After more than a decade of writing with the intention of building a career, I’m participating in my first author event! Corner Cup on Mainstreet in Tucker, GA from 10am-2pm Sunday, February 27. I’m going to show up in public as a writer. Not just a writer but An Author. With a novel coming out. I really want to be the cool, chill writer, rocking a blazer and sneakers. But I’ll probably be crying through the event. Or talking way too loudly at a million words a minutes. I have trouble using my indoor voice when I’m excited, and I will be very excited this Sunday.
So if you’re willing to hear me shout about my book, come out to the Corner Cup this Sunday. I’ll be selling copies of two amazing anthologies about living abroad that I contributed to and handing out my very first book swag! A little teaser for Jaguars & Other Game coming out in November 2022.
Before I began writing fiction, I wrote creative non-fiction about my experiences living in Brazil and I’m looking forward to sharing these anthologies and talking to people about how I used writing, specifically humor, to process and adapt to life abroad. In Once Upon an Expat, I talk about gym culture in Vitoria, Espirito Santo and the importance of rock-solid quads and a fabulous unitard. Giving birth prematurely in a foreign country wouldn’t seem fodder for comedy, but I’m believer in laughter as a painkiller. My essay in Knocked Up Abroad Again takes readers through my emergency c-section at 33 weeks and the 28 days my daughter spent in the NICU. Both anthologies are filled with heartfelt and humorous accounts of women from all over the world with the common experience of building a life and family in a new country and culture.
I’m also happy to talk about my experience with traditional publishing, finding an agent then going on submission (for a painfully long 28 months) and ultimately signing with a small indie press. I’ve hired editors and sensitivity readers and networked to find beta readers. I have an extensive collection of rejections from agents and editors and am always up for a good gripe session about how absurdly slow the publishing industry is. A global pandemic was able to play out in the time it took to go on submission. So if you’re looking for a fellow author to talk shop or are thinking about writing your first book, come stop by Corner Cup! I’d love to chat and make more local writer connections.
Also by buying a coffee and bagel, you’ll be supporting local businesses. Corner Cup is locally owned and operated and they give a ton of support to the community by selling the work of local artists. Their baked goods are also locally produced and delicious, (Shout out to Emerald City’s everything bagel!) so you can feel good about buying that chocolate croissant.
If you’re around Tucker this Sunday, I hope to see you. We can talk writing, swap book and pastry recommendations, and I promise to try and use my indoor voice.
I recently confessed to planning an entire trip to New York City around a preschooler. Housing, excursions, food…It was all for her. With the exception of Tuesday night. Because while our daily itinerary was planned around her, she was not the reason for the trip. Hamilton was the reason for trip. Ok, fine. My obsession with Hamilton was the reason for the trip.
I’ve never been one to fangirl. I have loved movies and cheered in the stands for a favorite team. But I’ve never painted my entire face and worn a giant foam hat chanting in unison in below freezing temperatures. I’ve never spent six months salary on replica Storm Troopers costume and blaster. I’ve never loved anything enough to wait in line for more than one hour.
A week later my husband said “Let’s do it. Let’s go to New York.”
At the same time as Hamilton was debuting off-Broadway in early 2015, I quit my job as a teacher to devote myself to writing and publishing my first novel. I was anxious. I was antsy. I’d given myself two years to get an agent. I announced this to family and friends not realizing that two years is a laughably short time in the publishing world. Congressional cycles come faster than novel debuts. But I was ignorant of the alternate reality publishing exists in and worried that at 32 years old I was running out of time to build a career.
Those years paid off. Hamilton was the most amazing theater experience of my life. I was in tears before the opening number was over. It was epic because every detail was right. I remember the way the lights changed at a stomp of King George’s foot to fabulous comedic effect. I remember Jefferson’s truly spectacular purple ensemble for his grand entrance in Act II. The intensity with which Leslie Odom Jr. delivered every line. Miranda’s complete breakdown after Hamilton’s forgiven by his wife. The banjo in “Room Where it Happens”. God, I love that banjo. The ensemble member who traces the trajectory of that fatal bullet in slow motion. It was all perfect.
And that level of perfection takes patience. You can’t nail every detail at the same time. You have to tweak them one by one over the course of weeks, months, and years with constant feedback and help. I’m trying to keep that in mind when I grit my teeth at the prospect of reworking my first chapter for the tenth time. When I get feedback from an editor saying this is great just rework these parts, and I’m so very tempted to interpret this is “this is great” as “this is good enough” and be done with it. Patience is a challenge for me. Accepting that “life is long” and I do have years to get it right is very difficult for me.
