, we left a bottle of champagne for the new owners. You could always see those kinds of things if you follow me on Instagram @RachaelHerron. And it was really emotional, you know, you guys have been with me on this journey. A lot of you have, as we get ready to go and actually locking the door with the keys that we’re no longer at, why am I gonna just cry thinking about it, with the keys that were no longer ours. Leaving the keys inside our residence that we no longer own. But there’s this also real childish reaction that is like, oh my God, I can’t believe we never burned down the house. I can’t believe we didn’t destroy things while we were living there for 15 years. We were adults enough to do this, to have a house, and then to sell it and to make a little bit of money and to walk away happy and healthy. Those walls of that house saw so much happiness and a lot of grief, of course, and lots of squabbling of, you know, it’s all a lot of life. But more than anything else, I think it’s our happiness and I just hope that the people who bought it from us have half that much happiness and they’ll be set. [00:04:34] So, that was a big emotional thing that happened this week. And I’ve been talking to classes, my two classes that I’m teaching right now and thinking again about prioritizing because in the 90-day cycle that I teach, we are at about week nine, and this is where enthusiasm flags regularly. This is just where it drops off. And I just wanted to mention this real briefly that our enthusiasm for doing our writing will always flag. It will always fail. We will read a fantastic book on writing or we’ll read a fantastic novel or memoir, and we will be so inspired to write and to create that space where we are writers and we are actively doing our work. And then that might last for a few weeks, even a few months, sometimes. And then life gets in the way. We constantly have to reprioritize our writing. So, right. I wonder if you can hear that breeze that’s coming through the window, right on the microphone. It’s really a gorgeous day and the wind is just moving through the space. But I want you to ask yourself, where are you in terms of prioritizing your writing? Most writers, you’ve heard me say this before, and I’ll say it again many times in my life. Most writers don’t write, especially first drafts, more than an hour or two a day. More than an hour or two of first draft writing tends to exhaust the brain.[00:06:00] It has been proven that deep work, even by people with high levels of mastery, can’t usually maintain that kind of deep mental thought work more than three or four hours max. So, it doesn’t take long to do your life’s work. It’s just that you have to figure out where you’re going to fit that hour or two into your day, into your busy life, into your busy schedule. So, when was the last time you sat down and said, okay, I’m going to get one hour a day, four days a week on my book and then make it happen? Put it on the calendar, actually do it rather than just hoping you will find a time to do it. You’re never going to find a time to do it, my friend. It doesn’t happen. We are occasionally moved to do work without planning it, but it is not a reliable way to get your work, your book or books done. So just a reminder, if writing has slipped away from you a little bit, it is time to reprioritize, fit it into your schedule. [00:07:05] Dude, I am in a stranger’s apartment in a place I’ve never been and still, I know the bare minimum of what I need to do to progress on the project, which I am working with right now. And I show up and do it. And it doesn’t matter how much you have to do in a day. You are never going to be less busy than you are right now, never. We always think we are. But you can’t wait until the job gets easier or until the kids leave the house or until the kids go back to preschool. You gotta find those 10 minutes, those 15 minutes, I’m being very prescriptive and bossy right now.  But I think that this is just something I’m hearing a lot from other people, the difficulty in finding the time in their day. I think that there’s a way that we speak about that that is not helpful. We talk about finding the time in our day. We don’t find the time in our day, every once in a while, you can find time in your day. But mostly honestly, my days are booked am-pm, hour by hour. I have to make time. I have to sink my teeth into the day and chew it out of the day. There’s blood and sinew left behind after I create and force myself to find the time where I write. And then I show up and I do a crappy job and it feels a little bit uncomfortable and I’m used to that discomfort and I show up the next day and I either write a more first draft crappy words, or I fix the ones from the day before, if that’s where I’m at in my process. [00:08:35] Where are you at in your process? Where do you need to find that time? Where do you need to make that commitment to yourself? And again, you’re gonna make that commitment and you’re going to keep it for awhile and then you’re going to fail. And that is the writers’ life. And then you realize, oh, I failed again, need to reprioritize. It’s just like in meditation, the magic is in getting distracted and bringing your thought, your thoughts back to what you were trying to focus on, your breath or a candle flavor, whatever it is you’re trying to do. The magic is in the distraction. The magic of keeping coming back, back to writing is noticing when you haven’t been writing and bring yourself back, gently and with love. And sometimes with sharp teeth. You can have gentleness and love and sharp teeth at the same time. As long as you are simply biting yourself, don’t bite anybody else. It’s not, it’s not hygienic or sanitary. [00:09:30] So, those are my words to you today. And I don’t know, I’m just feeling pretty freaking good that we did it, that we got out. I can’t keep saying that I hope the hardest part is over, of moving. I hope the hardest part is over. We both have two suitcases here and a backpack. That’s what we own. And, I, now we just have to move. Now, we just have to move from place to place. We’re going to be moving around Oakland a little bit. We’re going to be going to Idaho and then down south to LA to see family and friends before we leave. And then in 23 days from today, we’re on a plane to our new life and I am very excited about it. Maybe next week, I’ll try to remember to talk about fear setting, which is something that I did recently, and it really helped me become truly excited about. I’m going to make myself a note to talk about that.  Also, if you’re waiting for a mini episode, because you asked me a question, because you’re at that $5 a month level on Patreon and haven’t answered it yet, I am very sorry. Every single day, I’m trying. I have a note, must do the bonus mini episode and I haven’t done it because I’ve been too busy. And then when I do collapse on the bed, I’m just scrolling through TikTok because I’m so tired. So, that is coming soon, I promise. And I’ll talk about fear setting next week, and I know that you’re going to enjoy this interview with Karen White. Please come find me on the internet, where I live, wherever that is, good by me, basically all the places. Leave me a note with how you are doing. [00:11:02] Oh, I got a really nice note from someone this week who said, I always hear you talk about your email list, but I was actually sitting at my desk this time. So, I rolled over and I typed in the URL and I joined your mailing list and y’all. My writers email list, haven’t sent any new ones out for a while because I’ve been busy, but there’s one already drafted on my desktop. I’m going to stop making excuses. But my auto-responder sequence is I think it’s probably seven or eight emails long, and it is juicy goodness of gifts. Basically, I’m giving you of things I have learned the hard way from writing. It’s all free stuff. Just sign up and get it. It’s letters of encouragement. That’s all it is. So, if you’re sitting at a place where you could reach your phone or at a computer, type in RachaelHerron.com/Write and just sign up for my email newsletter.  Right now, why don’t you do it? Rachel Herron, Rachael spelled funny, R A C H A E L H E R R O N.com/write. Sign yourself up for that. The thing I love from that the most is that in that first email, I ask and I want to hear from you, what you are struggling with. I read every letter and I respond to every letter because you matter to me. So, I would love to hear from you. I would love for you to sign up and enter that correspondence with me. It’s, I always complain about my email backlog and email is the bane of my existence, except for hearing from writers. That is the joy of my existence. So please come get some email into my inbox from writers. All right, I’m feeling a little silly and a little punchy, and I’m going to go sit on a veranda and read a book. I’m reading The Echo Wife. It’s a trip right now. And I’m really enjoying it so I can’t wait to do that, right the heck now. Enjoy the interview and get some writing, reprioritize your time, my friends. And then tell me about it. All right, goodbye. 

Rachael Herron: [00:12:57] Okay. Well, I could not be more pleased to welcome to the show today, Karen White. Hello, Karen. Welcome!

Karen White: [00:13:03] Hi, Rachael. Thanks for having me today. 

Rachael Herron: [00:13:05] I’m thrilled to have you. Let me give you a little introduction. Karen White is the New York Times bestselling author of more than twenty-five novels, including the Tradd Street series, Dreams of Falling, The Night the Lights Went Out, Flight Patterns, The Sound of Glass, I love that title, A Long Time Gone, and The Time Between. She is the coauthor of multiple books with New York Times bestselling authors Beatriz Williams and Lauren Willig. She grew up in London but now lives with her husband and two dogs near Atlanta, Georgia. And the Last Night in London is her most recent release. And we were just saying that you might hear or see some of our dogs as you’re listening or watching this. So, welcome, welcome! Your new book is so exciting and I’m so thrilled to be able to talk to you about it.

Karen White: [00:13:50] Thank you.

Rachael Herron: [00:13:51] This show is for writers, about writers and it is about the writing process. And you’re so prolific. I can’t wait to talk to you about it. 

Karen White: [00:14:01] I’m sorry about that

Rachael Herron: [00:14:02] No, I know I am too. I love talking to prolific writers, but I would love to know how you, how do you do it? How do you get it done?

Karen White: [00:14:10] I honestly, I don’t know. When I, you could see my desk right now. I mean, I have been struggling the last few months, really the last couple years, just because, you know, I have, it was easier when my kids were younger and lived at home. It was easier to organize my days. And then the more popular you become, you know, the more demands on your time. I’ve also inherited my older parents, which is a full-time job. And it’s not as regulated as when, you know, I knew that when I dropped my kids off at school, I would have X amount of time before I would have to go pick them up. And even after I picked them up, I could bring my laptop and take them to the, you know, horseback riding or whatever. And so, it was just very, very diligent. And now I’m just, you know, I’m plus the social media that, you know, social media is just exploding and I’m expected to spend a lot of time on social media and I didn’t have that before. So, it was a lot easier to stay focused, to not be constantly, you know, texted or whatever. I mean, when my kids were growing up, I had my phone, I would just leave it in the car because I just wanted for emergencies or to, yep, there’s your doggy.

Rachael Herron: [00:15:22] There’s my dog coming out.

Karen White: [00:15:24] You know, so, I think it’s just getting harder and harder because of that. Not just because of my life, but also because of the world and how, you know, authors now are expected to be very accessible. And so it, I don’t know how I’m doing it anymore. I will tell you one thing, I have like little to no downtime, so it’s hard. But I’m really working to change that, but, I, I’m at a good holding pattern right now. I’m trying to be very structured with my days, you know, but it’s hard. It’s hard. So I just do what I have to do. I write whenever I can, whenever I’m not doing anything else.

Rachael Herron: [00:16:09] So you’re not strictly a morning writer or an afternoon writer, but it fits it around everything else.

Karen White: [00:16:15] Right. I try to be a morning writer. You know, I do get up an hour early before the dogs and my husband. Cause that is my best time. And I don’t turn on my phone. I don’t look at social media. I don’t do anything, but sit at my computer. And even if it’s not the best writing I can do, at least I’ve got something. So, when I go back to it during the little snatches of time to the rest of the day, I at least have got a flow going and I know kind of where I’m heading with the scene or whatever. And that really helped because I love morning writing and, yeah, the rest of my life would go away. I could really, you know, just sit down for a few hours and you know, and get it done. But I even not that long ago, I remember just sitting when I was on deadline and just locking myself in my office and working and writing and it was joyous. And now it’s like, oh my gosh, I’ve got to get up and I’ve got to do this. I’ve got to pay these bills for my dad. And I, sorry and the squeaking. 

Rachael Herron: [00:17:13] I love the squeaking.

Karen White: [00:17:14] Yeah, and I need to chase it. And also, I have a, so my mother has Alzheimer’s, my dad has dementia and now my 15-year-old dog, not the one who’s squeaking, the one who is somewhere in the house, has to wear double diapers. So, it’s like,

Rachael Herron: [00:17:27] That’s a lot. Are your parents in the house with you?

Karen White: [00:17:30] Oh lord, no. 

Rachael Herron: [00:17:31] Okay. I was going to say you can’t write anything if that were true, oh my god.

Karen White: [00:17:34] Oh no, that would be the end. That would be the end of my career. No, they aren’t. They are in a facility, but I take care of everything. Everything. Doctors, insurance, pills, all that. 

Rachael Herron: [00:17:48] I feel honored that you were able to spend the time with me here. That’s fantastic. I know. The talking. 

Karen White: [00:17:51] Well, this is the fun thing, you know. And I’m honored I can, you know, take care of my parents. But you know, I have to remind myself that my career is extremely important to me and I work very hard on these books and on this book, and this is what I want to do. And if I have to like, not take a vacation for four years, which is kind of where I am right now, to get it all done, then that’s what I’m going to do because it’s temporary. This is a season. It’s not always going to be this way.

Rachael Herron: [00:18:19] Yes. I really like thinking about writing and our lives in the, in terms of seasons. It’s really important for our sustainability as writers.

Karen White: [00:18:28] Exactly, exactly. And I, you know, I do try to, I try to relax. I take breaks during the day. You know, like I’ll do a 20-minute nap because I can’t live. Cause I, like I said, I get up very early, so it’s a long day and I normally don’t turn my computer off till 10 at night. And that’s just email and social media, you know, that kind of thing. And you know, 

Rachael Herron: [00:18:50] I just took a 25-minute reading break on the couch, which is right before we talked and I never do that and it just felt so good and so delicious. I need to do it more often. 

Karen White: [00:18:58] And you know what, that’s the other thing, absolutely. I love to read and I was realizing, I wasn’t reading anything friends would have books come out and I wouldn’t have any idea you know, what they were about. And, I do a lot of audio books, you know, because I drive a lot, but I love a print book. So, I’ve been doing, and that’s what I do, I do, I take reading breaks during the day, usually right before I write, I’d like to read maybe 15 minutes and then, so that’s my treat. So, when I, you know, gone doing stuff and I have to get back to writing and it’s like, oh, I’m so tired, I don’t want to write, like, well, you can have 15 minutes of reading first and then you can write. 

Rachael Herron: [00:19:32] I love that. And it primes the well and serves as inspiration.

Karen White: [00:19:36] Absolutely. And there’s so many great books out right now.

Rachael Herron: [00:19:38] I know there’s so many, there’s so many, including yours. What is your biggest joy when it comes to writing? 

Karen White: [00:19:46] You know, it’s when, well, typing the end. 

Rachael Herron: [00:19:50] Oh yeah. 

Karen White: [00:19:51] Yeah. I’m definitely one of those writers who, and again, I can never remember the famous writer who said this but, I don’t enjoy writing, I enjoy having written. 

Rachael Herron: [00:20:03] Yes.

Karen White: [00:20:04] Because it’s hard, it’s hard, you know, and you, I’ve been doing this for a very, very, very long time, and I still, you know, I still find the joys when I’m in that rhythm. I mean, it’s harder lately cause I, it, I’m so fractured. But when I get the time to sit and do nothing but just, you know, dive into my characters and my stories, that that is the biggest joy. But I have to say, and something that has been really missing and during this COVID year when I haven’t been allowed to go out and see readers, I love talking to readers who read my books and they want to talk about these characters as if they are as real to them as they are to me and you know, what it meant to them. And I do, I get, and they do email me and that is, you know, just lovely, you know, when I hear from people, you know, say, just the kindest things about what my words had meant to them and their lives. And these are people, you know, I might never have met if it weren’t through the words of my books. So that is a wonderful thing. I might not be a neurosurgeon, you know, and saving lives, but at least I like to think that I have positively impacted other people’s lives.

Rachael Herron: [00:21:11] Absolutely. That’s what we do. That’s amazing. Would you mind sharing a craft tip of any sort with our writer listeners? 

Karen White: [00:21:21] Yeah. One thing that has become very important to me since I have to stop writing and do something else and then get back to the writing, like throughout the day. And that is exhausting, you know, it’s so much, it really is easier to just sit down and do it in one long stretch for however long you have and it’s hard this way. And I find that if I leave my writing, where, whatever I’m doing before I have to stop it, if I leave it on, like in the middle of a sentence, the middle of a paragraph, the middle of an action, the middle of dialogue, then it’s easier to jump back in instead of like finishing a scene and then like, yeah, I’m going to get started. Because it’s so hard, especially as your day goes through and you’re getting more and more tired and not like meant, you know, physically tired. But for me, the mental fatigue is real because I’m juggling so many balls in the air and it gets exhausting. So by the time, like I try to do my last round of writing, usually around four o’clock and sometimes five or six. And, if I haven’t set it up, there’s just no way that’s going to be, I’ll start like, oh, I know I need to check Instagram. You know, I become like the magpie that shiny, but I find that’s a really big help. And then, it just it’s like the jumping board to dive into your story again.        

Rachael Herron: [00:22:50] I love that you set that up throughout your day. And I also love how well it dovetails with the idea of you starting early in the morning. I have this theory that if we touch it early in the morning, it just makes it easier to go back to all day long because we’re not scared of it. But for some reason, if it’s 4:00 PM and we’ve been putting it off, now I’ve had an entire day of now, now I’m scared.

Karen White: [00:23:09] Now I’m really scared. Now there’s a reason why I’m scared and 100% and like when I have to do doctor’s appointments and things, I never make them first thing in the morning, even if it’s a fasting appointment, because I want to be able to get those, you know, that hour in, in the morning. And then I do a workout, you know, cause that kind of, you know, invigorates the brain. And, you know, then get dressed, whatever, and then I can do other things. But I don’t want to start, you know, social media because the longer you pushed it, it’s like, you know, studying for that test or doing that homework. You know, when you were in school, the longer you put it off, the uglier it is. So just, let’s, just do it because, and remind yourself that this is something you choose to do. This is something that at least for me, at one point, you know, did give me a lot of joy and it still gives me a lot of joy. It’s just, I’m, it always tends to be the last thing in my life that I get to, get to do. And it’s the one thing that I want to do, which is kind of funny how upside down my life is. So, I find that if I just carve out, even if it’s just chunks of time during the day, but I have to be very, very diligent about it, and very disciplined and I am, I’m very disciplined. I don’t think you could write this many books and live life, you know, without being very disciplined.

Rachael Herron: [00:24:37] I love that. What thing in your life affects your writing in a surprising way? 

Karen White: [00:24:44] Like negative or bad or?

Rachael Herron: [00:24:45] Either, either way. Good or bad.

Karen White: [00:24:49] You know, it’s funny. And I, because we’re all writers, like I really absorb things, whether it be a movie I watched with a friend, or a series I’m watching, or a book I’m reading, the notions really affect me. 

Rachael Herron: [00:25:08] Ooh, how so?

Karen White: [00:25:09] Well, like right now, I’m not binge watching. Cause I don’t have, like, when I eat lunch, I turn on the TV for 20 minutes and I’ve been watching, it’s an Australian series, it was seven or eight, what do you call them? Not episodes. 

Rachael Herron: [00:25:28] Oh, seasons?

Karen White: [00:25:29] Seasons. Thank you. That ended in 2015 and it set in Australia, sort of at the, in the fifties. And I’m addicted, but there’s so much family tension and drama. I’m just like drawn into it. And, I just find that it’s sort of, it flips the light switch on my own emotions, you know, not the same emotions, but it just kind of invigorates me. It just kind of electrifies me so that when I go back to my own, I’m just a little more, you know, ready to impart emotions into my characters. 

Rachael Herron: [00:26:06] So we kind of, I think of it sometimes, like I’m a vampire. I’m stealing some of that energy.

Karen White: [00:26:12] Yeah exactly.

Rachael Herron: [00:26:13] In order to put it in our own. 

Karen White: [00:26:14] Exactly, exactly. 

Rachael Herron: [00:26:16] What is the name of that series?

Karen White: [00:26:17] It’s called A Place to Call Home.

Rachael Herron: [00:26:19] I’ve never heard of it, it sounds fabulous. 

Karen White: [00:26:21] It’s on prime video and,

Rachael Herron: [00:26:24] Oh, good.

Karen White: [00:26:25] I am, and I told my daughter about it and she’s addicted and I always had store dropping off books just to. Long story, but, there’s like five or six people in the store, all masked, all socially distanced and, one of the own, I mentioned that I’d been watching the series and I said a place to call home, and every single woman was like, oh my gosh. That is like, so makes, so you have to, it’s so good. It’s like every storyline and it’s not like I want to call it, it’s not a soap opera because it’s not, because it’s unexpected. 

Rachael Herron: [00:27:07] It’s sounds wonderful. 

Karen White: [00:27:09] Yeah. The way the characters change and grow. It’s like, it’s not like in soap operas, you know, where Erica Kane was always the same person? You know, there is kind of one character like that who we just can’t wait until she dies. She’s so evil. But, you know, like, they all change and learn and, it’s just an, it’s a brilliant show.

Rachael Herron: [00:27:33] I had been looking for a new series. I’ve been looking for something- I’ve been looking for something exactly like that to kind of energize myself. So,

Karen White: [00:27:39] Yes. I was too, I was too. And like I said, there’s seven or eight,

Rachael Herron: [00:27:45] Seasons.

Karen White: [00:27:14] Thank you. I’m sorry. It is, I’ve always, like I said, this is my third cup of the day and it’s like five o’clock in the,

Rachael Herron: [00:27:54] It’s fabulous.

Karen White: [00:27:26] Seasons. So, it’s like, once you start, it’s like my daughter is like way behind and I’m like, would you please catch up so we can talk about what’s going on. 

Rachael Herron: [00:28:06] That sounds wonderful. Thank you for that recommendation. Speaking of recommendations, what’s the best book you’ve read recently and why did you love it?

Karen White: [00:28:14] Wow. I’ve read so many because I’ve been given a lot to read for, there’s so many books out right now. So, and I, and again, I listened to a lot on audible. When I recently finished on audible is one of my favorite, I haven’t read her in a while, but she’s one of my favorite authors, Simone, Simone, St. James? 

Rachael Herron: [00:28:35] No, I don’t know her.

Karen White: [00:28:36] And it’s called The Sun Down Motel. And it’s sort of like, if you like my triad street series, so there’s a little bit of a paranormal thing, very spooky. She’s such a great writer, such a great writer. Just really, really gives you those tinglies and, yeah, really. And that’s the first one I’ve listened to audio. I’ve read the other ones in paper version. And also, historical wise, I, oh gosh. So, I have to give a shout out. I haven’t read Beatrice’s coming book, which comes out in June. But Lauren just had a book come out March, The Band of Sisters, which is historical fiction, World War one. And she found out about this Smith college relief unit, while doing research for All the Ways We Say Goodbye, which is a book that we wrote together. And, she was, you know, doing research on Christmas customs in France, in during world war one. And she came up with this note about or a newspaper article about this group of women from Smith college that came to help at the front.

Rachael Herron: [00:29:45] Wow. 

Karen White: [00:29:47] Nobody had ever heard of this, but, she, because she’s such an excellent research person, she found, you know, letters that these women had written back home that are in the Smith college archives. And so, it just kind of and it’s, it is my, I love all of her books, but this is my favorite so far. The characters are just so well done in the story and you feel like you were there and you laugh, you cry with the women and it’s, it’s just, you know. It’s amazing to see how these very privileged women really got their, you know, feet wet and really, you know, made big differences to these people who had been bombed out of their homes, until they were shelled and they had to leave, but, really an incredible story really, really loved it.

Rachael Herron: [00:30:36] Thank you for that recommendation. It sounds amazing. Speaking of amazing and recommendations, can you tell us a little bit about your latest book, The Last Night in London?

Karen White: [00:30:44] Okay. Well, you know, it took me 400 pages to write it, so I’ll try to not size it. So it is a dual timeline story. So, we have, late 1930s, early 1940s. So there’d be a beginning of a world war II in England. And then we have contemporary time also in England, but the main character is Southern. I wrote Falling Home and After the Rain about 10 years ago, and both of those books are set in a small town called Walton, Georgia. And, one of the secondary characters is a 14-year-old girl in Falling Home and an 18-year-old girl in After the Rain. And ever since those books came out, I had been asked by readers to tell the rest of Maddie’s story. So, I’ve been looking for the perfect story for her. And that’s why she’s the lead character. Actually, there are two lead characters. She’s the lead character in the modern story, in The Last Night in London. And the other characters, Precious Dubose, who you might remember from All the Ways We Said Goodbye. And we see her there at the Paris Fritz in 1964. And she was also everybody’s favorite character and people have been saying, we need to see more Precious. So, Beatrice and Lauren, let me use that character for this book. And in All the Ways We Said Goodbye, and believe, this is not a sequel. These are just, I’m just borrowing characters. So it’s like kind of a reunion for me. And you don’t have to read the others.

Rachael Herron: [00:32:14] How fun that is.

Karen White: [00:32:15] But it wouldn’t be fun. You know, if you enjoy this book, you might enjoy reading those other ones. But, so, yeah, they let me borrow Precious and in the book, All the Ways We Said Goodbye. Precious alludes to some big event back in the war. And you don’t really know, and she talks about a big loss in her life and something that she’s always regretted, but we don’t know what that is. And when we wrote that, we didn’t know what that was. So, I thought, I’m going in this book so we can find out what that is. And so, we do find out. So, we have Maddie Warner, she’s now a journalist, a freelance journalist and she’s hired by a friend who is now a, an editor at British Vogue. She’s hired Maddie to interview Precious Dubose for her 100th anniversary. Precious has donated her clothes to the London Museum, London fashion museum. And it’s going to be on a theme of fashion in a time of crisis because Precious Dubose was a fashion model in London, during the thirties and forties, and then in Paris during the fifties. So, she has these gorgeous clothes and Maddie’s like, oh, that sounds like, you know, amazing. So they, so she comes to London to interview Precious. And of course, both of them have pasts, both of them have sorrows in their life. And both of them have secrets that they are trying to hide from others. And so, as they, as they get together, it’s, instead of just a straightforward interview, they both find that they are peeling back the layers and discovering an unexpected friendship and also ways to heal through their connection with each other. And the best part about it is, it is set in both time periods in the place where I lived for seven years in London on Regents Park, a building that did sustain damage during the blitz. So, it was the perfect setting for this book. 

Rachael Herron: [00:34:11] Oh, how fun. And I think you did an amazing, an amazing job summing up 400 pages into,

Karen White: [00:34:19] Thank you. I don’t know how to, you know, I don’t know how to, 

Rachael Herron: [00:34:22] That wasn’t rambling. That was wonderful. And where can we find you out on the internet? 

Karen White: [00:34:28] Oh gosh. Where can’t you find me these days? The best place to start is my website, Karen-White.com. It’s in my background here. There, you can find all the links to my social media. I’m on Twitter @KarenWhiteWrite, W R I T E. And I’m on Instagram @KarenWhiteWrite, W R I T E. And, Facebook, (KarenWhiteAuthor) 

Rachael Herron: [00:34:56] Perfect. Karen, it’s been a treat to talk to you. Thank you so very much for talking to us today.

Karen White: [00:35:01] Rachael, thank you, with my pleasure. 

Rachael Herron: [00:35:02] All right. Happy writing. Bye!

Karen White: [00:35:04] Thank you, you too. 

Thanks so much for joining me on this episode of “How do you Write?” You can reach me on Twitter, twitter.com/RachaelHerron, or at my website, www.rachaelherron.com, you can also support me on Patreon and get essays on living your creative life for as little as a buck an essay at www.patreon.com/rachael spelled R, A, C, H, A, E, L and do sign up for my free weekly newsletter of encouragement to writers rachaelherron.com/write/

Now, go to your desk and create your own process and get to writing my friends.

The post Ep. 245: Karen White on How to Leave Yourself Clues In Your Writing appeared first on R. H. HERRON.

A Paul and Daisy Soros fellow, Sanjena Sathian is a 2019 graduate of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. She has worked as a reporter in Mumbai and San Francisco, with nonfiction bylines for The New Yorker, The New York Times, Food & Wine, The Boston Globe, and The San Francisco Chronicle. Gold Diggers is her debut novel. 

How Do You Write Podcast: Explore the processes of working writers with bestselling author Rachael Herron. Want tips on how to write the book you long to finish? Here you’ll gain insight from other writers on how to get in the chair, tricks to stay in it, and inspiration to get your own words flowing. 

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Transcript:

Rachael Herron: [00:00:00] Welcome to “How do you Write?” I’m your host, Rachael Herron. On this podcast, I talk to authors about how they write, what their process is and how their lives fit together. I’ll keep each episode short so you can get back to writing.

[00:00:16] Well, Hello writers! Welcome to episode #244 of “How do you Write?” I’m Rachael Herron. And today, I am talking to Sanjena Sathian about how to make every word count when you’re writing in your book, in your work, in your world. It was a delight to talk to her and you are going to love the interview, so stick around for that. What is going on around here? Well, my friends, I just realized right before I pushed record that this is the last time you’ll see me in this spot. If you watch on the YouTube, but most people don’t. Most people listen on the podcast. So just know that right now, I am in Oakland, on a little street in east Oakland, that is a fantastic little, cul-de-sac, very, very family oriented. We know all of our neighbors. We have loved living here. Behind the house is a creek, there’s huge trees back there, eucalyptus and some terrible Acacia. On the other side of the trees is the high school and just a couple of weeks ago, I was sitting on the porch and could hear the way I always love to hear. I could hear the kids graduating and having their names called out and thank God they got to do a little bit of something in person this year. So that was nice. And I don’t know where I’m going to be recording this next week. Actually I do. I’ll still be in Oakland. I’ll be in an Airbnb. Don’t know what it looks like. It’ll be fine. [00:01:41] But it’s Thursday, June 24th, as I record this and this weekend, we’re out. We are out, we are loading the pallets we’re loading our boxes onto a pallet, which will be picked up by the shipping company and put onto a big boat. The staged furniture will be getting picked up on Monday. Everything we own needs to fit in our two suitcases. And on Monday, we will trundle our stuff out the front door and leave it locked behind us for the last time. And I’m really honestly right now feeling pretty okay with that. I feel ready. It feels like we have been gearing up for this for a long time, even though it’s only been about four months that we, since we have actually made the decision to move and sold the house and did all this stuff. But I am ready and ready for the motion. Ready, I’m ready to live out of a suitcase. I’m pretty stoked to live out of a suitcase, honestly. Packing is one of my favorite things. I don’t get to pack all the time. So that is wonderful. That’s happening. [00:02:42] What else is going on? Oh, I wanted to share with you, let me bring it up here, an amazing email that I got from my friend, Mariah. You have heard me talk about Mariah before. She is an amazing, beautiful writer and she’s also a friend. We go back a long time, from the knitting world. And she was a good friend of a friend of mine and that’s how I think we got him introduced Mariah. Is that right, through Carrie? Anyway, I have worked with Mariah and I have worked with Mariah because Mariah came to me when I went full-time as a writer, maybe a little bit before I went full-time and she said, you should coach writing. And I said, I don’t, I don’t know about that. And she said, you should coach me. And I said, well, okay. So I kind of practiced on Mariah. And I will always be grateful to her for allowing me to do that because what Mariah did it was, she showed me that I freaking love it.[00:03:37] I love being a book coach. It is fantastic and listen to this letter that she sent me. This is, this made my day, this literally brought tears to my eyes. So, I’m just going to summarize a little bit. She sent her book off to her editor for the second round of structural comments. So that’s awesome. Huge progress for celebrating that. But this is something a little bit different here. So, this is what she says: “There’s something else I need to tell you about yesterday before I made the final, final touches for now, I sent a snippet from my epilogue to my critique partner. She had some good stern notes about what wasn’t working in the snippet and it wasn’t on a language level. This was deep stuff about the relationship between my guys.” “As I said to her,” and this is now Mariah talking to her critique partner: “A few years back, they might’ve sent me into a spiral of ‘I’ll check the whole book. Can’t write for toffee.’ And now I thought, right, good points. Let me try and see whether this works or this maybe? No, that’s better. And I went ahead and found some relevant moments in the story where I could add new details and poof! Made it work, at least temporarily. Won’t upset me at all, if it turns out if it wasn’t the correct solution, I’ve got the tools now to try different approaches.” And then she says she owes it all to me, dearest Rachael, which is not true, Mariah, you owe it all to yourself. She goes on to say: “You’ve given me those tools and the confidence to apply them. Practicing it over and over has helped too, of course. But, where before, I got so very, very nervous reading about the endless editing rounds that you went through with your agent, I now think that yes, I could do that. A muscle has been built. Not saying that muscle will work forever and endlessly, but at the moment, I feel that, dare I say it, I actually like editing.” My life is complete, honestly. [00:05:36] This feeling that people get when they understand their best process for revision, which is not the same as my best process, everybody has their own best processes, but when they learn their best processes for revision and they have the tools, it really is like a muscle that we can continue to use. I always say that first drafts, you never know what you’re going to get. You cannot prepare for a first draft. A first draft might come to you super, super easily, or it might be the worst thing you’ve ever experienced in your writing life. But revision is reliable. It’s just a set of tools. You pick them up, you put them down, you use what tools work for you the best and the, and your muscles get stronger to use these tools better. And Mariah, you just made my whole life by sending me this. So, thank you, thank you, thank you for saying that. Yes. Revision is where it’s at. [00:06:31] Okay. Another little business thing I would like to do that I haven’t done for a while is thank new Patrons. You can always become a patron of the show over at patreon.com/Rachael. And I send out really kick ass essays every month. And I got to start thinking about writing this month’s essay. Right now, I’m using the Patreon essays to write about this move of moving around the world. And I’m writing the memoir that the book will become, so you’re getting the first draft. You’re kind of getting 1.5 draft, like it’s a first draft, but I have cleaned it up for grammar, but I don’t know if it’ll actually make it into the book because I’m writing a first draft. First drafts teach you what a book wants to be. So that’s what’s happening over Patreon and these are the new patrons. Thank you, thank you so much to April Smith and Lisa Belkin and Bill who edited his pledge. Thanks Bill. You know, I love you. No, Bill is amazing. Thanks Bill. Sandy Miranda, Robinet is new, Julia Borghini, hello, Julia. Deborah Hart and, Amanda Schiller and Caressa Swanson. Thank you, Carissa and Lisa Page. [00:07:40] Thank you, thank you all of you, whether you are a patron now, whether you have been one in the past, whether you want to be one in the future, seriously. Those small amounts really add up into something that allows me to spend my time at the desk and do this work for you, for myself. You’re truly a patron of the arts and that is really freaking cool. So thank you very much. I think I have caught you up on all the most exciting things. Oh, I will say that I finished recording the audio book of Life in Stitches this week. And I got the copy edit out to my copy editor, who you will be hearing from on a future episode, you’re going to, with Katrina, you’re going to love that episode. But I realized that I have this kind of little break built in right now, because as I was doing, I did this a little bit in the wrong order, so I will tell you about it really quickly. I revised a Life in Stitches. I added a few essays to it. And then I already had the copy-edited manuscript because it’s a rerelease of a book I got the rights back to 10 years later. So, I have a very clean draft. And I added to that, I revised it a little bit. I added the essays to it, and then I sent that off to my copy editor because I will have introduced new errors and the new essays absolutely need probably a lot of cleanup copy-edit wise. [00:09:00] And then, I used my document to create the book, to record the audio book. And then I realized that all these changes that I’m making as I’m recording, because this sounds a little bit better, or I just used that word, I don’t want to use that word again. I’ll change it. I realized that that’s not the version that my copy editor is working on. So, I can’t do the edits on the audio book until I am looking at the copy-edited version from Katrina in front of me. And I can change those few little words here and there that I, that I moved. So, I can’t even edit the audio book. I just got to kind of sit around and work on some other projects, which is really nice, really, really nice. I’m trying to get faster after memoir of the workbook off of my desk. I’ve been working on that for a while. I’ve had the interior formatted workbook back for a while, and I just have had no time to sit and figure out the changes. Cause it looks great, but I do want some things different so I can give it back to the designer. So work is going on even while we’re moving. I feel like I have talked enough. Let’s jump into the interview. Shall we? I hope that you are getting some of your work done and please, wherever I am on the internet, come and tell me about how it’s going for you. I always love to hear. All right, my friends, happy writing.[00:10:19] Hey, you’re a writer. Did you know that I send out a free weekly email of writing encouragement? Go sign up for it at www.rachaelherron.com/write and you’ll also get my Stop Stalling and Write PDF with helpful tips you can use today to get some of your own writing done. Okay, now onto the interview.

