Behind the Scenes of a Major Book Deal

And the highly un-glamorous journey of doing what you love.

I’ve been free lance for ten years. Which means I’ve paid my rent by doing everything from performing poetry at a private birthday party in a suspended glass tube while naked circus performers dance below me, to contorting my hyper-mobile limbs for “yoga” modeling (which is really just hey-go-into-the-deepest-backbend-you-can-without-warming-up-wench), to standing in front of an active tornado for a brand deal.

It’s been a colorful journey, to say the least.

I’ve crossed countless edges to understand my values as an artist. I’ve been a copywriter, a ghost writer, and produced god-awful commissioned poems. Those were the most excruciating moments—when I sacrificed the integrity of my pen.

At the start of this year, I made a decision to fully devote myself to the craft I love. To stop exposing my work in real time and let it marinate. To give myself space to undergo the hideous process of chrysalis without making it a display. Otherwise, the instant feedback loop inevitably distorts the work.

It’s unnatural to live in a constant echo chamber—how the hell are we supposed to know what our own voices sound like?

This isn’t a glamorous process. Every day, I sit in an empty room, and write for six hours, eating the shit sandwich that comes with creating any book. There’s doubt, and frustration, and a relentless stripping away of what doesn’t belong to the story. But there’s also a deeper fulfillment than I have ever known—an intrinsic sense of self-worth because I am all in.

Let’s talk about the book deal.

I don’t share the following story as a yeehaw-look-at-me-go. But to remind anyone reading that behind every overnight success are a thousand nights of struggle.

I got an email from Harper Collins in winter. They inquired about my next poetry collection. We exchanged notes for a few months, making sure we were the right fit for each other. It felt like that legend of the Chinese painter—I didn’t know if the words would be enough for the emperor, or if they would simply remain a shelter for my own spirit.

Fast forward: I’m in Switzerland, sitting with my best friend on her kitchen counter, wrapped in a towel after swimming in the river. I opened my inbox and saw the offer, then proceeded to run in a circle, crying and laughing, until I smacked face first into her lamp and broke it.

In the midst of giggles and tears, I heard a voice: You chose your art, and your art chose you back. Your stories, your poems—they will protect you now.

Behind this book deal are ten years of writing poetry for the sake of writing poems. Behind this book deal are fifty-three rejections from agents for my novel. Behind this book deal is every odd job I’ve taken to buy time to practice this craft that I can’t stay away from.

When we choose our art, it chooses us back.

I don’t know how or when—but I believe we can live inside of our creations. Every story told doesn’t just become ink on a page, but a living presence that walks beside us, guiding us home if we allow it.

Xx,

Your Friendly Neighborhood Scribe