No News Today
Nope, not here...
Hey there,
It’s me again. With no updates whatsoever.
Oh. Lies. There are updates. Lots of ’em. Before you ask: No, no one has offered to represent my book yet. But I’m not even salty about it. Here’s a brief timeline explaining why:
In November and December of 2018 I wrote The Other Women. It sucked back then.
In early 2019, I read about a course called a “novel incubator.” I thought it was a really cool idea - meeting up regularly with other authors working to revise their first drafts, and learning more about writing. So I applied. And I got waitlisted. This was encouraging for my first foray into the literary world, and I took it for the win it was.
After that, I learned of another novel writing course, taught virtually out of England. I applied and was accepted, like, the next day. There were 20 students in this class, and I was one of them.
The class started in the fall of 2019, and it was wonderful. It was a full year-long course, well worth the time and money, and I had one-on-one sessions with my tutor, live Q&A sessions with all my classmates, and a full editorial review. It was just wonderful.
Then, in 2020…well, we all know what happened in 2020. The sad thing about that with respect to the novel writing class was that the class came with a full weekend ticket to the Festival of Writing in York, England. Well that’s not the sad part. The sad part is that the festival was canceled due to COVID, and then it was canceled again in 2021.
BUT GUESS WHAT. It’s happening in 2022, and I. Am. Going.
This festival, which happens over Labor Day weekend (first weekend of September), includes lodging, meals, 3-hour mini-courses, workshops, and TWO one-to-one sessions with agents. Me and an agent. Face to face. In the same room. If I choose wisely, who knows what will happen.
So. Maybe the universe is putting things all in a row for me. (Or maybe not, but just let me dream for a bit, okay?) Because now I have a plan.
By September, I’m going to get that pesky beginning bit fleshed out a little more. I’m at least going to give myself time to muck around with it and explore whether or not what I want to do works. Other than that, I’m not going to do a single thing.
Nothing besides be a mom, work at my day job, and do this little newspaper thing that started a month ago but now has 10x more subscribers than my author newsletter - seriously, how can I apply these lessons, people?!
Also, I’m making podcasts and doing interviews and being interviewed and being a panelist on a debate…
So maybe I should clarify: I won’t be doing a single thing involving The Other Women between now and September other than getting the beginning sorted. That’s it. And that’s final.
Okay, I really wanted to talk about Ted Lasso today, but I can’t. It’s late, and I already threw more information at you than you likely know what to do with.
But I’ll be back soon, and in the meantime I hope you can catch some Ted Lasso if you haven’t already. Smiles for days, I tell you.
Until next time,
Nicci
