Interview at the Press 53 blog

I'm interviewed at the Press 53 blog for the new year. Thank you Christine Norris!

http://press53.tumblr.com/post/39928859763/5-questions-3-facts

The Next Big Thing

Big thanks to the fabulous Ellen Meister for tagging me in this latest writer's meme.

I am so looking forward to reading her forthcoming novel Farewell, Dorothy Parker which has been described as "wickedly funny and surprisingly poignant."





 

And now, on with the questions for me:

What is the working title of your book?

Bones of an Inland Sea


Where did the idea come from for the book?

From the late--and much admired--literary agent Wendy Weil. For years, I've been a fan of the work she represented: Anthony Doerr, Andrea Barrett, Molly Gloss, Rita Mae Brown, Alice Walker, Fannie Flagg, and most recently Heidi Durrow. I sent her my first collection and even though she passed on it, she said she would love to see a linked collection that focused on my marine ecology experiences. (I co-founded a study abroad marine ecology program in Dominica, West Indies, and that was in my bio. She was very observant.) I started working on Bones of an Inland Sea that very same day.


What genre does your book fall under?

I would say it's literary. I'm calling the manuscript a "composite novel" because many of the stories work alone, but they do interweave extensively and are meant to be read and appreciated as a whole. Other works I would also call "composite novels" would be The Martian Chronicles by Ray Bradbury, Let the Great World Spin by Colum McCann, A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan, and Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout. These are all books I greatly admire.


What actors would you choose to play your characters in a movie rendition?

Oh, my. Too complex a question for this non-moviegoer. How about instead I say who I would like to illustrate the cover of my book? I'd love to use a photo collage by Matthew Chase-Daniel. I adore his work. Maybe something like the image below--one that captures the essence of many smaller perspectives combining to make a more complete image of the whole:




What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?

(Pardon me, please, but I'm going to use the two-sentence description from my query letter.)


In BONES OF AN INLAND SEA we come to know passionate and restless Leslie Baxter through the secret lives of a host of characters whose paths intersect with hers, over many years, in locales as varied as the Sinai desert, a tsunami-torn reef in Thailand, Bikini Atoll after the atomic testing, and a futurist island utopia run by a dangerous charismatic leader. Written in a bold and inventive array of styles, Akers captures the longing we all feel for family, home, and a connection to something larger than ourselves.
 

How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript?

I never know how to answer that question. The real answer would have to be given in hours, not days, months, or years. And is that hours spent thinking about plots while washing dishes and showering? Hours spent dreaming of characters while asleep? Or does that only count creation time actually spent at the keyboard? And what of the fact that I wrote three other books while finishing this one? As you can see, any answer I give would be incomplete, but here's the best, most concrete numbers available: I started the first story in 2003 and finished the final one in 2012.


What else about your book might pique the reader's interest?

I think the range of characters would be of interest. I have a Vietnam veteran with PTSD who tries to save an aquarium full of fish, an elderly woman with Alzheimer's moving into a nursing home, a female-to-male transsexual meeting his father for the first time, fraternal twins from Puerto Rico whose separate lives take eerily similar turns, a man whose wife is in a persistent vegetative state and has been recently removed from life support, and an overworked menopausal woman struggling to survive the sandwich generation (among others).

Every story revolves around the ocean in some way, too. The settings include a reef in Thailand during the horrific Indonesian tsunami, the Red Sea at the tip of the Sinai peninsula, a plague of deadly box jellies in Dominica's waters, a post-hurricane rescue attempt gone wrong in Florida's Hutchinson Island, and so much more.


And I am hereby tagging T.L. Sherwood to take on The Next Big Thing next week.

The January FRIENDS & FAMILY issue of r.kv.r.y.

