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Write the Damn Book Already
Writing and publishing a phenomenal book doesn’t have to be ridiculously complicated or mind-numbingly overwhelming. From myths and misconceptions to practical tips and sound strategies, Elizabeth Lyons (author, book writing coach, book editor, and founder of Finn-Phyllis Press), helps writers feel more in control of and comfortable with the business of book publishing. Her interviews with fellow authors discussing their writing processes and publishing journeys aim to help you untangle YOUR process so you can finally get your story into the world.
Write the Damn Book Already
Ep 104: Writing Personal Essays with Amy Wilson
Click Here to ask your book writing and publishing questions!
Amy Wilson, the brilliant co-host of the "What Fresh Hell" podcast and author of Happy to Help: Adventures of a People Pleaser (Jan 2025, Zibby Books), joined me for a fabulous conversation about owning your story through writing.
We dive right into the real stuff—like what it’s actually like to share personal essays (and how to spill your truth without accidentally blowing up your family’s group chat). Amy opens up about her journey from writing the hilarious chaotic When Did I Get Like This? on parenting to exploring deeper themes, like people-pleasing, that resonate with an audience far beyond parents.
And for anyone out there staring down an editing deadline or wondering what in the world the publishing gods are up to—Amy shares some hard-earned wisdom. From her writing routines to her secret recipe for mixing humor with “let’s get real” moments, she provides an inside look at what makes her stories connect with so many people.
So, grab your favorite drink (and maybe one of your new notebooks--I know you have one), and get ready for some relatable insights, laughs, and just the right amount of “you’ve got this” inspiration.
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Welcome to the Write the Damn Book Already podcast. My name is Elizabeth Lyons. I'm a six-time author and book editor, and I help people write and publish powerful, thought-provoking, wildly entertaining books without any more overthinking, second-guessing or overwhelm than absolutely necessary. Because, let's face it, some overthinking, second-guessing and overwhelm is going to come with the territory. If you're anything like me, I believe that story and shared perspective are two of the most potent ways we connect with one another, and that your story, perspective and insights are destined to become someone else's favorite resource or pastime. For more book writing and publishing tips and solutions, oh and plenty of free and low-cost resources, visit publishaprofitablebookcom.
Speaker 1:Hi everybody, amy Wilson is the co-host of the award-winning podcast what Fresh Hell, and I do not know who. I'm just upset with everyone who didn't tell me about this podcast because a more apt title there really isn't, especially right now. But she's also the author of when Did I Get Like this? The Screamer, the Warrior, the Dinosaur, chicken Nugget Buyer and Other Mothers. I Swore I'd Never Be, which is a collection of essays published back in 2010. And her next book, happy to Help Adventures of a People Pleaser, comes out January 7th 2025 with Zibi Books. I'm not going to lie. When I saw the announcement of this book and that it was coming out from Zibi Books, I thought to myself Diana, who is one of the publicists at Zibi Books, please email me about having Amy on the podcast. I feel like she is my people. And that later that day Diana emailed me and asked if I would like to have Amy on, and I was like yesterday, I would like to have her on yesterday. And if you love fantastic book covers, wait till you see the cover of this one. It is amazing. The book has already been endorsed by Gretchen Rubin, who's kind of the penultimate voice on happiness, and also Mary Laura Philpott, who I found out about years ago when I fell in love with the title of her essay collection.
Speaker 1:I Miss you when I Blink is so rampant, it's so identifiable, I resonate with it so incredibly strongly, as do so many of my friends. And yet it would be so easy, I think, for an author to say that's been done a million times. And whenever people say that, my response is good, because if it's been done a million times, it means that there's a market for it. So then the question becomes all right. Well, how are you going to attack the topic differently, and to do it in a series of essays is certainly a different way of going about it. And yet it's also a difficult way in my mind to go about it, because essays I mean, if we're talking about, where do I start, where do I stop? I don't think that the question is asked more often than when you're trying to put together a book of essays or a book of poetry. It's like it could go on forever and I want to quickly draw a little bit of attention, because I meant to ask her about this in the interview and I admittedly didn't, because, as often happens, we kind of got off on a different note.
Speaker 1:But at the very beginning of the book and I'm looking at the ARC, the advanced review copy the author's note says the experiences and events recalled in this book are true. My recollections are based on my perceptions and memories of those events and I have done my best to portray those events as accurately as possible. Some names and identifying details of people and places have been changed in order to protect the privacy of others. It's such a poignant reminder that when you're writing memoir, when you're writing essay, when you're writing nonfiction and it's based on your own life, your story is your story to tell, and I love the line my recollections are based on my perceptions and memories of those events, that specific phrase, because I think that it often allows authors who are struggling with do I include this? What if I say this about another person, am I going to get in trouble for this? To really pull it back and ask themselves is this is what I'm saying, my recollect? You know it's obviously your recollection, but is it based on your perception, is it based on your memory, is it based on your experience of what happened? And it's a great way to release others from your journey in a very loving way and still feel empowered to tell your story and tell how something made you feel without needing to put a label onto someone else or needing to point a finger at someone else.