Rachael Herron: [00:10:37] I could not be more pleased to welcome to the show Sanjena Sathian. Hello, Sanjena!

Sanjena Sathian: [00:10:41] Hi, thank you for having me. 

Rachael Herron: [00:10:43] Welcome. Welcome. Let me give you a little bit of an introduction. A Paul and Daisy Soros fellow, Sanjena Sathian is a 2019 graduate of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. She has worked as a reporter in Mumbai and San Francisco, with nonfiction bylines for The New Yorker, The New York Times, Food & Wine, The Boston Globe, and The San Francisco Chronicle. Gold Diggers is her debut novel, and Sanjena, I loved it. 

Sanjena Sathian: [00:11:06] Thank you.

Rachael Herron: [00:11:07] It was everything that I wanted to read. It was, I’ve just had such good luck lately of diving into books that just lift up my heart and fill my writer’s spirit. So, I have been so excited to talk to you. Welcome, welcome. 

Sanjena Sathian: [00:11:23] Great to hear. 

Rachael Herron: [00:11:24] This is a show for writers and we talk about, on the show, we talk about process and how we get the work done because, I think all writers are all curious about other writers’ processes. I would love to hear about yours. You get a lot done in different areas. How do you do it?

Sanjena Sathian: [00:11:39] Yeah. Yeah. I’m very excited to talk process and craft. I mean, a lot of it is regularity. I, you know, I had a full-time job for, sort of the first half of my twenties and it was, it was hard to write on top of that. So, I have like deep sympathy for everyone who’s trying and like, mad props if you’re trying to, it’s so hard. I was not the kind of person who could wake up at 5:00 AM before going to an office and get stuff done. Like I couldn’t function that way. So, I tried to write in the evenings when I had that job. And it was okay. A lot of what I did actually was kind of takeoff on weekends. And just like, I had a job where I basically was working like 80-90 hours a week. I had to be on six days a week. But, my one day off on the weekend, I just turned my phone off and I would drive, I lived in San Francisco at the time, I would drive across the golden gate bridge and get myself a hostel and like, point Reyes or just drive for the day. You know, I would walk in the morning, take a little solo hike and then come and literally sit in my car and work. I think that was less good for actually producing great work, but it was really good for cultivating like an inner space where I could write. Because I think that’s one of the things that’s so hard is keeping up your relationship with your own, like private writing self, when you have to exist in public as someone else. I did a lot of this work when I did eventually go to grad school. And I’m sure you talk about grad school, whether or not that’s the right choice and things like that. For me, it was the right choice because I had already taken some time in the real world. And that meant that I could appreciate what it was like for someone to say you’re only job is to write. I can make use of that.

Rachael Herron: [00:13:30] That is gorgeous. 

Sanjena Sathian: [00:13:32] Yeah, I can make use of that. And so, when I was writing this, I woke up, and kind of got to my writing desk as soon as possible. Sometimes I would work out before I wrote, other times I would do that afterward. And I would write, say from like 9:00, 10:00 AM until about somewhere between 1:00 and 3:00 PM. And I tried to write a thousand words a day when I was just getting out new stuff. I am a vomit drafter. 

Rachael Herron: [00:13:57] Talk to us about that. I love that.

Sanjena Sathian: [00:13:59] Yes, so, yeah. It’s really easy for me to just spew work and really hard for it to actually be usable.

Rachael Herron: [00:14:06] That’s exactly me. Exactly. Yeah. 

Sanjena Sathian: [00:14:10] It’s, so producing can sometimes be hard. But the big thing I knew I would have to do is like write the world, explore the world, write the characters, be in them and with them. And then eventually I was going to have to add some shape. So, I would, you know, I would write for, you know, X amount of time, X number words per day. When I’m editing, which is where like the real work happens, then I can be at my desk from somewhere between like two and like 8 to 10 hours a day. So, it kind of depends. 

Rachael Herron: [00:14:42] Isn’t it interesting, how revision for some, for me, and for a lot of people that I talk to, revision seems we can sit down and just do it more like a job. And it, and for me, it’s the most creative part, but it also feels more like a job whereas the first drafting is just body and soul exhausting for me. So, I think that something that is very underrated is people thinking about hostels. I live in Oakland, so, I routinely go to a point Reyes or to the pigeon point hostel, I don’t know if you ever went to that one. That is where, they’re cheap, people. And if you’re a sweet talker, a lot of hostels will close during the day. But if you’re a sweet talker and you say, well, I’m a writer and I would just love to stay on the couch and I’ll be out of the way, then they won’t kick you out. They’ll kick everybody else out. And then you have this house to yourself all day. So, in your life now, do you, is your life set up to support the writing all the time or do you kind of have to still go into that, the beautiful way that you said, having the place to center your writing? 

Sanjena Sathian: [00:15:42] Honestly, the pandemic really messed it up. As we were talking about before we started recording, you know, I was in New Zealand when the pandemic hit. I had a three-month teaching job there and I was supposed to go back to India, which is where I sort of lived on and off and I got locked out. So, yeah. 

Rachael Herron: [00:16:03] I heard about people that happened to, but I did read a bunch of people saying, well, if you’re going to be locked out, it might as well be in New Zealand. Did you feel that way or did you, were you just desperate to get home? 

Sanjena Sathian: [00:16:12] The problem was, I would have loved to stay, but I was just frankly concerned that something would happen to my family and I wouldn’t be able to get back. So, instead of staying the perfect utopia, I flew home to Georgia and, not exactly a utopia, especially not in the pandemic. But you know, my life was just a scramble like everyone else’s. Like a suitcase of mine was still in India. It’s still there. Like my, literally my life was just like in, it was in boxes for a while. But I found, in case anyone is considering this, it is very hard to write when you are living in your parents’ home.

Rachael Herron: [00:16:49] What is it, what did that look like living in your parents’ home? and trying to write. 

Sanjena Sathian: [00:16:53] I was in the bedroom that I, you know, had to like spend my teenage years in, which automatically meant I regressed.

Rachael Herron: [00:17:02] That makes me want to cry, just thinking about it.

Sanjena Sathian: [00:17:04] Yup. In some ways, it was cool. Cause my, so everyone kind of came back, my brother and his fiancée came and sheltered in Atlanta because they wanted to get out of New York. And so, like we had like a whole group of people there and like my brother’s an amazing cook, so I was cooked for. But there was something and this kind of gets back to that question of like your inner, private life. They were all working jobs, you know, like consultants and bankers and doctors and people who are like, like highly professional white collar. Like, they’re doing the jobs that like account in society and trying,

Rachael Herron: [00:17:39] And probably talking loudly on zoom about it all day long. 

Sanjena Sathian: [00:17:42] Loudly on zoom, which is very bad. That was very bad for me. But I think what really, what injured me was that I was trying to like, live my writing life, the way someone else would live a job life. And that meant like keeping to traditional work hours. It meant like we ate dinner together a lot. And like the sort of like way that you would have to eat dinner together as a family when you were a kid. And like, in a lot of ways, it was wonderful how all that time together, blah, blah, blah. But, also not conducive to like, you know, carving out your own space. So eventually I moved out, I now have my own life again. But I really do think like, like we have to battle for space because writing does not look like traditional labor. And it sucks that sometimes people don’t respect it until you’re getting paid for it or that’s the primary way you’re making money. So, really like over the summer, I had to, you know, hurt my parents’ feelings and move out and say, I have to write new work. I need to, you know, like sell new work and that was hard for them to grasp, but you just have to battle for that private life.

Rachael Herron: [00:18:55] I love that you say that, and I love that you have named that because it reminds people that this is not a, this profession is creative. It’s not anything like a 9-5 job. And I have tried often to approach my writing as a 9-5 job. And it just doesn’t work unless I’m like in a third or fourth revision and then it does work. What is your biggest challenge when it comes to writing? And let’s say right now where you are now in your life. 

Sanjena Sathian: [00:19:20] Well right now, you know, I’m on book tour. My first book came out last week and one thing that’s actually kind of scary is like, I have been so happy to see people connect with the book. But my crazy anxious writer brain, here’s a compliment, and it’s like, oh my God, I’m not doing that in my current work. What if they hate me? And that is scary. Because I like teen pops, I think about like Disney, like stars who like decide to have like a sexual revolution when they hit their twenties to be like, you don’t know me.

Rachael Herron: [00:19:52] Right. 

Sanjena Sathian: [00:19:53] And I kind of get that. Cause by the time you’re promoting one book, I think almost everyone is already on to their next iteration. So, it’s been cool to talk about this book finally, but I’m also like, my brain’s already kind of in another place, so that is tough. But there’s also something really cool about reentering it and trying to be like, okay, what state was I in when I wrote that? Cause it’s like all a blur. So

Rachael Herron: [00:20:19] Oh, that’s lovely. How has it felt to be, to have your book release? How has it felt? 

Sanjena Sathian: [00:20:25] Yeah, I mean, you’ll know this. I mean, it’s crazy that this thing that was once a word doc, a PDF, all of a sudden, it’s in people’s hands. 

Rachael Herron: [00:20:34] Also, the cover is incredible. 

Sanjena Sathian: [00:20:36] I love the cover. I love it. 

Rachael Herron: [00:20:37] The cover is insane.

Sanjena Sathian: [00:20:38] They did an amazing job, just a completely amazing job. I think what’s interesting is like learning to talk about it from the outside and developing kind of a vocabulary for how the book can fit into other people’s understandings. You know, there’s been a lot of talk about the sort of thematic elements of the book. You know, it deals with immigrant identity. It deals with coming of age, it deals with it sort of challenges, this like model minority thing. None of those things are phrases that I used while I was writing, you know, like that’s stuff that happens later. I think I started,

Rachael Herron: [00:21:13] I love that. You were just, you were telling a story when you began and now you have to be able to talk about that story.

Sanjena Sathian: [00:21:18] Exactly. And I do think it’s useful. Like it’s nice to be able to say, you know, what, because I do think about politics. I think about justice. I think about, I think about social issues. Like I’m not, I think there is this like picture of like, Raymond Carvery, white male writer who sits apart from the social forces that shape their work. But of course, that’s a completely artificial vision. So it’s not as though I don’t think about those things. It’s just that, like, if they were absolutely the front of mind when I was writing, I wouldn’t be able to write a story. So sometimes I just have to push those aside, which I think is very common. But it’s been exciting to hear people relate to the thematic elements of the work as though they were like, I mean, I guess they seem like complete ideas now. They didn’t feel like complete ideas when I was writing.

Rachael Herron: [00:22:05] But that’s what our vision is for, and that’s what editors are for. And this may be related to that, but what is your biggest joy when it comes to writing?

Sanjena Sathian: [00:22:16] I think, I mean sometimes I don’t know if I’m feeling any joy while I’m actually doing the writing.

Rachael Herron: [00:22:20] Amen.

Sanjena Sathian: [00:22:21] Right. 

Rachael Herron: [00:22:22] Oh my God.

Sanjena Sathian: [00:22:23] It’s that like, Bukovsky poem, that’s so obnoxious, but it’s like, you should only be a writer. Doing something else would drive you to suicide or murder. Yeah. I mean, I feel like I do it because I have to. There’s just literally nothing else I could do with my life. But, I mean, I think joy comes from new understanding, maybe. Like, I think, yeah, I think I need, I write about things that I need to understand. Whenever there’s something that frightens me, like a black spot in my understanding of the world, that’s like a thing I have to write to word. Maybe it lightens the load. 

Rachael Herron: [00:23:02] That’s gorgeous. There’s a Susan Sontag quote that says, my writing is smarter than I am because I can revise it. And I go super deep into that quote and take even more from it in that, like, I am a smarter person because I write some BS and then I learned from it and I learn what I need to learn from it as I keep going back to it and learning from it. And I think that’s, that’s gorgeous. Speaking of getting those words on the page, or any form of this question, can you share a craft tip with our listeners? 

Sanjena Sathian: [00:23:32] Yeah. I mean, this is sort of post craft. It’s not like when you’re writing, but kind of in this like revision zone. I studied with Anne Fadiman, who’s a wonderful non-fiction writer in college and she used to do this thing in office hours where she would call you in, after you turned in a piece and you would sit there with her for an hour and it’s usually like a thousand-word piece. She’ll pull it up on her computer, and you would think you were going to get to talk about, you know, the inspiration behind the piece and your intentions. And you’re such a raw genius that we’re gonna talk about that.

Rachael Herron: [00:24:04] I’m so scared now.

Sanjena Sathian: [00:24:05] But, instead, she would go word by word and make you defend every single word 

Rachael Herron: [00:24:12] Oh, that just gave me goosebumps. I want somebody to do that to me, like in the next half hour or so. 

Sanjena Sathian: [00:24:17] Yup. Over,

Rachael Herron: [00:24:18] What did that make you feel like?

Sanjena Sathian: [00:24:19] I mean, over the course of an hour, you maybe got two sentences then. It’s, and like, she would have a, I sit right now with like a physical roche thesaurus on my desk because that’s something she taught us to do is like, you don’t use a thesaurus for like, you know, synonym, dark.

Rachael Herron: [00:24:38] Right.

Sanjena Sathian: [00:24:39] You use it to find the most particular word that is not the fanciest, but the most particular. And the thing that I, you know, people kind of do this a little bit in journalism, but never with that kind of painstaking effort. And when I teach writing, I do this to students. And what’s interesting is, it’s the students who don’t think they’re going to be writers, they don’t love writing, who take to it the best because they don’t have an ego. And they’re like, wow, you taught me something about how sentence works. Thank you. I’m going to be better now. Writers, students who think they’re writers, they are brats about this. They feel like,

Rachael Herron: [00:25:16] It came out perfectly the first time. I know what I’m doing. 

Sanjena Sathian: [00:25:20] Exactly. And it’s just so important. Like, you know, there’s this, there’s this Phillip Roth quote in the ghost writer that novel he wrote where, kind of this older Phillip Roth character told the younger Phillip Roth character, all writing is moving sentences around. And I think that’s a thing you have to come to terms with, if you’re going to try to do this as you and I know. Like, that’s what the work is and it cannot just be you in love with your own genius. 

Rachael Herron: [00:25:46] Oh my gosh. Yeah, exactly. I have an embarrassing way to do this. Because I was, I am still a Twitter person, although I’m taking, we’re on a break because I just can’t. But, so, I came up in Twitter when it was still 140 characters. And what I loved to do was put my entire thought as an, as many words as I wanted to have into a Twitter box and then streamline it down to those 140 characters. And I have this past now in my revision work, where I call it Twitterify, where I look at and I do that. I look at every sentence and make each word earn its keep. But I’ve never thought of doing it that, that beautifully and it shows in your work. It shows in the language and the lyricism and the rhythm of your work and the specificity. So amazing. You’re, that is, that’s really, what was her name? Anne Fetterman? 

Sanjena Sathian: [00:26:37] Anne Fadiman. F-A-D-I-M-A-N.

Rachael Herron: [00:26:40] I am not familiar with her, but I’ll have to look her up.

Sanjena Sathian: [00:26:42] Yeah. She wrote a book called The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down. That is, 

Rachael Herron: [00:26:45] What a great title. 

Sanjena Sathian: [00:26:46] Yeah, it’s incredible. It’s about, kind of cultural differences in medicine. I think won the national book award. And her essays are just these perfect little gems. I really recommend Ex Libris.

Rachael Herron: [00:26:59] Oh okay.

Sanjena Sathian: [00:27:00] Just, very small essay collection and just every single one is perfect.

Rachael Herron: [00:27:05] I’m obsessed with essays, so, thank you, thank you. My next, my next purchase. What thing in your life affects your writing in a surprising way? 

Sanjena Sathian: [00:27:14] That’s interesting. I mean, maybe this isn’t surprising, but I get in a really bad mood if I don’t have a book that I’m excited about picking up. And I think that’s something, you know, I keep coming back to this, in these craft conversations that I’m lucky enough to have now. People sometimes want to be writers who like don’t love reading and, you know, be gone with you, you know. Like it’s,

Rachael Herron: [00:27:38] Be gone.

Sanjena Sathian: [00:27:40] You, I like to have, I need to have a book that I am being pulled back to when I’m writing, because it reminds me of the kind of feeling I would like to give my readers that I just want them to want the book. 

Rachael Herron: [00:27:57] How do you make sure that you’re reading a book like that? I do, I do it, I think the only way I know how to do it is that I just keep throwing books out of my Kindle until I have the one where like, I can’t wait to go to bed because then I get to read for an hour. Is that how you do it? 

Sanjena Sathian: [00:28:11] Yep. That’s it.

Rachael Herron: [00:28:12] It feels a little wasteful, but it is what it is.

Sanjena Sathian: [00:28:1415 No, you have to, you have to want to be there. I think like, you know, in college I studied English lit and it was a very like Brit lit heavy program. And so, I don’t know, I just had to read the Fairy Queen twice and I don’t think it made my life better. I do think reading Chaucer, and Dunn, and Shakespeare did, and like, that’s not, Shakespeare is not always easy, but Shakespeare made my life better. I don’t need to read the Fairy Queen again. And I think also trying to read when I had a job was a big part of it too. Like, just realizing that there were books that I wanted to come home and pick up and books that I didn’t want to come home and pick up and just identifying the differences between those was really helpful.

Rachael Herron: [00:29:01] I, speaking of things like the Fairy Queen, I read that, and I believe this, that Milton was the very last person on earth who was able to read everything that was in print. 

Sanjena Sathian: [00:29:12] Wow. 

Rachael Herron: [00:29:13] And he had read every, or he had read through his daughter’s poor eyes as he lost his own sight, eyesight, but it makes sense. And since then, we’ve had an explosion we’ll never read everything that’s out there. So we have to be, we don’t, we don’t have long enough lives. We have to pick things that make us super excited. Thank you for saying that. Speaking of books that you love, what is the best book that you’ve read recently? And why did you love it? 

Sanjena Sathian: [00:29:38] I am right now reading The Four Books by Yan Lianke, which is a political satire set during China’s great leap forward. It is a very dark period. It is set in like a sort of political internment camp, but it is incredibly funny. 

Rachael Herron: [00:29:54] It is?

Sanjena Sathian: [00:29:56] Very Kafka-esque. 

Rachael Herron: [00:29:57] Nice.

Sanjena Sathian: [00:29:58] I mean, it just, it takes pleasure and a moment that is joyless. And I just think that is completely masterful. I’ve also really loved, I’ve had the chance to read two friends books that are both coming out in 2022. One is by Sarah Thangka Matthews. His book is coming out with Viking. It’s called All This Could Be Different and it is an incredible coming of age story of a whole community of friends in their twenties, in Milwaukee. It’s a queer love story of the kind that just crackles and makes you be like, Ooh, this is so sexy and also so daring and new. And it’s also, it does stuff with race that I’d never seen before. Like I read it and I was like, I didn’t know I needed this book, but I needed this book. And then another friend’s book is called Groundskeeping. It’s coming out. And they, Lee Cole is his name. He’s a Kentucky writer. And he, I know, you know, I knew the books that he grew up reading. You know, these Appalachian stories, Southern stories. But, it has like the sort of old, you know, Southern short story feel, you know, minus the racism. Plus, this field of like Elif bought humans, the idiot and this sort of like very contemporary coming of age discovery. It’s about a groundskeeper on a Southern college campus who has an affair with the writer in residence. And it’s about the sort of two of them coming into their own writing voices. And it is just like, both of these novels. I was like, they’re just word docs on my computer. But like, I am the coolest because I got to read them in advance. So, 

Rachael Herron: [00:31:35] Oh, and I just had like an image of me in bed with one of these or both of these books when they come out and I had just, I can’t wait to get my hands on them. And I’m sorry that it’s 2022, but I will still be, I’ll be, I’ll grab them. Speaking of amazing books, can you tell our listeners a little bit about Gold Diggers?

Sanjena Sathian: [00:31:52] Sure. Yeah. So, it takes place, the first half opens in a fictional suburb of Atlanta, Georgia. That’s a little bit of a fictionalized version of where I grew up. And it follows a 15-year-old boy, who’s 15 at the start, named Neil, who is kind of trapped in this like extremely claustrophobic high-achieving competitive Indian American bubble. And he is like really underachieving compared to them. It feels like he’s going to burn out struggling. He’s smart, but he just, he has an inner life, you know, this thing that we’ve been talking about. And he discovers that his best friend and childhood crush and neighbor, Anita, is really succeeding by all the sort of standards of their community. And he discovered that the reason she is so successful is that she and her mother have been stealing gold from other Indians in their community. And they don’t turn it into cash. Instead, they transmute it into this magical elixir and that allows them to steal the ambitions and energies of the Gold’s original owners.  And so, in the sense they are literally stealing ambition from other people in their extremely competitive environment. And the second half kind of picks up in Silicon Valley, another pressure cooker, full of competitive Asian immigrants, 10 years later. And the book ends up kind of, and it also has these cutaways to 1849 gold rush, California and 1980s Bombay. And it’s really an exploration of ambition and what it is required to make it in America. How you have to be better as an immigrant. And the burden that like, your parents arrived here and they made all these sacrifices, so you better make good on them. And the fact that there’s often just a very narrow definition of success in the particular corner of the Indian American community that I come from. The novel is sort of about a collective experience. It’s not the collective experience. It doesn’t stand for all Indian Americans, but it is, it does try to speak to, and with a we, to be in conversation with the community. 

Rachael Herron: [00:33:56] And it is gripping and beautiful and page turnery and the kind of book that I couldn’t wait to get back into bed to read my arc of it. So, thank you, Sanjena! It has been such a pleasure to talk to you. I wish you very happy writing and happy release weeking month thing and good luck with the book you’re working on right now. 

Sanjena Sathian: [00:34:16] Thank you. Happy writing to you, too.

Rachael Herron: [00:34:17] I know you’re going to knock it out. Thank you very much. Okay. Take care. Bye. 

Thanks so much for joining me on this episode of “How do you Write?” You can reach me on Twitter, twitter.com/RachaelHerron, or at my website, www.rachaelherron.com, you can also support me on Patreon and get essays on living your creative life for as little as a buck an essay at www.patreon.com/rachael spelled R, A, C, H, A, E, L and do sign up for my free weekly newsletter of encouragement to writers rachaelherron.com/write/

Now, go to your desk and create your own process and get to writing my friends.

The post Ep. 244: Sanjena Sathian on How to Make Every Word Count appeared first on R. H. HERRON.

Emma Straub is the New York Times-bestselling author of four novels, All Adults Here, Modern Lovers, The Vacationers and Laura Lamont’s Life in Pictures, and the short story collection Other People We Married. Her books have been published in twenty countries. She and her husband own Books Are Magic, an independent bookstore in Brooklyn, New York.

How Do You Write Podcast: Explore the processes of working writers with bestselling author Rachael Herron. Want tips on how to write the book you long to finish? Here you’ll gain insight from other writers on how to get in the chair, tricks to stay in it, and inspiration to get your own words flowing. 

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Transcript:

Rachael Herron: [00:00:00] Welcome to “How do you Write?” I’m your host, Rachael Herron. On this podcast, I talk to authors about how they write, what their process is and how their lives fit together. I’ll keep each episode short so you can get back to writing.

[00:00:15] Well, Hello writers! Welcome to episode #243 of “How do you Write?” I’m Rachael Herron. I am way thrilled that you are here today, as I’m talking to Emma Straub. Emma Straub is a blockbuster. She owns an incredible bookstore in New York and she wrote All Adults Here, which is a book that I absolutely loved. So, it’s going to be one of those episodes in which I covell and fangirl, and she’s such a beautiful writer and a beautiful person and I know that you are going to enjoy this interview. Oh my gosh, you can hear me stumbling. I didn’t even prepare notes of what I’m going to talk about because I am so tired. The house closed escrow. So we have sold the house and we’re moving to New Zealand. It’s really happening. I think I wasn’t willing to really believe it until the house sold. And we were so lucky that our house hit the market, sold and closed escrow in three weeks and six days. It did not even go to four weeks. It was all done and dusted. I’m still in the house. We’ve got another 10 days here in the house that we got back from the new owners. I’m sitting in a house that is not my own. It’s a very strange feeling when it’s been yours for 15 years and now it is not. And I was out there at this morning, watering, not my garden, before the heat of the day. It’s very strange. But that’s been really exciting. And so that was a couple of days ago that happened. So, I guess now we have to move to New Zealand. So, we’re doing that. [00:01:55] Let’s see, what else is going on around here? I am still somehow continuing to work and it’s going well. I am working on the revision of A Life in Stitches, adding a couple of essays and you might be able to hear that my voice is super tired. I am doing the audio book narration for it, which I am exceedingly excited about and it’s going great. The publisher never, I think I may have mentioned this last week, forgive me, but the publisher never did an audio book of this book, which was ridiculous. And it was something I was so irritated with them about because knitters and crafters listened to audio books before the rest of the world embraced the new audio revolution. The crafters had always been there and they always wanted this book in audio book. So now that I got the rights back, I get to do it. And now, that we’re in this house with empty closets, I took the closet furthest away from the street, I lined it with moving blankets, using this method that is really working well. And I will just say it here really quickly. I’m using command hooks to hang a cafe curtain rings with little hooks on them, with little, what are they called? Like pinchers. Clasps, and then kind of, I am connecting them to moving blankets. So everything is removable, which is important because it’s all fresh paint in that closet. But when I’m done, I just unhook the blankets, take off the command strip because those come off clean and then it’s like, I was never in there and I have this awesome audio booth set up. It sounds great. And I am truly enjoying the experience of reading this book. What I’m really enjoying is the experience of making this book. That was good. It was really good. I was proud of it, but I’m making it a little bit better and I get to use my voice to bring it to life. And that is just one of my favorite things to do. Y’all know that. [00:03:57] You all hear me extemporaneously and speaking too quickly and stumbling over my words. But when I get to do books and actual, really, really reading of what I’ve written, and that’s one of the things I love to do best.  I’m going to tell you a tiny, tiny little story. I was in college. I was not even in college, I’m in community college at this point because I couldn’t bear to leave my mama go to a four-year college yet. I wasn’t ready. So I went to this community college and I was taking English 1, you know, probably the very first thing. And we read in that a story that I’d read a million times before, Steinbeck’s Chrysanthemums and it’s a story that I love and this kind of bored professor, we were going to read it in class out loud and he were going to move around the room. And, you know, one person would read a couple of paragraphs and then the next one, he would move it and somebody else would read. Somebody read the first few paragraphs, I took over two paragraphs in, and then after I was done doing my part and I kind of paused to see if he wanted me to stop. He said, do you want to continue? And so, I read a couple more and then I remember this so clearly, I’m like, you know, 18, but he said to the class, he said, do you want her to continue? And they all, they said, I heard them like, do this noise. I was like, yeah, yeah, yeah. And maybe they were just saying that because they didn’t want to read out loud. But I loved reading that story out loud with emphasis, with passion, with emotion and when I was done, there was a silence and then they clapped and then afterwards a woman followed me outside and she said that it had made her cry. And I remember thinking, I’m reading words that I love and I’m putting my own expression into them. And how cool is that? And now, I get to do that in my own closet, in the back, reading essays that are important to me, reading fiction. I don’t know if I’m ever going to be ready to do that. But reading things, something that I wrote that I love that I’m passionate about. [00:06:05] So that’s been really, really fun and I’m getting a lot of work done on it. I’m hoping to finish it. I’m not hoping to finish it, I need to finish it by the end of next week. Because then we will be getting rid of everything in the house, including the stage furniture. There will be nothing in the closets including a recording studio. So I record this, I’m recording this on Thursday. By the time I talk to you next Thursday, I hope that I have it done and pushing it a little bit because I’m still continuing edits. I haven’t quite finished that either. So, I’m kind of editing and then recording and then editing and then recording and it’s fun. And I guess it’s giving me a place to put all this nervous energy that is coming out my pores. So, that’s, what’s going on around here. Let us jump into the interview with Emma Straub. I hope that you really enjoy it. Have as much as I enjoyed talking to her. She’s truly awesome. So, I wish you, my friends happy writing and we will talk soon. [00:07:03] Do you wonder why you’re not getting your creative work done? Do you make a plan to write and then fail to follow through? Again? Well, my sweet friend, maybe you’d get a lot out of my Patreon. Each month, I write an essay on living your creative life as a creative person, which is way different than living as a person who’ve been just Netflix 20 hours a week and I have lived both of those ways, so I know. You can get each essay and access to the whole back catalog of them for just a dollar a month. Which is an amount that really truly helps support me at this here writing desk. If you pledge the $3 level, you’ll get motivating texts for me that you can respond to. And if you pledge at the $5 a month level, you get to ask me questions about your creative life, that I’ll answer in the mini episodes. So basically I’m your mini coach. Go to patreon.com/Rachael (R A C H A E L) to get these perks and more and thank you so much.

Rachael Herron: [00:08:01] All right. Well, I could not be more pleased to welcome to the show today. Emma Straub. Hello, Emma!

Emma Straub: [00:08:06] Hi! Hi 

Rachael Herron: [00:08:09] Listeners, we have just gotten deep before the show on things like New Zealand and most importantly, cats. So, I, Emma’s already my best friend, but she’s not your best friend yet. She will be after this interview. Let me give you a little introduction so you know about her. Emma’s job is the New York Times-bestselling author of four novels, All Adults Here, Modern Lovers, not Levels, The Vacationers and Laura Lamont’s Life in Pictures, and the short story collection Other People We Married. Her books have been published in twenty countries. She and her husband own Books Are Magic, an independent bookstore in Brooklyn, New York. Welcome Emma. 

Emma Straub: [00:08:47] Oh, thanks for having me.

Rachael Herron: [00:08:49] I’m so excited. I’ve been so excited to talk to you because Modern Lovers has just been one of those books in my TBR pile forever and I haven’t gotten around to it. And I apologize for that. That is going to be immediately remedied because your publicist sent me a net galley for the upcoming paperback of All Adults Here. And I am in love, Emma. Your book is exactly what I needed to read right now, I fell into it with such excitement and gratitude. And so it’s one of those things, it’s one of those books, listeners that in the first scene, you’re like, no, yup, here I am, 100% committed. I’m not going to touch another book until this book is done. And in fact, I’ve kind of been having a crappy day and I promised myself after we talked, I’m getting in bed with your book and I’m not getting out for the rest of the afternoon. So, first and foremost, thank you for being my new favorite writer. I don’t mean to scare you, but you really are amazing. You’re amazing. 

Emma Straub: [00:09:51] It’s going to take way more than that to scare me.

Rachael Herron: [00:09:56] Good. Oh, that’s wonderful. You’ll hear my cat soon, that might work. Okay, so let’s talk about your writing process. This is a show for writers and we love to talk about process. I’m kind of a junkie for that question that we kind of roll our eyes when we get asked, but then we love to answer it. You know, what is your writing process? Can you tell me what your writing process is now, like now during the weirdness of the world? 

Emma Straub: [00:10:23] So when I was a youth, I used to be precious. I used to be precious about my writing process and I would only write in bed like Virginia Wolf and

Rachael Herron: [00:10:41] Oh I love that

Emma Straub: [00:10:43] a book with a cat or two, and I needed total silence and etc. And then I had children and it turned out that that was a lot harder to come by. 

Rachael Herron: [00:11:00] Yeah. I’ve heard this rumor.

Emma Straub: [00:11:03] Yeah. And by the time I was on my, by the time I was on my third novel, when I was writing Modern Lovers, I was writing it like on the subway, like literally anywhere. Literally anywhere where there were no small children that were related to me. And now, you know, so for the first, let’s say six months of the pandemic, I didn’t write a word because I have a five-year-old and a seven-year-old and all of a sudden, I was doing school while husband was at the bookstore, keeping that going, which is no small feat last year. I mean, you know, it’s funny. We like, sometimes we get into like, arguments about like, who was more miserable.

Rachael Herron: [00:12:12] Who usually wins? 

Emma Straub: [00:12:14] I mean, that’s the thing, it’s a problem. I mean, I would say I,

Rachael Herron: [00:12:17] I think you do.