The January issue is now live! We have some wonderful written work and beautiful illustrations. Please check it out!

r.kv.r.y. quarterly literary journal

Rejections: A view from the other side of the desk

First and foremost, I am a writer. But I have also been Editor-in-chief of the online journal r.kv.r.y. for about a year and a half now. It's been a wonderful, enriching, exhausting, eye-opening experience. So much so, that I thought it might be valuable to share some of what I've learned from my time spent on the other side of the desk.

I took on the challenge of editing the journal for three main reasons. First, I had been published by r.kv.r.y. in the past and I liked their mission (literary work on the theme of recovery) and I respected their founding editor Victoria Pynchon a great deal.She loved her journal but found that she didn't have time anymore to give it the attention she would have liked, so in the summer of 2010 she put out a call on Facebook for someone to take it over. I hate to see good work die out, so I volunteered.

Secondly, I have always wanted to be part of the side of publishing that helps authors get their work out into the world. I didn't want to only be an author clamoring for space herself. I think it's important for writers to give back to the literary community they belong to, and I saw this as an opportunity to do that.

Lastly, and most importantly, I wanted to understand what it was like to be in charge of reading, evaluating, and selecting work and putting together and publishing a final product. In some perverse way, I felt I needed to understand what it was like not only to give authors the good news, but also to give them rejections. By that time in my career I had received thousands of rejections myself, so I knew what it felt like to receive them. Many of my rejections had made me grumble and grouse about editors and their lofty decisions handed down from on high, but intellectually I knew editors couldn't be so different from me--they were people, many underpaid or volunteers, who were passionate about language, and in it for love rather than money.

Well, guess what? I learned that it's tough to be an editor, mainly (in my case) because I WANT to be open and excited by every single piece of writing I receive. I want to find value in everything that comes across my desk. I believe in nurturing writers and giving them a vehicle for their voices. I wish I had the time and energy to say yes to everyone.

But man alive, is that ever an exhausting position to take. I never fully appreciated the side of editing that meant saying no. As a writer sending out work, I imagined the editor's job to be an easy one. You get to sit and read good work all day long. From those you read, you simply pick your favorites, and voila! What could be more simple and enjoyable than that?

Well, it turns out that a lot of things can be more simple and enjoyable: cooking dinner, cleaning bathrooms, having a tooth filled. Okay, I'm exaggerating, but when you really, really want everything you read to be good...and you simultaneously have only enough space for what averages out to one story a month for the whole year, it gets frustrating. It gets overwhelming...even disheartening. And I know there are people who would respond with some version of, "So quit. Nobody's making you do this. The last thing writers need is a frustrated editor."

But the thing I want to say is that I'm not frustrated with the writing. I may occasionally get cranky about work on a micro-level, but the big picture is, I'm cranky because of the exhaustion that sets in when I am constantly evaluating work and most of it is good, solid work. That was a revelation to me. When you want to love everything, choosing who gets to play and who doesn't takes a heck of a lot of mental energy. It takes a certain amount of ego and it takes a lot out of you. No wonder agents and editors so often talk about "needing to fall in love" with a project. I get it. It's so darned easy to like everything (hello Facebook!), and yet you can't possibly give everything you like the same fair shot or you'd never get anything done.So yes, you have to fall in love.

And by "you," of course I mean "me."

In spite of the frustrations, though, working on the other side of the publishing equation has taught me a lot. And it has helped me...helped me to feel not quite so downtrodden when I get rejections. It has helped me to understand one of the most important (and simple) rules of writing and publishing. That rejection isn't personal.

Or... as I prefer to abbreviate the concept: R.I.P.

It isn't personal. It feels personal, you're sure it's personal, how could be anything BUT personal...but it isn't. The work is simply a widget, and this particular widget didn't fit.

So try again. If it comes back, re-examine your widget and edit as needed. Then try again.

Trust me on this one. Writing is a game of attrition. If you want to succeed, if you want to be published...don't attrish.

Dear Teen Me

My "Dear Teen Me" letter goes live today. Thanks to the moderators for this wonderful, important site.