Speaker 1:And so I just wanted to raise that for a moment, because I know so many of the authors with whom I work and speak are borderline terrified to put their stories out there because they are afraid that they're going to, in most cases, hurt someone else. And of course, this is a much longer conversation than I'm giving it right now. But I was struck by this author's note and the beauty that comes with owning your story and your experience and releasing the rest as usual. I have all of Amy's information in the episode notes. Let's get on with the conversation. So when I found out about you, I was like, the more I dug in, the more I was like where has she been? So your first book, which I was dying over the title oh, thank you.
Speaker 1:When did I get like? I wrote it down. When did I get like this the Screamer, the Warrior, the Dinosaur, the warrior, the dinosaur, chicken nugget buyer. And other mothers? I swore I'd never be, so that came out in 2010. That's right. I had to laugh because I had a book. My third book came out in 2010 and it was called. It was titled or it is titled you Cannot Be Serious. And 32 Other Rules that Sustain a Mostly Balanced Mom. And now my kids. Kids are. How old are your kids?
Speaker 2:my kids are now 21, 20 and 17 okay, all right, so mine are older 25, 23, 23, 20 and 16.
Speaker 1:So like it's, it's like I need, even though my kids are older, I need to read that book, your book, because I think we were living the same life, same life at the same time yeah and time.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I have a parenting podcast called what fresh hell, and our listeners now they know that our kids are on the older side. My cohost, margaret, and I both have. She has teens, I have teens and twenties, and our listeners I mean some of their kids are 20 years younger than our own and, of course, a lot has changed and a lot hasn't.
Speaker 1:So, okay, let's talk about that for a second, because what's interesting is are you okay talking about that book too? Sure, okay, I love to just talk about the whole process of writing as opposed to necessarily like the content of the books which people talk about a lot, and I love that too, but so many people are doing it. So do you find, how has that book aged?
Speaker 2:Let's say it that way, you know, I think, pretty well. It turned out to have a long tail in terms of marketplace. It turned out to have a longer tail and it kept selling. Pretty well, it earned out and my proud husband will still give it to new moms sometimes to read.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I think, parents, the journey of that book is it's a series of times that I vowed not to overthink things. I think, as parents, I'll do right. So each essay is a moment in my parenting journey, starting with trying to get pregnant, that I was like I'm just going to be real mellow, I'm not going to overthink this. Okay, last time I did, but this time I'm not going to. And each essay, um, you know, has that mini arc of of the person saying I'm super cool and super mellow, and then going to the, you know, going to the crazy town side, and then, over the course of the book, gently and generally moves toward the big realization of the book, which was that wanting the best for your kids shouldn't mean you forget to enjoy having them, which I think I was kind of missing sometimes.
Speaker 1:Well, and it parlays interestingly right into Happy to Help, which is the book coming out now and I'm curious. So it's been what? 14 years approximately, and when did what? Fresh Hell. I can't with the podcast title. It's so great said actually when she answered the phone or answered the door.
Speaker 2:What fresh hell is this? And so my co-host. Margaret her mom used to say this, I guess, when she came around the corner and saw the flower spilled and somebody riding the dog what fresh hell.
Speaker 1:So that's, the easiest decision we ever made was what we were going to call the show, what we're going to title it, what you're going to title it, and so when did that start? When did you start that?
Speaker 2:2016, the fall of 2016. Okay, so it's been eight years.
Speaker 1:Eight years, yeah, and it's a pretty regular. You do regular episodes, it's not just weekly.
Speaker 2:It's every few days. Yes, we do multiple episodes weekly Now. I mean we have hundreds and hundreds of episodes. So Monday is usually one from the vault that are gathered around a theme, and then Wednesdays, the two of us on a topic, and on Fridays we interview authors or experts. That's been so fun for me. Really the most fun part of that whole job out of many fun parts is getting to interview authors about their books and ask them either the tricky parenting question or the tricky process question that you would want to ask that person. It's so fun.
Speaker 1:So are all of your guests, parents, on that show Not necessarily no.
Speaker 2:In fact, we just had somebody, britt Barron. She wrote a book called Do you Still Talk to Grandma, and her book was about finding common ground with those with whom we disagree, which was a really useful episode, I thought.
Speaker 1:Appropriate right now, isn't it? Yes?
Speaker 2:yes, and not a parenting related one at all, but certainly parenting adjacent, because once you become a parent, your extended families start to feel less. You know less optional. You want to find common ground.
Speaker 1:You want to give it a shot. That's a great way of saying that they are less optional. Yeah, I love it. Yeah.
Speaker 2:I mean anything's possible.
Speaker 1:But we want to find common ground.
Speaker 2:So, anyway, that was a great conversation and just to have that opportunity to bring ideas to our listeners and engage with the authors myself, it's really, really. It tickles my brain in a good way.
Speaker 1:So how did you evolve over the years, from the first book to feeling like you know what? Now I think I want to do one on people pleasing, essentially, which is such a relatable whether you're a parent or not, it's such a wildly relatable topic.