Emma Straub: [00:12:19] I would say, I win, but he was like, I would say my like emotional labor was more intense but he was doing like more physical labor, which was intense and I don’t, I mean, it was bad all the way around is what we ultimately come to usually, depending on who’s having a worst day. But so, the first, you know, from March until like September, October, I didn’t write a word because I had no minutes in which to do so. But then in the fall, my, so one of my kids was in school five days a week, starting in September and the other one started totally remote. And then has, it has like worked its way up. So now they’re in school four days a week. God, it’s so boring. I’m sorry. It’s like, 

Rachael Herron: [00:13:33] This is not so boring. This is fascinating. But, I have just a quick question. What kind of writer are you when you’re not writing? Are you a grumpy one or are you just like kind of bobbing along?

Emma Straub: [00:13:44] I would say I’m bobbing along mostly because, but unhappily, like I’m bobbing along unhappily because I really love to work. I really love to work. Like I love to write. It’s my favorite thing. Like it’s, 

Rachael Herron: [00:14:02] It shows, it shows in your writing. 

Emma Straub: [00:14:06] I know. So, but yeah, so, okay. So basically once school was like reintroduced as a concept and we hired a wonderful, beautiful babysitter who could help, then, my, like professional life started to seem possible again. And then I started writing and yeah, I mean, I, what I’m writing now is so wild. It’s so different. And I think like, I think that this is, I think it’s going to be really, really interesting to be a reader in the next, let’s say five years.

Rachael Herron: [00:14:55] I have thought the same thing. Yeah. 

Emma Straub: [00:14:57] It is like, I mean, like if I am writing what I’m writing, like, it’s going to like I’m writing a book, that is time travel with has time travel. And like, if like I, who knows, like just people are going to be writing some wild, wild stuff and it is going to be really exciting and interesting to see how everyone is like processing the trauma of this year, you know?

Rachael Herron: [00:15:37] Yeah, I’m at once right now, I’m trying to balance two proposals. One is the happiest, most up-lit book I’ve ever written. And one is the darkest book I’ve ever heard talk about and in, up to, and including like, my wife won’t let me talk about the book in the house. 

Emma Straub: [00:15:54] Oh my God, oh my god, that’s going to be a problem.

Rachael Herron: [00:15:58] I think that might be a problem, but I think we are really just we’re all writing those peaks and valleys. Where did you write before all of this happened? Were you an outside cafe writer or were you an inside? Have you had to adjust to that? 

Emma Straub: [00:16:11] I have always been an inside person, but last, I guess I wrote most of All Adults Here in a coworking space that I could walk to. And it was perfect because it got me out of the house and I could drop my kids off at school and then keep walking and it was like a nice walk from home. 

Rachael Herron: [00:16:43] I had a coworking space for three weeks before the pandemic, I had just made the decision to do it. And I would take Bart there and take the train and it was like, you know, two stops. But did yours survive? Mine closed.

Emma Straub: [00:16:56] No, mine closed too. And you know, I think that like, I mean, one good side, if we can call it that, is that like, I am now able to work at home. Like, before I would have said, oh, I can’t work at home, but I can and I do. And actually, I bought something recently, just a couple of months ago that really changed my whole game. 

Rachael Herron: [00:17:24] Tell me it was an Alpha Smart. 

Emma Straub: [00:17:26] I don’t know what that is. 

Rachael Herron: [00:17:28] Oh, that’s a different topic for a different day. Tell me what yours is. 

Emma Straub: [00:17:31] I’ll be next, whatever that is. It sounds like a robot that writes my books for me. 

Rachael Herron: [00:17:37] Yeah. That I, that I would like to buy. I can’t afford that one actually. 

Emma Straub: [00:17:41] Yeah, I’m looking for that one, but I bought myself a treadmill for my, and an adjustable desk. So, I just walk on my treadmill. I don’t go faster than that because, but I love to walk and I just, I don’t really have time ever for anything. But now, I can walk for, you know, a half an hour or an hour maybe, and then sit for a while and walk and sit, and then I can write. I’m going slow enough that I can write. I can type and, 

Rachael Herron: [00:18:24] That’s sounds brilliant. I have wanted, I will admit that I made one once with a cheap treadmill I got off Amazon and it was not a good one. And then I tried to drill a shelf, and it was just really a bad idea all around and it kept on falling off of it, but I have a dream of having the real kind. So, it really, you really can write at it?

Emma Straub: [00:18:45] Yeah. And I mean, like it’s not even like, the real kind, like, so Ann Patchett, who is like my sister friend. 

Rachael Herron: [00:18:52] She’s amazing. 

Emma Straub: [00:18:54] That’s like all one thing, but mine is like a little Frankensteiny. But who cares? I just bought like, it’s not the cheapest treadmill, but it’s low profile. So like it’s really made for people to like shove under the couch or whatever. And so, it wasn’t crazy expensive and it has made my life better. So, I mean, I think that moving to New Zealand, like is already going to just improve things like 3000%. But what if you want to just like, touch it up even just like a scooch more. 

Rachael Herron: [00:19:33] I literally just had the thought, could I buy a cheap treadmill here because electronics are expensive there. Would I be able to get a step-down converter in order to run the voltage needed for the treadmill. And then I stopped that brain thought and then went back to listening to you. But yes, I think that that could really, really work. What is your biggest challenge when it comes to writing?

Emma Straub: [00:19:54] My own brain, I mean, I would say, I mean, it’s not fair to blame my children, right? 

Rachael Herron: [00:20:06] I don’t have kids so you can blame them. I don’t have that, that feeling that you shouldn’t.

Emma Straub: [00:20:11] Yeah. I mean, I guess the biggest roadblock is just that I have so many other things that require my attention. 

Rachael Herron: [00:20:25] I cannot imagine. 

Emma Straub: [00:20:27] I’ve like we’ve, this last year has been excruciating obviously. But the one thing that I feel really good about is that we are a better, more efficient, just like better functioning bookstore now than we were a year ago, even before the pandemic. And, what that means for me is just that I, they need me there less. 

Rachael Herron: [00:20:03] That’s awesome. 

Emma Straub: [00:20:04] Which is really, really, really good, especially, you know, since the fall, because, I’ve been writing and I am on deadline and, you know, God knows how long it’s going to take me to figure out, how to edit this time travel level, so, you know, I need all the time I can have, I can get, yeah. 

Rachael Herron: [00:21:36] Yeah. What is your biggest joy when it comes to writing?

Emma Straub: [00:21:41] I guess, I mean, I love a lot of things about it. I love when it slips in, like when it slips from the, from feeling like, okay, so I have this woman who’s like, 39, you know, from like when you like making conscious decisions to feeling like they’re people. I love that. I love that feeling.

Rachael Herron: [00:22:23] Does that happen to you in a first draft or is it, does it happen more in later drafts?

Emma Straub: [00:22:27] Yeah. I think it happens in the first draft, like, and at some point, you know, like it’s, it’s not always the same, but I like both with All Adults Here, what happened was that, like, I thought it was about, when I started, I thought that the book was really just about Astrid, who’s the, you know, the matriarch of this family, her daughter Porter and her granddaughter, Cecilia. Like, I thought it was really just about them, but then all these other family members kept, so like walking in, you know, and I mean, it’s like the same thing happened when I was writing Modern Lovers that like, I thought it was about this one family and then like the family next door, basically, I like kept like walking over there and I was like, okay, fine. It’s about them too. Like I get it. I get it. Brain. 

Rachael Herron: [00:23:30] Oh, and it’s just what my brain wants to read. Are you a fan of Elinor Lipman? 

Emma Straub: [00:23:36] You know, I am, I am I just, I, what did I just read? Oh my God. Something, I can’t remember a book by her.

Rachael Herron: [00:23:44] There are, I have levels in my brain and there, I don’t know if they’re color coded or numerical or whatever, but when I need, like, when I need soothing in a way I go to Elinor Lipman, but you just took one step above, you’re above her now. But I keep thinking about her and while I’m reading your books and the way that family is very real and very messy, but still, there’s just, it’s just underpinned with love. And that’s, it’s something that is so hard to pull off, organically and realistically, and it’s amazing. So, speaking of your writing chops, can you share a craft tip with our audience of any sort?

Emma Straub: [00:24:26] Oh geez, okay this is hard. I mean, this is like, I don’t know. Apologies if this is too broad, but my number one tip for people who are aspiring or emerging writers is to finish it, whether it’s a story or a screenplay or a novel. Perfection is a lie and like a dumb one. Like, I don’t know. I mean, I think there are a couple of people in the world. Like when I was in, I remember when I was in my MFA program, Kevin Brockmeier, who is an amazing writer came and talked to us and we asked him a question sort of like that or about his, no, it was about his process. And he said something and like, I could see the, like our faculty, like, you know, basically drawing there, like a hand and a line across their necks because he said what he does is he writes one sentence until it’s perfect.

Rachael Herron: [00:25:50] Oh no. 

Emma Straub: [00:25:52] And then he moves on to the second sentence and he works on that sentence until it’s perfect, but you know, it has to be perfect with the first sentence too. And he just goes on that way until he’s written the whole, and then he’s done. 

Rachael Herron: [00:26:06] Oh my God. Which is what every new writer thinks is the only way to write.

Emma Straub: [00:26:11] Right. And like, to me, that’s just plain impossible. Like just, yeah, I mean, I was born with, I don’t know if it’s just like, I dunno what it is, like a tube, like a one, like teaspoon, too much confidence or something. Like, I am always like, I’m done. Okay. That’s it. And then I have to go and fix things, but like, I just don’t think, I don’t think there’s any way to make something good unless you finish it. Like, it’s just, it’s so easy to psych yourself out and be like, oh, it’s not going to be good or whatever, like to like buy into the myth of perfection when, like that doesn’t matter. If like, if you’re choosing between, you know, having something to be perfect, I don’t know. I mean, I guess like if you’re Donna Tartt right, and your goal is to publish a book every decade, then like, maybe that is your goal. You know what I mean? 

Rachael Herron: [00:27:43] It is. But I would even argue with that, that there are a lot of people who want to be Donna Tartt and they aren’t finishing their books. I always say if revising, as you go is only it, your method, if you are finishing books. There you go. And Kevin’s got it, Donna’s got it. But most people don’t. 

Emma Straub: [00:28:03] Yeah. I mean, it’s so hard. It is so hard. 

Rachael Herron: [00:28:13] Yeah. Perfect. And I love that craft tip and I think we cannot hear it enough. What thing in your life affects your writing in a surprising way?

Emma Straub: [00:28:27] God, this is a hard question because I feel like everything that really affects my writing is not at all surprising because it’s like, you know, something that has some large gravitational pull on my time. 

Rachael Herron: [00:28:46] Can I ask you a pointed, Rachael directed question then? 

Emma Straub: [00:28:49] Yes please. 

Rachael Herron: [00:28:51] How do your cats affect your writing? Cause I really want to know. 

Emma Straub: [00:28:56] Well, right now, two out of three are snoozing right next to me. I, you know, I would say, here’s what I would say. Right now, when I’m on my treadmill, it helps me. Okay. I have a real answer. It used to be that if Killer, who is my 16-year-old. 

Rachael Herron: [00:29:22] Perfect Cat.

Emma Straub: [00:29:24] Of a possum. So, if Killer was on my lap, then it would, I can write for longer because, to move her? No, right? And now I, that’s how I feel about my treadmill. That like, if I’m writing and I’m walking, like I am a fidgety, 

Rachael Herron: [00:29:44] Yeah, me too.

Emma Straub: [00:29:46] Fidgeter, snacking. Like I, 

Rachael Herron: [00:29:50] Hair twisting, glasses adjusting. Yeah.

Emma Straub: [00:29:54] I probably need a glass of water. I probably have to pee. I probably need to snack. I probably need to whatever, you know. But if I’m walking on my treadmill, then I’m, I wanna do that. So I would say treadmill and cats both are anchoring devices. 

Rachael Herron: [00:30:17] I love that. And as a person who struggles with ADHD, I think I have to get a treadmill. I think it’s like, I think it’s necessary. Okay. And I’m going to throw this question at you and if your brain goes completely blank, that’s fine. But what is the best book you’ve read recently? And why did you love it? And this is impossible to write or ask of a writer and it’s doubly impossible to ask of a writer who owns a bookstore. So I apologize. 

Emma Straub: [00:30:43] Yeah, but I mean, I can do this. Okay. 

Rachael Herron: [00:30:47] My brain just goes blank when this comes up.

Emma Straub: [00:30:52] Okay. So right now, I’ll just tell you what, I’m, what I am reading and what I just finished. Okay. So, what I’m reading right now is The Galley of Colson Whitehead’s new book, Harlem Shuffle, which comes out in October. 

Rachael Herron: [00:31:07] Nice. 

Emma Straub: [00:31:08] And, it’s, you know, he’s, he had two really emotionally intense books in a row and I can see him having fun. 

Rachael Herron: [00:31:27] Oh, good. I’m so glad to hear that. I loved his, I loved his poker book for that reason.

Emma Straub: [00:31:32] Yeah, the Poker book, the Sag Harbor and even Zone One. Like, I mean, he’s written so many. Like he, they’re all bangers, you know, like they’re no skips, but yeah, it’s a fun one so that I’m reading and enjoying. My friend, Ashley Ford has a memoir that’s coming out in July, I believe it’s July.

Rachael Herron: [00:32:00] I can’t wait for that. I cannot wait for that one. 

Emma Straub: [00:32:04] It’s wonderful. It’s wonderful. You know, I feel really lucky. I mean, it’s sort of an absurd position to be in really where, like, where this has happened to me so many times, but I have so many friends, you know, who are people who I’ve made friends with as an adult who then write memoirs. And it’s like getting in a, like a machine and like going back and seeing someone’s whole childhood or like seeing what makes them who they are. It’s amazing. 

Rachael Herron: [00:32:48] Really being dipped, really dipped inside their brains. And how cool is it to be dipped inside Ashley Ford? Like that is amazing. 

Emma Straub: [00:32:56] Yeah. So that is terrific. And then I also just read this middle grade book called Middletown by a woman named Sarah Moon. And I don’t read much middle grade. I mean, my kids are five and seven. And so, I read a lot, I mean, I read a lot picture books and I read a lot of, sort of like younger chapter books, but yeah. But this sort of like, you know, third grade through like eighth grade kind of reading zone, I really haven’t dipped my toe in, since I was that age and this book is really good and it made me cry and it’s about sisters. And what’s really nice about it is that it’s about these two sisters whose mother is an alcoholic and it’s about them, sort of taking care of themselves and, but like nothing really bad happens to them, which is nice. 

Rachael Herron: [00:34:11] Yeah, yeah.

Emma Straub: [00:34:12] And also, one of the two sisters who’s in like the eighth grade, seventh or eighth grade in the book is gay, but it’s not a plot point, it’s not her coming out story. It’s just, you know, one part of who she is. And like, there is like a sweet, like sort of first romance. 

Rachael Herron: [00:34:44] Tell me the name of this one again. 

Emma Straub: [00:34:45] It’s called Middletown, the writers named Sarah Moon. And I love Sarah for many reasons. And one of which is that her daughter goes to the same school as my kids. And so, I see her at preschool drop off, which means she’s like one of like only a few grownups who I interact with out in the world. And she, like me is the daughter of a writer, and so we have a lot in common. Her mom is Amy Bloom

Rachael Herron: [00:35:20] Oh, wow!

Emma Straub: [00:35:21] whose white houses was a scorcher. 

Rachael Herron: [00:35:23] Yes. Wow. Yeah. Nice, nice lineage there. Oh my goodness. Oh, you have really good answers, Emma. Okay. I’m going to ask you the last question and then I’m going to say goodbye to you, but please stay on the line just for a second afterwards. Can you give us your logline pitch for All Adults Here? 

Emma Straub: [00:35:44] Yes.

Rachael Herron: [00:35:45] Okay. Sorry. I said it wrong. My wife always says, I said that wrong adults, not adults.

Emma Straub: [00:35:49] Say it, listen. This is your show. You can do anything however you want. Okay?

Rachael Herron: [00:35:56] Thank you! Thank you. 

Emma Straub: [00:35:58] You’re wife, she’s not the boss here.

Rachael Herron: [00:36:00] I was practicing it last night. All adults, all adults. Cause I do have some weird leftover New Zealand, Kiwi accent, things that come out and it just it’s, 

Emma Straub: [00:36:08] Well, it’s time to lean into that. 

Rachael Herron: [00:36:10] I know. 

Emma Straub: [00:36:12] Okay. So, all of those here, or as I like to say, All Adults Here is, 

Rachael Herron: [00:36:19] Thank you, Lala

Emma Straub: [00:36:21] it’s an inter-generational, multi-generational family story that takes place in the beautiful Hudson Valley in New York. It’s about a sort of a, you know, slightly fastidious matriarch and her three adult children who are each fucked up in their own ways. Can I say that?

Rachael Herron: [00:36:49] Yes, you can.

Emma Straub: [00:36:50] And then her granddaughter, Cecilia, who has just been sort of shipped up from New York city where she’s gotten into a little bit of trouble at her school. But yeah, I mean, it’s really about making mistakes, and figuring out who you are and forgiveness. It’s, you know, hopefully it’s funny, I think that makes me sound really serious, which like, there are some parts of it are. 

Rachael Herron: [00:37:26] It’s hilarious from jump, like no spoilers, but a lady gets hit by a bus and it is the funniest shit I’ve ever read. Plus, the end of that first scene, I was like, oh my God, Astrid, go, go with yourself. So I cannot recommend this more highly to people. Please pick this up. When does it come out and paperback? Is it already out on paperback? 

Emma Straub: [00:37:51] Yeah, yesterday. 

Rachael Herron: [00:37:52] Congratulations!

Emma Straub: [00:37:53] Yep. Thank you. 

Rachael Herron: [00:37:54] Happy paperback birthday. Thank you so much for being on the show, Emma. This is such a huge treat for me.

Emma Straub: [00:38:01] My pleasure and have a good move. Good luck!

Rachael Herron: [00:38:06] Thank you! Thank you! Thank you. 

Thanks so much for joining me on this episode of “How do you Write?” You can reach me on Twitter, twitter.com/RachaelHerron, or at my website, www.rachaelherron.com, you can also support me on Patreon and get essays on living your creative life for as little as a buck an essay at www.patreon.com/rachael spelled R, A, C, H, A, E, L and do sign up for my free weekly newsletter of encouragement to writers rachaelherron.com/write/

Now, go to your desk and create your own process and get to writing my friends.

The post Ep. 243: Emma Straub on How to Finish Your Book appeared first on R. H. HERRON.

Jennifer Craven is the author of “A Long Way From Blair Street” and “All That Shines and Whispers,” both works of historical fiction. In addition to her novels, she had bylines in various publications including the Washington Post, HuffPost, Motherly, Today’s Parent and more. When she’s not writing, she teaches fashion merchandising at Mercyhurst University in Erie, Pa.   

How Do You Write Podcast: Explore the processes of working writers with bestselling author Rachael Herron. Want tips on how to write the book you long to finish? Here you’ll gain insight from other writers on how to get in the chair, tricks to stay in it, and inspiration to get your own words flowing. 

Join Rachael’s Slack channel, Onward Writers!

Transcript:

Rachael Herron: [00:00:00] Welcome to “How do you Write?” I’m your host, Rachael Herron. On this podcast, I talk to authors about how they write, what their process is and how their lives fit together. I’ll keep each episode short so you can get back to writing.

[00:00:15] Well, hello writers! Welcome to episode #242 of “How do you Write?” I’m Rachael Herron. So thrilled that you’re here with me today, as I’m talking to Jennifer Craven, who was such a joy to talk with, and we really talk about how to get the words on the page, which is something that we are all always dealing with. So, that is coming up in the interview section. A little bit about what’s been going on around here. Y’all it’s getting closer, six weeks out. We’re six weeks away from moving to New Zealand. And when I say those words out loud, I don’t even understand them. I keep stopping in my tracks and thinking, oh my God, we’re really doing it. So, I know maybe you’re getting tired of hearing that. Sorry about that. It is just what is going on. We got a beautiful bouquet of flowers from the buyers of the house, saying they can’t wait to live here. So I’m thinking that they don’t want to cancel the contract yet. We still have, it is Thursday. We still have five days to go before escrow closes and I will believe it when I see it, but we just got the flowers yesterday and they’re gorgeous. And I just thought that was the most thoughtful, sweet thing ever. In the meantime, I have been actually getting work really done. I’m still working on Life in Stitches, the revision and the adding the extra chapters to it. I’m planning on hopefully starting to record the audio book next week because we have two more weeks in this house and I have an empty closet and I got all this stuff to line it with. So, I’m going to do that and record it before we go. [00:01:57] I also got another idea for a new book. They just keep coming to me. But this one is kind of sticking. I may see if I can write it while I’m doing a couple of other things. I always talk about how, for me, it is best to focus on a project and stick to it until it is done and then I pick up another project. However, there is an exception in my world with this and that is sometimes I am able to work on a fiction project at the same time that I’m working on a non-fiction project. And that’s what this would be. So, I could keep working on these non-fiction projects that really need to get off of my desk while perhaps I am writing a thousand words a day-ish or so on this new project. I will just say that it involves organized religion and tarot, and things that delight me to think about writing about, I don’t know if I ever told you all, but in my youth, I think that kids either go to sex, drugs, rock and roll or religion, and I was that teenager. Oh my goodness. I was Pentecostal, speaking in tongues, that kind of thing for about two years of high school. My hippie parents were incredibly upset about this. I think it was my best way of rebelling was basically becoming a Republican and a Pentecostal at the same time. Both of those things passed right around the time I got my first girlfriend, which changed everything and the church didn’t want me, at that point, I wonder why. But it would be really fun to write about that stuff. I dunno, it feels fun and dangerous. And, I shared this somewhere. I can’t remember where, but Hush Little Baby is to date my best book. It is my strongest work. Super proud of it. People are loving it. The people who are reading Hush Little Baby came out last month, loving it. I will say that people who are reading Hush Little Baby, are not that many. It is not selling well. Books right now, a brand new books, especially hardcover fiction is just not selling. [00:04:06] So, my book isn’t selling. That’s why I may not be a thriller writer for much longer, or I may have to take a break from it. If I want to write thriller, this is, these are my guesses. If you happen to be my publisher and you’re listening to this number one, I know you won’t. Number two, cause you’re very busy, Stephanie. But number two, I also know how publishing works. My first book did pretty well, very well. My second, and I’m talking about my thrillers, my second thriller, which just came out, Hush Little Baby, is not doing well. Which means that if I don’t earn out or get close to earning out my contract, the advance that they gave me, then they can’t financially offer me a new contract, because I’ve already been a blot against their bottom line, right. So, I know in my heart that perhaps I won’t be writing thriller for a little while. And honestly, my heart is okay with that. I’m just so filled with all these other book ideas that are not thrillers. [00:05:02] So that is all right, but it’s something I really wanted to make clear and actually made myself a note of this. And I can’t believe I remembered to say it, but there’s this myth that a good book will sell well. That is not true. Commercial viability has nothing to do with quality. And you’ve seen this. You’ve seen crappy books outsell all the other books. And you’ve seen your favorite book failed to perform well in the marketplace. Every once in a while, it will go together. A great book will sell well, and those are the ones that we celebrate. But, I’m far enough along in my career and I’m happy to report that I know that bad sales have nothing to do with the quality of the book. And that’s fine. I can hold both things in my head that I wrote a really good book that people love and also nobody’s buying it. I don’t know why I feel so cheerful about it, but I do. Because I know that this, I’m not in this for one book. And I bet that if you’re listening to this podcast, you’re not in it for one book too.  You were possibly in this game for the one book you’re writing right now, and then you want to get it out there into the world. The best thing you could be doing while you’re trying to get that first book out into the world is writing the second book and the third book and the 15th book and the 25th book. [00:06:18] You don’t have to go up to 25 if you don’t want to, but you’re a writer, you’re going to keep writing. And that is the thing, like while my book is either becoming a bestseller or failing to sell or somewhere in the middle, which I’ve been kind of on all of those spectrums, except for the extreme bestseller. I’d like to try that someday. While all of that is happening, it doesn’t really matter. That’s the part I have almost zero control over. I can Instagram about it. I can write blog posts. I can write articles and try to send people towards me so that then they then discover the book. But that kind of marketing is very hard to do. I can’t do much. I have no control. So, I choose to let go of that and work on the books that are thrilling me. The ideas that literally keep me up at night and I can’t stop thinking about, so that’s what I’m doing. And that is what I would encourage you to do, too. [00:07:14] If you are thinking hard about marketing, if you’re thinking hard about how to get an agent, number one, if your book is not done and revised a bunch of times, and it is the best, and you’re done to the best of your ability, you don’t need to do that right now. You don’t need to be researching that and figuring out how to do things. You need to be spending your time writing and revising the book so that then you can get it off of your plate and start writing the next one. When you get closer to releasing your book, you can start thinking about all that other stuff, but I’m just gonna encourage you to put the time in on the hard stuff. It’s the easy stuff is thinking about marketing. The easy stuff is thinking about what, where’s the publishing market right now when it comes to middle grade fantasy. That’s fun. Of course, you want to research that rather than doing the work, but again, get comfortable with doing the hard work of sitting down, keeping your butt in place, doing uncomfortable work. Anything else would feel better. But you know, that after you’re there 15 or 20 minutes, you slip into it and suddenly it starts to feel good to work. [00:08:18] So, I would challenge you if you haven’t done any writing this week, pick a time and a place, set yourself down and do a little bit. This is the work of your heart. Listen to me less and write more. I know that you can do it. I know that you have it in you. That’s why you listen to podcasts like this. That’s why you’re here, because writing is inside your heart. So please do some of that for yourself. Come find me on the internet, tell me how it’s going. And in the meantime, let’s get into this interview with Jennifer Craven, and I wish you very, very happy writing my friends. [00:08:53] Hey, you’re a writer. Did you know that I send out a free weekly email of writing encouragement? Go sign up for it at www.rachaelherron.com/write and you’ll also get my Stop Stalling and Write PDF with helpful tips you can use today to get some of your own writing done. Okay, now onto the interview.

Rachael Herron: [00:09:11] All right. Well, I could not be more pleased today to welcome to the show, Jennifer Craven. Hello Jen!

Jennifer Craven: [00:09:15] Hello! Thank you so much for having me. 

Rachael Herron: [00:09:17] So happy to have you. Let me give you a little bit of an introduction here. Jennifer Craven is the author of “A Long Way from Blair Street” and “All That Shines and Whispers,” I love that title, both works of historical fiction. In addition to her novels, she had bylines in various publications including the Washington Post, HuffPost, Motherly, Today’s Parent and more. When she’s not writing, she teaches fashion merchandising at Mercyhurst University in Erie, Pennsylvania. That’s why you look so cool. That whole fashion merchandising thing. So welcome to the show! 

Jennifer Craven: [00:09:50] Thank you. 

Rachael Herron: [00:09:52] Let’s talk about your writing process because obviously you’re a busy person and you do a lot of different things. 

Jennifer Craven: [00:09:57] Yes. 

Rachael Herron: [00:09:58] How do you get it all done? 

Jennifer Craven: [00:10:00] You know what? It’s not easy. I don’t think any writer would ever say it was easy.

Rachael Herron: [00:10:04] Oh my god, if they said it was easy. I’d probably boot them up the show, 

Jennifer Craven: [00:10:08] Honestly. Seriously. 

Rachael Herron: [00:10:09] Just like, click the hang up button. 

Jennifer Craven: [00:10:11] Yes. So, I mean, for me, it’s more of, kind of like, you know, the idea spark and then finding time to just kind of like, get it all, get all the words out, you know, and then go back and sort of revise. But yeah. So, you mentioned that I do teach there, like that. I do have kind of that day job thing going on, but in addition to that, I have three young kids. So,

Rachael Herron: [00:10:30] What are their ages? 

Jennifer Craven: [00:10:32] Eight, six, and four. 

Rachael Herron: [00:10:33] Oh see, that is, I don’t know how. Got to tell us how. 

Jennifer Craven: [00:10:37] That’s what a lot of people say to me. They’re like, how on earth? Like a lot of my friends have kids around the same age, you know, that sort of thing. But they play really well independently and they know that I write. They know that I’m a writer. We talk about that kind of stuff. They, you know, they show their books for like show and tell on, you know, like zoom. And,

Rachael Herron: [00:10:55] Oh, how cute.

Jennifer Craven: [00:10:56] I know, so, honestly, there, they just really kind of get it. And, but I, but I’m also very conscious to say like, okay, if my kid needs me, I’m going to stop what I’m doing and give my kid the attention. So, it’s a lot of maybe like I’ll bust out like a quick paragraph and then, you know, go do a puzzle on the floor or like, I’ll be coloring in a coloring book, like thinking about my plot. You know, that kind of stuff. So, it’s really just kind of like a balance, but yeah. So, it’ll be after the kids go to bed and thankfully mine go to bed like at a pretty decent hour. 

Rachael Herron: [00:11:27] Oh, that’s nice. Yeah. 

Jennifer Craven: [00:11:28] Yeah. Or weekends, or, you know, my husband’s great and he, you know, helps out. But honestly, when I really get in like the writing groove, it like flows. So, you know, I can really just kind of like, get it going and I get a good chunk done a lot of times. 

Rachael Herron: [00:11:44] I think that seems to be one of those blessings, hopefully given to most parents who have this, but I think there’s so much, and this is my guessing. So, you tell me if I’m right or not. But there’s so much that you can’t do that when you can let it flow, you have to let it flow. Like it’s just got to go. 

Jennifer Craven: [00:11:59] Oh, for sure. And that’s so true. You know, especially with first drafts, because sometimes I can get stuck in my head and over analyze what I’m writing and then I’ll say like, no, stop. Just get it out, just write. And then you can go back later and it’s probably going to be garbage and you might delete it all, but you know, at least it’s something there and you can like work with it and craft it from there. So yeah, I have to like really stop myself from trying to edit as I go along.

Rachael Herron: [00:12:28] Are you more of a plotter or a pantser? 

Jennifer Craven: [00:12:31] Hundred percent plotter. 

Rachael Herron: [00:12:32] Wow! Talk to me about that. 

Jennifer Craven: [00:12:34] Yeah. So, I am not a spontaneous person in, so like the idea of just like going by the seam of my pants gives me extreme anxiety. So, I’m like highly organized. I like lists. I like reminders. In fact, my office space is really a corner of my kids’ playroom. So, you know, I kind of have this, like, we have this agreement that I don’t want toys in my little area, you know, that kind of stuff. But I have a little, 

Rachael Herron: [00:13:02] That’s really beautiful though. Like they have the full reassurance that you’re right there. 

Jennifer Craven: [00:13:06] Yes. 

Rachael Herron: [00:13:07] But you’re busy.

Jennifer Craven: [00:13:08] Yes, 

Rachael Herron: [00:13:09] You’re doing your job and they’re doing their job. Yeah.

Jennifer Craven: [00:13:11] I mean a lot of times and I’ve snapped like kind of like selfie pictures for, you know, my Instagram where it’s like, I’m sitting here typing and my four-year-old is sitting right here, like playing cars, you know? So it’s kind of fun, but I do have this one little wall space next to me. And I recently just put up this big, huge piece of paper and I’m like plotting things and I have notes and I have pictures, ‘cause I like to like visualize characters and that sort of thing. So yeah, I’m definitely a planner. Definitely a plotter. 

Rachael Herron: [00:13:40] That’s awesome. I wish I could be more of a plotter someday, someday. What is your biggest challenge when it comes to writing?

Jennifer Craven: [00:13:47] Probably like that whole perfectionism idea, to be honest, you know. Just thinking about like, too far in advance of like, well, what am I going to do once the, and it’s kind of like, Jen, just stop, just be in the moment. Write what you’re thinking and you worry about all that other stuff later. That’s, I kind of have that problem in general and in life, you know. 

Rachael Herron: [00:14:07] Yeah, me too, me too.

Jennifer Craven: [00:14:9] You know? But, 

Rachael Herron: [00:14:10] You’re making it sound easy, though. How do you actually do it? Like when you’re at the desk and when the, how do you do it when the scene is just sucking?

Jennifer Craven: [00:14:18] Maybe take a break or maybe just think like, all right, I’ll come back to this, you know. I know I want to have this scene, but it’s really just not coming to me right this second, but I might have something else in my head. If I have another scene, I’ll just jump ahead, like, you know, have a page break and start something else and then I’ll come back. I don’t like that because I like, you know, that order sort of thing, but I’ll do it. And if I don’t have that secondary scene, it’s like, all right, maybe that’s my signal that I just need to like, step back for a second, take a little break, go for a walk, whatever, you know. Writer’s block happens. It’s a real thing. 

Rachael Herron: [00:14:52] It’s hard when we’re, when we have the time, when you don’t have much time to get it done, that must be really difficult when you do feel that blockage.

Jennifer Craven: [00:15:02] Right. I mean, yeah, I’ve listened to so many author interviews and things, and obviously authors who are older than me or whose kids are grown, that kind of thing. And they’re like, oh, I wrote all day and I, you know, sip my coffee and or whatever. I went away for the weekend to write. And I’m just like, what? You know.

Rachael Herron: [00:15:18] It must be nice.

Jennifer Craven: [00:15:19] I couldn’t even imagine. I have like at least 15 more years till something like that would be possible, you know, but it’s something to look forward to, I guess. But on the flip side, I liked having my kids around and I think it’s important for them to see me doing something that I love and, you know, they understand that, like feeling passionate about something and also understanding that like, mommy works, like I have things to do, you know? So, 

Rachael Herron: [00:15:45] I think that’s really, really, really beautiful. I love that. What is your biggest joy when it comes to writing? 

