PRESENT-DAY SNIPPET: HOW MY DELUSION CAUSED ME TO WRITE (FINISH) MY (HOPEFULLY DEBUT) MANUSCRIPT
My first yes in a sea of nos (re publication), Grammy’s birthday, Kit Kat’s dental surgery, and some writer shoutouts
My therapist Lorraine introduced me to Mslexia magazine. She knows I harbour not-so-secret dreams of becoming a novelist someday and she asked ever so gently if I’d heard of it. She said it was a publication for writers, a women’s magazine; they had competitions and calls for pitches and all sorts. I hadn’t heard of it but she let me borrow a small stack of copies she had and said I could take all the time I needed to look through them and return them when I was ready. They also have a website.
I’d already begun submitting things about two years ago which began with The Nan Shepherd Prize. I’m nothing if not ambitious (read slightly delusional). Of course, I got nowhere near the £10,000 publishing deal prize with Canongate but it began my “spray and pray” approach to writing and submitting things. My fiction writing, of course, two years ago and perhaps even now wasn’t “quite there.” But it was a good way to keep going, keep practising.
Early readers were gentle with me even though my writing has been a work in progress.
A dream of decades
I found a post from sixteen years ago on Facebook where I’d talked about how I was working on a short story. That happened to be for one of my creative writing courses in university. One professor, Dr V, had told me that I was more of a ‘novelist.’ I think that was code for ‘waffles a lot.’ I never did have the brevity to become Raymond Carver, Alice Walker, or Truman Capote.
Another much-loved creative writing professor, Dr Hall, was such a wonderful teacher, who taught by modelling. We’d read a sample and try to emulate it. She said how one of her former students had gone on to be a well-off novelist of the type of novels like The Babysitter’s Club but about horses or something for Middle School aged children. In a way that gave me hope that it was okay to become any sort of writer. We didn’t have to be high-brow.
Dr V assigned brilliant books like The Brief and Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, a Pulitzer prize winner by
(who now has an amazing Substack), and that year some of us saw him speak at Florida State University. I’m still missing my signed copy so if someone borrowed it, please let me know. It feels like a hole in my heart. Diaz was very lovely in the signing queue for the three minutes of conversation (so, thank you, it left a huge impression on me). I knew in my writing I was never going to reach such literary heights. But that book has stayed with me, the power of it never forgotten.Diaz that day read from his book but he also said something else that stuck with me: how powerful storytelling and reading out loud is, how we all used to gather around and tell stories. I remember sitting happily listening to my grandparents, mother, and uncles recount family lore. I’ve always been drawn to stories and to people.
I’ve always been that person on the park bench that people would tell their life story to and I loved that. So many people hate that sort of interaction. They don’t want to be the keeper of other people’s stories but I do. I love to be nosy and learn more about people and so many pieces of things that I’ve gathered over the years may have made their way into my manuscripts. I’ll never know.
I also found that in 2010, many months after writing those first short stories, I was perhaps very prematurely collecting information on literary agents and emailing advice to myself, filing it away in a Gmail label called “literary agent information.” Thanks to high school sweetheart being an early invitee to Gmail I was one of the early people with a Gmail email address (I think circa 2006).
Pitch competition win
Those readers who follow my social media will know I won a pitch competition in Mslexia magazine (the March/April/May issue 105, page 61).
I’m a little (a lot) miffed that the editor cut down my pitch. The call was for 300 words exactly with very specific parameters and I worked hard to write 300 words on the dot. But it was also at cross purposes. I guess I was supposed to write it as if it was a query letter. But I wrote something different. Either way, it’s semantics. I’m thrilled I won and even got paid £50 for it. I would have absolutely done it for free.
It’s not like winning something for fiction writing but I’m still buzzing. I won something. The very first time. I have submitted so many dozens of things now, I am so used to rejection. I was beyond surprised to be emailed that I won something. I have no idea how many people entered but I suppose that doesn’t matter.
Semantics aside – whether it was meant to be a pitch or a query letter – I won feedback from legendary literary agent Catherine Cho, who was incredibly generous with her feedback. I was emailed the longer version and she gave me almost 1,000 words of things to improve, which I most definitely will do. In preparation, I also read her brilliant memoir about her postpartum psychosis called Inferno. Definitely a must-read even for those of us without children.
So, on 29th January, I found out I won this competition. I was asked to fill out a form with banking details and bio – none of which was actually used so who knows. The only problem was that the pitch said: “Do you have a novel or memoir ready for submission?”