Speaker 2:It was important to me that this one not be a parenting book and not be exclusively you know, not seen as exclusively a mommy book, because my kids are older and because I wanted it to have a broader appeal. So I certainly wrote it with the female reader in mind. But I was very talked to the publisher all along about like I don't want it to say mom on the cover or indicate mom or even use sort of you know, pink, two feminine colors. I want it to be a book for everyone that certainly speaks to women, and part of the reason was was, I think, because I've been doing the podcast for so long, I've seen so many takes on parenting and I feel like I have covered that so fully. I wanted to explore something else, I guess.
Speaker 1:I love that you said that because for me, like, my first two books were about parenting twins right In the well not right as though you know, but anyway in the first year and then in the toddler years. And then the third book was about being a parent. And so after that point so many people were like, well, when are you going to do the preschool book on twins? When are you going to do the high school book on twins? Oh, is the entrepreneur book about being in all these things? And it was like it's not that I'm done talking about being a parent. I don't think that that will ever not be part of my personal experience, even though my kids are all older now.
Speaker 2:I mean they're 16, all the way up to 25.
Speaker 1:But it's like at some point I really resonate with that I wanted to shift the conversation that I was having. Wanted to shift the conversation that I was having. I don't know if it's a way, it is a way from, but it's not to ignore it, it's just a different. I guess what I was wanting to say at a certain point and I'm curious about your perspective on this was I have this perspective and I'm a parent not as much. Okay.
Speaker 2:Right, that's right, and parenting certainly intensifies who you are. It turns you into more of the person you always were, and it's sort of this thunderdome where you're trying to apply the things that have worked for you up until now, some of which are maybe dysfunctional, but they've certainly worked, and then I feel like this, but not anymore. That's kind of what the first and second books are about. I wrote a second parenting book. I wrote a proposal and simple chapters and everything, and it was going to be about parenting kids seven to 14. That was my sort of you know, follow up and I got good feedback on the manuscript. But people felt like it was an interesting situation bumping up against the marketplace. There are no books for parents of kids this age and I was like I know, that's why I wrote this one. No, no, no, no, no. That there is no shelf for this book means this book wouldn't work Exactly.
Speaker 1:We can't sell it.
Speaker 2:There have to be other books like your book. So I learned that lesson the hard way. Then I was invited by my agent at the time to write a novel, and so I did NaNoWriMo and I bought all these books on how to write a novel and I spent like three years writing a novel and I wrote it. It was not. When I finally finished it and sent it to my agent I think we both agreed it needed so much major surgery that the patient might not survive. It was really like, okay, I've learned to write a novel. That's really hard and it just didn't work.
Speaker 1:What do you think is the difference? What was the difference for you? Because I'm in the same boat right now I'm working on my first novel and it really is different to me. I think a lot of times people, including authors who have only written in one genre, think a book is a book. If you can write this book, you can write that book. What, for you, was the big difference between nonfiction and fiction?
Speaker 2:I just I talked to Jennifer Egan about this, believe it or not, and she said I just can't believe you write these essays, and she's a very famous novelist. I'm like I don't know how you do that for me. She said I don't know how you make these stories out of your life and I said well, I just I write what happened next. Of course, that's not all there is to it, but you're sort of limited to. This is what happened. Now, how can I shape meeting out of it and make it interesting and connect it to something else? But but it's there, it's something that exists already that you're turning into something else as opposed to like. And then the phone rings. It always just felt like um, I had a hard time. I, I would, I would write the plot. I'm much more of a plotter than a pantser.
Speaker 1:I would know it was going to happen and I think it just all felt a little bit too deliberate and dot connecty and not free enough. That is interesting and I've never thought of it that way, but it's almost not, as there isn't as much room to move with an interpretation of something, because that's not what keeps a reader of fiction reading. There's a difference between mystery and almost an esoteric kind of I don't know like develop what opinion you will from this. Yeah, as someone who's writing fiction, you do have to have these concrete plot points.
Speaker 2:Yes and yes, and a really good sense of interiority and just and scenes, and I think you need all that for nonfiction too. But it's not that I was terrible at it, it's just that I'm a lot better when I'm writing in my own voice, connecting the dots of things that happened.
Speaker 1:So how did that feel to let go of that after three years?
Speaker 2:you know, sad. And then I just thought, okay, you know, maybe this is uh not going to be for me and that's okay, I'm not. I was doing this podcast. I was very busy uh and very happy doing it and it was collaborative. I also like that.
Speaker 2:After working on a novel for three years at the library, you know when the times my kids were at school that it just it was lonely and then I didn't have anything to show for it and the podcast was easy and fun.
Speaker 2:Easier and super fun and near-term deadlines, and it just was working. And then, um, I uh got to be on Zibi Owens's podcast because I ran into her at a party, I think, and she had read when did I get like this and said can I have you on my podcast? And I said, well, it came out 10 years ago. And she said, I don't care, I liked the book, I'll have you on. So she had me come on and then, out of that, she was just starting her own publishing company at the time asked me do you have any ideas for why haven't you written a second book? She asked me and I said, well, it's a long story and we talked about it and she asked me if I had some ideas and we kicked some ideas around and she ended up hiring me on a very quickly written book proposal to write the book that became Happy to Help.