Jennifer Craven: [00:15:52] Definitely just hearing people’s reactions to my words, whether it’s like an essay that I’ve written for someplace or the books, you know, I’ve just had a flood of people just tell me the really nice things, you know. I had one person who I’m friends with on Instagram, who really is kind of like a new social media friend where we don’t know each other in real life and she sent me like a really sweet message. And those sorts of things just are really uplifting and validating that what you’re doing is, you know, not just for yourself, but other people are getting something out of it too. So, I mean, I would write, regardless. I would write if no one read it, but my grandma, cause she would read everything, you know. That sort of thing, but it’s really nice to hear other people’s validation. And if someone tells you otherwise, they’re lying.

Rachael Herron: [00:16:44] Do you, keep those at a certain way?

Jennifer Craven: [00:16:47] I mean, I definitely screenshotted that message from the one person. I did send it to like my mom and I was like, look how sweet this was. You know, it kind of made my day, but otherwise I just remember it and try to like live in the moment, whether it’s like, you know, with a friend or a neighbor, or I had a book signing like last, you know, week or two ago. And just really trying to remember those moments. 

Rachael Herron: [00:17:07] You had like an in-person book signing?

Jennifer Craven: [00:17:08] We did. I mean, I’m in a small town at a small local bookstore and we all had massive social distancing.

Rachael Herron: [00:17:13] Oh, that sounds so great. 

Jennifer Craven: [00:17:15] It was nice to kind of be able to get back in, in front of people and, and that sort of thing.

Rachael Herron: [00:17:19] Yeah. The reason I asked about saving it is because people who say that those things don’t light them up, I think are lying, like you said. And I really believe in saving them. I have something called a mash notes folder and the emails that touch me the most, I save in there for like a rainy day for like the worst day ever. I’m saving them. I’ve actually never had to go in and reread them. And I don’t, I’ve never felt the urge to reread them, but I think at one point I’m going to have a terrible, terrible day and I’m just going to have to go back and reread them. So,

Jennifer Craven: [00:17:48] Yeah. That’s a great idea. I love that. I mean, reviews online are always there, but those extra special things that were just sent to you personally. Yeah, for sure.

Rachael Herron: [00:17:56] Yeah. And the problem with the reviews online, is you know, then there’s the one stars also there, you know, you don’t want to read all of them. Yeah. Can you share a craft tip of any sort with us? 

Jennifer Craven: [00:18:07] So for craft, I kind of touched on this a little bit earlier, but I think probably just trying to like, get, just get the words out and not being like too stuck in your head. And then my other thing I was going to talk about was the plotting, which you brought up as well. And I 

Rachael Herron: [00:18:26] Well, let’s go a little deeper with the plotting. How do you do it? Are you keeping it in an Excel spreadsheet or in a notebook or what? 

Jennifer Craven: [00:18:33] It’s a lot of my head and a lot of stuff comes to me at night, which doesn’t, it always, you know, in the middle of the night. So, I might like jot something down on the, like the notes app on my phone so I can remember it in the morning, things like that. But, my husband’s really great because we kind of like sometimes bounce ideas off, or I’ll say, like, I kind of had this idea and he loves movies and movie kind of buff. So he has that like storyline sort of ability to what makes a good story. Not from like a writing perspective, but from a movie story.

Rachael Herron: [00:19:00] A story’s a story.

Jennifer Craven: [00:19:01] Yeah.

Rachael Herron: [00:19:02] If somebody understands story, they get it.

Jennifer Craven: [00:19:03] Right. So, I kind of usually have a general idea or I want to write a book about, it’s like kind of, sort of set in this sort of scene or whatever, and then I’m sure some of your listeners have heard of like the snowflake theory, where it kind of grows. 

Rachael Herron: [00:19:17] Talk to us a little bit more about it because I’m actually, it’s one of those series I’ve always meant to look at and I, I’m not very clear on that. So can you tell us about it.

Jennifer Craven: [00:19:22] It’s really kind of pretty simple, but just like a snowflake, kind of how there’s like a center, you kind of have like that really small idea. And then each little branch of like the snowflake would be kind of like growing it bigger and bigger and bigger. So, there’s, if you go to like a website, there’s all kinds of explanations, like detailed explanations of how to do this, but essentially, it’s really just starting small and then adding a layer, adding a layer, adding a layer. So I usually kind of have that original idea. And then think, okay, well, how could I up the stakes? Or how could I add more tension or okay, this character’s arc is going to do what you know, so, and then it just kind of builds from there. 

Rachael Herron: [00:20:02] I love that. I’m in that delicious period right now where I’m like trying to decide what book I’m going to work on next. So, I think I’m snowflaking all over the place and that’s, that’s really fun. So what thing in your life affect your writing in a surprising way? 

Jennifer Craven: [00:20:20] I would probably say teaching.

Rachael Herron: [00:20:22] Yeah, how so?

Jennifer Craven: [00:20:23] Just because I come in contact with so many people. So, I teach college and so, they’re adults. I’m not teaching like elementary school. So, I’m having conversations with these young adults all the time. So, I don’t really write Y.A books, but they’re sort of in that demographic. So, sometimes they’re kind of stories or experiences can inspire some ideas for me that I could then merge into like the adults’ realm. Yeah. Or tie in, like, sometimes I like to have a character who is kind of in that Y.A age range, but it’s not like the main focus, so it doesn’t become a Y.A book.

Rachael Herron: [00:21:02] Right. 

Jennifer Craven: [00:21:03] So yeah, it’s kind of interesting that the students, cause I, you know, college, it’s like a whole cross section of people and in my department is primarily female. So, I have kind of like a lot of those girl issues and cliques and those sorts of things. So, it’s interesting to see where those kinds of things end up in my books. 

Rachael Herron: [00:21:25] Can I ask a really dumb question? I don’t really know what fashion merchandising is.

Jennifer Craven: [00:21:30] Oh yeah. So, fashion merchandising is basically kind of like the business side of fashion. So,

Rachael Herron: [00:21:35] Okay, that’s what I assumed, like the marketing and the sales.

Jennifer Craven: [00:21:38] It’s more like buying and planning, those sorts of things. Visual merchandising, styling. All of those sorts of things. So yeah. It’s not like, we’re not teaching like the fine arts of sketching and draping. Not that kind of thing.

Rachael Herron: [00:21:50] Right. How does that inform your work? Does any of that kind of? 

Jennifer Craven: [00:21:55] The fashion stuff? 

Rachael Herron: [00:21:56] Yeah. 

Jennifer Craven: [00:21:57] I always find myself wanting to drop it into my books. Like in the one that I’m sort of querying right now out in the query world is, you know, the one I mentioned the dad wearing like his Ralph Lauren buttoned down and, you know, he’s expensive loafers and that kind of stuff. So that comes really easy to me, describing clothing. I mean, I, you know, I have a master’s degree in textiles, so I’m very in tune with like fabrications and how something would like drape on the body, you know. So sometimes I might go a little overboard on that because it’s just so natural, but it makes for a good description.

Rachael Herron: [00:22:32] It does. And actually, that’s a really nice bonus skill to have, because I feel like I’m always, if they’re not wearing something wool and knitted, I don’t know how to describe it. They’re wearing, they’re wearing clothes. Their bodies are covered in the way that should be covered legally. Yeah. That’s all I have.

Jennifer Craven: [00:22:47] We’re just at like a big benefit gala. So they were wearing like brocades and all these Italian, you know, so that was kind of fun. 

Rachael Herron: [00:22:54] I love reading those kinds of things. Okay. Speaking of reading, what is the best book you’ve read recently and why did you love it? 

Jennifer Craven: [00:23:00] I just finished. I feel like I was late to the bandwagon, The Vanishing Half.

Rachael Herron: [00:23:05] Oh my gosh. I’m the last of the band, right? It’s like on my Kindle and I haven’t started it yet. You loved it?

Jennifer Craven: [00:23:09] Okay. So, I was waiting for my library to open back up. Cause I want, I like to try to support my local library. And so I just got that two weeks ago, finished it in less than a week. So good. It was, it met all the hype for me. It was really great for fiction. And then before that, I actually read Hidden Valley Road. 

Rachael Herron: [00:23:30] Hmm, I don’t know that one.

Jennifer Craven: [00:23:32] By Robert Kolker, it was, I want to say it was maybe 2019, but it’s a true story based on a family in Colorado Springs who had, this was, would have been in maybe the 70’s –ish. 12 children, and six of them are, were officially diagnosed with schizophrenia. So, it was like a wild, true story, family story, but it also kind of delved into like the science behind it and the research and that kind of stuff. So, it was fascinating, but because it was a true story, it was just like, it was also, it read like a novel 

Rachael Herron: [00:24:07] I love those, kind of non-fiction. 

Jennifer Craven: [00:24:08] Yeah, so that’s definitely one to check out. 

Rachael Herron: [00:24:11] Thank you! Thank you. My TBR list goes deeper by the second. Okay. So, can you tell us about yourself, your most recent book and where we can find you on the internet?

Jennifer Craven: [00:24:21] Absolutely. So, my most recent book was All That Shines and Whispers. 

Rachael Herron: [00:24:26] It’s such a good title. Let’s talk about that again. Like, it’s beautiful.

Jennifer Craven: [00:24:30] Thank you so much. It came out in February. And it’s basically a re-imagining of the Sound of Music. So, it’s kind of like where the story ends or leaves off at the end of the film, kind of what happens next. So, if anyone is a fan of the Sound of Music, I think that you will like the book.

Rachael Herron: [00:24:50] I’m like a super fan. 

Jennifer Craven: [00:24:53] So am I, it’s my all-time favorite movie. And every time I would watch it and my kids and they know all the songs and all that kind of stuff, the film credits are rolling. They’re going up over the Alps and I’m like, I want it to keep going. I want more, you know, I want more drama and whatever. So I played with it. I had some liberties of imagining character lines and that kind of stuff, but I think, you know, it’s really just kind of like a fun, but some surprising twists, you know, that I sort of re-imagined, and that one, yeah. So, it’s a pretty quick read, but I had a lot of people saying like, oh my gosh, this totally like brings back the movie and it’s very nostalgic and all of that kind of stuff.

Rachael Herron: [00:25:32] Oh my gosh, I cannot wait to read this. I may start it tonight in bed. I think I need exactly that. And where can we find you out there on the internet? 

Jennifer Craven: [00:25:39] So I’m most active on Instagram. I’m @jennifercravenauthor   and a little bit on Twitter (@jencravenauthor), but I’m not, you know, super, super active there. I’m also on GoodReads, so I was posting about like, where you can, you know, what I’m reading and that sort of stuff. Mostly Instagram. 

Rachael Herron: [00:25:56] I love Instagram. And while my dog barks us out, I will just say, thank you so much for being with us, Jennifer. That was so, so, so awesome. And I wish you happy writing and I’m sorry about the dog.

Jennifer Craven: [00:26:08] That’s okay.

Rachael Herron: [00:26:09] Take care.

Jennifer Craven: [00:26:10] I’m so glad that we could chat. I appreciate it. 

Rachael Herron: [00:26:11] Me too. Alright, happy writing.

Thanks so much for joining me on this episode of “How do you Write?” You can reach me on Twitter, twitter.com/RachaelHerron, or at my website, www.rachaelherron.com, you can also support me on Patreon and get essays on living your creative life for as little as a buck an essay at www.patreon.com/rachael spelled R, A, C, H, A, E, L and do sign up for my free weekly newsletter of encouragement to writers rachaelherron.com/write/

Now, go to your desk and create your own process and get to writing my friends.

The post Ep. 242: Jennifer Craven on How to Get the Words On the Page appeared first on R. H. HERRON.

Ilana Masad is a fiction writer, essayist, and book critic whose work has appeared in the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Washington Post, the Paris Review, NPR, BuzzFeed, Catapult, StoryQuarterly, McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, as well as several others. All My Mother’s Lovers is Masad’s debut novel.

How Do You Write Podcast: Explore the processes of working writers with bestselling author Rachael Herron. Want tips on how to write the book you long to finish? Here you’ll gain insight from other writers on how to get in the chair, tricks to stay in it, and inspiration to get your own words flowing. 

Join Rachael’s Slack channel, Onward Writers.

Transcript:

Rachael Herron: [00:00:00] Welcome to “How do you Write?” I’m your host, Rachael Herron. On this podcast, I talk to authors about how they write, what their process is and how their lives fit together. I’ll keep each episode short so you can get back to writing.

[00:00:16] Well, Hello writers! Welcome to episode #241 of “How do you Write?” I’m Rachael Herron. So glad that you’re here today as I speak to Ilana Masad on something that is always really exciting to me to think about and to dwell on, which is chasing emotional obsession. It’s not really fair to say, but I’m going to say it anyway, that I am obsessed with obsession. I might be, might have a little bit to do with the fact that I’m an addict in recovery, but obsession is so fascinating in all of it. Tiny ways that it sneaks into our lives and all the big ways in which it can make our lives incredible or derail or kill us. So we talk about that and our conversation was just fascinating. I know that you are going to enjoy talking to her. You’re not gonna be talking to her. You’re gonna be listening to her, but listening her to talk to me and with me for your benefit. So please enjoy that. [00:01:18] What’s going on around here? Well, I’m still in the house for another three weeks or so. And then we move into an Airbnb. The sale is still going ahead. We’re supposed to close escrow in, I think 12 days, touch wood as my mother would say, I’m still very nervous about it. Oh, just nervous about everything. But yeah, that’s where we are in our move toward New Zealand. I did have a moment today when I was writing my journal and I thought, what the hell are we doing? Because all of a sudden it’s really close. Like I can see three weeks in our house, two weeks in an Airbnb, one week in Boise, and then we leave. That’s seven weeks away and then we are leaving to go live in a new country. Just the two of us with no friends, a very small smattering of family who, no you know, I’m not close to but they are a family and I liked them a lot, but wow. Wow! What the hell? That’s my feeling today. What the hell? Writing wise, I have been steadily plugging along my assistant Ed Giordano. If you have not heard the episode where we talked to each other on episode 200, you should go back and listen to that because he’s awesome. We have committed to some accountability together because its always helpful to have an accountability partner. And I want to reassure you that if you’ve had an accountability partner in the past and you flaked on them, we all have. That’s how accountability partners go. Get a new one, go back to the old one, restarted up. That’s part of accountability is failing and I really got pretty granular when I was talking to him about what I want to accomplish in the next few weeks while we’re so busy, I just want one hour, a day focused work on the project at hand.[00:03:11] And I have a bunch of projects at hand that I could choose from, but I am just choosing one at a time and I’m working my way through them. And generally I do more than one hour. But knowing that I have to do one hour, one focused hour means that I don’t look at my email first in the morning. I don’t all the things that are normally easy for me, are not easy for me right now. Well, everything is so upside down. So having that one hour to fall into, has been really awesome. This morning I was working so my project at hand right now, I will tell you is a re-release of my collection of essays in memoir shape called A Life in Stitches. It’s a 10 year anniversary, and I got the rights back. So I am self-publishing it with a new essay and a new epilogue, a new cover. I am hoping to get a bunch of beta readers from my email list because I would like some reviews. I have great reviews on the book and I am going to have to lose all those reviews, since the one thing you can’t change on the vendors is ISBN. And I do not own the ISBN the Chronicle books assigned to the memoir. So I have to give it my own ISBN, which means it’s a brand new book and I’ll lose all those awesome reviews. So that’s something I’m thinking about, but that’s what I’m working on right now. That’s my project at hand and working steadily on it.[00:04:29] Moving forward, it’s just getting done. It’s just getting done in one and two and three hour bursts, but mostly one or two hour bursts and it’s going to be done soon. And then I’m going to read the audio book of it, which I was so excited about. I don’t think I’ve mentioned that on this show, but I always wanted an audio book of that particular book. Knitters, listen to audio books, knitters, listen to audio books before anyone else was listening to audio books so that they could keep their hands free and their eyes on their work. Knitters crasher’s, crafters in general love audio books. So I’m very excited that I’m going to be able to do that. And in something I may regret, I’m going to try and do it here in the house in the next three weeks before we leave so that I can at least be editing it when we’re in New Zealand. So I am in the process of soundproofing, or at least sound dampening one of our closets because we’ve never had a closet that was empty. And right now we have bunches of closets. Well, three closets that are empty and I’m going to line one and make it into a soundproof chamber. We have air conditioning now that’ll save my life. So that’s what I’m working on right now. That’s what’s going on around here. [00:05:39] That’s enough of an update for me. Let’s jump into the interview with Ilana. I hope that you enjoy it. I hope that you are getting some of your own writing done. Do you need an accountability partner? Come to any of these episodes, HowDoYouWrite.net and at the bottom, there’s always a link to join my slack channel. Find an accountability partner in there. We have an accountability channel in onward writer, slack channel. So you should come and join that. All right. Happy writing my friends and enjoy the interview. We’ll talk soon. 

Rachael Herron: [00:06:07] Well, I could not be more pleased to welcome to the show today, Ilana Masad. Hello, Ilana, welcome!

Ilana Masad: [00:06:12] Hi, how are you?

Rachael Herron: [00:06:14] I am so happy to talk to you about All My Mother’s Lover’s. I have been really

Ilana Masad: [00:06:19] Thank you 

Rachael Herron: [00:06:20] looking forward to this interview. Let me give you a little bit of an introduction here. Ilana Masad is a fiction writer, SAS, and a book critic whose work has appeared in the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, Washington Post and the Paris Review, NPR, BuzzFeed, Catapult, StoryQuarterly, McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, as well as several others. All My Mother’s Lovers is Masad’s debut novel. And first of all, I loved it. 

Ilana Masad: [00:06:49] Thank you

Rachael Herron: [00:06:50] Second of all, I saw it referred to, and I kind of remember where I saw this, but I saw it referred to as a queer tour de force. And I really feel like that’s what it was. So first of all, I want to thank you for the way that you write about love 

Ilana Masad: [00:07:06] Thank you 

Rachael Herron: [00:07:07] and its forms. But even more than that, like my, one of my favorite things in life to write about, and to think about not to feel necessarily, but to write about his grief. And you do- I have goosebumps just thinking about your book right now. You did such an incredible job with that

Ilana Masad: [00:07:22] Thank you. Thank you. I, grief is one of those legitimately universal feelings. I think it just looks so different depending on who you are and when you are and where you are and how,

Rachael Herron: [00:07:32] Yes

Ilana Masad: [00:07:33] How you relate to it. But it’s something that I think any person who is lucky enough to have any kind of love in their life feels

Rachael Herron: [00:07:40] And I think it’s really important, what you just said to how you relate to it. I think how we all relate to it changes as we, you know, aging and changing the lives of, there are some people in my own life that I’ve known who are not willing to ever look at it. And then there are people who kind of enter into willingness unwillingly because of events. And I think that’s kind of what you look at in the book. And it was just so moving to me. So I would like to talk to you about your writing process. This is a show for writers and about process. However, I feel like you might have, this is my jumping to an assumption. I feel like you might have feelings about not writing a book like this, but also being a book critic. How does that feel? How do you put those two things together? How do you step out of your own way to get the work done?

Ilana Masad: [00:08:31] Well, in terms of, I mean, I think about fiction and criticism just very differently, you know, like they serve such different purposes in my life as a writer and I tend to not think about them in relation to one another very often, or at least I think that was true before the book was published. I think the process of publication as most writers will tell you is so utterly different than what writing is, right. Publication is like the opposite of writing. 

Rachael Herron: [00:09:02] Every way

Ilana Masad: [00:09:03] Right, exactly. And so, I think probably now I’m realizing more how much being a critic means that I get in my head about who’s doing better than I am, and who’s getting the accolades and, you know, and I need to always remind myself, well, first of all, it only looks like that from where you’re sitting, the people who are experiencing that are probably not feeling it the way that it looks. Right. Most people, I think, I mean, at least most writers I know even those who’ve succeeded very much don’t tend to feel the success in the way that it maybe looks like they should feel it. But otherwise, I mean, I, you know, and just in terms of the craft, I really don’t think about them in related ways at all. Which I think is lucky because I’m not sure I wouldn’t be able to write fiction if I had started out as a book critic, but I started out as a fiction writer. I just succeeded in my book criticism sort of writing earlier or more publicly than I did with my fiction writing. 

Rachael Herron: [00:10:08] That makes so much sense to me. For some reason, I thought the book critic proceeded the fictional, although really nothing usually proceeds fiction. We started so, so young that makes a lot of sense in my head. How does it- and these are just my own, I know these aren’t on the list of questions that I said, but how, how does it feel just out of curiosity, how does it feel to be critiqued?

Ilana Masad: [00:10:29] It’s weird, you know, because I find myself looking at the articles, like both from, you know, my own ego is there as a writer of like, what are they saying? And are they saying nice things? Or are they saying not nice things? What are they criticizing? But then also as a critic,

Rachael Herron: [00:10:44] Yes

Ilana Masad: [00:10:45] and I’m thinking of it like, oh, well, I don’t like I don’t critic. I don’t write criticism the way that this person wrote criticism and I’m critiquing the critique from my critic perspective of what the kind of criticism that I like and that I think is important. And the kind of criticism that I feel is bland or is nitpicky in ways that I don’t always think are useful, but that’s also my very particular approach to criticism. And it doesn’t mean that my approach to criticism is correct. It’s just mine, 

Rachael Herron: [00:11:13] It might be a superpower of sorts though. You don’t have, honestly, they can’t, you know how we talk about it in meditation when you’re, you know, when you can separate yourself from the thought and be looking at the thought. You’re kind of looking at the criticism and not wrapped up in the emotion perhaps of being inside and I’m guessing

Ilana Masad: [00:11:30] It’s both. I think it’s both. I think sometimes actually the critiquing of the criticism is probably a defense mechanism so that I don’t have to deal with my emotions about it. 

Rachael Herron: [00:11:41] Yeah. That makes total sense. Okay. So what is your writing process? How do you get it done? 

Ilana Masad: [00:11:48] You know, this is one of those questions that I think is difficult for me, just because it’s so different, depending on what I’m writing and it’s changed over time and it changes in terms of how my life changes. So, but I tend, it seems like what I tend to do is I write in short bursts. So like, I’ll have, I mean, first of all, I can’t write for very long at a time, you know, so I’ll sit down at my computer and maybe two hours is the most that I can do. And that includes reading over what I’ve written. And I tend to write in like, you know, like a month here and then I won’t for a long time. And by not writing, I mean, specifically fiction because I will be writing a bunch of other things, but not fiction. And then, I’ll take time off and then I’ll do another month. And yeah, I think that’s the NaNoWriMo training that I did, you know, like doing a lot of NaNoWriMo when I was younger and I still use it as kind of a tool, you know, like, oh, November’s coming, let me plan out. Like, I’m going to have a chunk of something that I’m going to write during that month. Even though it won’t be maybe the amount of words or, you know, I’ll just use it as a tool, you know? But again, everything that I write tends to happen differently, like sometimes I’ll sit down and write a whole flash fiction piece at in one go and it’ll be nearly done from that one time. And then some short stories I will take, you know, months and years to figure out. So I think it really just depends. I wish I had a, you know, a more consistent practice, but I just don’t. 

Rachael Herron: [00:13:22] Well, I love to how you’re illustrating for listeners, how our writing processes do change. And that’s why I do the show because mine is always morphing and changing just a little bit. I am a huge NaNo fan. My first published novel was a NaNo. My first NaNo actually. And I’m on the writer’s board. And I just think that, you know, like the month as a package of time is so useful for a lot of writers, not for every writer, but for a lot of us.

Ilana Masad: [00:13:50] Yeah. And the gamification aspect of it as well was fun though, getting a little badges and things, you know, it’s like just little rewards 

Rachael Herron: [00:13:56] and just knowing that you’re not alone, 

Ilana Masad: [00:13:58] Yes.

Rachael Herron: [00:13:59] You’re really, really not alone. So what is your biggest challenge when it comes to writing?

Ilana Masad: [00:14:03] Well, I will be very honest. I think the biggest challenge at the moment is my own fear of writing again and my mental health, and the difficulty in pulling back from things that give me more immediate gratification or cookies. Like I just mentioned, you know, like those badges. So the fact that writing, you know, it takes time and it requires some form of discipline but I’m so terribly and utterly burned out from four years of graduate school, while simultaneously freelancing is a book critic, then I’m finding it really difficult to get myself back into that discipline the groove, although I’ve managed to do it in the past and so I will, again, I am sure I will again.

Rachael Herron: [00:14:44] It sounds like you understand seasons. 

Ilana Masad: [00:14:46] I’m trying to, it’s very, that’s, you know, it’s hard to remember that when I’m alone in a bad moment but I try to remember that. 

Rachael Herron: [00:14:55] Yeah. What is your biggest joy when it comes to writing? 

Ilana Masad: [00:14:58] Well, that again, I think changes, right. And I think that recently I’ve lost a lot of that joy and I’m trying to get it back and to remind myself of the things that I love about writing and about stories, because I think that I’ve fallen into this trap of capitalist consumerist culture. And I’ve started to think about my work as a product rather than as art, right. That’s meant to touch people. And even if that’s 5 people, if that’s 10 people, rather than like, oh, I need to count how many people it’s touching. And I mean, it’s true that a book is an object, is a product, right? I mean, the reality is the thinking of, but the reality is that thinking about it this way, it’s really the quickest way at least for me to lose sight of why I write. And I think I write to forge connections between readers and a story to delight, to cause someone to feel as deeply when reading as I feel while reading, to draw someone toward a different place and time and person and I mean, making things up as this weird kind of alchemy, right? It’s making something from nothing or making something from a jumble of impressions and ideas and mysterious spaces, and that’s kind of magic. That’s the closest thing that I recognize to magic. So I guess my biggest joy is when I get to that moment in a story that surprises and delights me where it feels like what it feels like, what it’s about and what it’s doing. It knows. It knows those things. The story knows those things, whether it’s short or long. And I’m kind of just along for the ride. And I mean, it doesn’t happen as often as I’d like, but when it does happen, wow. You know, like that’s just mind blowing and amazing when it does happen. 

Rachael Herron: [00:16:33] It is mind blowing. There’s a sound that I like to think about when the book does something like that, when things fit together and you reach that moment and it almost in my head makes an audible *inaudible voice* noise when you feel that. And if only I could feel that every day, 

Ilana Masad: [00:16:48] Yes exactly, I wish. Of course

Rachael Herron: [00:16:50] but you can’t feel that today, that’d be amazing. 

Ilana Masad: [00:16:53] It would.

Rachael Herron: [00:16:54] Can you share a craft tip of any sort with us? 

Ilana Masad: [00:16:57] Sure. So I will say that I feel kind of wildly unqualified to give craft tips, even though I teach creative writing. But the reason I say that is because I’m not always sure how to separate craft elements out when discussing them, because they seem to always relate to one another, right? Like they never really stand in a vacuum and I also find that myself and I think many other writers too, I don’t think about my own writing through the lens of a craft perspective, even though I obviously practice craft elements. Otherwise I, you know, I’d not be writing anything, but it’s, I don’t always think about it very consciously through those lens, which I know some writers are able to do that. I’ve just not one of them. But here’s something maybe I hope, so in terms of idea generation, I often hear that we’re supposed to write what we know, right? Like that that’s a cliché, like what do you know? And I find that kind of ridiculous advice because fiction, isn’t only about what we know. It’s also about the imaginative limital space of discovery and invention and the plurality of genres that we have outside the motive realistic. Prove that like you can’t have fantasy. With writing, what, you know, you just, you can’t because we don’t actually know how physical magic works or how dragons work. We don’t, we invent that. Right. If we wrote what only, what we knew, we’d be writing memoir and even memoir, you know, most nonfiction writers will tell you that it’s not about objective truth or certain knowledge because human memory is fallible human beings, right? Human beings. We’re not objective creatures and we have lots of very rational and complicated feelings, which are subjective. So in terms of idea generation, I’d say right toward your emotional obsessions. So, you know, like I’ve been writing about grief and death and parent-child relationships for ages. And then I published a novel where these ideas were like at the center, right. But recently I’ve become more obsessed by ideas about truth and trauma and how we define mental illness. And who gets to define it, and how and why they’ve gotten to define it. And so in terms of idea generation, my advice is what are you obsessed with? It doesn’t have to be big. It doesn’t have to be like something you have to research. It can be an emotional obsession to like, not just, you know, I’m obsessed with this particular stamp that’s in my grandfather stamp collection, although that can also generate, there are many novels that start with weird stamps, right? But what are the emotional obsessions and what questions do they raise for you? Because I think the fiction is a really wonderful venue for exploring questions, especially on answerable ones or ones where the gray areas are much more interesting than the definitive answers. 

Rachael Herron: [00:19:39] I absolutely love this idea of interrogating yourself for, to look at your emotional obsessions. I often think about looking at obsessions and I recently wrote a first draft of a very terrible book, which might turn into something someday, who knows. But, it was based on my obsession with luggage I, when I am stressed, my wife always knows when I’m stressed out because I’m on Amazon reading luggage reviews. I never buy luggage. I already have the perfect luggage. Like I bought that years and years ago, but they soothed me. And so I wrote, so this became a book, but what it really was, was a journey into the emotional reason behind this person’s need for what did luggage actually mean to this person and where, you know, what

Ilana Masad: [00:20:18] and what that is

Rachael Herron: [00:20:20] Yes, exactly. It’s super easy.

Ilana Masad: [00:20:22] It’s so good

Rachael Herron: [00:20:23] It’s so right there. 

Ilana Masad: [00:20:24] Right there.

Rachael Herron: [00:20:25] It’s my dreams of like, you know, there’s a tsunami, I wonder if I’m stressed out. Yeah. I’m not too deep in that way, but really looking at that emotional connection to the obsession or the emotional obsession, I think is really beautiful. Thank you for that. 

Ilana Masad: [00:20:38] Thank you

Rachael Herron: [00:20:39] That’s going to blow someone or many someone’s in mind as they’re listening to this. Can you tell us what thing in your life affects your writing in a surprising way?

Ilana Masad: [00:20:48] Sure. Well, so I think first of all, I think that everything affects my writing to one extent or another, like really. I mean, I feel that I, you know, I think many writers are kind of sponges, emotional sponges or detailed sponges. I think we have different things that we noticed or become sponges for but in that way, like, there are so many things that I wouldn’t even know affected my writing. But at least with the book because I’m not really sure what is, what that surprising thing is with what I’m working on now. But with the book, it took me until I finished writing it and other people started pointing this out for me to realize how Jewish a book it was. Like, I really did not realize that even though there’s a shiver at the core of the book, I don’t know, it seemed like as I was writing it, that wasn’t the important part or it wasn’t unimportant part, or it was just, you know, that was something that I was writing into what I knew kind of, sort of, but it wasn’t until afterwards that I realized, oh, this is actually quite a thread that continues throughout the book. Hah! Interesting. Because I have such a weird, weirdly emotional changing relationship to Judaism, to my own Judaism because of where I grew up and because of what it meant to grow up, where I grew up and so, yeah, so it just, it was surprising to me to realize I’ve written such a like “Jewy” book.

Rachael Herron: [00:22:20] Isn’t that? Interestingly, when somebody points something out and you’re like, well, it is, yes, it is right. It’s right there. You’re right. It’s right there. And I didn’t know, is the Judaism finding its way into the current work in progress that you know?

Ilana Masad: [00:22:32] Not at all. Not at all though, then this time, not even like a little bit, which is fine, 

Rachael Herron: [00:22:37] But I bet there will be something that somebody points out about that book at some point that you will not have seen coming. 

Ilana Masad: [00:22:41] Probably, 

Rachael Herron: [00:22:42] which I think is 

Ilana Masad: [00:22:42] Probably

Rachael Herron: [00:22:43] Delicious. I love that. I love that about writing. What is the best book that you’ve read recently? And why did you love it

Ilana Masad: [00:22:51] There’s a lot. So I’m just gonna, I’m just gonna talk about one though. I think. So I recently read Akwaeke Emezi’s Freshwater, which, I mean, it was really big in 2018 when it first came out. 

Rachael Herron: [00:23:02] I didn’t read it then, but I heard a lot about it. Yeah.

Ilana Masad: [00:23:04] And I hadn’t gotten around to it then, either, but I did read and review a, and this is a latest novel a few months ago, the Death of Ubik Ogi. And I was really excited to finally read their debut a couple of months ago and I found it just extraordinary. And it’s use of narrative voice because it’s narrated by the gods and or spirits inhabiting a human. And it’s this beautiful. 

Rachael Herron: [00:23:25] That’s ambitious. 

Ilana Masad: [00:23:26] Yes. And it’s this beautiful kind of reorientation of what in the west many people might recognizes or categorize as a mental illness, but which instead is wrestled with and eventually embraced as like a valid and even sacred form of difference that relates to the human ada’s history and belief system and traditions and worldview and it also views itself, it allows itself to move through time in this really fluid and unapologetic way that I really enjoy. I have troubled myself writing without this kind of strict delineation of time and knowing like when everything is happening, which is part of why my book is sort of condensed in this quite short period and there’s dates and everything, because I helps me think. But I really admire how Emezi sort of allows the story to unfold via this kind of more narrative sense of time. So time that allows itself to sway from past to recent past following the needs of the narrative and the needs of what needs to be explored, what needs to be given backstory, what needs to, why we need to maybe jump forward at some time, why we need to then fold back. And I just really admire that kind of fluidity that’s in there so just from my, both from a story perspective and from a craft perspective, I really, really admire it. 

Rachael Herron: [00:24:39] If I were to read one of their books, would you recommend that one, more than the newer one?

Ilana Masad: [00:24:43] Oh, I would recommend both now because they’re both very different. But for I guess if you’re looking for a really cool narrative structure and narration structure and aeration choice, yes, I would take Freshwater, first. 

Rachael Herron: [00:25:04] I really liked the way that your whole being lit up when you were talking about that narrative structure. It sounds really exciting to me. Let’s talk a little bit about your book and for those who haven’t read it, will you please tell us maybe the log line or how you describe your book.