A whole novel. Um, I had two beginning manuscripts. One of roughly 15k words and another of roughly 9k words. I submitted pitches for both so I had to – rather embarrassingly – email the editor to ask which pitch won? She replied The Broken Engagement Club pitch. Guess which one was my least-started manuscript? You guessed it right! That one!
For In Search of Golden Retriever Boyfriend, I had characters, backstories, an entire outline of every chapter written, I had a whole plot done and a good chunk of the beginning. Sure it’s a basic rom-com plot but there were things ready. If that pitch had won, I’d have been away!
My (un)healthy delusional brain
I got it in my head that Catherine Cho could possibly potentially provide feedback and then think she loved my pitch idea so much that she’d request the manuscript and I didn’t want to start our brilliant relationship off on the wrong foot, so I’d have to say that “yes, I have a manuscript but it’s only my zero draft” which is not the same as “manuscript ready for submission” (i.e. ready for a literary agent to see pages and chapters or maybe the whole thing) but better than “I only have a smidgen of an idea.”
I had dream cloud castles of finding a literary agent so miraculously, like skipping from square negative two to one-hundred and two. I’d be a billion per cent ahead of the game and I’d have this lovely story to tell as if I won some kind of mall model competition but the literary equivalent.
Backtracking, 29th January, I found out that I won the competition. The magazine was due out 1st March. In my head that meant I had approximately thirty days to write at least 65k words. I worked it out. I had to write roughly 5,000 words per day. And you know what? I did it.
After feeling like a bleary-eyed bear, barely able to awake from bed in the winter light, barely making progress with my writing all January as the reminders on my calendar said on a Saturday, “Write 5,000 words of GRBF” (the name for the manuscript pitch that wasn’t chosen) and I thought in three months I’d have a draft of that if only I could write that much per week.
Winter blues and grief of losing so many men in my life around January and February in the last half-decade, just made me not want to wake early.
But suddenly, I was waking at six something, cleaning the downstairs, thinking, and then spending one to two hours before work writing. Then, I was writing during my lunch break, sometimes writing after work. Always pondering. As I went to sleep at night, scenes would play in my head, a problem solved for my characters and as I awoke, they’d be speaking to me as well, playing out scenes as if I was watching the film version of my novel in my head.
By 28th February, I had over 97k words of a manuscript and I felt utterly elated.
Of course, Catherine Cho did not reach out to represent me.
That was never going to happen but in the infinitesimal chance that it might, it meant I was motivated enough to finish. I am proud of the manuscript and the story. I think it’s some of my best work.
Maybe see me in a couple of weeks when I edit it and then maybe I’ll be crying into my cup of tea, but for now I’m happy with it.
I used an outline but I also let my characters tell me their stories – and other wishy-washy writery things. In my subconscious, I’d dream about my characters and wake with solutions, wake with them playing out scenes at a cafe, say, and I knew what to write for that scene. It flowed out of me. I absolutely loved the process. I was shattered, working it around my full-time day job, yet I was still able to take breaks and days off. But now I know just like my failed romance novel last summer (50k words), I know I can do it and keep doing it.
I’m now 25k words into the Golden Retriever Boyfriend novel and I have about three more novel ideas lined up to write about so I’m going to keep going. Yay!
I mean I may still be delusional but at least I’m a motivated delusional writer?
Help from friends and my wonderful husband
Michael is my biggest cheerleader and surprisingly good editor. He’s already read my draft and made suggestions and caught some typos that spell checker would miss, such as when I wrote stray instead of spray (or the other way around).
He’s always had an eye for detail and I love his quirky commentary and his suggestions of things that can be cut (i.e. the times I sound like an advert for the town in which we live, practically describing every pub on the road) and other details that could potentially be added (like the mention of the lucky dog in the park – that’s more rumour but a fun one).
Nicole, my gorgeous Glaswegian colleague, read the manuscript as I was writing. I’d send her chapters periodically. She’s been a tremendous help with one of my younger characters, who is around twenty-six. I can’t fully recall how old Nicole is but she’s around that age bracket and this age bracket is rather fascinating in its world outlook.
Apparently, ‘booty call’ is no longer a word and young people say ‘situationship’ or just ‘hook up’ but they’re all so woke now they probably wouldn’t say that.
Nicole has been great at giving gentle but helpful feedback.