Speaker 1:So did it not start? You said the book that became Happy to Help.
Speaker 2:It did not start as Happy to Help. It started as I had several conversations with her about, yes, it should be a book for women and moms but not just moms and she had been toying with this idea. She said maybe this is something about slack in women's lives and how you have to pick up the slack. Let out the slack, give other people slack, give yourself slack, see if you can do something with that. And I thought, okay, I will. And so I whiteboarded all those things out.
Speaker 2:What are these categories and what are the essays I could write about each one of these categories and no matter how hard I worked on it probably a couple of weeks I spent on that the column. When did I need to pick up the slack? And I didn't do it. When had my lack of effort really shown up in my life? That I should have tried harder? And I tried as hard as I could and I couldn't think of anything to go in that column and I realized that, no, I was actually always the person who had over-delivered for the most bankless job, for the most dead-end relationship that I had shown up and shown up, and shown up. And that was what the book was going to be about.
Speaker 1:So how did you process? So many times when people are writing nonfiction, memoir, essay, poetry they're processing what they're learning about their experience as they're writing Right, right, and sometimes that can feel really fulfilling, almost like oh, now I understand why, fill in the blank. Other times it can feel almost what's the word like. It takes you off kilter a little bit, because I think some people start to kind of question themselves and so how does that work? I saw that Mary Laura Philpott has endorsed and I found her when she did. I Miss you when I Blink, which had me at the title. I mean, what an amazing right An essay can feel. It almost feels like journaling in a way, but it's so different from that. How did you reconcile those things where, when you were writing, you were having those thoughts of well, what thoughts were you having? I don't want to lead the witness here, but yeah.
Speaker 2:I mean you write the book that you need to read. So when I set out to say, like, why have I been? You know, am I? Am I a happy helper? Do I like helping people? I think I do. I mean, I always have, and going all the way back to the beginning and having the you know, the privilege of doing that is so great, but I think in order for it to be a book, there has to be a. So why are you telling me this? Underpinning this and I did. I used to be an actor and I used to write stuff for myself to perform.
Speaker 2:I was gonna ask you about your show, sketch comedy and I did a one-woman show called mother load that toured around the country. I was going to ask you about your show. Uh, it was like a TV executive came to see one of my shows that I did and sort of suggested to me well, you should write a show about your you know small town, every, every town, usa upbringing. I'm like, okay, I'll work on that. And he said, but don't, this is what sets a good one person show apart from a bad one. When I'm sitting there and I think, why are you telling me this? And I can't answer the question, then the show needs more work. So wait, don't show it to us until you can answer that question.
Speaker 2:And I've carried that with me in everything I've done ever since. Why are you telling me this? And so, very quickly, once I realized, right, there are no times in my life that I have given less than 150%. There's no such thing. And then I'm like I think that's true for a lot of women. That's why I'm telling you this. I think we're all like this, or most of us are. And then that became top of mind, exploring why are we like this? And I pretty quickly decided well, we're supposed to be, we're conditioned to be.
Speaker 2:And so then that became part of what the book was about. I'm going to walk you through, through my personal lens, the reasons why I think this is kind of true for a lot of women that we're told that we're the helpers, that we can handle more than our share and we should seem happy while we're doing it. And then when we say we're struggling, we don't get help. We get advice to fix ourselves so that we'll be better able to keep doing more than our share. And once I knew that, okay, that's what the book is about. That's why I'm telling you this. And once I knew that, okay, that's what the book is about, that's why I'm telling you this. And so then it became easier to know which stories still fit into that framework and which ones were good stories but they didn't fit the framework.
Speaker 1:And that's such a challenging aspect of any book, but specifically nonfiction and essay is kind of putting things aside. Did you have any pieces that you wrote and ultimately deemed this doesn't go in the book?
Speaker 2:Yes, yes, I think most of them ended up staying in the book, but by changing the timeline. It's not chronological, it jumps around quite a bit with a purpose, with a trajectory. The character's trajectory is not chronological but there is one, and by changing the trajectory and moving realizations sooner, even though they happened two years ago or something, it gave the book more shape and it also took out some of the heaviness. There's also times in the book where I talk about some pretty serious, more chronic than dangerous, lots of uncertainty, medical stuff for my kids that I had to walk them through. And all the helping in the world has its limits when you're dealing with a confusing chronic illness.
Speaker 2:And I needed to write about those parts. They seemed very important to me, to the story. I didn't want the whole book to be back of toilet mom LOL humor. I wanted it to be more weighty and yet these weighty parts needed to earn their way into the book. I mean they did to me, but then I had to go back and make them feel a little bit lighter, a little more of a piece with the rest of the book, and so I think I ended up editing down a lot of those parts to be less explanatory, because it didn't really matter. It matters the feeling. Everybody gets it. You know your kid's sick and you're not sure what's wrong. Okay, I get it. I don't need to know three pages about. You know types of medications.
Speaker 1:Correct and how did you decide? Okay, this is done, Because that's also such a hard thing, you know when you work with a publisher such a hard thing you know when you work with a, a publisher, it's not just your decision, right?