Ilana Masad: [00:25:20] Sure. So, it is about a queer 27-year-old woman named Maggie, whose mother dies very suddenly in a car crash. And Maggie goes home for the Shivah and the funeral. And while she’s there, she discovers five letters that her mother asked to have sent out upon her death. And they’re all addressed to men or to names that she recognizes as men’s names. And she’s like, who are these dudes? Because my mom has been married to my dad for however many years and like, seems like a perfect marriage. And both in order to discover who these men are and in order to escape her grief and the reality of the Shivah and her family, and needing to sit with people, she decides to go on a road trip to deliver those letters and begins to get to know her mom in a way that she never had before. 

Rachael Herron: [00:26:11] The mother-daughter story is like, it’s the- two things for me in writing and reading: is grief and mother daughter story. And oftentimes those things are linked. So basically you were pushing every button that I own. So thank you for that. I really, really appreciate that.

Ilana Masad: [00:26:26] Thank you for reading it. 

Rachael Herron: [00:26:27] Of course. So again, the book is called All My Mother’s Lovers and where can we find you and all the things that you do online?

Ilana Masad: [00:26:35] Well, and the paperback is also coming out soon. I’m not sure when this is going to be airing, either just came out or 

Rachael Herron: [00:26:42] By the time this airs, the paperback will be out. 

Ilana Masad: [00:26:45] Okay. Great. Well, so there’s a lovely paperback, which is all writers know is the best of all formats. So please enjoy the paperback. And you can find me online at @IlanaMasad.com, that’s my website on Twitter and TikTok, I’m @ilanaslightly, and on Instagram, I’m @ilanaslightlyignorant and I am on those platforms too much. 

Rachael Herron: [00:27:10] I have actually never had an author give their TikTok handle here. And I’m very excited to go follow you because I can’t like that is my that’s my dopamine reward, is TikTok land.

Ilana Masad: [00:27:20] Well, I confess to not having a niche. I use it very much the way I use all other social media, which is with my small little live journal heart, by which I mean sometimes it’s cringe and sometimes it’s political and sometimes it’s funny and sometimes it’s cringe again because I that’s when I came of age.

Rachael Herron: [00:27:43] Well, I can’t wait to follow you over there. Ilana, thank you so much for your time and for your book and for your words of wisdom here, it’s been a treat.

Ilana Masad: [00:27:50] Thank you. Thank you so much for this and for doing this as a former podcaster, I know how much work it is and I really appreciate it. 

Rachael Herron: [00:27:59] The pleasure is 100% mine. Thank you so much and happy writing!

Ilana Masad: [00:28:02] You too! 

Rachael Herron: [00:28:03] Bye!

Thanks so much for joining me on this episode of “How do you Write?” You can reach me on Twitter, twitter.com/RachaelHerron, or at my website, www.rachaelherron.com, you can also support me on Patreon and get essays on living your creative life for as little as a buck an essay at www.patreon.com/rachael spelled R, A, C, H, A, E, L and do sign up for my free weekly newsletter of encouragement to writers rachaelherron.com/write/

Now, go to your desk and create your own process and get to writing my friends.

The post Ep. 241: Ilana Masad on How to Chase Emotional Obsession appeared first on R. H. HERRON.

Kathryn Nicolai is the creator of the enormously successful podcast Nothing Much Happens and the author of the book of the same name. Nicolai is an architect of coziness, writing soothing stories that both ease the reader into peaceful sleep and teach the principals of mindfulness so that waking hours likewise become sweet and serene. She leans on her years of experience as a yoga and meditation teacher to seamlessly blend storytelling with brain training techniques that build better sleep habits over time. She is the owner of Ethos Yoga. She lives in Michigan with her wife and three dogs.

How Do You Write Podcast: Explore the processes of working writers with bestselling author Rachael Herron. Want tips on how to write the book you long to finish? Here you’ll gain insight from other writers on how to get in the chair, tricks to stay in it, and inspiration to get your own words flowing. 

Join Rachael’s Slack channel, Onward Writers!

Transcript:

Rachael Herron: [00:00:00] Welcome to “How do you Write?” I’m your host, Rachael Herron. On this podcast, I talk to authors about how they write, what their process is and how their lives fit together. I’ll keep each episode short so you can get back to writing.

[00:00:16] Well, Hello writers! Welcome to episode #240 of “How do you Write?” I’m Rachael Herron. I’m absolutely thrilled that you are here with me today because today I am talking to Kathryn Nicolai and I fan girl quite a bit. This woman has changed in my life, because she has changed my sleep. She tells stories that help you go to sleep. And she has a book about it too. And it just popped into my head one night when I was listening to her voice. I thought, oh my goodness, I want to talk to this writer. And she said, yes. And it’s a fantastic conversation. We talk about focusing on the good in life and also in writing, I know you’re going to love it. I can’t wait to re-listen to it myself, honestly. So that’s coming up, stick around for that. [00:01:03] What’s going on around here? Well, the house sold, it went on the market last Wednesday, and it’s sold on Monday. So five days, tons of people through the house, we were not here. We exited the house and stayed at a friend’s house who was out of town, which was so miraculous and wonderful. It sold quickly. It sold for above asking, and I will believe it when the money hits the bank and I hand the keys over until then, I’m just very, very hopeful because everything is working out. Timing wise, the staged furniture gets to stay in here we were out of the house for about a week or so, and it was really hard to un-nest the house that we had lived in 15 years and leave just the stage furniture in here. And some things that we hid in closets and drawers, you know, like our spices, I still want to cook for the next five weeks while we’re in the house. And then we came back to the house last night and re-nested all of the stuff that had traveled with us over to my friend’s house is now all over all the tables and the counters. And, you know, my desk has exploded and it’s everywhere and we’re going to have to un-nest again for the appraiser to come through. And then for the buyers who we are allowing to come through and measure things and do things like that.[00:02:23] So we have to re-stage it. Which is weird. But it feels really good to be back in these walls where we have spent 15 years, even if the house looks nothing like ours, it looks beige. If you’re looking at me on YouTube, number one, I apologize about my hair. It’s just been a day. And number two it’s all gray. Like I said, white carpets. It’s not us. I literally went to Home Depot and bought seven drop class to cover the carpets. I am not letting our feet touch these white carpets, even for a moment, I don’t trust us. So that’s where I’m at and living still in chaos and trying to get more and more comfortable with that because it’s going to be this way for a while. In terms of writing, I have only been writing during Rachael Says Write, I think I mentioned this last week. I really like Rachael Says Write, those two hours twice a week people show up and write and I am one of them, that is like a sacredly held space for me to do my writing. Otherwise I’m having such a hard time finding time to fit it in. So that’s I always record these on Thursday and that’s happening this afternoon. Thank goodness. I’m going to be writing a Patreon essay about nesting, about what it means to have home, what home means, what it means when you adjust it for good reasons, you know, good grief. We are the luckiest. We’re not being displaced by war. We are choosing to do this amazing, exciting thing that we are very, very, very privileged to be able to do. But it still makes me feel like a cat who’s just had cold water thrown all over them and just the lack of continuity really puts me on edge. And that’s, you know this, an exciting thing for me.[00:04:22] I believe that one of our biggest goals in life is to learn how to deal with moments that aren’t comfortable. Especially when it comes to our writing, dealing with moments that aren’t comfortable. If we want to be comfortable people who have a happy, smooth life, we are not going to be writers. Writing is hard to do, and it’s not smooth. And it is uncomfortable. A great majority of the time. And if we are people who cannot stand discomfort and run away, of course, we’re going to stay away from our manuscripts forever and knock it back to them and not do the writing of our hearts. If we get comfortable, or more comfortable, nobody’s going to get comfortable with it. But if we get more comfortable with discomfort and being able to sit at the desk and look at the words that are just stupid, that sound wrong, that sound awful and realize, oh, they went, now it won’t be very good right now, but I can fix them later. I’m not going to fix them today. I’m going to fix them later when I’m in a fixing stage. And when we’re in that fixing stage and it feels bad and wrong and uncomfortable, we just know that that’s part of the process as a writer. That’s what it feels like. We just keep coming back and therefore things get done. We are not going to be comfortable as writers, but we are going to be living as writers. And I think that’s really, truly amazing. [00:06:45] So that’s about what’s going on around here. I would love to hear what’s going on with you, how your writing is going. Please reach out to me. I will be releasing a couple of bonus episodes here, coming up, including the talk that I had when my book launched last week. I got the permission to do that and that’s going to be fun. And then I have a writer Q&A, for those of you who subscribe at the $5 and up level on Patreon. I’ve got some many questions, many answers coming at you. So hopefully I’ll get those out this week, but I wanted to make sure that this went out on Friday as always. And I’m going to wish you a very happy writing and I’m going to also wish you happy sleeping, perhaps listen to Kathryn’s dulcet tones as you go to sleep tonight. And let me know how that goes for you. You’re going to love the way she writes stories. Okay, my friends I’ll talk to you soon and happy writing.[00:06:35] This episode is brought to you by my book Fast Draft Your Memoir. Write your life story in 45 hours, which is, by the way, totally doable. And I’ll tell you how. It’s the same class I teach in the continuing studies program at Stanford each year, and I’ll let you in on a secret. Even if you have no interest in writing a memoir, yet the book has everything I’ve ever learned about the process of writing, and of revision, and of story structure, and of just doing this thing that’s so hard and yet all we want to do. Pick it up today.[00:07:11] Well, I could not be more pleased today to welcome to the show, Kathryn Nicolai. Hello, Kathryn! 

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:07:16] Hi, thanks so much for having me. 

Rachael Herron: [00:07:18] I am a little giddy. I’m a little starstruck. We were already connecting before this. Let me give you a little introduction for people who don’t know who you are yet. Kathryn Nicolai is the creator of the enormously successful podcast, Nothing Much Happens, and the author of the book of the same name. Nicolai is an architect of coziness, writing soothing stories that both ease the reader into peaceful sleep and teach the principles of mindfulness. So that waking hours likewise becomes sweet and serene. She leans on her years of experience as a yoga and meditation teacher to seamlessly blend storytelling with brain training techniques that build better sleep habits over time. She is the owner of Ethos Yoga. She lives in Michigan with her wife and three dogs. Welcome!

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:08:01] Thank you so much for having me.

Rachael Herron: [00:08:04] So I found you by, probably the way everybody else finds you, which is, you know, searching sleep podcast. And I’m sure that yours was the first one that came up and I have tried everything to sleep over the course of my life, literally everything. And I swear to God, Kathryn. Yours is the only freaking thing that works. 

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:08:23] I’m so glad that you’re getting sleep. 

Rachael Herron: [00:08:25] It is amazing! I have been, I usually go to bed before my wife, but every once in a while she comes to bed at the same time. And she, and this is what I want to first start asking you here. Like, so my wife goes to sleep like four seconds before her head even hits the pillow and it’s incredibly irritating and I never sleep. So, I asked her the night that she came to bed recently at the same time as me. Do you mind if I play my friend’s story? And she goes, no, I’d love to hear what it sounds like. And she never even got past the introduction. So your story, how are you asleep? I’m dying to know 

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:09:03] I do sleep really well because I’ve been doing this my whole life. One of my first memories being like four years old, was laying in bed at night and having that awareness of imagination where, oh, I can take my mind anywhere? Oh. And being like four years old and going, I could tell a story, you know, I was obsessed with stories even as a kid and especially audio stories. I can remember, I have a condition called aphantasia, which means I can’t visualize anything. I have no inner eye. So, I think I really have always responded to audio and I remember like I had a Peter Pan record, and I would play it over and over the story of Peter Pan. And then my dad got me in like my first books on tape and I ran that thing out. He had to check it out from the library, like every other week for the entire summer. And so stories were always big to me and so I’d always done this my whole life. And I remember the stories that I would tell myself as a kid. And so as I got older and I was meeting, you know, just paying attention to my yoga students, listening to my family and friends, hearing from so many people who kept saying, I can’t sleep, I feel anxious. I can’t settle down. And I kept thinking, how do I get this from me to you? Because I know how to do this. And that’s when I thought, oh, it’s a podcast. 

Rachael Herron: [00:10:29] It’s the most brilliant podcast and it is the most brilliant book. So let me tell what my experience of this is, and then you can actually tell what you actually do. But my experience is that you tell me a story with really rich detail. And this is really why I wanted to have you on the show because with all writing detail, the more detail we are, the more specific we are, the more universal it becomes in terms of understanding what’s happening. And you give my brain a track to follow. Like right now we are in the middle of a move to New Zealand and I am anxious as hell. Like my brain just wants to follow every track on like, how are we going to have to get the house painted? What kind of suitcase should I buy? But you give me a different track and then you do this beautiful thing where you say, and if you wake up in the middle of the night, you can replay it. And I do, and it works. I’m like there was a lemon tree and then there was a pencil. How would you describe how you tell these stories?

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:11:29] Well, I always think of it sort of as a recipe, there are three factors that I always like to put together for a solid bedtime story. One is that the overall action or activity of the story should be soothing. So no off the bat, anything we’re going to do, it’s going to be enjoyable and soothing. 

Rachael Herron: [00:11:45] There’s no bungee jumping in these stories, yeah. 

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:11:48] There’s no suspense, there’s really very little in the way of action, but that’s kind of nice. As a reader, I always love the part of the book before the inciting incident, when the person is just moving through their life and I’m 

Rachael Herron: [00:12:01] Status quo?

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:12:03] Just a little bit longer because I just want to hear like, what are they going to eat for lunch 

Rachael Herron: [00:12:07] I love list of things. Like what did they put in their luggage? I want to know what goes in the luggage.

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:12:10] Yeah. I intentionally put a lot of lists into that

Rachael Herron: [00:12:13] yes,

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:12:14] Into the podcast and whenever I, you know, if the character goes to the farmer’s market or there’s going to be lists and lists and lists of everything. So call me an activity and then there needs to be this element of familiarity or nostalgia, where even if you haven’t had the experience, you can relate to it so easily and you know, that it would feel good. And then last is tons of sensory details. Cause that’s going to make you present. It’s going to keep you in that moment following that track and just on sort of the neuroscience level what’s happening in that moment, is that we are shifting you out of your default mode network and the default mode network is the place where everything spins, it’s sort of the background static. It’s what your brain does when it doesn’t have anything else to do. And we’re putting you instead into a task positive network. Task positive network means your brain now has a job 

Rachael Herron: [00:13:07] interesting 

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:13:08] you can sleep in task positive, but you cannot sleep in default. So that’s why it works to think through it in the middle of the night, even if it’s just, and usually it’ll happen in just a couple of seconds, 

Rachael Herron: [00:13:17] A few seconds and then I’m gone again. 

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:13:19] Yeah. Oh, I remember there was this I’m out because I got switched over in my brain network. 

Rachael Herron: [00:13:25] It is bizarre. So I listened to the podcast for probably about a month or two and during that you tell the story once, and then you tell it again a little bit slower. And the, for the first few weeks I was listening, I could, I listened to all the way to the end. Yeah. Both. And now I listened to, now I can, now I’m listening to the book because it’s just easier for me to put on audible and press the go to the end of the chapter. And I listened to each chapter. I don’t know, five or six times before I even know what you’re talking about because I’m faster at sleeping now.

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:13:55] It does progressively get better over time.  

Rachael Herron: [00:13:58] You’re a freaking saint. That’s all I gotta tell.

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:14:00] Glad to help

Rachael Herron: [00:14:02] So can we talk about, because this is where it’s even more interesting for me, you as a writer and how you came to this. Was this something, I mean, obviously this is something that you intended to do. It is something that you were bringing to people to share your talent with sleeping. But where does writing exist in your body and in your background?  

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:14:21] You know, it’s new 

Rachael Herron: [00:14:23] Shut up!

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:14:24] It is, it’s something I’ve wanted my entire life, but always been too afraid to do. And then I got to that age where I started to embrace what I call my, “What The Hell” mantra, where you feel, what the hell, I’ll just try it. But I was so sure. Because I’m such a lover of books and narrative and storytelling and literature, you get into that place of going. I’ll never do that. So maybe I shouldn’t. And then luckily I feel like there’s this moment as I got older, where I embraced a little bit more of my own mediocrity and went, it doesn’t have to be that, it could just be because you like to create it. So I honestly had not really written until about three and a half years ago. And then I just, you know, I remember hearing years ago an interview with Erin Morgenstern who wrote The Night Circus, she was on Terry Gross and she talked about how she’d never really written before. And then she wrote The Night Circus during, 

Rachael Herron: [00:15:23] NaNoWriMo

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:15:24] Yeah. I remember like taking that seed and going, put that in there for later. Like even if you haven’t, that doesn’t mean you can’t start. And now I am writing so much. I have so many other projects going and, it’s different kinds of writing and it is so fascinating to me. So now, and the thing is before this, I never considered myself to be a creative person. I thought I was creative, adjacent. Like I was a creative jealous kind of person who was like, I like to hang out with those people the artists and the actors, that’s where I found my friends and my relationships. And, but I just thought I don’t have that thing. 

Rachael Herron: [00:16:03] You hung out there because you were one. 

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:16:06] Yeah. I just didn’t have the strength yet to go actually start typing. 

Rachael Herron: [00:16:12] And that is the hard part actually. 

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:16:14] But it’s, you know, once you build some muscle memory of that, then, you know, I was writing yesterday and I was telling my wife, like, I feel like right now, I am like got the wheel of this giant boat in my hands and I am trying to steer it, but the wind is blowing. And right now I only kind of know what the shape of the map is. And artistically it’s incredibly exciting and also terrifying because I don’t know where the ship’s going and I can’t control it. Which as a writer is really kind of fun, but a different experience for me because I wrote the same kind of thing for so long. So now that I’m branching out into other things, it just keeps growing, you know, that capacity for creativity and to create new worlds. 

Rachael Herron: [00:16:57] I’m going to predict that that only gets bigger and wilder as you go, as you go. So what, and I’m sure people ask you this, and maybe it’s a, it’s an uncomfortable or rude question, but I’ll ask it anyway. What percentage of the stories are memoir-ish and what are fiction? I mean, I know that you’re not in, you’re not an innkeeper, so I know that that’s, that was not true.

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:17:24] First, I want to say that my own life is ridiculously charmed and wonderful, but these aren’t about me. 

Rachael Herron: [00:17:31] Yeah. I figured.

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:17:32] And people often would prefer that they are. And I say, if you like to think of it that way, 

Rachael Herron: [00:17:38] I don’t go to the farmer’s market every single day, 

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:17:40] I’m going on a bookstore, 

Rachael Herron: [00:17:42] every dog, you know

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:17:44] I don’t live in the cottage and in the brownstone and in the farmhouse, you know, but I remember somebody wrote me after I wrote a story last season about a kitten that gets found and brought in from the cold, and she just kept insisting. She was like, can you send me a picture? I just need to look at and I kept going, I’m sorry, I don’t have a cat. And she’d be like, I don’t understand what you’re talking about. This just becomes really real for people. So, there are little elements sometimes that I’ll pull from my life or something I notice, but they’re not about me. Yeah. 

Rachael Herron: [00:18:20] Yeah. Okay. That is what I was. That is what I was predicting. The work that you’re doing now, may I ask, is it more fictional or is it more memoir-ish?

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:18:27] No, it’s more fictional. 

Rachael Herron: [00:18:30] Exciting. 

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:18:31] Yeah. It’s going to be a really groovy piece. I have a couple of cool pieces on the go right now and I’m writing every day. So I think the world of Nothing Much is going to get bigger and more in depth. We’re going to see people as individuals more, there’ll be characters still –

Rachael Herron: [00:18:47] Stop it, I love it.

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:18:48] Yeah. But we’re really going to dive in a little bit and you’re going to get to know that guy who sold the bakery. The one with the flower in his eyebrows who put gram flour in everything. Let’s find out about something from his life. And the house he lives in and the cardamom bums, he bakes for his neighbor. So the stories are going to get bigger and richer which I’m, like as a writer interested in sinking a little bit deeper. So yeah, this next piece is going to be really great. 

Rachael Herron: [00:19:16] What is your biggest challenge when it comes to doing this writing or any writing?

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:19:19] Mostly it’s the actual doing of it. Once I get the wheel turning I’m okay. And right now I have a goal of 5,000 words a week and I’m mostly hitting it. So you know what I had like dry spell in the summer where I think it was just the anxiety of 2020 and realizing we were still a long way away from the end of, you know, what we were going through. And it was really a struggle for me to find a place for creativity because I was feeling so anxious. And so I started, I did like 30 days where I wrote for 20 minutes a day, just a real approachable number. It doesn’t feel, I mean, I almost you can’t get anything done. Almost by the end of 20 minutes, you’re like, wait, wait, I just

Rachael Herron: [00:20:06] I was getting going 

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:20:07] Yeah. So I do set up a timer and it really helps remind me, I know how to do this. I can, you know, I enjoy this. I’m not somebody who’s tortured by writing you know, I know a lot of writers are, but I think specifically the genre that I write in, is incredibly pleasant. So once I’m in that world, I’m happy. Leave me alone. You know, 

Rachael Herron: [00:20:29] What is your biggest joy when it comes to doing this? 

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:20:33] Just when I find something I didn’t expect to find. You know, when you sort of suddenly and I think I’m not a great strategic thinker. Like I could never play chess. Part of my aphantasia, I can’t hold much in my brain. A lot of memory is processed visually and I don’t have access to that. So things are kind of immediate to me. And then every once in a while, I’ll realize subconsciously or however through the creative gods, I have laid something out and, oh my gosh, when I turn this corner that door’s going to open and it’s exactly where it needed to be. It feels surprising to me as a writer. So I feel, that is a great joy as a writer when you realize, oh this is going to go over there. Oh, that’s great. I can’t wait to see what’s over there. 

Rachael Herron: [00:21:24] I love that feeling so much. And I think that is the default mode network sometimes at work, like it has been spinning, but in the background, maybe pulling some things into where they should be. So that’s one of the good sides of that. Can you share a craft tip of any sort with us?

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:21:43] Well, I think that 20 minute exercises are really useful one when you feel stuck. I also think, making them, I take a ton of notes through the day. 

Rachael Herron: [00:21:57] Where do you take them? I like, I like the nitty-gritty specifics. Do you think of any phone or

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:22:00] Sometimes it is just, you know, as I’m writing, I’m going, oh, wait a minute, in like 20 minutes, we’re going to do this thing 

Rachael Herron: [00:22:09] and I’m looking, I can get to you then, take a number 

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:22:11] Yes. I know, you like tug at your sleep and you’re like, I can’t get to you right now, can you hold? And I take them also on my phone. If I’m out walking my dog or something, like I just was walking my dog and I saw something that will, I was writing a, episode of the podcast. It’ll come out just in a couple of weeks, but I just saw something that I was like, oh, this is going in. I know what this is going to be. So I jotted it down in my phone, but I have like a long list. And often that just sparks a thought for me. Just starts to get the wheels turning. I keep like a Pinterest mood board going again because I don’t have a visual imagination. It’s so useful for me to be inspired by visuals but I think whatever, you know, whatever, however you relate to your creativity, the more you practice it, the more it feels like, I always feel like it’s something like everybody has it, but it might be like in a box in your basement and if you tried to find it, you couldn’t get your hands on it real quick, but if you keep going out and digging out and putting it in your front pocket, you’ll be able to get your hand on it right away. In the moment that you need it, it’ll be there in your grasp. You’ll feel more confident. And that inspires like continual creation. So it is sometimes just slog through, pick it up, do it again, even if it’s a mess, do it again. 

Rachael Herron: [00:23:29] I love that analogy of just having it to hand all the time, having being ready to catch those synergistic synchronistic things that you see, like on your walk. What is the lag time between you writing a piece and then it actually showing up on the show?

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:23:46] Pre COVID, it was like two months. Post COVID, it’s like eight days 

Rachael Herron: [00:23:54] See and I almost would have expected this the opposite. Why is that?

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:23:58] I think I had a really rigorous schedule before, I guess that would be my other tip. Is I need a schedule and I write it out Sunday night and it’s almost hour by hour for the entire week but because I’m still in my house, no one’s like enforcing it, but I used to have these really rigorous go and sit in the coffee shop or go and sit in the library, writing days. I miss that so much. 

Rachael Herron: [00:24:19] That’s the thing I miss most about, besides all the, like the actually traumatic heartbreak kind of stuff. But writing out of my house is the thing I miss the most.

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:24:27] Yeah. And that kept me going and now it is a little bit more of a slog, I think also just because I’m writing so many other projects, then I’m like, oh an episode, we don’t take breaks. We just keep creating. So, yeah. So now it’s a short window.

Rachael Herron: [00:24:45] What is the thing in your life that affects your writing in a surprising way? 

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:24:52] My overall mood affects me a lot. And you know, I’ve been on an upswing for the last month or two, I think just feeling sort of optimistic and I own a yoga studio and we’d been shut down again and we’re open again so I’m teaching. 

Rachael Herron: [00:25:08] Oh, wow. 

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:25:09] Yeah. And- 

Rachael Herron: [00:25:10] It’s awesome. 

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:25:12] Yeah. So I’m able to flex other parts of my brain and all of that, I can get out. I’m in Michigan so, and it was like 67 degrees today.

Rachael Herron: [00:25:20] Wow!

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:25:21] So being able to like get outside and do the physical activities that really contributes to my mood. I find that when my mood is low, when, especially if I’m anxious, it’s a lot sometimes just to get from that through the day, and there’s not a lot of extra energy. So, that’s why I think I’m writing a sort of at a fevered pitch right now. I need to make hay while the sun shines. 

Rachael Herron: [00:25:47] Yeah, literally. 

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:26:48] And the sun is shining right now. So I think probably mood. 

Rachael Herron: [00:25:53] How? So I have a pretty long-term meditation practice and a yoga practice that is mostly on sometimes off, but I find, and I tell my students a lot that like my meditation practice is the single most useful thing that I can do for my writing. Because just like when your brain starts wandering, when you’re meditating and that gentle bringing it back is the same thing. It’s exactly the same thing we feel on the, when we’re sitting in front of the computer, I’ve got to go get a cookie. No, you can write one more sentence. How do you find that yoga and meditation affect your writing and your creativity?

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:26:27] Yeah. I feel like it really prepared me to write these kinds of stories because I’ve been training my brain for the last 20-years as a practitioner to pay attention to the small details of life that are enjoyable or worth our gratitude and so I’m constantly looking for things and going, oh, that’s nice. And just letting your register in my body. But it feels good. You know, I talk about, about the negativity bias a lot and how that points us always to focus on scary stuff. So when we deliberately go out and look for sweet stuff, we’re not putting on rose colored glasses, we’re just taking off the gray ones. And it’s actually a more realistic look at the world. 

Rachael Herron: [00:27:11] I love that you said that. That is, I’m so tired of people being mad at me for my rose colored glasses. You know

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:27:17] Yeah, it’s not Pollyanna, it’s real. And we need that. And so, and it became, can become a habit. So it’s something that I very deliberately do because of my yoga and meditation practice is to look for things to appreciate and enjoy. We’re meant to enjoy our lives. And so I want to just keep bringing them up in front of my readers and listeners and going. What about this? What about this? And people told me all the time, but like, I didn’t think it would do this, but I’m starting to notice as I go through my day, there’s good things happening. And it’s been kind of a theme I’ve been saying through 2020 to my students on zoom. Lots of good things are happening today. Lots more will happen tomorrow. And to be reminded, cause it feels like sometimes we’re just in this big, you know, doomed abyss, but lots of good things are happening. 

Rachael Herron: [00:28:07] What a great a mantra. That’s maybe your next podcast. So now it’s oh, no, it’s your current podcast. That’s what it is. It already is. Okay. So can you tell us where to find you and all the things that you are actually, I forgot to ask you, what is your, the best book you’ve read recently? I just skipped that question. You have it at the tip at the time too.

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:28:22] I do. I’m going to tell you who wrote it. It’s called Once Upon a River, Juliet Stevenson. 

Rachael Herron: [00:28:30] Yes. I loved that. Loved that.

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:28:33] She is a master storyteller and she writes these characters that I don’t know if you noticed this, but I’ve noticed in the last 10 years, there’s this trend in fiction toward just despair. I call it despair porn where-

Rachael Herron: [00:28:51] I call it miss-lit. but I kind of also write it so I can’t knock it too hard, but yes, there’s such a trend toward it

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:28:59] It’s almost like a plate of hot sauce or vinegar, and they’re like, this is a meal. And you’re like, no, no, no, no. There are other flavors in the world, but every character is reprehensible and unreadable, every situation is just the most gut-wrenching thing you can imagine. And, I find that Juliet Stevenson has this way of, she writes these characters who are complex. They’re not simple. They’re not all good, but there’s, they’re human and they’re relatable. And for they have forgiveness and then there’s magic in the story in a way that just feels really organic and not forced. So when I find a book like that, I’m like, this is point your ship in this direction. This is a true north moment as a writer. I want to make sure that that’s her name and that I don’t have her mixed up with the person who reads her books on audible. 

Rachael Herron: [00:29:51] I want to say that I didn’t think that was her name. Once Upon a River, wasn’t it, Sittenfeld no Setterfield. Diane Setterfield. 

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:30:00] I think Juliet Stevenson is the woman who voices now

Rachael Herron: [00:30:05] Have you read The House in the Cerulean Sea?

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:30:09] I can get on my list, 

Rachael Herron: [00:30:11] T.J. Klune, it’s right up there with that book for me, in terms of complex character creation, but also just really juicy goodness to sink into just joy but reality, but also a touch, well, not a touch quite a bit more fantasy than in Once Upon a River, but yeah, I think you’ll like it. Okay. Now tell us where we can find you everywhere.

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:30:35] Yeah. We’re on, Instagram (nothingmuchhappenspodcast),   Twitter (nothingmuchpod), and Facebook (nothingmuchhappenspodcast), just Nothing Much Happens or Nothing Much Happens Podcast. If you give it a search, it’ll pop right up and then Nothing Much Happens.com you can listen anywhere that you listen to podcasts, you can buy the book from anywhere you buy books. I always recommend that you look, go to your local store and order it if they don’t have it on the shelf, just tell them about it and they will be happy to order it for you and then just sweet dreams. 

Rachael Herron: [00:31:01] Oh my gosh. I love it. When you say that at the end. I was at my neighbor. I told her about it. My neighbor she’s in our pod and I was telling her. I told her about you and the podcast. And then just the other night, she was over having a nice dinner. And she said, I just love it when Kathryn says sweet dreams, 

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:31:19] I’m glad it feels that way, because I just want people, people need to have a place where they feel held and safe. 

Rachael Herron: [00:31:25] We do. 

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:31:26] It is such a joy to me to provide a little bit of sanctuary in the world we’re living in right now. It is a complete joy. So it’s absolutely my pleasure to share.

Rachael Herron: [00:31:36] It’s my complete joy and pleasure to speak to you today. Thank you for doing this, Kathryn. I really appreciate your time. And, yeah, now I can go to bed now not scared. I just go to sleep now. So thank you. 

Kathryn Nicolai: [00:31:47] My pleasure. 

Rachael Herron: [00:31:48] All right, take care. Bye. 

Thanks so much for joining me on this episode of “How do you Write?” You can reach me on Twitter, twitter.com/RachaelHerron, or at my website, www.rachaelherron.com, you can also support me on Patreon and get essays on living your creative life for as little as a buck an essay at www.patreon.com/rachael spelled R, A, C, H, A, E, L and do sign up for my free weekly newsletter of encouragement to writers rachaelherron.com/write/

Now, go to your desk and create your own process and get to writing my friends.

The post Ep. 240: Kathryn Nicolai on Focusing on the Good in Life and Writing appeared first on R. H. HERRON.

Kirsty Capes works in publishing and, as a care leaver, is an advocate for better representation for care-experienced people in the media. She recently completed her PhD which investigates female-centric care narratives in contemporary fiction, under the supervision of 2019 Booker prize-winner, Bernardine Evaristo. Careless is her first novel.

How Do You Write Podcast: Explore the processes of working writers with bestselling author Rachael Herron. Want tips on how to write the book you long to finish? Here you’ll gain insight from other writers on how to get in the chair, tricks to stay in it, and inspiration to get your own words flowing. 

Join Rachael’s Slack channel, Onward Writers!

Transcript:

Rachael Herron: [00:00:00] Welcome to “How do you Write?” I’m your host, Rachael Herron. On this podcast, I talk to authors about how they write, what their process is and how their lives fit together. I’ll keep each episode short so you can get back to writing.