I was in Hebden Bridge (West Yorkshire) the other day and I overheard some young ladies very wisely dissecting the trauma of a friend and this was why they understood why this friend sought ‘safety’ above all, staying in a dead-end job and afraid of change. I thought how very perceptive of these young women. There’s loads of conversations now about psychology and consent and I love that for this generation.
They understand terms like ‘gaslighting’ and they can see relationship red flags better; however, I’ve also read articles about how many of the women in this generation also haven't had sex in which they haven’t had choking as a routine part of that.
Back in my day (I sound really old now), that was not a routine or expected part of sex. In fact, I’m not sure I’ve been choked in bed all that often. I am probably too boring and vanilla for all that.
Contacting a developmental editor
Further into my delusions of stardom and quick fame (one can dream, eh?), I contacted a developmental editor I follow on Substack called
. She worked as an editor at both Hachette and Penguin and does freelance developmental editing for a very reasonable rate.I figure that’s my best shot at getting my manuscript and query letter truly ready to pitch to agents.
Anyway, despite my manuscript being the zero draft, I asked if Kristen was willing to take me on as a client and very thankfully she saw something in my opening chapters. She typically works on rom-coms and mysteries, which very conveniently are two genres I’d love to write, and I have also realised that every good rom-com has elements of mystery to it.
I was just as delighted when Kristen said yes as when I won the magazine pitch.
I feel like it’ll get my foot in the door and make the manuscript the best it can be. Fingers crossed and I’ll keep you guys updated.
Anyway, in my future dreams, I hope Catherine Cho will be one of the first literary agents I pitch and I can then say that she provided feedback in the magazine competition and blah blah does she vaguely remember me and does she have any interest in this project? The authors who sign with her usually become actual famous superstars so fingers crossed. Hah!
And
decodes in her Book Deal 101 post what it means when Publisher’s Weekly announces debut author book deals. I have noticed that Catherine Cho has routinely secured “good deals” and “significant deals” for her clients, which translates to $100-250k for “good” and $251-499k for “significant.”Of course, even if I do get my delusional dream life, then I’m not suddenly going to be very rich even if it seems like it.
Literary agents take 20% (well earned as they are taking a gamble on you and work for free at first). Taxes take a further 40% (I’m sadly now in this tax bracket – obvs happily but also it would be nice if I was on the higher end of it). Then things get paid out in four installments. You get 25%1 on contract signing, 25% on manuscript submission, 25% on publication of the hardcover, and the final 25% on paperback release. All of this can take two years or more.
Even with a $100k book deal, that’s $8,000 ish left per payment. Of course, most debut authors are probably lucky to get a $10k book deal, never mind ten times that.
Plus, that means that the publisher is hoping that you’ll sell at least 5,000 copies of your debut novel to earn out your advance on royalties. You never have to pay back your advance, but if you don’t sell out your advance – apparently all hearsay as I’m nowhere close to this – that can impact future advances and debut novelists are very lucky to sell anywhere between 500-1,000 copies of first-time novels and supposedly even 500 copies is considered quite good.
Long story long, I will not be quitting my day job for £15k a year.
But still £15k extra per year would be very cushy with mine and Michael’s day job incomes. We may even be able to go part-time. I know! I know! I’m dreaming again. But I suppose that’s the point of an imagination.
We all think when authors get book deals they are laughing to the bank and it’s Stephen King, Lee Child, Marion Keyes, Jojo Moyes, and JK Rowling from here on out. Even Nicholas Sparks back in the day got a $1m advance on The Notebook and that was really more like a novella but gone are the days of this sort of book deal, unfortunately.
I think in a way, people have more of a shot at publishing now than they used to. It’s simultaneously harder and more egalitarian.
I have heard rumour that the TV, Netflix, or film deals are where you get paid the $250k to $1m plus, unless, of course, it gets optioned by Reece’s Book Club in which you mostly get paid in publicity, but I’m dreaming before my manuscript is even sent off for step one of many.
The next manuscript
Since I can’t really rest on this one manuscript, I figure I need two to three completed manuscripts as I go out on submission because if an agent doesn’t like that novel, I have a backup.
Of course, this one is slower as I am writing it at a pace of five chapters per week (under 2,000 words per chapter) as opposed to three chapters per day (which was my goal for The Broken Engagement Club), but I’m plugging away and it gives the outside of work hours purpose. I feel happy doing it and I’m thankful I have Michael as a huge support.
He’s spent a lot of time on his own lately but I’m thankful he believes in me and is always there to read my drafts.
My family, friends, and colleagues are also super supportive and I’m thankful for that. Let’s hope if I do make it to a book on the shelves, I have plenty of people who at least buy one copy. Hah!