Speaker 2:so I spent about 10 months on the first draft, from like, okay, go write this idea, and to to handing it in. And um, after a couple of months they came back and said okay, you're going to do a developmental edit. We've hired this developmental editor for you. She specializes in essay collections. She's tremendous. Her name is Andrea Robinson. So then I had to wait three more months for her editorial letter. It came. It was incredibly long it was. I read it and thought, darn it, she's so right, and now I have to do all of this work. Right, it was like a 10-page single-spaced. You're off to a good start. Now you need to fix these huge, major things. Yeah, and I had to do it right.
Speaker 2:And that took like another nine months to do the second edit, and then, you know so, then we both liked it, and then we took it to the publisher, and then the publisher, and then the publisher wanted more changes. I mean, it had many permutations, large and small, and it took a while and I think you know the end result is a very tight book, for sure. But yeah, you have to kind of take your lumps as an author and have that moment, be mad. You know my book is perfect. What do you mean?
Speaker 1:Right, exactly Okay.
Speaker 2:Do that Now. Put it aside and do the work.
Speaker 1:And that's the thing I think is that, as authors, it's we, when we get the edits back, we instinctively or I don't know what it is we want it to be perfect. We want there to be one little mark here and one little mark there, Right. But what I'm often sort of recommending is you don't want that because nobody. That means that the editor really didn't look at it.
Speaker 2:Right, you know you want that.
Speaker 1:Were there any pieces that you found yourself fighting for, that maybe were recommended to come out or shift that you thought no, I really want to keep that the way it was or is.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think that the hardest thing was that it did sort of take a turn for the sad. And I guess the other thing I will say is it took a turn at times for the TED talkie that I had done some research, you know, for each essay. I mean, what is perfectionism? And it seems to be kind of gendered. Let me do some research on that.
Speaker 2:And so I would do the research, and then the research would be in the essay in a way that I hoped was skillfully woven, and now when I look back I can see that they were correct. There were times that it all of a sudden turned into a different kind of book and then it went back to the old way. So, even though at the time I felt like this research has to be in here because it's important to sort of underline and endorse what I'm saying, I could tighten it, I could make it more conversational, or there are places I could just cut it out, and you're the author, they'll believe you when you're saying these things you don't need to say, and some other experts said the same thing.
Speaker 1:So I ended up taking not all, all of it, but a good deal of that back out and that's interesting because I find, especially when writing non-fiction, there can be a huge tendency to lean on what other people have said, because we're not entirely confident yet in what we are saying. Yes, so it's almost like we're like, see, this is, this is okay, this is okay to say this might very well be true because these other renowned people have said this.
Speaker 2:Right, anne Lamott said it too. Right, exactly, it's like you know, with both books, with all of your projects, do you take comfort in?
Speaker 1:having that editorial friend partner to say, okay, it's done, it's ready to go. How do you navigate that moment of thinking okay, it's good enough, because we both know it'll never be perfect, Right? And do you go back ever and read and think, why did I say that? Or I could have said that differently, or I didn't say why didn't I include this story? So how do?
Speaker 2:you. I mean this, this had such a long road because when I started writing it, I was really starting writing it. I didn't work enough for two years and then query, so, um, it felt like a long journey, so I think I was ready for it to be done. I just recorded the audio book last week. You did it yourself, I did it myself, I mean, you know, with a, with a audio engineer, but I'm reading it and it was really fun and great experience and, of course, found like one typo here and one typo there. Tiny things or just tiny. Why did I say it that way?
Speaker 2:Right or why didn't, and that was. That was a moment where it was like, okay, it's, maybe someday it'll be fixed. May I'd have multiple printings and they'll be fixed. And some of it is just it doesn't need to be fixed, it's just, it's just done, it's out of the oven now.
Speaker 1:Right, it's not wrong. It's just I could have said blue instead of aquamarine Like it's not right.
Speaker 1:I find when reading and I often recommend that authors read their work out loud, because there's something different that happens when you read it out loud and you not only do you catch obvious errors, but you catch when you are, when you yourself are tripping over your own words then it's possible that you don't trip over them when you're reading them with your eyes, but when you're saying them out loud you trip and that can sometimes be an indicator that the reader might trip right. It's a little bit of a different experience.
Speaker 2:Yep, yep, and especially for nonfiction, memoir and essay kind of thing. I read it out loud several times as I was working on it. Because, yes, because then it also made sure, when I was trying to cut out the research and making it not sound too TED talky, I could find those portions more quickly and definitively. When I was reading it right, all of a sudden was flipping into literally another voice. Okay, I can fix this.
Speaker 1:Yes, Did you ever have moments, while you were in the middle of the writing it, either with this or with your first book but where you thought why am I doing this? This is dumb. Yes, I did.
Speaker 2:Yeah, okay, so tell me about that. Sure, I mean, definitely, when you get these big edits and you have to start over and you think you're done and you have to put months more, even though, like I said, it was good advice and correct, yeah, just thinking I wasn't going to finish, wasn't going to be able to do the things that were being asked of me, and that's when, again, having an editor to be sort of going between you're not hearing, you're not in the meeting, where they're talking about this needs to be fixed and that needs to be fixed, it's being sort of, you know, filtered down to you, which is probably good, and then your editor can sort of be your ally. You know, I was told that maybe some. I think it was because I had some heavy stuff in there. So it was like, cut the heavy stuff and add lots more light stuff.