[00:00:16] Well, Hello writers! Welcome to episode # 239 of “How do you Write?” I’m Rachael Herron. I am so thrilled that you’re here with me today. If you’re watching on the video, I am in a friend’s house who is out of town, housesitting for her, so that’s why it looks a little bit different. Might sound a little bit different, that might keep happening for a while on the show. As you know, today we are talking to Kirsty Capes, and we are talking about stealing or borrowing tips from screenwriters in order to write novels and she was, as all my guests are, delightful, so, I know that you will enjoy the interview, stick around for that. [00:00:52] What’s going on around here? Well, moving is continuing a pace. It’s been a very exciting, very incredibly busy week. Probably the busiest we’ve had so far as we completed cleaning up the house, getting the interior painting done, getting the staging done. We, I just realized this morning when I was journaling that we are not homeless because we have a house, but we are without a home. Our home has gone. The staging is ridiculous. It is just ridiculous. If you look at my Twitter, I have linked, or on my Instagram too, I have posted pictures of what the stagers did to our house. It is so fancy. It is mid-century modern; it has clean lines; it has light colors. It’s white carpet. Oh, it’s white carpet. All of that has been done. All of that has been put in and as of yesterday, people are coming through the home and hopefully somebody will want to buy it as soon as possible. I’m here in this friend’s house for another few days, and then we will go back to the house and we will live in the staged furniture, which makes me very nervous, especially when it comes to my wife and her coffee cup on those white carpets so that’ll be interesting. I’m just planning on buying drop cloths, drop cloths and putting them absolutely everywhere because I don’t trust us, I don’t trust myself and I don’t trust her. So, it is a weird feeling. We have everything that is hours that we need for the next, however long with us. We have our clothes, we have our computer setups, everything that is not packed and ready to be put in a shipping container is with us, besides our kitchen stuff, we did leave a minimal amount of kitchen stuff in our kitchen because we are cooks and we will keep cooking and we will pack up the spices and our favorite two pots at the very last minute, right before we leave the country at the end of July. [00:02:54] So, for the next two months, we are without a home, home. Without our home that we created together and have lived in together for the past 15 years. But what was home? What is home, really? Home is my people, my wife, my family. Home is my writing, home is reading. Home is talking to you all, home is thinking about writing. Home is teaching, home is being with my students, that is all home. That’s all the home that I need. Get back to me in six months and see how I feel about that statement. But it is pretty exciting right now. And I’m feeling, I’m pretty good, I really am. I’m glad that we rehomed our cat Waylon when we did, because he is settled in so beautifully and that makes me so happy. And my little dog dozy is actually going to be living in this home behind us until we can send for her, until we buy a home and can send for her. She’s going to be living with my friend Sophie, and that’s the house we’re in. So, it’s really pretty nice that we’re spending 10 days in this house, with the house with dozy so that she can get to know this as her new home as well. And, when it comes to writing, I can admit that it, except for the two hours, twice a week, where I’m in RachaelSaysWrite, where I’m writing, that’s about the only time I’m writing right now. It’s been, rough and that’s fine because I’m actually not on a deadline right now, I’m just doing different projects, finishing up some revisions of things. And I do get those four hours a week, but on the other days I have been, I’m not a step tracker, but my aura rank that I wear, that tracks my sleep, I am a sleep tracker because I have terrible sleep and this has really helped me to get better sleep. It also tracks my steps and I was really impressed when I started to get 11 and 12 and 13 and 15,000 steps a day as I was, you know, moving around the house, packing, moving, cleaning, doing all this stuff. But over this last weekend, I was getting 23, 24, 25,000 steps a day. Absolutely exhausted. So much to do. And it’s, it’s seemingly never ending. So, I think that now that the whole, the house is open for business and people are coming through, there’s really nothing left to do. There’s nothing left to pack. I would like a nice 5,000 step day where I just walk from the, this desk to the bathroom and back, and maybe out for a coffee.[00:05:20] So, that, because Sophie lives in a place where there is walkable, I have to tell you, this is one of our dreams, is to someday live, where we can walk to things. For 15 years, we have lived in a place in east Oakland. There is nothing to walk to, even the liquor store is closed. There’s literally nothing to walk to at all. Here, at Sophie’s house, there is a Trader Joe’s, there is a Pete’s, coffee shop. There is a Chipotle, there’s 31 flavors. There’s a comic book shop, like literally two blocks away. So, someday in New Zealand, we would love to move someplace where we can walk to some place. Walking to a cafe, isn’t that amazing? And we’re entering a time where, perhaps, you’re getting closer to being able to write in cafes again. In New Zealand, of course, we’ll be able to write in cafes because they’ve been opened since last June of 2020. But all of us in the United States, too, we’re getting to a place where perhaps the writers are going to be able to go out and write again. And for a lot of us, that’s kind of a big deal. However, we have gotten used to writing at home, haven’t we?  So that’s been something that’s one of those silver linings of the pandemic. Perhaps we all had to learn how to write and revise in our homes, which is something that I’ve heard from a lot of writers, is something that we were really bad at, a lot of us were really bad at. So, that’s exciting. I’m just going to jump in to the interview right now. I’ve updated you on all the important things. So please enjoy this. Please get some of your own writing done, whether that’s in your home or in your car, or on one of those car lap desks like I have. And then come find me where I am on the internet and tell me about it. I really, really love hearing from you all about where and what kind of writing you’re doing, what you’re struggling with. Please, let me know. I will be doing a mini episode soon, probably within this next week. So, if you have any questions, I have a couple of questions that are waiting in the queue that I will get out in that mini episode and I really love doing those. So, if you are at patron at the level at which I am your mini coach, which is $5 a month, lay some questions on me. Let’s get some good ones in there. There are already good ones in there. Let’s get some great, a great selection to do a mini episode on and thank you all for listening. Thank you all for being here. Thank you for being writers cause you’re amazing. Okay. Bye. [00:07:41] Hey, is resistance keeping you from writing? Are you looking for an actual writing community in which you can make a calls and be held accountable for them? Join RachaelSaysWrite, like twice weekly, two hour writing session on zoom. You can bop in and out of the writing room as your schedule needs, but for just $39 a month, you can write up to 4 hours a week. With our wonderful little community, in which you’ll actually get to know your writing peers. We write from 8:00 AM to 10:00 AM on Tuesdays and 4:00 PM to 6:00 PM on Thursdays and that’s US Pacific Standard Time. Go to RachaelHerron.com/Write to find out more.

Rachael Herron: [00:08:21] Well, I could not be more pleased to welcome to the show today, Kirsty Capes. Hello, Kirsty! 

Kristy Capes: [00:08:26] Hi! Thank you so much for having me, so lovely to meet you, Rachael.

Rachael Herron: [00:08:29] It’s a thrill to have you on the show and I’m so happy to talk about writing today. Let me give you a little introduction. Kirsty Capes works in publishing and, as a care leaver, is an advocate for better representation for care-experienced people in the media. She recently completed her PhD, congratulations, which investigates female-centric care narratives in contemporary fiction, under the supervision of 2019 Booker prize-winner, Bernardine Evaristo. Careless is her first novel. And when this releases, it will have just, the book will have just released. So, congratulations on that. 

Kristy Capes: [00:09:05] Thank you.

Rachael Herron: [00:09:07] Have you, we don’t have a term that I can think of, and it may be a blind spot in my vocabulary. And I shouldn’t even say the word blind spot, but using more sensitive language, but we don’t have, we don’t use the term care leaver here in the states, as far as I know. Can you explain what a care leaver is?

Kristy Capes: [00:09:25] So a care leaver is anyone who has spent time in the care system at any time in their life. I think generally, from like a policy governmental perspective, it’s six months in the care system. Although I might be wrong on that, it might be three months. And they have left the care system. So, you know, they’ve either aged out or they’ve left whatever care situation they were in.

Rachael Herron: [00:09:59] I feel like here, at least there, people, I hear conversation, people talking about there should be a term. We should have a term. Instead, we just have foster kids who’ve aged out and that’s, I mean, there might be a better phrase for that, but I love that you are an advocate for this and talk to me a little bit about how your first novel is about this subject. Did you always want to do this or is this just kind of what came out of your body as a care leaver yourself? 

Kristy Capes: [00:10:25] Yeah, so I think there was definitely a part of it that it just came out of my body as you say. So, I grew up in foster care myself and I always wanted to write. I always wanted to be a writer. I was a really big reader as a kid and I had, I went to university and I did creative writing at university. And a lot of the creative writing that I was doing, were kind of short stories and poems and things like that, that were kind of influenced by my own experience growing up in care. So, I had all of these kinds of bits and pieces of writing, where I was kind of looking at the care experience, dealing with my own care experience, kind of working through some of that. And I got to the point where, I was, I felt as though I was ready to start writing a book and it seemed very natural for me to write something about care because I’d been through it myself. I had so much firsthand experience of it. I had a lot of writing already on the care experience and it felt like it was something that I needed to do for myself to kind of have some sort of catharsis maybe to, you know, kind of deal with some of the sort of unresolved bits of my own experience. And also, you know, I was very, very aware that when I was growing up in care, there were very few representations of people like me in the books that I was reading. And as such a big reader, especially as a child, it was so it felt very important to me to write something that felt very true to my own experience, but also felt more of a positive and hopeful representation, of someone who’s been in foster care. And that’s kind of where Careless came from it. 

Rachael Herron: [00:12:28] It, I’m not done with it yet, cause I just started it the other day a little bit late, but it is beautiful. 

Kristy Capes: [00:12:34] Oh, thank you.

Rachael Herron: [00:12:35] Your writing is just sublime and it deserves all of the accolades that you are getting. I’m so excited to read more of it. Let’s talk a little bit about what your writing process is like. How do you get it done? Do you have a full-time day job? Are you working around that? Are you working on the next book? Tell us all about that.

Kristy Capes: [00:12:56] Well it’s interesting that this podcast has fallen when it has, because I just sent my second book to my editor yesterday, first draft.

Rachael Herron: [00:13:08] Like, and as we’re recording this, I think your book comes out in about a month. Is that right? 

Kristy Capes: [00:13:13] Yeah. About three weeks. Yeah. 

Rachael Herron: [00:13:15] That’s exactly the timeframe I had for my first two books. And I hated turning in my second book before the first one had come out. It was also, 

Kristy Capes: [00:13:22] Yeah, it was really insane. So, yeah, I mean, it’s all at the front of my head at the moment, so I can tell you all about it. But, I had, I do have a full-time job. I have a nine to five. I work for HarperCollins, funnily enough. For mills and boon, which I think in the states is called Harlequin. So, lots of lovely romance. 

Rachael Herron: [00:13:46] I’m also a romance writer, so 

Kristy Capes: [00:13:49] Oh, amazing! So yeah, I do my nine to five there. And, 

Rachael Herron: [00:13:55] What do you do there?

Kristy Capes: [00:13:56] I do marketing, which is loads of fun. I love working there. It’s just the best. So yeah, so it’s been, it was quite intense. And I think originally when I got my book deal, back last year, in February last year, they kind of asked me when I would be able to deliver book two. And originally, they wanted January, 2021. And I was also doing a PhD at the time last year as well. So, 

Rachael Herron: [00:14:31] Oh my God.

Kristy Capes: [00:14:32] It was quite a lot going on. But, so originally, I was kind of doing my day job and then my PhD was kind of evenings and weekends. And then I went straight from that into writing book two. So, I kind of said, can I have April, please? January? And very, very gratefully, they said, yes.

Rachael Herron: [00:14:54] Mark you. Yeah.

Kristy Capes: [00:14:57] So, yeah. But, most of my writing, not so much for book one, for catalyst, because I was writing that as part of my PhD, but definitely for the second book, it has been, kind of a little bit of a balancing act in terms of balancing my day job with the writing. And at the moment, because I’m working at home because of pandemic, I found it quite difficult writing in the evenings because I’m essentially turning off one laptop and turning on another and kind of not really moving or anything, so. 

Rachael Herron: [00:15:35] How do you manage it? 

Kristy Capes: [00:15:37] Well, at first, I told myself that I would, my weekday evenings was for me, no writing in the evenings. So, I sort of protected my weekday evenings as kind of like my me time, my nap time or whatever. And so I was writing on the weekends, Saturdays and Sundays, and then it got towards, it got closer to the deadline and I realized that I needed to write more. 

Rachael Herron: [00:16:11] As we do. 

Kristy Capes: [00:16:12] Yes, exactly. Didn’t quite, my meticulous word count planning did not work out. So yeah, I ended up to sort of the last month or two. I was kind of doing lunchtimes, evenings, weekends, like any, any spare moment I could grab. So yeah, it was quite intense.

Rachael Herron: [00:16:33] But as we speak, when did you ship it? 

Kristy Capes: [00:16:36] Yesterday. 

Rachael Herron: [00:16:37] Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh. And did you spend the night in front of Netflix and bottle of wine?

Kristy Capes: [00:16:42] Yeah, glass of wine. Absolutely. 

Rachael Herron: [00:16:46] One thing I want to point out that, is that there, that is really, really important, I think, and this is something that I forget and that people I talk to always forget, but you said first, I protected me time. And we have to. We have to have our downtime planned. Otherwise, as writers, we always have that nagging, like I should be writing. I should be writing. I should be writing, but not if you’ve planned it. So that worked, I bet that worked as well as it could until you ran out of time. 

Kristy Capes: [00:17:13] Yeah, exactly. Yeah. And I think, I always think that, like writing is a little bit like setting yourself homework. And you know, you’ve never, you can never do enough and you can never, you know, have enough of a word count down in a single day or a single week. And I think it can be quite difficult to kind of combat that sort of the guilt that’s associated with that. If you’re not writing, if you’re just, you know, going out with friends or, you know, watching Netflix or whatever it may be, to kind of stop yourself from feeling guilty about not writing whenever you’re not doing anything.

Rachael Herron: [00:18:00] How do you,

Kristy Capes: [00:18:01] Because I find that quite difficult.

Rachael Herron: [00:18:02] How do you manage to do that, when you manage to do it? If you manage to do it? 

Kristy Capes: [00:18:08] I think having a really robust schedule for me is really important. And rather than kind of thinking about word count and things like that, I kind, I give myself kind of allotted times, whether it’s, you know, a few hours or a lunch break or a morning, a Sunday morning or whatever it might be. And, this is kind of gross, but on the weekends, I write really well in the morning. The morning is like the perfect time for me to be writing. So, on Saturday and Sunday mornings, I wake up, I walk the dog and then I tell myself, you can’t take a shower, you can’t get dressed, you can’t do anything until you have written for two hours.

Rachael Herron: [00:18:56] I love that. Yes!

Kristy Capes: [00:18:59] And it does work. It’s not, maybe it’s not the healthiest strategy, but,

Rachael Herron: [00:19:03] I think it’s wonderful! As writers, we probably, as writers, we probably shower less than other people, anyway. I mean honest, that’s my biggest goal in life. What is the biggest challenge do you have when it comes to writing? 

Kristy Capes: [00:19:19] I think for me, the biggest challenge, especially with writing the second book has, is I think it’s the kind of isolation and aloneness and loneliness that can come with writing. I think it’s, you know, it’s, by nature, it’s a very solitary pursuit and I think it can be very easy to get very lost in whatever story you’re trying to get down on the page and kind of forget the world around you, forget to talk to people, forget to go outside, all of those kinds of things. And I think because of the situation we’re in at the moment, all of that has been exacerbated so much. So, it’s been quite difficult to find the right balance. And I think as well, it’s quite hard to go from doing something that’s very personal and very introspective to then, you know, going out into the world and being a social being. And, you know, having conversations with people and stuff like that, it can be quite difficult to go from one to the other very quickly, so, yeah. 

Rachael Herron: [00:20:38] And the going out and talking to people is also fraught with literal danger.

Kristy Capes: [00:20:43] Yes.  

Rachael Herron: [00:20:44] It’s never been this way for writing. It’s always felt like this for writers, perhaps. But it’s, 

Kristy Capes: [00:20:50] Just that nice little extra added anxiety for, 

Rachael Herron: [00:20:53] Frisson of terror, yeah. What is your biggest joy when it comes to writing? 

Kristy Capes: [00:21:01] Oh, also a very good question. I think my biggest joy is the satisfaction of knowing that I’ve written something really good and being quite smug and proud about it.

Rachael Herron: [00:21:15] Yes! I love that feeling.

Kristy Capes: [00:20:18] It’s the best feeling ever, when you know you’ve had a really good session and you’re like, yeah, that is really good stuff what I’ve just written down there. I love that feeling. So, 

Rachael Herron: [00:21:29] That particular brand of smugness is something I think about a lot. It’s so delicious, like you can’t, you can’t share it with anybody because then smug goes wrong. But like inside your heart, you’re just sitting, you know, especially if you like sit on the couch with something delicious afterwards, you know? Oh, it’s literally the best.

Kristy Capes: [00:21:46] Exactly, yeah.

Rachael Herron: [00:21:49] Can you share a craft tip of any sort with our readers?

Kristy Capes: [00:21:53] Yes, I can. So, something that I’ve found really useful in my writing, and I think it’s probably a bit unconventional is, I really like using screenwriting craft for my fiction writing.

Rachael Herron: [00:22:11] Like what?

Kristy Capes: [00:22:12] So, things like, there’s a great screenwriter theorist called Blake Snyder. He wrote a book called Save The Cat, but he has a beat sheet, you can look it up online, it’s free to view online. And it’s essentially, it’s kind of like a story structure, but it’s specifically for screenwriting. But it, he basically lists every single beat you need to have in a story to make it cohesive. And it’s just a really nice, it’s almost a little bit like paint by numbers.

Rachael Herron: [00:22:46] Yes. Hand it over. 

Kristy Capes: [00:22:49] Yeah, exactly. So, it’s really nice to have someone telling you, this is what you need to do to make your story work. 

Rachael Herron: [00:22:55] Yeah.

Kristy Capes: [00:21:56] And inevitably, it always ends up you know, not following, you know the structure to a T, but I feel like, I’m a real plotter, I love plotting my stuff out. So, when I’m in the really early stages of writing something new, I use Blake Snyder’s beat sheet to plot everything out. And it really helps me to kind of visualize the story and its completeness. So, I definitely recommend that.

Rachael Herron: [00:23:22] So where do you keep all of this plotting? Is this something that you’re writing along synopsis and then you’re writing the book or is it more like outline format? 

Kristy Capes: [00:23:31] It’s usually a spreadsheet that gets more, 

Rachael Herron: [00:23:35] I love a spreadsheet. 

Kristy Capes: [00:23:37] Yeah, me too.

Rachael Herron: [00:23:39] We’re weirdos, but they’re just, oh, they’re so good.

Kristy Capes: [00:23:42] You know, what’s really satisfying about a spreadsheet is dropping your word count in for each chapter and watching the total go up. I love that. So good!

Rachael Herron: [00:23:52] I’ve actually never combined the plotting with the I want to do that now. I really want to do that. I want to see that a bit.

Kristy Capes: [00:23:58] It’s delightful. It’s very satisfying. All about the small wins. 

Rachael Herron: [00:24:03] Okay, so, I’d love to go granular on this. What is, what else is on this spreadsheet? Your scenes probably planned out. How much is written in each box for a scene? How much do you know about it? 

Kristy Capes: [00:24:15] Probably like not very much in the early stages, probably a couple of sentences for each scene. And then I will usually have a separate tab with my main character or main characters and then all of the secondary characters and their relationships to my main characters. So, the book that I’m writing at the moment has kind of three main characters in it. So, I’ve got each of those guys and then kind of all of their family members, all of their friends and their relationships. So, I can just keep track of the names and things like that, and then things like people’s ages, what they do for a job so I don’t accidentally change their job halfway through, those kinds of things. And then I usually have a separate tab, which is kind of a to-do list. So, as I’m writing, I tend not to look back too much as a, you know, I don’t sort of edit as I go along because I find myself getting pulled out of the story. So, as I’m writing, if something occurs to me that I need to then go back and change, I’ll kind of keep a list of everything that I need to do. And then when I’m sort of towards the end of the manuscript, that’s when I’ll go back and kind of weave all those extra bits and pieces in. 

Rachael Herron: [00:25:35] I do something exactly like that, but I use post-its and I, when every time I have an idea, I jot a post-it and they’re all in one spot, and then. 

Kristy Capes: [00:25:43] Oh amazing. 

Rachael Herron: [00:25:44] I’ll deal with that later to fix. 

Kristy Capes: [00:25:45] I love that.

Rachael Herron: [00:25:46] But I also really like the idea of being in the, in the spreadsheet. I just love the spreadsheet. I’m less of a plotter, but I want to be more of a plotter, always. What thing in your life affect your writing in a surprising way? 

Kristy Capes: [00:25:59] I think, the thing that I’ve noticed affected my writing, and it’s only because I’m not doing very much of it at the moment, is driving. I didn’t realize, I was thinking about this questionnaire. I was like, what is it? It’s quite a hard one. But I think I do a lot of my “writing” while I’m doing things that don’t require a lot of, sort of brainpower.

Rachael Herron: [00:26:29] Yeah.

Kristy Capes: [00:26:30] Not, not to say, I mean, I do concentrate when I’m driving.

Rachael Herron: [00:26:33] No, but it’s route, it’s automatic. Yeah.

Kristy Capes: [00:26:35] Yeah, exactly. Especially if you’re driving somewhere familiar, you can kind of go on autopilot. And I realized that there are lots of things that are quite eon in my sort of daily life where I’m writing and I’ve not realized that I’m writing, but I’m just doing it in my head. So now, because I used to drive to the train station to go to work, and obviously we’re working from home now, I’ve had to find different pockets of time where I can do that kind of brain work, where I’ve lost it from things like driving. So that’s been really interesting. 

Rachael Herron: [00:27:13] What pockets have you found?

Kristy Capes: [00:27:16] So, walking the dog. So, I have a golden retriever. So, when I’m walking him, he’s lovely, things like doing chores, like, doing the hoovering or washing the dishes.

Rachael Herron: [00:27:30] Dishes are good.

Kristy Capes: [00:27:31] All of that kind of thing, yeah. Any kind of cleaning. Yeah, all those sorts of things, making dinner, anything like that. So, yeah, it’s been really interesting, but I’ve realized, it’s made me realize that actually I’m doing a lot more work internally than I thought I was. You know, I always kind of thought that, you know, the act of writing was sitting in front of a page and getting the words down and, you know, doing your plotting and you’re planning and things like that. But so much is just going on kind of in the background when you don’t even realize it.

Rachael Herron: [00:28:10] And I think it has to, I think that’s a wonderful thing for people to, to think about and realize, is that you are doing the work. For me, I, the driving thing, I miss all the podcasts I used to listen to. But nowadays, when I drive, I tend to not put the podcast on because I want that time for the, for the low-grade thinking.

Kristy Capes: [00:28:31] Yeah. Absolutely. The kind of psychological space needed to think. 

Rachael Herron: [00:28:36] Yeah. I could also do more walking, but you know, that, that involves leaving the chair and I don’t feel like it. What is the best book that you’ve read recently and why did you love it? 

Kristy Capes: [00:28:46] So I’ve been kind of reading a little bit outside of what I would normally read at the moment and it’s because I’m writing. So, I’m trying not to read anything too close to my own writing. And I think also I just, I’m really desperate at the moment for just lovely, uplifting romance. I think we all need it at the moment. So, I’ve been reading lots and lots of good romances and rom-coms. One of them is The Mismatch by Sara Jafari. So, I don’t, I think it comes out in June, so one for your list. And that is about a British Iranian girl who meets a white boy. He was very kind of, it’s a very opposites-attract thing, not just in terms of coming from different cultures and upbringings, but also like, he’s a jock and she’s an arty type and that kind of thing.

Rachael Herron: [00:29:43] Oh, it sounds delicious. 

Kristy Capes: [00:29:44] Yeah. It’s very, very good. And it’s kind of just about, it’s kind of an opposites attract story. But it also has, you know, some much, much more difficult issues in there as well. So, yeah, I thought it was absolutely fantastic. And then I’ve also, 

Rachael Herron: [00:30:04] The Mismatch.

Kristy Capes: [00:30:05] Yeah, The Mismatch. And then, I’ve also been reading loads of Mhairi McFarlane at the moment. I don’t know you’ve heard of her.

Rachael Herron: [00:30:13] I’ve never heard of her.

Kristy Capes: [00:30:14] So, she’s a British romcom writer. And she just does the best, most joyous romances ever. I absolutely love her. Yeah. I always go back to her, you know, if I’m feeling a bit down or I just need something really light and uplifting and you know, something to read in the barf, I just love Mhairi McFarlane.

Rachael Herron: [00:30:36] Do you have a particular favorite that you would recommend I start with? 

Kristy Capes: [00:30:41] Oh, I think, If I Never Met You as a Good One. 

Rachael Herron: [00:30:48] Okay. 

Kristy Capes: [00:30:49] And the one I’m reading at the moment is called, It’s Not Me, It’s You. Great.

Rachael Herron: [00:30:56] That’s such a good title. 

Kristy Capes: [00:30:59] And I’m halfway through that. I haven’t finished it yet, but it’s very good so far. 

Rachael Herron: [00:31:02] Oh, thank you. Thank you. Speaking of wonderful, wonderful books, can you please tell us a little bit about Careless, what it’s about and give us a little taste of it.

Kristy Capes: [00:31:12] It’s not quite an uplifting romcom. 

Rachael Herron: [00:31:16] It’s not, but it’s so beautiful. It’s so beautifully read.

Kristy Capes: [00:31:19] Oh, thank you. I would like to think it’s very uplifting as well. So, “Careless” is about a young girl who’s 15. Her name is Bess. She is in foster care. She’s growing up in a small suburban town, just outside of London. And she finds out that she’s pregnant and the story is basically following Bess as she kind of decides what she wants to do about this pregnancy. And it’s also about her best friend, Eshal, who is a British Bangladeshi and is kind of being expected to participate in an arranged marriage and she’s not so sure that she wants to. And it’s just kind of about these two girls, their friendship, you know, their unconditional love for one another and you know, how they kind of overcome all of these really difficult situations, to kind of follow their dreams and establish their own agency. And, you know, carve their own paths for themselves. So yeah, I mean, it is, it deals with some difficult issues, but I think ultimately, it’s really a story about hope, and, you know, aspiration and, 

Rachael Herron: [00:32:44] And that beautiful, and that beautiful friendship. You write, the friendship between the girls is so wonderfully, it’s, it’s evident from the beginning of the book, so. 

Kristy Capes: [00:32:54] Oh, thank you. 

Rachael Herron: [00:32:55] I’m glad you didn’t accidentally spoil the ending by saying, you know, and then they are never friends again. That would be unbearable. Okay, and where can we find you out there on the internet? 

Kristy Capes: [00:33:07] So I am on Twitter @kristycapes, and I am on Instagram @kirstycapes.author 

Rachael Herron: [00:33:15] Perfect. Kirsty, thank you so much for spending your time with me today. It was a joy to talk to you and may your debut novel fly from the shelves. 

Kristy Capes: [00:33:25] Oh, thank you so much. So lovely to meet you. 

Thanks so much for joining me on this episode of “How do you Write?” You can reach me on Twitter, twitter.com/RachaelHerron, or at my website, www.rachaelherron.com, you can also support me on Patreon and get essays on living your creative life for as little as a buck an essay at www.patreon.com/rachael spelled R, A, C, H, A, E, L and do sign up for my free weekly newsletter of encouragement to writers rachaelherron.com/write/

The post Ep. 239: Kirsty Capes on Using Tips from Screenwriters to Write Novels appeared first on R. H. HERRON.

Meghan Scott Molin comes to writing by way of a Masters in Architecture, a minor in Opera, a professional career as a barn manager, and five years crash course as a mother. She currently resides in Colorado with her fellow zookeeper (husband), sons, horse, adopted stray cats, and corgi. She is an avid lover of everything nerdy from Wars to Trek, Hobbits, Who, and beyond. When she’s not writing, she’s cooking, dreaming of travel, coveting more corgis, and listening to audiobooks while hanging out at the barn.

How Do You Write Podcast: Explore the processes of working writers with bestselling author Rachael Herron. Want tips on how to write the book you long to finish? Here you’ll gain insight from other writers on how to get in the chair, tricks to stay in it, and inspiration to get your own words flowing. 

Join Rachael’s Slack channel, Onward Writers!

Transcript:

Rachael Herron: [00:00:00] Welcome to “How do you Write?” I’m your host, Rachael Herron. On this podcast, I talk to authors about how they write, what their process is and how their lives fit together. I’ll keep each episode short so you can get back to writing. 

[00:00:16] Well, hello writers, welcome to episode number, I have no idea. And this is going to be the shortest intro ever, because I’ve only got a few minutes and it has been an enormous week. I am not even sure who you’re going to hear in the interview next. I honestly am not, usually I look it up, but I’m, you know, usually several months ahead of time. So, I need to look it up and remind myself about what we talked about. I don’t even have time to do that. So, I’m sure you’re going to enjoy it. I’m sure it’s going to be fabulous. So please stick around and enjoy that. What is going on around here? Literally everything. Hush Little Baby came out. Yay! I have a book launch party today as a sub, so it drops on May 14th. So, if you get those in time, you can come to Murder by the Book, to my book launch. And if you’re a writer, you may want to kind of see what an online book launch looks like. You can find the info for that at murderbooks.com/herron. My last name H E R R O N. [00:01:17] Also, the house is torn apart, empty. Vacant as of today, if you’re looking at me on the podcast, on the YouTube, I am wearing overalls because it’s that kind of day. I am so grubby. I should not be allowed in my coworking space honestly, if they knew what I had done today. It’s been pretty insane. Like there’s, now we have no furniture as of right now, but last night, you know, we’re sleeping on the floor on a blow-up air mattress. Tonight, we’ve got a couple of nights at a hotel because we have nothing in the house and then it’ll get staged. But basically, everything that needs to happen, has been happening at the very last minute. Quite an intense experience. And, you know, then we moved to New Zealand in 10 weeks. But the go time, the actual go-time has been this week, and just before I drove to the coworking space today, I drove with my wife, with our cars full of the final boxes to put in our teeny tiny pod, which we will then repack and send on a pallet or two overseas. But it’s doing that kind of thing and I’m freaking out a little bit. I’m also really happy and excited, kind of to step into this brand-new adventure and also be launching a book at the same time is super, super awesome and super exhausting. I don’t think I’ve had more than five hours sleep for the last four or five days. So, tonight I’m hoping to sleep. I have done zero writing for it, for about seven days, not even, I think I have journaled twice and I normally do my morning pages. If you have never done morning pages, I encourage you to try if you have never done The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron, which is where the morning pages idea comes from. I always encourage people to try that. It is, three pages, handwritten first thing in the morning, and honestly, it is a life-changing exercise. And I basically do my morning pages every day, and I have now for several years. I kind of go in and out of the morning pages, but I’ve been deeply in them. And the fact that I haven’t even been doing that is very strange and feels very odd in my body. So, I’m hoping to get back to that tomorrow, because tomorrow they’re just going to be laying floor, flooring and carpet, and I can’t help with that. I can just unlock the house and let them do that. So, that’s where I am.[00:04:00] I feel silly and giddy and excited and very glad and honored that you are here with me listening to the show even on a day when I’m giddy and excited and weird. And, I have no idea who you’re about to listen to. Please enjoy. Please come find me on the socials, and tell me how your writing is going. I really, really care. I really love to hear this from you. So, that is all. Next week, I’ll have more information on everything about the podcast, but this week we don’t have it. So, and that is just goes to show. We can have a shitty first draft and move forward with our writing lives. I don’t think this metaphor is working, but, normally, you know, my metaphors are a little bit better. They’ll be better in the future. This does feel like a first draft podcast. Here we go. Enjoy the interview. Happy writing, my friends.

Rachael Herron: [00:04:53] Well, I could not be more pleased to welcome to the show today, Meghan Scott Molin. Hello, Meghan!

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:04:58] Hi. How are you? 

Rachael Herron: [00:05:00] I’m good. I, we were just talking for a second before the show. I know you just ran in from the barn where the horse is sick.

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:05:05] Yes. 

Rachael Herron: [00:05:06] Is the horse going to be okay?

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:05:08] Horse is going to be okay. Kids are over the norovirus. This is my life. 

Rachael Herron: [00:05:14] And that’s what we’re going to talk about today. 

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:05:15] It’s chaos! Pure chaos.

Rachael Herron: [00:05:18] Writing it around the chaos. Awesome. Let me give you a little bio for you. Meghan Scott Molin comes to writing by way of a Masters in Architecture, a minor in Opera, a professional career as a barn manager, and, barn, I sounded like I said bar there. Different. And five years crash course as a mother. She currently resides in Colorado with her fellow zookeeper (husband), sons, horse, adopted stray cats, and corgi. She is an avid lover of everything nerdy from Wars to Trek, Hobbits, Who, and beyond. When she’s not writing, she’s cooking, dreaming of travel, coveting more corgis, and listening to audiobooks while hanging out at the barn. Welcome!

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:05:54] Thank you so much for having me. I absolutely love your podcast. It keeps me going. 

Rachael Herron: [00:05:59] Oh, thank you so much. That means a lot to me. Doing the podcast and speaking to people like you is what keeps me going. So, I want to talk to you about your process because how the hell do you do it all? That’s what I would like to know. Cause you are, how old are your kids? 

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:06:16] Two and five. So, in theory this year, I would have had kindergarten to help me out, but not so much. Now I’m a kindergarten teacher. 

Rachael Herron: [00:06:28] That should also go on your amazing bio. Unofficial kindergarten teacher. What a fricking year. So, let’s talk about your writing process. How do you get it done? I want to know like how and where, when, all of it. 

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:06:45] Well, I wish I could say that I had some sort of process that looked great on Instagram and that I was elated about. But I think the reason I reached out to you is that I’m operating in a land of middle grounds and a land of not ideals and I don’t think that I’m the only one. And I think so many of us do look at social media and do listen to interviews and think that everybody has it all together. I wanted to offer a realistic view of how someone is getting writing done, even though, it does not look great on Insta. 

Rachael Herron: [00:07:21] I love that. I absolutely love that. So, because it’s so it’s such an easy fallacy to fall into believing. So, what does writing look like to you on a day-to-day basis? 

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:07:33] So I, because of this last year, I had to find something that was sustainable. And in my head, I had this picture of what being at home with little kids would look like, with writing and, my corgi is coming to say, hi, sorry. Hopefully he doesn’t get in the shot. 

Rachael Herron: [00:07:48] Great. My dog’s probably going to bark in a second. So yeah. 

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:07:51] So I, I just think that, rather than that, that clip art of the mom with the computer and her kid, I really had to be realistic about what my life looked like, what my kids were. And my kids are very light sleepers, very early morning risers and working in the mornings is really tricky for me. So, I write in my closet on a floor chair, and I have pictures on my Instagram if anybody ever wants to take a look at my, really not illustrious setup. But I ninja out of bed about 30 to 45 minutes before my kids get up and I have to do it like super silently. I can’t get tea. I can’t go look out the window. I can’t work at my desk. I take my laptop and I sit literally in a dark corner where I can’t wake up my husband and I turn off the internet and I do write. And it’s, 

Rachael Herron: [00:08:51] I love that because when you are in a closet without internet, there’s nothing else to do, but write. Like you don’t have, you can’t waste time. You’re not going to accidentally look at Twitter. No,

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:09:02] No. And I, I have learned the long and hard way that I have to turn off the internet, like I am the five-year-old because, otherwise, I do get distracted by shiny. So I go, I usually spend about five minutes when I’m waking up to think about what I’m writing, what I’m excited about writing that day. And then I aim for about 800 words, which really doesn’t sound like a lot. Before kids, I was capable of doing about 2000 words a day or in a session. But these days, my bar, my minimum bar is about 200 and I consider that a successful day. It sounds so small, but it does add up. 

