Another Mountain to Climb

What it feels like to be starting the next book

I’ve learned that there comes a time in a working writer’s life when you find yourself in a valley at the bottom of a mountain.

You’ve launched the last book, you’ve traveled far and wide and devoted most of your working hours to making sure that people have heard of the book, know where to buy it, know where you are appearing to talk about it. 

You get on the stage with a conversation partner, you show some photos, you read passages and answer questions, and you sign books while chatting with readers.

Photo credit: Helen Houghton

It’s fun and energizing and inspiring but inevitably a drive builds in you to stop talking about one book and start writing the next.

When people ask me how many books I’ve published, I give some vague reply like “over 50.”

 But thinking about what’s next, I went back and counted how many novels I’ve written. 14, it turns out. 14 novels for middle grade, young adult, and adult readers. (Besides essays and poetry and short stories, the rest of my published books include a memoir for adults and lots of picture books for young children.) I hate to think how many words that adds up to or how many trees have been sacrificed to send my characters out into the world. Don’t get me wrong. I’m proud of my career, deeply grateful that I’ve been able for so many years to make my living doing what I love best.

But can I do it again?

Fifteen is a nice round number, but it’s another mountain to climb. And right now, I’m deep in the valley wondering as I always do how to find that path that will lead me up and out. Eudora Welty once said, “Each book teaches me how to write it, but not the next one.”

Whenever I talk about the writing process, I like to describe the black crow that settles on my shoulder and whispers in my ear.

 “Who cares?” the bird asks. Or “Do you think anybody will bother to read this?”  Or “That character doesn’t make any sense.” When I am starting out, I always imagine taking that black bird and locking him in a cage in the very back of my closet. Once the first draft is done, I bring him out and let him chatter at me again. That’s when I need him. He’s great at picking up on my word repeats or my tense shifts or my characters’ inconsistencies. But at this beginning stage when I’m the most vulnerable, when everything from laundry to exercise to knitting can tempt me away from the page/screen, that old crow’s voice needs to be silenced.

So, here I am, reporting from the bottom of the path. How do I start? I get out my handwritten journal and begin once again to scribble with a pen. I write an essay or a poem or a short short story. I start to make notes for characters and ask myself questions I’ve always found useful. What do they look like? What’s the one thing he or she would grab if their house burst into flames? I jump in and write a scene from the middle of the book if I’ve gotten far enough to imagine a middle. I write a diary from a character’s point of view. I take myself on non-verbal artist dates to places like museums or dance programs or concerts. It’s amazing the questions one’s imagination can answer when you’re not asking directly, but simply opening up space for the characters to speak, sometimes directly to you, often to one another.

I have to admit that at this stage in the process, I avoid bookstores perhaps because my favorite piece of advice to writers comes from Fred Allen, the radio comedian who asks one simple question. “Why write a book when you can go around the corner and buy one?”

Wish me luck as I search for ways up this new mountain. I’ll need it.