Speaker 2:And I didn't want to you know, I didn't want to do that and so, with my editor, we came up with a compromise where it was like lose some of the heavy stuff, which is going to be half the problem, and then add, like, some light stuff. You're going to add it here and you're going to add it there. And again I was like I can't do it, I can't do it. And she, she was like I think you can. I think this is like five pages, I think it's not very long with this. What's going to be added here? And she was right. Of course she was right, right. So that was my big crisis of confidence that she walked me through.
Speaker 1:Yeah, was it? Was it different in a maybe a good way or not so good way, to have the pressure of basically having a book deal before you had written the book and therefore kind of having the timeline. So you've got a shortened timeline, right, you don't have an indefinite period of time to think about. Do I want to write this? Do I not want to write this? Should I write today? Should I not write today? But at the same time you have that pressure of I've got to turn this book in on such and such date.
Speaker 2:Yes, and I think it really helped me, I mean.
Speaker 1:I'm an obliger.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I am an obliger and I used a burn-up chart. You used a what chart? A burn-up chart. So Serena Bowen is my friend. She's a romance novelist that's her pseudonym but she uses software. We have other friends who use notebooks where I knew I needed to get to 75,000 words by December 1st and so that meant and I had the overall goal and that meant I was going to write 14 essays that were each this long and I broke it down and I put in the data each day and it really helped keep me going and I also built in I'll be on vacation this week.
Speaker 2:I was sick that day or whatever, and the software would actually like change my goals, but it kept me on track. Anyway, I handed it in. I was just talking to Zibi about it now that she said I can't, I can't believe you did it. I was well, of course you did it because you gave me the chance. She said, yeah, but people don't do that. You give them, like, go write a book and here's the deadline. They don't come back with a book. Right, you did. And that's, I guess, the kind of person I did.
Speaker 1:Well, I think tracking it in that way it makes so much sense logically, like just divide out your words. It's like a bill If I have to pay a thousand dollars, divide it out over the number of months that I have to pay it and then know how much to pay. It makes all the sense in the world, but for some reason some people's brains just don't work like that. And I have a friend, Sam Garcia, who wrote a book last year titled Regenerative Business and it's nonfiction, and she had this spreadsheet and it blew my mind because it was like it had all these macros and calculators in it and every time she wrote it would let her know, and I think in her own brain that allowed her to see herself getting closer to the result. And for me, my question for Sam was do you ever worry, though? Okay, you just wrote 2000 words. So your 2000 words closer Are you ever like? Yeah, but those 2000 words might be crap, Maybe they air quote, don't count.
Speaker 2:But they do count because they're still words, so that I think that's what it is in that.
Speaker 2:NaNoWriMo kind of way. They're words. Right, you wrote your pages today. You wrote your words today and it wasn't very many words. I mean, I might have written 1000 words a day. I basically wrote a page a day for a year and got to a book. It wasn't that much. I tend to, really. I didn't literally write a page, but basically once you write the crap, as you said, and like cut it back down. Yeah, it was about a page a day and for me that's what worked Taking a bite every day, maybe only two hours, and doing it Usually very early in the morning, even on Saturdays and Sundays. Yes, even you know I did it every single day.
Speaker 1:You did it every day. Okay, pretty much.
Speaker 2:I think I took off Christmas morning and when I was on vacation, but I think I did it. Out of 365 days, I probably did 358. Yeah, okay, because that's what worked for me. Other people might be able to go to a cabin in the woods and write 30,000 words in two days that I. I don't know how you do that.
Speaker 1:I don't either. I don't either. Now do you sit down and just go, or do you think about it? Do you know what you're going to write about on each individual day? How do you turn off that perfectionism?
Speaker 2:tendency. I have so many tricks I mean the best tricks I've learned. I got a couple of tricks. One of the tricks I use is to stop, like in the middle of a sentence or a middle of a thought, and then at the end of the session say next, go into part, where you wonder why that is whatever. You leave yourself instructions for the next day and then I also use that overall. There's a book called 2K to 10K. I forget who wrote it.
Speaker 2:It's small, I mean not much more than a pamphlet, and the best idea I got out of that this was for fiction, but it applies to any kind of writing is you don't have to get stuck in. Two people are robbing a bank, right? Instead of writing everything like they argue over who's going to drive, Then they can't find the keys. Why did you do this? I don't know. Why are you always like this? I don't know. Pull up at the bank. It's bank, it's closed. You know that. You write and then this happens, and then this happens. Right, you do the scene that way first, and then you go back and you word it out.