Rachael Herron: [00:09:42] It sounds so real. 

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:09:44] And I want to encourage everybody, I wrote two books that are over a hundred thousand words last year. One of which is the book that just came out, my third in my trilogy, and then another one that I’m revising right now for sub for my agent. And I wrote half of a romantic comedy fund project for myself. The little stuff really does add up. My goal as a mom and a writer, is to get enough done in the mornings that I feel like I’ve done it so that I can turn off the writing part, I can mom seven times during nap times I get another 200, 500 words in. Sometimes right before bed, I can get another 200 in, but my husband really likes family time at night. So, I try to respect it. It is messy. It’s not beautiful. It’s piecemeal, but it does add up to be significant over a year. 

Rachael Herron: [00:10:40] I love that you are saying this and I can imagine parents, especially mothers, listening to this right now, like with tears in their eyes, because I have students who are writing in 10-minute increments. Like the kids go down or they’re, I had a student just yesterday say, you know, my kids were playing peacefully. I know, she came into the slack and said, my kids are playing peacefully, I’m going in. And 10 minutes later, she said, they just got in a fight. I’m done. This is, but she had that 10, those 10 minutes and it really adds up. You have, you’re with 47 north, right?

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:11:11] Yes. 

Rachael Herron: [00:11:12] Yeah. And your first book is, has more than a thousand amazing reviews. It’s, you’re a bestselling author and you’re doing this in the tiniest, tiniest pockets and increments of time, and it is not pretty, but it’s getting done.

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:11:26] It isn’t and I think, the thing, the thing about it is, I had a second kid. My second book and my second child were due at the same, same week, right. So don’t do it that way if you can help it. It wasn’t great. Having more children then takes your time more. And I have found that the more, the more my time has taxed, the more I have to remind myself, I have to focus on the writing, the other stuff will come. My platform will come, my time to interact on social media more will come, my time to do author engagements will come. I have to right now, focus on the important part, which is getting words down on the page. And that’s really hard because you see all of these other people out there doing all of these other things. But I have to be a mom, especially in COVID when there is no other option. There’s no childcare, even if I wanted to, I couldn’t. There’s no real support other than my mom is wonderful, and sometimes like, right now she has the kids so that nobody is screaming and bleeding into the, into the scene. 

Rachael Herron: [00:12:35] In the podcast, yeah.

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:12:37] So, I think that we all have these pictures of what it, what we’d like it to be like. And then we have to just live in the reality and do the work. Even if it’s in those tiny increments of time, it does add up over time, even though we wish it would be more significant. 

Rachael Herron: [00:12:54] I think it’s so great too, that you’re prioritizing what needs to be prioritized, you know. Your kids will always take priority over everything else. But, your second, most important thing that you do first thing in the morning when you open your eyes is get the writing done. So that, I call it, I talk about this often but, you’re joining the smug club, like yeah, I got 600 words done today and you can be smug for the rest of the day, no matter what you got some done. 

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:13:18] And it’s, it’s about sustainability. And I wanted to talk about that, that word specifically, because,

Rachael Herron: [00:13:24] I wrote it down when you said it actually, it’s so important. 

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:13:27] Sustainability is different for everybody. And it was a really hard, I hope everybody has a therapist. I can only see mine every once in a while, but it’s something she and I talk about. I am a very driven person. I’m type A and I met myself in COVID, because pavement met face because I’m so used to pushing really hard for deadlines and then taking a week or a month to recover even with writing. Like I have done those days where I’ve done 7,500 words a day for three days or four days to really finish a draft. I cannot do that in this situation. And there are other parents who have to watch their kids for whatever reason, or have to work and have to watch their kids. Sustainable is the key word when you’re trying to determine everyday what you can do. So, for me, I tried getting up at five in the morning and I could not do it. It wrecked me as much as I was so happy to get a 1000 or 1500 words in. I could not do it. It ruined me as a parent for the day I was short-tempered with my kids. I didn’t have the energy. And so, I have had to find a sustainable middle ground, where I get up sometimes only half an hour or 15 minutes before my kids are because I’m awake enough, I feel rested enough. And I can write and parent, and I think the sustainability piece, especially right now, while people cannot find or get the support that they always need as a parent. Dads suffer from this too. You have to find something that you can do every day. And that’s often so much less than we are actually capable of, but it’s because we use that energy every single day and there’s no recovery time.

Rachael Herron: [00:15:13] The thing is like the smallest, the lowest viable minimum that we can do on any day is so small and it keeps us going. There are people who will dream, and this makes me really sad every time I think about it, but there are people who will dream about writing for their whole lives. And then there are people who write 80 words a day. I have a friend who writes a hundred words a day, she has for, oh, I think like 11 years now, and she’s written full books, but she only writes a hundred words a day. And that’s all she can do with her health, and it’s truly amazing. How do you know when something has become unsustainable for you? 

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:15:51] So, therapy. 

Rachael Herron: [00:15:54] Yes, that. Yeah.

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:15:56] I think I suffered from this as a professional. It’s one of the reasons I left the architecture profession. I am a don’t listen to your body go until you absolutely can’t go anymore and then crash. 

Rachael Herron: [00:16:08] Welcome! Welcome, friend. 

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:16:10] There are a lot of us in this writing industry because I think the boom bust of the publishing really almost encourages this on its own. It’s really hard. It’s hard to talk yourself into sustainable trajectory, right? So, I think, if you’re happy to sit down and write, and if you have ideas, if you feel fulfilled when you’re finished writing, and if you then can mentally let it go, I think that’s a really good place, whatever that mark is, it might be a thousand words for you, it might be a hundred words for you, it might be 10,000 words for you, and you’re a magic unicorn and please come teach me how to do that. But, 

Rachael Herron: [00:16:52] I was going to say, don’t come into my hot tub party. You’re much nicer than I am.

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:16:56] But I think sustainable is different for everybody else. I wanted to give people a picture into my sustainable because as a working publishing author, I think, it’s so easy to think that we should be doing 5,000 words a day and wouldn’t that be wonderful. But you can also be a published, productive writer. I’m sure my agent wishes I could write faster and so would I, but also, she knows I’m working on it and I know I’m working on it and she’s a mother and I’m a mother and I think as long as I’m happy moving forward in the end, I will get there. 

Rachael Herron: [00:17:31] I write as many books now, maybe fewer. Now that I’m full-time, as I did, when I wrote in 30 or 45-minute bursts, before 12 and 18-hour shifts, it, it’s that, that is my sustainable, and it didn’t change when I had more time to do it either. So, this is so beautiful. What is your biggest joy when it comes to writing? 

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:17:53] This is maybe kind of funny, I don’t know. I love, so I love talking with people and I love sharing how I got published. I love sharing or hearing how other people got published. I love sharing my process. I love the interactive part of authoring. I love hearing how people have read my books and it’s changed her life. I love telling people how I have read their books and it’s changed my life. The interpersonal part really is a huge unexpected joy for me. When you’re writing your first book, you have no idea what’s on the other side. And I have found tremendous joy in the interpersonal part of like, having author friends and helping them mold their books and having them help me mold my books and it, it is a huge joy, the community and the outreach is my absolute favorite part of this. I know I should say it’s the writing. 

Rachael Herron: [00:18:51] No, you shouldn’t. You should say exactly, exactly what it is for you. And I was just talking to somebody else earlier about this today that, that my writing friends understand me better than anyone else. They understand me better than anybody else in any of the other circles, in which I spin. The writers are the ones who really, really get it. Can you share a craft tip of any sort with us?

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:19:11] So I have two, I have one that’s a little bit more of a, that’s related to my, my child rearing, that, it is a site that I used when I was really struggling. So, I’m working on what I call an Everest project. 

Rachael Herron: [00:19:28] Ooh, I like that, that phrase. 

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:19:30] Yeah, it means it’s really, really, really hard for me. And so, my, it took me by surprise. My first three books were an absolute breeze and a joy to write. Like, they were fully formed in my head.

Rachael Herron: [00:19:42] Wow.

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:19:43] They were magic. Right. And I didn’t realize that projects could be so hard. I’m working on a project, a rewrite right now, and there have been times where getting that 200 bare minimum has been an absolute slog in my head. So, I used a site called 4thewords.com, the number four, the words, it gamifies writing. So, you can slay monsters and earn points by typing your words. Right? So, 

Rachael Herron: [00:20:13] I love that. That goes along with that whole type A personality too, right?

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:20:16] I guess so, I don’t know. So, I needed something to take the pressure off of my brain and by making it a game, it really, really helped. So, it’s not exactly a craft tip, but it is something, if you are struggling. So, say your kids are about to get up and you have 15 minutes and you just need to focus and you can’t turn off your brain. It is something that really has helped. 

Rachael Herron: [00:20:40] Is it one of those sites where you type into the site itself and then copy and paste the workout? Yeah?

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:20:45] It is. There’s a little bit of formatting to be done afterward, but I didn’t care. It made my, it made my draft go when it was not going on its own. So, and then the other craft tip I was going to share is more of a mental tip and that’s to that’s the five minutes I spend before I’m writing and it’s not so much just planning out when I’m going to write. It’s that I’m picking what it is that I’m excited about writing about the scene that I’m writing about and trying to get to that. I call it my candy bar. I don’t know what other people call it, but,

Rachael Herron: [00:21:19] I love that.

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:21:20] If you can find, okay, if you’re struggling with a scene, you need to ask yourself if you’re struggling because it’s boring and it’s really boring. Or if you’re just having a hard time getting to the thing that you’re excited about. I find that determining for myself, what it is about the scene, is it like witty dialogue? Is it the new magic system? Is it the, you know, the kiss, the, whatever it is that you’re really excited about, it just helps me meet the page with a lot more excitement other than, here I go, I’m in the I call it the soggy middle, I’m in the soggy middle and I don’t really know what I’m doing. But, if you think about the one thing you’re excited about that day, it does help. 

Rachael Herron: [00:22:07] I have never heard anyone say it like that, and that makes so, so, so, so much sense to me just to kind of push your own energy up a little bit by doing that. 

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:22:18] I’m a five-year old in my head.

Rachael Herron: [00:22:22] Promise me a candy bar and I will do basically anything for a Cadbury creme egg. So that might be my Cadbury crème egg moment. That’s beautiful. Thank you. Thank you so, so much for that. What thing in your life affects your writing in a surprising way?

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:22:37] So, I’m a horse person. And I think, I never would have linked the two, until I needed my horse for my mental health over COVID. The exercise, the sunshine and everything. I think for me, it’s not so much this year. I do miss it. I used to clean stalls. And at , that sounds like a terrible chore. Doesn’t it? 

Rachael Herron: [00:23:04] I had a horse when I was a kid and I just, I remember like even the smell was great to me. Like it all worked for me. 

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:23:11] I mean, you try to explain how cleaning up poop is great to people and they just give you a weird look, but I realized how much doing something repetitive with my body, so that my physical energy was getting taken care of, helps my- unlocked my mental energy. And I would just spend like an hour every morning while I wasn’t paying attention to what my hands were doing just listening to a podcast, contemplating my plot. And I think that that can be translated into parenting. Like if you’re folding laundry and you’re not really having to pay attention, I think sometimes it’s a great time shockingly or up in the middle of the night nursing. I have done that too, where you’re just rocking and kind of zoning out, realizing, I guess I could use that time to let my brain kind of run unchecked on my book. Kind of a surprising, joyful time. 

Rachael Herron: [00:24:05] Surprising and beautiful. Really in a really big way. I love that. What is the best book that you’ve read recently and why did you love it?

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:24:14] I have been in a reading slump. 

Rachael Herron: [00:24:17] Oh, I hate slumps. 

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:24:18] Terrible. I’ve been in a reading slump and a weird media thing. I’m considering it pandemic fatigue, but I’ve really, I have enjoyed some arcs. My friends have sent, I’ve been an audio book listener recently though, like an avid audio book. That’s how I can get through things. The most memorable one recently, is Catherine House by Elizabeth Thomas. So, it is an atypical read for me. I don’t typically, swing toward the literary side of science fiction, but this was a hauntingly, lovely atmospheric story about a girl who arrives at a boarding house with some questionable things going on. And, 

Rachael Herron: [00:25:07] It sounds almost like this was it like Gothic science fiction in a way. 

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:25:10] Yes, yes. Lots of descriptions of like the dripping honey and the food and the squashy pillows and all of these intrigues in the middle of the night, incredibly inclusive, a diverse cast, just really a lovely, memorable kind of haunting book.

Rachael Herron: [00:25:31] That sounds wonderful, thank you. It just went on my TBR pile. One thing, before we get to where we can find you on the internet, if you, if a new mother was to come to you, she’s got a 10-month-old and she says, I want to write, what’s your one piece of advice for me? What would you say?

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:25:52] This is going to be counter-intuitive but I’m going to say it’s okay not to write.

Rachael Herron: [00:25:58] Love that, yeah.

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:26:00] They’re just, I have had two very complicated children. Luckily, they’re healthy now, but I had a really complicated pregnancy. It is a really complicated delivery. It is really complicated babies. And I think sometimes we put too much pressure on ourselves to be productive when our energies are best spent taking care of ourselves. And my advice would be if at all, just take care of yourself and take care of your kid. If it is an absolute need for you, the way it is for me to write, probably just jotting ideas down in a journal. Is that enough? If it’s not, then move the scale up to like, yeah, try 10 minutes a day, but make sure, I think, it’s different being a working writer when I kind of have to write and I have to make the juggle, and I want to support people who are on that end as well, but stories unfold in our minds and our hearts first. And I think it’s okay to nurture them there for a little while or jot down notes or whatever it is, because it is such a taxing time and we just, as a culture, really don’t recognize it. And sometimes it’s okay to just not be able to do very much. And I wish somebody, you know, before I had children had said that to me, because I think we expect a lot out of mothers, but,

Rachael Herron: [00:27:22] This is exactly why I wanted to talk to you. And I don’t think you could have said it better or more beautifully, and we can extrapolate that out to not just mothers, but when you’re having, when somebody’s dying, when you’re losing your job, when you’re moving, when you just have to, we, and I don’t, I say you, we have to be more forgiving for ourselves and there are times when we can’t write. 

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:27:40] And I think we tend to think we aren’t writing if we’re not putting words on the page, but having planned novels in the middle of the night in my head while I’m nursing my kid, I can say, if you’re thinking about your book, if you’re dreaming about your book, if you’re making notes, if you’re thinking about twists or Woody banter, you are writing. It may not be getting on the page very fast, but you are still writing.

Rachael Herron: [00:28:06] Perfect. Perfect. Meghan, thank you so, so much. Where can we find you on the internet? 

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:28:12] If you find me on Twitter, tell me to go write. No, I’m just kidding. I am mostly on Twitter, @megfuzzle because I got that before I was a writer. Sometimes on Facebook. My website, could use a little dusting off, but mostly, I mean, Facebook and Twitter. And, I have a, the third book in my series is out, The Vigilante Game. It just came out in paperback. And so, if anybody picks it up and reads it and wants to send me a picture, I would love it. 

Rachael Herron: [00:28:47] Also, the covers are amazing, people should go look at your books. Can you give us a 30-second overview of this series?

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:28:54] Sure. And by the way, my covers are by Danny Schlitz. He is an amazing, amazing comic artist. And it’s just worth his weight and gold. He’s amazing. My books are about a female comic book writer who solves crimes with her drag queen best friend and a dreamy detective. And they are a comic book, it’s like a copycat comic book crime and in the end, she gets to try to be a vigilante hero herself. So that’s the third book is she actually gets to put on spandex and a Cape and go,

Rachael Herron: [00:29:29] That’s a really high concept and very well stated, that logline that just. It makes me frantic to start reading 

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:29:36] They’re nerdy and hilarious and really escapist reading and so I hope that people enjoy them. 

Rachael Herron: [00:29:41] That’s what we need right now. We need more of that. Meghan, it’s been such a delight to talk to you. 

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:29:46] You too! Thank you!

Rachael Herron: [00:29:47] Thank you so, so much for this. And I know that you have, I know that you’ve changed some people’s hearts today and they feel a little bit better from where they are. 

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:29:56] If anybody needs support, truthfully, just reach out to me and I, my mission right now is to try to support other parent writers.

Rachael Herron: [00:30:03] Thank you, Meghan. Thank you so much for everything. Okay. 

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:30:05] Yes, thank you.

Rachael Herron: [00:30:06] Happy writing. 

Meghan Scott Molin: [00:30:07] Happy writing. Bye. 

Thanks so much for joining me on this episode of “How do you Write?” You can reach me on Twitter, twitter.com/RachaelHerron, or at my website, www.rachaelherron.com, you can also support me on Patreon and get essays on living your creative life for as little as a buck an essay at www.patreon.com/rachael spelled R, A, C, H, A, E, L and do sign up for my free weekly newsletter of encouragement to writers rachaelherron.com/write/

Now, go to your desk and create your own process and get to writing my friends.

The post Ep. 238: Meghan Scott Molin on How To Write When Life is Just Too Busy appeared first on R. H. HERRON.

Kristin Beck first learned about World War II from her grandmother, who served as a Canadian army nurse, fell in love with an American soldier in Belgium, and married him shortly after VE Day. Kristin thus grew up hearing stories about the war, and has been captivated by the often unsung roles of women in history ever since. A former teacher, she holds a Bachelor of Arts in English from the University of Washington and a Master’s in Teaching from Western Washington University. Kristin lives in the Pacific Northwest with her husband and children. This is her first novel.

How Do You Write Podcast: Explore the processes of working writers with bestselling author Rachael Herron. Want tips on how to write the book you long to finish? Here you’ll gain insight from other writers on how to get in the chair, tricks to stay in it, and inspiration to get your own words flowing. 

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Transcript:

Rachael Herron: [00:00:00] Welcome to “How do you Write?” I’m your host, Rachael Herron. On this podcast, I talk to authors about how they write, what their process is and how their lives fit together. I’ll keep each episode short so you can get back to writing.

[00:00:16] Well, Hello writers! Welcome to episode #237 of “How do you Write?” I’m Rachael Herron. So thrilled that you’re here with me today, as we are talking to Kristin Beck, who was a delight. And she is talking about that perennial question that we all have on quietening or quieting, depending on whether you are using American or British pronunciation, spelling, quieting that inner editor. We all need to work on doing that. We all have to learn how to do it. It is something that never goes away. So, I know you’re going to enjoy this delightful interview. All right. What is going on around here? As I was preparing to record, I was like, there’s just nothing going on around here, writing wise. I remember coming from a migraine, so this will be quick. That’s why the podcast is late. Yesterday, when I normally would have done it, I just had to cancel everything and go to bed and I felt very grateful to be self-employed that I could do that. Although if I was, if I put you out in any way, I apologize for that. I had to do that to a few people as I, as the migraine knocked me out.[00:01:24] However, the migraine is also making my brain slow and I forgot that I have a book coming out this week as you listen to this episode. It comes out on Tuesday, May 11th. It is called “Hush Little Baby” and I think it’s my best book yet. It is scary. It is intense. I was just texting with a book seller who loved it and we happen to be friends, so we were texting and he said it was incredibly tense and really stressed them out in a good way. It’s so fun! It’s so fun. And I’m very proud of this book. It has a little tiny bit of sobriety in it, which I am pleased with, but it’s just about a character who happens to be sober. It’s also about a character who happens to be queer. This is definitely not me in this book, but we always put pieces of ourselves in our books. And I’m proud of this book. I hope that you like it. Also, I would like to invite you to something. Yes, you. You, wherever you’re sitting, wherever you’re listening. If you hear this in time, I would love you to come to the virtual launch party. I’m so excited about the launch party because, for all of the books in my career that I have written, my launch parties are in person, and they are in the bay area, and friends come, fans come. It’s fantastic. But it’s the bay area. I am restricted geographically. This time for the first time, we are not restricted geographically. And my launch party, which is on Friday night, Friday, May 14th. If you’re listening to this, 2021, I will be in conversation with Sarah Shepherd of Pretty Little Liars at Murder by the Book, which is just the most wonderful thriller, murder, mystery, crime fiction bookstore in Houston, Texas. And it’s really one of my top two bookstores in the world. And, the other one that I love is, Diesel Books or East Bay Booksellers, and that’s because it happens to be my local bookseller, but otherwise it would be Murder by the Book for sure. And, I’m so pleased to be doing my launch with them. So, if you want to come, I would love it. [00:03:44] We’re just going to be chatting about books. We’re going to be talking about writing. We are going to be talking about this particular book and it is at 5:00 PM Pacific time, on Friday, May 14th. And the link that you can go to, to go, to watch for free is murderbooks.com/herron. Murderbooks.com/H E R R O N. All the information is there. I would really love it if you came, plus I’m really nervous that nobody will show up and then Murder by the Book will be unhappy with me. But I hope that doesn’t happen. Also, if you buy your book from them, pre-order it, or order it that day, I will send you a signed book plate, signed, made out to whoever you want, and it’s an awesome book plate Dutton designed it for me and it’s covered with blood spatter. You can actually see it in my Instagram stories or on my TikTok, if you want to go find me there. But it is the best book plate that I’ve ever seen and you want it, even if you get the book in, e-version send me proof of receipt in whatever way you want to Rachael @RachaelHerron.com and I will send you a book plate. So, but I’d really love to have you come, hear me talk to John at Murder Books and Sarah Shepherd, who is an amazing writer, and it’s going to be fun. Friday, May 14th, 7:00 PM Central, 5:00 PM Pacific, 8:00 PM Eastern. You should come, murderbooks.com/herron. [00:05:10] All right, that’s my, push for that. Also, this week, I- my Fast Draft Your Memoir came out in German. So, if you’re a German speaker and you’d like to read that, please go do that, that’s available. And that was exciting, also working on Fast Draft Your Memoir workbook questions or I’m doing, a brand-new workbook that goes along with that book, we’re kind of optimizing what we can, I’m doing that with my assistant ed who is wonderful. But the thing that’s really exciting this week is the release of Hush Little Baby. So, thank you. Thank you. Thank you. If you, oh, if you’re looking at it, at me on the YouTube, if you’re one of the few people who do that, most people do consume this with their ears, not their eyes, but the posters behind me and it’s such a good cover, I love it. So, that is all the news that I have for you today. Let us jump into the interview with Kristin Beck. I know you’re going to enjoy it. I hope that your writing is going well. I hope that you do not have a migraine and that there is no migraine in your future. And I believe in you, I believe in your writing in your book. So please get a little writing done and come find me on the internet and tell me how it went. Okay, my friends. Bye.[00:06:30] Hey, you’re a writer. Did you know that I send out a free weekly email of writing encouragement? Go sign up for it at www.rachaelherron.com/write  and you’ll also get my Stop Stalling and Write PDF with helpful tips you can use today to get some of your own writing done. Okay, now onto the interview.

Rachael Herron: [00:06:49] All right. Well, I could not be more pleased to welcome to the show today, Kristin Beck. Hi Kristin! 

Kristin Beck: [00:06:53] Hi, thank you so much for having me.

Rachael Herron: [00:06:55] I am delighted to have you, let me give you a little bit of an intro before we get started. Kristin Beck first learned about World War II from her grandmother, who served as a Canadian army nurse, fell in love with an American soldier in Belgium, and married him shortly after VE Day. Kristin thus grew up hearing stories about the war, and has been captivated by the often unsung roles of women in history ever since. A former teacher, she holds a Bachelor of Arts in English from the University of Washington and a Master’s in Teaching from Western Washington University. She lives in the Pacific Northwest with her husband and children. So welcome to the show! We are talking about writing and its process. Your first novel just came out, right?

Kristin Beck: [00:07:38] No, it’s coming out actually in a few weeks. It’s April 13th is the update. 

Rachael Herron: [00:07:42] So by the time this show goes live, it will be out. Will you tell us the title and just a little bit about your book?

Kristin Beck: [00:07:49] Sure. So, the book is called Courage, My Love, and it is about, two women in the Italian resistance who led very different lives. And, when the German occupation takes over in Rome, they’re both pulled into the resistance and decided that they need to fight back. 

Rachael Herron: [00:08:06] I am in love with all things Italian. So, when I was asked about this, but I’m only about halfway done with the book right now, but I am loving it. And it’s just so fun and beautiful. Where did this idea come to you from, for these women? 

Kristin Beck: [00:08:22] Well, so when I was in my twenties, I lived in Italy two different times.

Rachael Herron: [00:08:27] Where?

Kristin Beck: [00:08:29] Once in Sienna.

Rachael Herron: [00:08:29] Oh, I love Sienna.

Kristin Beck: [00:08:31] And then just outside of Venice as a teacher for a semester. So yeah, so it was, it was pretty dreamy. So, I’ve always loved all things Italian as well. And I was looking, I was actually just sort of looking into women and the resistance in general during the war. Not totally searching for ideas for books, just sort of interested. And I came across a newspaper article of the staffette, which were women couriers during the war in Italy. And I was just sort of, captivated by that. I hadn’t heard much about them. And so, I started reading, and kind of delved in the way historical nerds do. And, after a few weeks of reading about them, I just thought I would really like to write a book about these women

Rachael Herron: [00:09:16] And you did.

Kristin Beck: [00:09:18] And yes, and then I did, and here we are.

Rachael Herron: [00:09:21] And how does this, so this, this is a podcast about process and how we get the work done. How did you fit this into your life and around your life? Where does, where does writing fit? 

Kristin Beck: [00:09:32] So my writing schedule tends to revolve around school schedules, because I, 

Rachael Herron: [00:09:36] How, how old are the kids? 

Kristin Beck: [00:09:38] They are nearly 9 and 11.

Rachael Herron: [00:09:40] Okay.

Kristin Beck: [00:09:41] So, not super young anymore. But I tend to write when they are at school, so I kind of get everyone packed off for the day. And then I sit down and I work for as many hours as I can, which on the good days is until it’s pickup time. And then other days I have other business things to do for writing. 

Rachael Herron: [00:10:02] So what are you doing now? Are you working on the next book? 

Kristin Beck: [00:10:05] I’m actually working on the third book. I, so I had a two-book contract when I sold Courage and wrote that second book last year, during well, it’s still the pandemic, but really during the pandemic and so that one is in editing right now and I am working on number three.

Rachael Herron: [00:10:28] How did you find both of those difficult things? How did you find learning how to write during the pandemic? And also, how did you find book two? Because the book two blues are real for a lot of, they were real for me. Did you run into those?

Kristin Beck: [00:10:42] Actually, so book two, I feel very lucky because I understand where those book two blues would come from and, they didn’t come to me on that book. It’s just a really, I, to me it was a very compelling subject and I felt like the book sort of took off and wrote itself. The hard part was that the pan- I was about halfway through when the pandemic started. So, my schedule, you know, was like, everybody else’s schedule was kind of thrown on its end. And I finished the book with kids doing zoom school and that kind of thing. But it worked out and it’s yeah, I’m, I’m really excited about that book. 

Rachael Herron: [00:11:22] Is that also historical? 

Kristin Beck: [00:11:24] It’s historical fiction. It’s about nurses at well, it’s actually about a Swiss nurse and then a Swiss red cross worker who both worked for the Swiss red cross and they’re in occupied France, and they help, ultimately help kids who are refugees escape, occupied France. 

Rachael Herron: [00:11:42] Oh, how very cool. 

Kristin Beck: [00:11:43] Yes. And it’s based on real women, they were, real characters. So it was, that might be what helps me beat the sophomore blues. The women were just so inspiring and their stories were amazing and it made it feel relatively easy to write as easy as writing can be. 

Rachael Herron: [00:11:59] Which is never as easy as we want it to be ever, except on like a random Tuesday once a year. It’s really easy. But other than that, yeah. What is your biggest challenge when it comes to writing?

Kristin Beck: [00:12:11] So my biggest challenge, historically, it was always about finding time. When I first started writing, like when I first set out to write a novel, my kids were really little, they were like in preschool and toddler age. And so, then time was, just really finite. And I was sort of sneaking in hours to write when they were preschool or I feel like I wrote almost a whole book when they were napping. So that was really challenging. And then that, that changed once they went to school and suddenly, I felt like I had a wealth of time. And I had sold the book at that point. And so, I was able to just work on it. But in this past year, those early struggles of sort of time economy, definitely crops back up with the pandemic. I found myself sort of back to my earlier days of, you know, getting up very early to write or writing after everyone was in bed at night. But I was sort of grateful because I think in the past, I really had to learn how to do that. And I had those skills. I’d sort of been through like time autonomy bootcamp early on. 

Rachael Herron: [00:13:17] Yeah. And you got to pull out those that toolbox and use it again. That’s really, really clever. What is your biggest joy when it comes to writing?

Kristin Beck: [00:13:26] So my biggest joy is definitely those days when, you just sort of drop into the zone and, are in the, you know, the flow, the trance of the story world. And I always set an alarm because I go pick up my kids in the afternoon. So, I set up an alarm just to make sure, you know, I don’t miss that. And I love the days when the alarm goes off and I’m just sort of jolted out of writing and realize that I’ve been lost in the story. That’s, those are the most satisfying days for me. 

Rachael Herron: [00:13:55] That’s one of the hardest things for me about flow is it’s- it always reminds me of sleep. Like you cannot enjoy it when you’re in it. You can only enjoy knowing that you were in it, when you were jolted out of it. Yeah. 

Kristin Beck: [00:14:09] Yeah. That’s true. You don’t even realize that you are in it until suddenly the world sort of wakes you up.

Rachael Herron: [00:14:14] Yeah. Yeah. Darn world. Can you share a craft tip of any sort with us? 

Kristin Beck: [00:14:19] Sure. So it’s kind of related to that greatest joy. And I feel like it’s a fairly common craft tip, but I, it’s the one that to me is the most important. And that is when you’re writing, to try as much as possible to quiet that internal editor or that internal critic, that would like to find mistakes as you’re working or remind you of things you still need to look up, if you’re writing historical fiction in particular. I just feel like my very best writing comes when I’m sort of in that subconscious writing flow. And if I allow that editor, you know, that we all have in our minds to speak up at all, it just jolts me right out of that. And it can be very hard to get back into the story flow. 

Rachael Herron: [00:15:04] How do you personally do that? How do you shut up that, that mean guy? 

Kristin Beck: [00:15:11] I think I just start working. I think that’s just really,

Rachael Herron: [00:15:14] That’s such a good simple, true answer. You just kind of ignore it and you just work.

Kristin Beck: [00:15:19] You start typing and it takes a while, you know, sometimes, and sometimes there are few pages that get discarded along the way, but eventually I feel like the story takes over.

Rachael Herron: [00:15:28] That is smart, yeah.

Kristin Beck: [00:15:30] Also, music, I think too. That’s another one I often will, if I, if I’m just kind of stuck in the everyday world, I’ll put on some music and try to help it sweep me off into somewhere else. 

Rachael Herron: [00:15:42] Do you have playlists for your books or just kind of random?

Kristin Beck: [00:15:48] Kind of random. I feel like, I do feel like I return to certain songs for certain characters, or certain moments in the book. But, generally random. 

Rachael Herron: [00:15:57] Can you write to words or no words? 

Kristin Beck: [00:16:00] Either one.

Rachael Herron: [00:16:01] Wow! I’m also impressed when people can write with words because I, they literally end up just falling out of my fingertips. Like, how did that word get over? Oh, wait, that was in the song. 

Kristin Beck: [00:16:12] It was in the song. Yeah, I do. I do listen to a lot of piano music. I feel like piano music in the background is really kind of perfect. 

Rachael Herron: [00:16:20] I just read that Baroque is apparently something really, really good to stimulate our minds, the tempo of a lot of Baroque pieces and I’m planning on trying it, but I hadn’t remembered it until this very moment. What thing in your life affects your writing in a surprising way?

Kristin Beck: [00:16:36] Well, this is kind of get back, it gets back to the whole-time economy question. I think because when I started writing, it was, I just didn’t have much time to work. I developed habits, and I would often put on Curious George for my kids and sit down and write for the hour that they were watching that. And I also, at that time was going to various classes and workshops on writing and people would talk about writer’s block. And I always felt like at that time of my life, I didn’t have the ability to have writer’s block.

Rachael Herron: [00:17:08] You didn’t have the time for writer’s block.

Kristin Beck: [00:17:10] No time for that. And at the time, I wouldn’t have said that that was benefiting my writing, but I feel like now, especially with this pandemic here, I realized how much that had stood me in good stead because I look back and I feel that, I still have those habits of sitting down and not allowing myself to wait for inspiration or, you know, to go on social media or something like that because, I always feel like my time is finite, although it’s less so now. So, I think that’s a surprising effect of those early years. I wouldn’t have foreseen that, that would be a helpful thing. 

Rachael Herron: [00:17:51] It was a perfect bootcamp for you. I’m reminded of, I learned to drive on this old Suzuki Jeep like thing in the jungles of this island called Sai Pan. And it just was the worst thing. It was a, you know, standard and it was the worst vehicle. And my dad would always say like, if you could drive this, you could drive anything. It’s kind of the same thing. Those tools come back later, we need those things. So that’s really awesome. 

Kristin Beck: [00:18:16] That’s a good analogy. 

Rachael Herron: [00:18:17] What is the best book that you’ve read recently? And why did you love it?

Kristin Beck: [00:18:21] So, this is such a hard question of course for any writer, or any reader. I’ve read so many good ones lately. And my, you know, my to-be read list is so high and there’s so many good ones on there too, I know. But I think the one I’ll talk about is a book that I actually read as an arc. But it’s out now. It came out in January and it is Our Darkest Night by Jennifer Robson. And,

Rachael Herron: [00:18:44] It’s so familiar, but I don’t know anything about it.