Dear Teen Me

An author video from 2009

This interview aired on a local TV station in 2009, but most of the discussion revolves around about the process and the art of writing, which are timeless subjects.

What does success look like to you?

I have a good friend who has recently hit a publishing wall. She's a great writer, with a published book that was nominated for a major award. Her writing inspires me. Now she has a second book out on submission and the process is killing her confidence in the unique way that only the publishing industry can. What she describes feeling is common among writers, even the successful ones. We all simultaneously think we're something really special...and nothing at all. It doesn't make sense, but that seems to be the way of the creative mind.

If you are a writer, here's what I think you need to spend at least a little bit of time thinking about: What does "success" look like to you? I'm talking about in your heart-of-hearts, what does success look like? When you have that warm vision of you as a successful writer, where are you? What are you doing? In my daydream of success, I'm standing at a lectern, reading and answering questions and I have a large audience. So, that's "success" for me, it turns out, and that tells me that I am more interested in reaching people, in having an audience, and connecting with readers. Now for another writer, he might envision success as walking on stage and accepting a big award, or getting an excellent critical review of his work, or making the canon. Another writer might just see success as being able to find the time to write, alone, for long stretches. If you know what success looks like to you subconsciously, you can make changes in your work to push it in that direction.

You have limitations, you say? All writers have limitations, even the great ones. And most creative people are working through the same themes for the bulk of their lives. I just read John Irving's most recent book, and thirty-plus years later he is still rehashing the same themes--absent women, dastardly dogs, death of a child, and oral sex (usually taking place in a car) that goes horribly wrong. Every one of his books seems to have one or more of these issues creep in--but he's JOHN IRVING...and he's a writer with limitations.

When the negative responses start to come in, we can parse them for similarities. Do any of the publisher's responses ring true in terms of specific criticisms? Are there common complaints that can be addressed before the next round of submissions? I'm always amazed by the ways that small adjustments can make a huge difference to readers. (And help the writer to feel proactive instead of reactive.)

Alternatively--and this is a scary question, but bear with me--could it be time for you to give up? Maybe it is time to ask that awful question. Asking is just asking, just admitting to a possibility. Why not give up and see how it feels? No one has to know but you. Just stop caring and tell yourself you are never going to write another fricking word again, ever. Not one. Then see how that feels. Freeing? Good. Go with it. It is guaranteed to take you somewhere. I've given up about five times in my writing career. I do it once every three years or so. I simply swear off the stupid writing. What a relief!! I don't ever have to write again. Thanks be to God. And yet somehow I always come back to it. It's how I process the world, so I can't seem to not write. And when I come back to it after sincerely swearing off the writing, I come back with renewed vigor and fresh eyes because I know I'm doing it by choice. I usually feel less pressure when I come back, because hey, I quit writing, so who cares what my next "thing" looks like?

And my final words of wisdom...chances are good that you are actually closer than you have ever been before. Look behind you at the long road you have already traveled and imagine yourself back there at the start of it all. Wouldn't where you are now look like success to that far away writer? Here is what I told my friend: You have an agent who believes in you. Your work is being sent out and landing on the desks of big NYC editors. It's getting READ!!! CONSIDERED!! It only takes one yes. You've done your part, let the agent do the hard work now. And maybe it's best if you tell her to hold onto the responses for a while. Ask her not to tell you what they are until she has a common complaint that you can address. You don't need to read and obsess over the nuance of every single rejection. Let her do that, let her absorb the blows for a while. She's got more distance. It isn't her baby in the same way it is yours. It sounds like it is self-defeating and counterproductive for you to be kept apprised of the responses as they come in. Plenty of writers tell their agents they don't want to know, they just want to write. You could try that with this next round of subs and see how that works for you.


And in the end, maybe the truest sign of success is simply being able to write and not worry about how it is (or will be) received. Maybe we all need to remember that the real joy is in the writing.