Speaker 1:That helps me get out of my. I need the perfect adjective right now. Just write something. That's the only way I can write fiction, what you just described, and I learned that through writing. So you know, I thought a certain way would work and I tried that and it didn't. And then repeat that 26 more times and I finally tried this whole bull. I just call it bullet pointing. Yes, do what you said, and it's even less than what you said. It's like she goes to a coffee shop. She leaves the coffee shop. It's absurd because you'd be like well, liz, what, what the hell happens while she's in the coffee shop? I don't, I have to force myself to go. I don't know. I'll figure that out later because I'm trying to rush to the end. And my friend Millie Two-Body Alexander, who's just written her fourth I think fourth, if not fifth novel, says that all the time Liz rushed to the end, just rushed to the end, and I don't are you? Is that kind of your?
Speaker 2:approach. Yes, I think it's. I think it's helpful. And then you don't want too much detail, right? Because you do want to give yourself the coffee shop, like, oh my gosh, and she walks in and the cousin is there and that's where she meets the cousin. You solve a problem, right? It just falls into your lap. That does happen, even for planners. It just falls out of the sky into your lap. That does happen Even for planners. It just falls out of the sky. And I think it happens more when you aren't worrying about each word as it comes off your fingers, if you're just like go to the coffee shop and stuff happens.
Speaker 2:You're putting a container around it, just like I like writing about stuff that happened and making meaning out of it. But I have something to work with already you have something to work with, and then your inspiration can sort of show up.
Speaker 1:When you have to like write I've said this for years you have to write your way through it, into it, out of it. Like to your point about that. She walks into the coffee shop and then that's when she meets her cousin. That will just come to you in that moment. But if you don't write, she wrote, went to the coffee shop.
Speaker 2:She walked up to the counter. It was, you know, yellow with grease. If you're doing that and I mean like oh, that sounds stupid and back, you're not going to get to the part we're like oh, and the cousin's there, you don't have room for that.
Speaker 1:I spent and this is not a joke I spent hours, but I was like, will she get a latte or a cappuccino? Is she the type of girl who likes? And then I got myself so entangled in oh my gosh, I don't even know my main character because I don't know whether she would get a latte. Or would it be an upside down latte? What is an?
Speaker 2:upside down latte.
Speaker 1:Let me call my kid who's a barista and ask what an upside down latte is. I mean, that is the level of sort of whether you it's perfectionism and overthinking on steroids, like it's another level, but those things are those things for you, fun to layer back in. Granted, you're not writing fiction, but are they fun to layer in?
Speaker 2:later. Yes, yes, yes, Because then you're not. So it takes the fear out of it. Yes, yes, Because then you're not, so it takes the fear out of it. I think the like what do I say next? Well, you say next she walks into the coffee shop. It just, yeah, it just makes it all. It brings it down to size. Some people would probably think writing with a spreadsheet is insane, and maybe it is, but for me it made it. All you have to do is get to the next dot today. You don't have to. You're not worrying about what if I can't finish by December? You don't worry about that. Today, you write 1,500 words.
Speaker 1:Okay that. I mean that is such a. It's such a basic, simple tip, but it works so well for so many people. It's just get to the next thing Just bring the win closer.
Speaker 2:You know John A Puff talks about that in Finish. You make your wins absurdly small. I think he says so, yes, get a sticker for writing 100 words today, then do that, and then you build out. Don't be like I'll never finish my book. Don't make it that big People.
Speaker 1:When I first started working with authors who were primarily writing and they would have word count goals and they would say, let's say, their word count goal was 500 words a day. And they would message me and the group and say, well, I only did 20 words today and my response would be but it's not zero, it's not 15. You got 20 words. We get there one word at a time. So, as you approach the launch and all of that, what are you really excited about? What feels different today from 2010?
Speaker 2:Well, I think honestly the ability to do a show like this, that back in 2010, you are praying for the big publicity hit and getting on a TV show did move books more than it does now. Now that seems to be the prevailing wisdom that nobody knows what sells books anymore. So just try everything Right, but you either like get on Good Morning America or, oh well, you know. Better luck next time. I just think that, just like you can self-publish, now you can have independent podcasts. Now you can. There's sub stack newsletters I can reach. I'm now, of course, behind on pitching people, but I have all these authors we've interviewed sub stacks.
Speaker 2:I admire podcasters I admire, to reach out to them and say like, hey, like, what do you think about this book? And there's so many different ways for somebody to say, yes, you know some. We interviewed somebody on our podcast and I sent her my book after I was done the you know arc pages and said, would you consider writing a blurb for this? And she gave me a very nice not right now on that, but how about I put it in my newsletter the week that it comes out, which is, honestly, at least as helpful as one more quote on the cover? And there's just so many ways for us to lift each other up and break through, I think, and so I really like that.
Speaker 1:What is most fun for you now? Not to say that that answer can't change tomorrow, because it absolutely can. But if you could only do and this might not even be a fair question to ask but if you could only do one thing like what are you just really enjoying in terms of book launching or community connection? Any of the all of the above?
Speaker 2:I really I like doing interviews like this and speaking engagements. It's not in everybody's comfort zone at all. Some people would really rather be writing their next book than than going on speaking engagements. I really like the speaking engagements. I like sharing an idea and seeing somebody in the audience see her eyes light up or, even better, like elbow the person next to her that's you or that's us, or you did that. Seeing that and making that connection. I love that. So I'm really looking forward to having conversations in person and more podcasts and getting it out into the world and hoping I can connect with that reader. I was imagining the whole time.