Kristin Beck: [00:18:47] Well, it’s another book about Italy during World War II. So, I couldn’t wait to read it because there aren’t that many books about Italy during World War II out there. And I knew, maybe a few months before I was asked to read it that she was working on it, and I was really curious how she was going to tackle a similar subject to my book. And it was just a beautiful book. It’s really heartbreaking and uplifting. And it’s about a Jewish woman who has to go into hiding during the German occupation and her life in hiding. And I just thought it was beautifully done and very different than my book, which was also interesting, you know, in fantasy. So yeah, I would definitely recommend that book to anybody. 

Rachael Herron: [00:19:31] Did you find a relief knowing that it was so different from yours?

Kristin Beck: [00:19:38] I don’t know if I thought about it that way. I was just interested. I, you know, I was curious to see how a different writer would tackle, you know, the same period in the same setting. I don’t think I was too worried about it being similar and I knew going in that it was a different topic than my book.

Rachael Herron: [00:19:57] Did you, or were you reading it for a blurb? 

Kristin Beck: [00:19:59] Yes. 

Rachael Herron: [00:20:00] And have you talked to her about the book? Have you guys communicated at all that way?

Kristin Beck: [00:20:04] A little bit. Around the time. A little bit. Yes. And she read mine. She’s read my book too. So, yeah, so we’re going to have a chance to talk about that actually for my launch event.

Rachael Herron: [00:20:15] Perfect. That’s what I was wondering if they were putting you together in some way. I think that’s awesome. I have gained two of my best, best friends just from blurbing and then from reaching out to each other afterwards and saying, “Hey, that was great” I was just emailing with Holly Robinson, who we blurbed each other, and then it really becomes this community, this friendship, or it can, so I’m glad to hear that. Okay. So, where can we find you online, where do you prefer to be found?

Kristin Beck: [00:20:45] So I’m on Instagram and I have a Facebook page. I’m writing Facebook page. So, it’s KristinBeckAuthor is my handling, both of those. And then I also have a website which is also KristinBeckAuthor.com so, I can be found on any of those places. 

Rachael Herron: [00:21:03] Right before we go, because we still have a little bit of time here, tell me how you are feeling, because this is people love hearing this. How are you feeling about being a debut author and coming out in just a few weeks? How what’s your heart doing? 

Kristin Beck: [00:21:15] Well, it’s definitely a mixture of joy and nerves, right? It’s a big transition. And I think the pandemic plays a role because it wasn’t something that when I imagined coming out with a debut book would be at play. So, everything’s online and in some ways that’s wonderful because we can reach more people and there are more ways to have conversations, with the online platforms. But it is a shift from what I had initially imagined. But yeah, I mostly, I’m very excited. I’m definitely excited and a little nervous. 

Rachael Herron: [00:21:51] What are you going to do the day the book comes out? 

Kristin Beck: [00:21:54] Oh, that’s a good question. 

Rachael Herron: [00:21:56] You have to have some kind of celebration.

Kristin Beck: [00:21:57] Oh, I should have a celebration. I don’t know what I’ll do though. I would love to say that I would go out to lunch or something, but we’re not quite here yet, right? 

Rachael Herron: [00:22:07] I know. I know. But do think about it. Cause that, it’s just such, it is such a special day and it only happens the one time. I remember my debut morning, I woke up and I really just felt like the whole world looked different to me, you know, and the next day was back to normal, but that day was really, really cool. So,

Kristin Beck: [00:22:28] That day you’re officially an author, right? 

Rachael Herron: [00:22:30] Are bookstores open in your area? 

Kristin Beck: [00:22:32] They are. They are open here. 

Rachael Herron: [00:22:35] May I recommend just going to look at your book? 

Kristin Beck: [00:22:38] Oh, that’s a good tip. Yes. 

Rachael Herron: [00:22:40] That’s what I did with a bunch of friends. We had like six or seven bookstores that we were going to go to in order until we found a copy and hopefully, you know, we would, we hoped that we would, find a copy, but I found one at the first place, Books Inc. in Alameda, and it was there. And then we just crossed the street and went to the bar. I don’t remember much after that, but just seeing it on the shelves, I would recommend doing that.

Kristin Beck: [00:23:01] Yes. That sounds like a perfect debut day. 

Rachael Herron: [00:23:03] Well, thank you so much for talking to us, Kristin, and may it fly from the shelves. We wish you all the best with this and your future books. 

Kristin Beck: [00:23:10] Thank you so much. 

Rachael Herron: [00:23:11] Okay. Take care. Bye.

Kristin Beck: [00:23:12] Yes, thanks so much. 

Rachael Herron: [00:23:14] Thanks so much for joining me on this episode of “How do you Write?” You can reach me on Twitter, twitter.com/RachaelHerron, or at my website, www.rachaelherron.com, you can also support me on Patreon and get essays on living your creative life for as little as a buck an essay at www.patreon.com/rachael spelled R, A, C, H, A, E, L and do sign up for my free weekly newsletter of encouragement to writers rachaelherron.com/write/

Now, go to your desk and create your own process and get to writing my friends.

The post Ep. 237: Kristin Beck on How to Shut Up Your Inner Editor appeared first on R. H. HERRON.

Kathleen West’s novels, Minor Dramas & Other Catastrophes and Are We There Yet?, have been best books picks by Real Simple, Newsweek, People Magazine, Entertainment Weekly, Good Morning America, Pop Sugar, and the New York Post. A teacher for 20 years before she published her first novel, Kathleen is particularly interested in the topics of motherhood, ambition, competitive parenting, and the elusiveness of work-life balance. She is a life-long Minnesotan and lives in Minneapolis with her family.

How Do You Write Podcast: Explore the processes of working writers with bestselling author Rachael Herron. Want tips on how to write the book you long to finish? Here you’ll gain insight from other writers on how to get in the chair, tricks to stay in it, and inspiration to get your own words flowing. 

Join Rachael’s Slack channel, Onward Writers!

Transcript:

Rachael Herron: [00:00:00] Welcome to “How do you Write?” I’m your host, Rachael Herron. On this podcast, I talk to authors about how they write, what their process is and how their lives fit together. I’ll keep each episode short so you can get back to writing.

[00:00:16] Well, Hello writers! Welcome to episode # 236 of “How do you Write?” I’m Rachael Herron. I am so thrilled that you’re here with me today. As I talked to Kathleen West, who was an absolute delight. She was one of those people that I just wanted to adopt into my life immediately. We had a great chat and she has this great craft tip on deliberately writing scenes you’re not going to use. And I loved it and I’m trying it actually at the moment. So I know you’re going to get a lot out of the interview, stick around for that. What’s going on around here? Well, if you watch on YouTube, you can see that I’m in a completely different space. I am in a co-working space because my office is blown apart. So I apologize if the sound quality isn’t quite up to what you’re used to. I won’t be able to bring my big boom mic and I mean, I could, it would look really weird getting it here on Bart. But for the next few months I will probably be recording quite a bit in here. I will definitely be teaching in here. Because it is not comfortable to be at my house when people are inside the house, working on it, doing things, painting, and I needed a place to escape. And it just kind of wanted to mention it because this is me taking my job seriously. This is me giving myself a place to work that is quiet. That is mine. That is not in the middle of chaos. [00:01:52] So, it was exciting. This is my very first time being in here. I took Bart and took the train to get here, which was incredibly nerve wracking. I did not know my nerves would be so wrecked to be on Bart for the first time in more than a year, I am vaccinated, fully vaccinated. You know, it’s been more than a month, but still on the train, you can’t get more than six feet away from people. Even, I, you know, I came over at like two o’clock and not rush hour and still you’re right next to people. So that was a little weird and I didn’t feel comfortable also getting here was a little weird. I just want to say and honor the fact that anytime we do something for the first time or doing something for the first time and it’s hard and it’s nerve-wracking, you can just walk in here, you know, figuring out the path to get to this building. I’m up on the sixth floor, I’m looking at the Oakland federal building, the double towers, there’s a pale blue sky and light blue clouds. And I’m looking at the Skyway walk over. This is downtown Oakland. It’s really a place that I love. And I love that this is the view I have right now, in this co-working space, I can ‘rent’ or ‘borrow’ privately offices whenever I want, which is actually what I’m going to be doing the whole time I’m here because I still don’t want to be sitting out in the co-working space. So I’m going to just be grabbing these private offices to be in. I’m feeling very grateful, very lucky, and also pretty darn sensible for taking myself and my job seriously. This is what I’m going to be doing when we get to New Zealand after we get out of quarantine. I was super stressed trying to find Airbnbs cause we don’t know where we’re going to be living. We don’t know what city we’re going to be in. You know, trying to find rentals that had three bedrooms because my wife needs an office. I need an office and I realized, oh, or will you just do co-working spaces? And that’s such a relief and it’s just a business expense. And yeah, honestly, I’m pretty stoked about it. I’m supposed to be sitting on the other side of the desk with my back to the window, but why would I do that? Because what an incredible view. So also it’s very bright, so you can see me in all the full glory on YouTube. I usually- there is no ring light needed in this office. I must tell you that.[00:04:17] What else is going on? Yeah. Waylon our cat, who we rehomed is settling in beautifully. He loves the kids. He’s getting petted all the time and he’s getting a lot of love so that, does our hearts very, very good. We needed to hear that. The move itself is coming along. However, I will say that we are entering a couple of weeks of the hardest stuff, you know, moving all of the boxes that we have filled out into the pod and then from the pod into organizing it onto the pallet, which will go onto the container ship, which will take our stuff. We’re only taking one pallets worth of goods, unless we take two because it just seems like not enough space for the boxes that we have. They assure us it’s all going to fit on one pallet, there are people who are shipping it on the container ship, so we shall see, we can always order another pallet. It’s not very expensive. Thank goodness. So, but that’s the kind of thing we’re doing. We’re doing pretty big and ups-upsetting. I’m using the word upsetting deliberately because it is upsetting the status quo, the normal every day. And I just wanted to mention that yesterday, I had a meeting with my mastermind’s group and this is a group of writers. We’ve been meeting probably off and on for a year or so maybe more. Most of them are urban fantasy writers. All of them- no, we kind of, we kind of run the gamut, but there are a couple of urban fantasy writers and these are all people who have been in the business as long as I have. We all entered around 2009, 2010, and they are so important to me.[00:06:00] We don’t meet that often, maybe once a month, once every two months. But when I sat down yesterday, we do a hot seat row, you know, just, we rotate through all the way through all five of us. Everybody gets a turn to talk about what they’re struggling with, and what I said I was struggling with was trying to figure out what to write, how to write working on how many books are in process right now, something like five or six plus re-releases of at least six. I know I had the numbers. I think the last time I was on the podcast, but the numbers are high. How do I focus? How do I get things done? I did finish the faster after memoir workbook. The German edition will be coming out soon. So things are getting completed because I am choosing to focus on one thing at a time and getting them off of my desk. But what my mastermind group said was Rachael, for the love of God, why don’t you cut yourself some slack and just move. I love that advice. I can’t take that advice because I’m Rachael. But I can take a little bit of that advice. I can take it for in the spirit, with which it was meant, which means I can understand that I am not going to get as much done as I usually do when I have a home office. And I go there in the morning and I leave at night. Everything is up in the air and it’s okay if I’m up in the air too, I need to remember to treat myself with gentleness, understand that I’m still and always will be a writer. I could do a little bit less. And this is what I tell my students when they are in the throws of the hard stuff in life. And we’re talking the hard stuff we’re talking, moving divorce, loss, death, grief, a pandemic. I’m not being lazy.[00:07:47] I’m always worried that I’m being lazy, which is something you might identify with in this work-obsessed productivity, obsessed culture. And I freely admit that I am just as obsessed with productivity as the next person, if not more, but we have to remember to give ourselves a break when stuff is hard. And stuff is a little bit hard for me right now. It’s good. It’s all chosen stuff. So that makes it feel good, better but I still have to go gentle. So I just thought, I would say that in case you’re dealing with some hard stuff or some big life changes, if you’re beating yourself up in any way, I want you to knock it off. No, beating yourself up, do a little bit of writing, do what you can, and then pat yourself on the back really hard. Give yourself that California granola hug, like literally put your arms around your shoulders and give yourself a squeeze because you’re amazing. You’re amazing. And look, you’re here. You’re thinking about writing. You want to think about writing. I thank you for spending this time with me. It really means a lot to me. And I’m so glad that you’re here. I just want to take a second to thank new Patreon members. I don’t think I thank them last week. Helen Conway and Rita Zelos, thank you so, so, so much. If anyone is ever interested in supporting me over on Patreon it eally makes a huge difference in my life. It allows me to write these essays on right now, I’m writing chapters of the book about moving to New Zealand. You can always look at that @patreon.com/Rachael R A C H A E L. And a new essay will be coming out tomorrow on the day that this podcast goes live. So if you’d like to read about moving to New Zealand, that’s the place to do it. All right. Thank you for being here. Thank you for listening. And I know you’re going to enjoy this interview with Kathleen West. Please keep doing your writing. You’re the only, I know it sounds like a cliché. It sounds trite, but I really, really mean it. If you don’t write your book, no one will write your book and we will lose your book or your books. And we need those. We need those in the round. So, do you writing friends. Do a little bit, come find me on the internet and then tell me all about it. I’d love to hear that and happy writing. [00:10:00] Hey, you’re a writer. Did you know that I send out a free weekly email of writing encouragement? Go sign up for it at www.rachaelherron.com/write and you’ll also get my Stop Stalling and Write PDF with helpful tips you can use today to get some of your own writing done. Okay, now onto the interview.

Rachael Herron: [00:10:18] Well, I could not be more pleased to have on the show today, Kathleen West. Welcome, Kathleen!

Kathleen West: [00:10:22] Thank you so much, Rachael, I’m so happy to be here. 

Rachael Herron: [00:10:25] I am thrilled to talk to you. I’m loving your book. I’m right smack dab in the middle of it. So I’m not sure what’s going to happen yet. So it’s kind of the sweet spot of being in a book. Anyway, let me give you a little introduction. Kathleen West novels, Minor Dramas & Other Catastrophes and Are We There Yet? have been best book picks by Real Simple, Newsweek, People Magazine, Entertainment Weekly, Good Morning, America, Pop Sugar, and the New York Post. A teacher for 20 years before she published her first novel, Kathleen is particularly interested in the topics of motherhood, ambition, competitive parenting, Ooh that’s all in this book. And the elusiveness of work-life balance. She’s a life-long, Minnesotan and lives in Minneapolis with her family. So welcome. This show is for writers and we talk about writing, but I would love to know, are you still teaching or are you full-time writing now? 

Kathleen West: [00:11:16] Well, I was full-time writing last school year, 2019-2020. And this fall, I taught third grade full-time in the fall. So just, I really found myself missing teaching during the pandemic, which sounds crazy, but I really 

Rachael Herron: [00:11:35] It does. 

Kathleen West: [00:11:36] I realized that teaching is really a coping mechanism for me. Like if I have to be like the adult in charge in front of a classroom of kids, like that helps me deal with our realities. So I, it was a perfect opportunity, the woman who replaced me had a baby this fall, so same classroom, same colleagues. I just dashed back in for a semester. I felt like I was doing a great thing for myself and for the kids. And then I was back to writing full-time in December.

Rachael Herron: [00:12:05] Wow. So were you doing on zoom or were you in the classroom at that point?

Kathleen West: [00:12:08] I was in person with them, I had half the kids every day. So 10 were with me and then 10 were with my assistant and then we would alternate day by day and then in November, when everything peaked, we were online for between like the week before Thanksgiving and then until winter break. 

Rachael Herron: [00:12:26] Wow! And it seems like, I mean, you have such a cheerful aspect about doing that. It seems like you enjoyed it.

Kathleen West: [00:12:31] I did, you know, I really loved my students this year. They were like a lovely group of kids, really adaptable and flexible. And I love the other third grade teacher that I worked with at school. So really nice to be back with her and to kind of engage in that friendship again and then I also knew I was going to be done. So,

Rachael Herron: [00:12:53] I love that. Yeah. And it had a timeline on it. Yeah. So, when you- now, and so now you’re back full time writing. Can you tell us a little bit about your process? How do you get work done? Are you a morning writer? Are you a binge writer? What, how does that work for you? 

Kathleen West: [00:13:08] Yeah, when I first started writing seriously, not that long ago, like 2015. I worked really early in the morning before school, so I’d get up at like 5 o’clock, 4:45 when I was working on a project work until 6:15, and that was that like, that was the time of day that I was I’m awake and free to do my stuff. So, that’s what I did. And now that I am more flexible with writing as more of a bigger, bigger part of my real career, I don’t tend to get up that early anymore. I don’t, you know, I get up at 6 or whatever, you know, between 

Rachael Herron: [00:13:43] That’s still damn early 

Kathleen West: [00:13:45] I start writing usually until everybody settled, you know, like I might do email or other tasks and then in terms of like binge writing, et cetera, when I’m in the drafting phase, it’s very painful. Like first draft I can- it’s I can hardly do it. It hurts my body, 

Rachael Herron: [00:14:02] Me too

Kathleen West: [00:14:03] Put the words down on the way. So I have to just make very small goals, like 200 words, and you can have a coffee. 200 more words, and you can go on Twitter. If you hit 800, you can walk the dog, you know, like, so just like little chunks and now, like I have a book due next week. I know like the convergence of the launch of my new book and this due date is really my own fault. It’s because of the teaching this fall. And then I didn’t finish by March 1st when I said I was going to so

Rachael Herron: [00:14:31] That’s so difficult though.

Kathleen West: [00:14:33] Yes. But this feels like the last revision, like I can really disappear into that work for hours and hours. But other than that, I really can’t. I don’t know. I’m very distractible.

Rachael Herron: [00:14:42] I am exactly 100% the same way. And I’ve never actually asked anybody who has the same similarity as me, this question, but why do you think that is? Because I’m exactly the same way. I hate every single, I try not to say this, but it’s true. I don’t like first drafting but in revision I can spend, I can spend easily six, seven hours. And if I’m on deadline and the book is due that week, like it is, I will spend 12 hours and be, I’ll be tired, but I’ll be okay and happy. Why is that you think? 

Kathleen West: [00:15:08] I don’t know. I think it’s because it’s so hard to get to know the characters in the beginning, you know, like and it takes me a lot of rounds, a lot of chapters that I end up throwing away until I even know like how they’re going to react or what they’re going to do or to get them to be consistent. So I think that initial work that getting to know them is just harder than it is to just, I don’t know, be with them at the end.

Rachael Herron: [00:15:32] I think that’s a great answer. I think that is exactly what happened. Who is your editor? 

Kathleen West: [00:15:36] Carrie Donovan. 

Rachael Herron: [00:15:38] Oh she works- she’s my friend, Juliette Blackwell’s editor and she loves her. 

Kathleen West: [00:15:44] Yeah. She’s brilliant. Yes. I can’t wait to give her this book. I’m a little nervous because I know that she’ll have some great idea that I need to implement that will be a lot of work, but I know that it will be a great idea. 

Rachael Herron: [00:15:58] Yeah. And as Julie always says, we have to let our editors do their work. They’ve got to earn their money. They’ve got to think hard. They’re gonna help us. I love that. So what is your biggest challenge when it comes to writing?

Kathleen West: [00:16:05] Gosh, you know, I think it’s that, that need that I have to write so much to get, like, I think I’m probably write 250,000 words to get to the final 90,000 words. And maybe that’s the same for everyone. 

Rachael Herron: [00:16:19] No, it isn’t. We’re anomalous. I usually have about 200 to get to a hundred.

Kathleen West: [00:16:25] That’s my biggest challenge, you know, and I- in each of the three books I’ve written so far, I’ve reached a point, where I’ve needed to like scrap it and start over. And my agent has been the one to tell me that 

Rachael Herron: [00:16:38] it’s hard. 

Kathleen West: [00:16:39] Yes. And she, it’s not really like starting over because I’ve already gotten to know the characters and everything. It’s still such a painful moment to like drag the chapters to the trash and then there’s always tears but then she’s right. You know, like she’s 100%, right. This time I’m like, cause my team at Berkeley is like, well, you know, maybe you could have some deleted scenes that you send out and I’m like, oh, I’ve got like 40,000 words deleted scenes for forever, so yeah.

Rachael Herron: [00:17:11] I’ve never used a deleted a scene to do that and I’ve always meant to. Jumping back to what you said that you just started really writing in 2015, writing hard like this. What were you, did you feel like a writer before? Is it something you’d always wanted to do? Or is it something you came too late?

Kathleen West: [00:17:26] Yeah, no, I’ve always wanted to be a writer and I was really committed as a kid and I’ve always been writing, you know, I had a blog that’s still exists I don’t write on it as much anymore, but, and I was a writing teacher. I was just really distracted with, you know, I got, I graduated from college, I got married, had my kids, you know, had my full-time job. And then finally I was like, well, if you want to be a novelist, like you better write a novel. So it was just like a stage in life where I was, my oldest kid was six. I had the bandwidth to have like a new hobby and then this is my new hobby. 

Rachael Herron: [00:18:01] That’s, I just want to like point out the really the profundity of that sentence. If you want to be a novelist, you better write a novel. And there is somebody I know there’s at least one person listening to the show going, oh, dang it. I guess I better- 

Kathleen West: [00:18:16] You have to try it. I mean, that’s the other thing, I had been a pretty strong perfectionist for most of my life. I don’t think that I am anymore and in some ways it’s hard to like, let go of that identity because there’s a part of me that thinks, like, if you’re a really hard worker, then you must be a perfectionist. But, I’m grateful to be in this place now because I don’t think I could’ve been a professional writer earlier in my life because I wasn’t very good at accepting feedback or understanding that it’s not perfect the first time. So getting, you know, having my agent say, like you’re a brilliant genius now start your book over. I wouldn’t have been able to do that before.

Rachael Herron: [00:18:54] And I love that you said there are tears involved. There’s always, always tears involved. And then we just pick ourselves up and do it again. So what is the biggest joy you have when it comes to writing? 

Kathleen West: [00:19:04] Well I had a great joy today, so I have this woman, Nicole, she’s a young adult writer. Nicole Kronzer, she’s the author of a brilliant book called Unscripted, which is about teen improv camp. So 

Rachael Herron: [00:19:515] Oh, that sounds fun. 

Kathleen West: [00:19:17] Yeah, it’s really a fun book. But she and I, she’s a teacher too, and she was on sabbatical last year. And so I would go before the pandemic, I would go to her house. She has a studio in her backyard. It’s gorgeous. And we would just sit there together talk, then set the timer, write, and then talk again. You know, and just being started reading each other’s stuff. And now we can’t do that in person, but we do it on zoom. So I’m usually just with Nicole in the morning on the zoom and we just hit mute and then work for a while. And it’s always me that breaks the silence. Like, hey, are you still there? But this morning I broke the silence to tell her I’m like this chapter that I just looked at is really good. I mean, just having that realization, you’re like something in this, this is really good. Like I did a good job on this. That’s my biggest joy, both my friends and the other friends that I’ve met through writing. And like coming across something that I’m just like, yep. That’s good check. 

Rachael Herron: [00:20:11] And you had both of those things today, 

Kathleen West: [00:20:13] Yes. So it was a great day, 

Rachael Herron: [00:20:15] Oh, that’s wonderful. I absolutely love that. Can you share a craft tip of any sort with us?

Kathleen West: [00:20:20] Yes, I will share a craft tip I’ve been thinking about this week, because one of my friends is writing a book in multiple points of view for the first time. And I have done that. For all three-

Rachael Herron: [00:20:31] You’re so good at it. Yeah.

Kathleen West: [00:20:33] I really, when I read the Liane Moriarty’s, The Husband’s Secret, oh, this is what I want to do. So that was a big motivator for me but she asked me about doing that and there was an exercise that I learned in the class that I took from the author, Nina LaCour, and I think it really helps for all character, but especially if you need multiple point of view, because you don’t have so much time to give a lot of details about each person and what she suggests is you list five pivotal life events for your character, you might not see them on the, you probably won’t see them on the page. You know, like it’s like they got divorced in this time or when they were in second grade, this happened. And then write those scenes, even though you’re going to throw them away or at least write one or two of them. And then I find myself being able to just drop in little nuggets in my multiple points of view chapters, because I know all that stuff. I don’t really want to do it when I sit down to do it because it feels like a waste. Cause I know for sure it’s going to be run right, but then I think it pays off later. 

Rachael Herron: [00:21:34] It absolutely pays off. I’ve never heard this tip and I think it’s absolutely brilliant. And one thing I want to say is that I love books that are in multiple points of view and I often write them however, there’s always that moment where you’re starting off at the first chapter and it’s a slog because you’re like, okay, I’ve got 17 different names. Now I’ve got this mom, this mom, this kid, that kid that, you know all, how am I going to remember this? And you made it seem so easy. I was never confused as to who was what? And then, you know, the mom comes on and like all of this stuff and you do it so well. And it must be from doing that to trick, triggers are part of it?

Kathleen West: [00:22:08] I think so, or all that time, you know, 

Rachael Herron: [00:22:11] Cause you really know them. 

Kathleen West: [00:22:12] Yes. And then there’s another teacher that gave me another tip that really helps where you kind of string through a certain thing. Like a repeating image can go from one chapter to the next, which really helps you kind of string along. And I used to do it very obviously, like I’d have yellow in the last sentence of one chapter and then yellow in the beginning of the next chapter. And I don’t do it quite that way anymore, but just thinking about something that will, you know, the reader can grab onto and just have a little echo in the next bginning part, I think that helps too. 

Rachael Herron: [00:22:44] Can you think of an example that you did that, that wasn’t yellow? I think that’s really fascinating too.

Kathleen West: [00:22:47] Well I just looked at one today where, two different chapters are counting or two different characters are counting down to an event that’s 39 days away. So one character is like it’s 39 days away and you get it like in a bar, it’s two adults talking and the next chapter is an eight-year old and he’s counting down in his little Bible, 39 days away. So, that sort of think, you know

Rachael Herron: [00:23:10] I love that. That also feels very Liane Moriarty-esque to me, and I just like worship that woman. So, and I can see the similarities in your writing. I really can.

Kathleen West: [00:23:19] Well, that’s my favorite compliment. So I’ll take it.

Rachael Herron: [00:23:23] I really, really, really can. So that’s awesome. 

Kathleen West: [00:23:27] With the, she mentions the bachelor. I think it’s in The Husband’s Secret. And the bachelor of the television show, several characters mentioned having watched the bachelor. And I think that’s where I first got the idea to do that. 

Rachael Herron: [00:23:38] It’s so smart. Thank you. That’s two tips. That’s two great tips for the price of one. What thing in your life affects your writing in a surprising way?

Kathleen West: [00:23:47] Well, my only other thing that I do is, running. I love running and it’s really a similar pursuit in a lot of ways. I really liked the book, what I talk about when I’m talking about running by 

Rachael Herron: [00:24:04] Murakami. Yeah. I love that book.

Kathleen West: [00:24:05] Yeah. He talks about that too. Like the need to pursue something and like the attention span of takes and the dedication it takes. And a lot of times I’ll go on a run and then figure out a bunch of stuff. Sometimes I go on a run and plan to figure out a bunch of stuff and then there’s nothing, but sometimes I’m like, okay, this is it. This is ending. I got it. You know, so that moving of my body is really important. And I think that impacts the writing.

Rachael Herron: [00:24:31] When you are running, are you listening to music or podcasts or quiet or are you just letting it all percolate? What, how do you do that? 

Kathleen West: [00:24:37] Sometimes I listen to a podcast for the first half or a book. I let, I love to listen to audio books and I’ll do that for the first half of the run. And then I’ll switch to music for the second half and when I’m listening to music, I can really zone out. And then sometimes I’ll just go silent, like just this, or maybe yesterday, the day before I was like, no music, just silence, like, you know, get in your head and see what happens. So I switched it up. 

Rachael Herron: [00:25:04] I love that. I do a similar thing in swimming and I’ve just gotten, swim buds so that I can, and I have been thinking about like, what do I want to do with this time? Because if I’m listening to an audio book or a podcast the whole time that I’m not gonna have the writing thoughts that I want. So, yeah, that’s a good answer. Do half and half. And what is the best book you’ve read recently? And why did you love it? 

Kathleen West: [00:25:26] Oh man. I’ve read a lot of great books recently. I just read The Chicken Sisters, by KJ Dell’Antonia 

Rachael Herron: [00:25:34] Isn’t that delight. And she’s so delightful too. She’s been on the show. 

Kathleen West: [00:25:37] And I love her podcast also and she, the thing I really love about that book is something that I try to do in my books too, or aspire to, where she has this really fun premise. The book is about a reality TV show, and it is about like this reality TV show and all the pop culture and hype and all this stuff that goes with it. Sorry about that. 

Rachael Herron: [00:25:58] No worries. 

Kathleen West: [00:26:00] But then you get this like really emotional sister story right next to it. And it’s about childhood trauma and coming out of it. And I was just like amazed by the end that she’d managed to get those two things in the same book. So that’s why I really like that one

Rachael Herron: [00:26:15] I love that. Thank you and I love that Reese picked that one for her

Kathleen West: [00:26:22] I know! Such a great, I love when anyone, from my genre, it gets picked and like, yes, I love to write light reads. You know, one of my friends, when I first read minor dramas my 1st book was like, I hope you don’t take this the wrong way, but this is totally a book I would read at the beach. I’m like, yeah, I did it on purpose like, so I love it when those kind of books, which a lot of people like to read when they get the acclaim.

Rachael Herron: [00:26:46] Especially, I think right now I’ve been writing thrillers for, my last two books have been thrillers, but right now I’m writing a light beach read and it’s so enjoyable coming out of 2020, I don’t want to do, I’m just not interested in writing a thriller right now. 

Kathleen West: [00:27:02] I want to write a thriller next to you

Rachael Herron: [00:27:03] You should

Kathleen West: [00:27:03] I need to, but I need to, I don’t know how to, I like, okay you’re gonna tell me how

Rachael Herron: [00:27:07] I’m going to tell you how. This is, how, because you and I are already, I can tell so similar, you write your normal book. And then your agent and your editors tell you, ‘Wow! You wrote a light women’s fiction novel. Now make it a thriller.’ And those hundred thousand words that I would throw out would be like all the emotional fun stuff. And then I would rev up the pace of every scene and add more plot points and tighten everything, but I-both of the thrillers that I’ve written, both of them had just been women’s fiction at first, so great.

Kathleen West: [00:27:35] And where do I put the dead body in or the kidnapping or whatever? 

Rachael Herron: [00:27:39] I have to shove them in there. Like one, in the second, the one that comes out in May, I had to literally find a dead body. It just- cause I didn’t want one, so yeah, but apparently you need one.

Kathleen West: [00:27:51] Yeah. Yeah. I gotta, I’m excited to try that. I read so many thrillers and mysteries. I was having a reading rut this fall and it was really busy at school too. And finally in November, I’m like, you need to snap out of it. Only mysteries and thrillers all the way through the end of the year. 

Rachael Herron: [00:28:08] Do you like dark thrillers?

Kathleen West: [00:28:10] Yeah, I like them all!

Rachael Herron: [00:28:11] Have you read Girl A, yet? 

Kathleen West: [00:28:13] No, should I read that? 

Rachael Herron: [00:28:14] Yes. Yes. Go get it. It really like shook me up and like made me think, oh, maybe I do want to write a very, very dark thriller. You’ll love it. It’s great. Okay. Will you please tell us right now about, Are We There Yet and where we can find it, and you online? 

Kathleen West: [00:28:30] Sure. Are We There Yet is a book about Alice Sullivan, a mom who feels like she’s got everything in order. Her kids are getting older. She doesn’t have to change diapers. Her career is kind of taking off and she’s an architect interior designer. And then she finds out that her daughter’s second grade conference, that her daughter is woefully behind in reading. And at the same time, he gets a call from the junior high about her son who has engaged in some really unfortunate bullying behavior. And these two stumbling points really impact her relationship in the community and her standing in her peer group. So it’s a book about, you know, forgiveness and secrets and culpability, and 

Rachael Herron: [00:29:12] And it’s very real. It’s just very, very real and, but real in the, in the comfortable way. Like I want to spend time way, not with like, if these were my friends, I might, you know, oh God, it’s just so nice to be with them. And your voice is so good and so enjoyable. Thank you for writing it. Where can we find you online?

Kathleen West: [00:29:29] I really like to be online on Twitter. And I’m @kwestbooks on Twitter and then also on Instagram at kathleenwestwrites, those are probably the best places and I really liked to interact with readers. So feel free to, you know, send me a little, drop me a line. 

Rachael Herron: [00:29:46] I love that. Thank you. It has been such a joy to talk to you. It’s so nice to meet you. 

Kathleen West: [00:29:50] Nice to meet you too. I can’t wait to read. Let’s stay in touch!

Rachael Herron: [00:29:53] Let’s keep in touch. I was just going to say that I do not say this on all the shows, but yes let’s please do that.

Kathleen West: [00:29:57] We seem like we would, you know. Okay

Rachael Herron: [00:30:00] I agree! Thanks Kathleen so much. Happy writing! Bye. 

Rachael Herron: [00:30:05] Thanks so much for joining me on this episode of “How do you Write?” You can reach me on Twitter, twitter.com/RachaelHerron, or at my website, www.rachaelherron.com, you can also support me on Patreon and get essays on living your creative life for as little as a buck an essay at www.patreon.com/rachael spelled R, A, C, H, A, E, L and do sign up for my free weekly newsletter of encouragement to writers rachaelherron.com/write/

Now, go to your desk and create your own process and get to writing my friends.

The post Ep. 236: Kathleen West On Deliberately Writing Scenes You Won’t Use appeared first on R. H. HERRON.