Kit Kat news
Our beloved Kit Kit (my late Father’s cat we inherited) had to go in for dental surgery this week and my goodness mine and Michael’s obsession with this cat reared itself in that we were like what I imagine worried parents are like when their child is in hospital (or the closest approximately child-free cat people can be – I think having a human child would be too much to contend with emotionally).
Michael barely slept the night before and all day at work I could barely concentrate worrying if our sixteen or seventeen-year-old cat would make it through anaesthesia. I think Kit Kat sensed our unease the night before surgery because he took turns sitting on both of our laps and slept on my pillow right by my head and I cuddled him all night.
Then when he was home Thursday night, he was standoffish but last night at 4 am, he did his usual chirping to me which indicates for me to smooth out the duvet and make a spot for him to curl up and he’s been curled up with me all morning.
Hopefully, he will start eating more than the homemade chicken broth we made for him. I hope his mouth heals as he barely had teeth left before and now he has fewer but we already fed him a soft diet so that will continue. We are also rather indulgent with him (Michael buys him a cooked chicken each week as well as smoked salmon), which may have to stop as the vet said something about early stages of kidney failure and that we need to talk ‘renal diet’ in future, but we are all about giving him some very loved and indulgent final years as he settles into his new life away from my Daddy. Will keep you posted.
Grammy’s 89th birthday
Grammy is 89 today! She’s my mother’s mother. We are taking her out for lunch and I look forward to seeing her. She is one of my all-time favourite humans and as a former2 Reader for the Church of England, she has always been a wonderful writer and public speaker. All of my presents were books (the best kind) and she introduced me to Narnia, Harry Potter, and all kinds of magical stories when young. She encouraged my love of reading and writing.
Grammy (Dolores or Dee as English friends call her) moved to England from southern Illinois and Wisconsin in the 1960s with my English grandfather and has lived in England ever since. She’s over in Leeds now and the traffic gets worse but she still lives independently with no carers and is still sharp – and refuses to walk with a stick. After so much loss in my life, I’m thankful and grateful still to have her – and let’s hope we can have a big family bash when she turns 90!
Substacker shoutout
If you haven’t discovered
, check him out. He writes these little poems and ‘garbage notes,’ all read in his beautiful voice (I’m a sucker for a good reading voice). I’m not particularly one for poetry but I enjoy his.Also, I have read twenty-seven books this year. Yay!
I recently read/listened to
’ novel The Crimson Ribbon. I don’t love this time period (1600s, Cromwell era, beheading the King) but she is such a brilliant, beautiful writer and her novels are true page turners. One chapter in I was hooked with Ruth’s story and when Lizzie and Joseph came onto the scene, I wanted to see what would become of them all.
I have a coaching meeting with Katherine next week, so I figured I wanted/needed to read more of her books after having taken her life-changing Arvon course last summer and reading The Coffin Path, which has stuck with me. I became a founding member of The Inkwell because it was the same price as her coaching and I figured why not but I’m coming to the end of my year and needed to schedule in my coaching call quickly. I’m not sure what to expect but I’m excited nonetheless.
Another read this year was a recent very hilarious book called Over My Dead Body by Maz Evans and as I was listening, I kept thinking this is exactly the kind of thing
writes. The premise hooked me anyway. It was a page-turner. It was funny and wry. Anyway, if you like that sort of funny murder mystery thing, read Katie’s book The Man in the Wall. That was also hilarious and so well-written. It’s a short read (roughly 6 hours) to tick off on the old Goodreads. Katie is truly not paying me to write this stuff. I just really love her writing (and you can buy the book for £2).
Now to continue on one of my many projects. Watch this space. And please send good vibes to the universe that I find the perfect literary agent and that my developmental edits go well!
Thank you all for reading and your support and coming up next, as promised, the beginning of how I met my gem of a Yorkshire husband.
I promise I’m a good real-life day job editor! But my original had 125% by mentioning the contract signing bit twice. Eek!
Grammy says she's known as a 'Reader Emeritus' and not 'former Reader.' Oops! And that I said very nice things about her. I told her I was taking her out for lunch yesterday and we surprised her by having more family and friends at the restaurant for her. We all had such a delightful day with her. Fingers crossed we have such a lovely time at her 90th as well.
So thrilled to read this update. Congrats! And loved the photos of your granny, what an icon. I miss mine ❤️
I didn't know about all that stressful editorial behind-the-scenes!