Speaker 1:Do you feel that sort of quintessential pressure that you know back in the day, right in 2010 and before it was? You have a very short window to get this book moving and I think that has changed immensely because we're seeing books from the past have a resurgence and, just through word of mouth or social media or whatever, do you feel that pressure on yourself or do you have a little bit more of a relaxed let's just have fun with this and see where it goes? I do.
Speaker 2:Yeah, of course I feel some of that pressure and think I should be doing more than I did today, but I think that's exactly true and a book will find its way. I have a friend whose book came out in May and it was the number one book on Audible, on all of Audible. Six months later, last week went up huge on Audible and of course I congratulated her and said what's your secret? And she's like I'm not really sure what happened. I think it might have gone on an Audible email. She wasn't even sure and it had just shot to success six months after it came out. So you can't count on that happening ever.
Speaker 1:And I'm so glad you said that, because so often we don't know. But I mean, I said it the other day, my first book, which was in 2004, I mean, it was another lifetime practically still is my best-selling book, and I can't tell you why I don't know how to replicate.
Speaker 2:I've heard you talk about it it's the twins. And right, if you want to know about raising twins, yours is the perfect book for that. Yeah, it has a long tail.
Speaker 1:It has an incredibly. And at the same time I'm sitting here and I'm like but, and that's great, I love that. And also there are these other books I've written that I think are pretty good too, and I can't say why, you know. So it's I actually like that. I can't explain it because there's no pressure on me to help someone else read, I don't know. And by the same token, sometimes people will go on, let's say, good Morning America or the Today Show, and they think that is going to be the kicker and it doesn't really move the needle, or we just don't know. And for me, I love waking up every day not every day, but most days and being kind of wondering or recognizing God, anything could happen today.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, and that's. It's freeing. I think you have to let go of expectations a little bit and you know like with my first book it ended up having a long tail. I ended up meeting people. I ended up 15 years later going on a podcast to talk about it. That led to my second book deal. The most roundabout way to writing a second book I could ever have imagined, and so I think that has helped me be sort of.
Speaker 2:I wrote this book to make the reader feel seen and feel better about herself, and she's going to find it, and when that happens, then it's been successful.
Speaker 1:So last question I always ask what are you reading right now, or what have you read recently that you really loved? What? I'd love to know what the audible was that you mentioned. Oh, it's the five-year lie by.
Speaker 2:Serena Bowen. Okay, she is a romance novelist that recently this is her first um venture into writing thrillers. It's a really good one. I didn't listen to the audible, I read it. It's great. Um so, um. So, if you like thrillers, I was in search of a book. Uh, that was really unputdownable. I like reading a lot of non-fiction and I do for the podcast. We're always interviewing authors in the podcast, but for pleasure. I wanted that book that I just couldn't put down, and I read the bee sting by paul. Let me see if I have it behind me. Nope, I don't the bee.
Speaker 1:I'll look it up. He's by paul paul. He he won all these prizes and he's first name is Paul.
Speaker 2:He won all these prizes. He's an Irish author and he won all these prizes in Europe for this book. And it's a family novel four-person family, same series of events told from each of their points of view. Sad but super funny in that only Irish can do this way, and just I couldn't put it down. Even though it was a total doorstop, I loved these characters. I can still like see them in my mind's eye and loved that book.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's an amazing. I don't think I could really write in that many points of view. Yeah, I have a hard enough time really remembering like my own name most days, so that is a great-.
Speaker 2:I think that was it. Yeah, when you read a book and you're like, well, I don't know how they did this, I don't know how they did it and I shouldn't do this, and when it's not jarring to you as the reader, right, right, when you can, seamlessly, as the reader know.
Speaker 1:Okay, now we're back in this character or now we're over to this character. That is a special kind of skill.
Speaker 2:He did something with punctuation. If you read the book you'll see one of the characters. He removed all punctuation and he must have written it with punctuation and then removed it. That must have been what he digs. I can't imagine writing without punctuation at all. So he must have done, you know, find, replace all the periods, and so it's very stream of consciousness, obviously, and it makes it a little harder to read and it forces you to slow down. But it's somebody whose mind is very muddled and it forces you to slow down and be in that person's mind space and it's, it's genius.
Speaker 1:Well, I really commend the editor because I don't think I could have done this. Right, right, right. I just don't see that working out for Liz no. Oh my gosh. Well, thank you so much. I'm so excited. I'll put everything in the show notes, including your book recommendations. Okay, great Thanks. I need to take a road trip so I can binge. What Fresh Hell. I laughed out loud when I saw that that is just such a great title and I can't wait to dive into it.
Speaker 2:Thank you, liz, this was really fun.
Speaker 1:Thank you so much for tuning in. If you enjoyed this episode, this is your friendly reminder to follow or subscribe, leave a quick review and share it with someone you know has a great story or message but isn't sure what to do next. Also, remember to check out publishaprofitablebookcom for book writing resources and tips and to see all the ways we can work together to get your book out into the world. Again, thanks so much for listening and I'll talk with you again soon.
