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The Book I HAD to Write

By: Paul Zakrzewski
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  • Summary

  • Welcome to the Book I had to write. This is the show where I feature critically-acclaimed writers, who tell me about the stories they just HAD to get out in the world. Episodes focus on places where that sense of urgency meets resistance. We talk about where authors get stuck—and how they succeed. Whether it’s about mindset, craft, or the changing landscape of publishing—this show covers everything you need to know to start & finish your own writing project.

    bookiwanttowrite.substack.com
    Paul Zakrzewski
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Episodes
  • What do you need to know about marketing your book in 2024? with Kathleen Schmidt

    What do you need to know about marketing your book in 2024? with Kathleen Schmidt
    Feb 21 2024
    Last year, I came across an essay called “Book Publishing is Broken” by today’s podcast guest, Kathleen Schmidt .Using her decades of experience in book PR & strategy, Kathleen laid out several reasons why traditional publishing fails writers. (If you haven’t already read that post, you’ll get to hear Kathleen’s reasons in our interview).And the essay really stood out…not just because Kathleen presented solutions to the problems she diagnosed…but also because her perspective was clear-sighted, well-informed, but also so honest, direct, and personal.I’ve been hooked on Publishing Confidential , Kathleen’s Substack newsletter, ever since. With over 5,000 subscribers, I think of it as one of the must-reads for any writer looking to understand today’s publishing landscape.In our interview, we talk about that landscape, about the utility of hiring an independent publicist, and the value of creating work that reaches beyond traditional media outlets.We also discuss why memoirs are one of the hardest categories for agents to sell right now, and what authors can consider to make their books more marketable.Kathleen Schmidt is the Founder and President of Kathleen Schmidt Public Relations, a boutique firm specializing in branding, PR, marketing, consulting, and business strategy for authors, publishers, and booksellers. She also writes and publishes the Publishing Confidential newsletter.Warning: this episode includes a brief mention of suicidal ideation. If you or someone you love is struggling with a mental health crisis, you can contact the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-TALK (8255). (In Spanish, dial 1-888-628-9454). Some of my biggest takeaways:Publishing too many books and lack of marketing support are primary reasons why the industry struggles.Publishers produce more books than the market can sustain, often neglecting to back many with substantial marketing efforts. "They publish far too many books," Schmidt states unequivocally. It's a perplexing situation that challenges authors and industry insiders alike. The ramifications of this are profound—not just for the discoverability and success of individual titles but for the long-term sustainability of publishing entities themselves.Schmidt expresses her consternation over the lack of direction regarding advances and acquisitions: "It's all kind of garbled and I feel like if you're not able to pay authors an amount that they can live on, what are we doing?" These pivotal industry dynamics are not just numbers on a spreadsheet but represent the livelihoods of creatives whose stories shape our culture.Authors need to participate actively in the marketing and publicity of their books, using strategies tailored to their specific audience.In the digital age, a robust social media presence is often considered non-negotiable. But where should authors concentrate their efforts? Schmidt advocates for targeted strategies—"find where your audience lives when they're not reading books"—and identifies threads and Instagram as effective platforms. However, she aptly recognizes that "every author should do" does not mean straitjacketing all writers into a one-size-fits-all approach. Instead, authors need to be authentic, engage with their readers, and leverage digital surrogates when necessary to carry their message.Schmidt's distinction between pitch-focused publicity versus sales-driven strategies underscores the complexity of book marketing in the current landscape. "I am the publicist who thinks about how are we going to sell the book?" she poses, aligning author success with commercial viability and practical application.Memoir faces challenges due to market oversaturation and authors should consider additional angles to be sellable.The realm of memoir publishing is undergoing profound change, leaving many authors pondering the fate of their personal stories. With the market oversaturated by similar stories, distinguishing a memoir requires more than just a riveting life story—it requires a unique angle or an additional layer of value such as the 'Memoir Plus' concept.Schmidt pushes authors to grapple with the real question: "is it a book or is it an essay?" This discernment is crucial in a world where the distinction between public sharing and a publishable memoir is increasingly blurred by the constancy of social media narratives. The trend now demands memoirists to consider if their life narratives are enough to stand alone as books or if they are better shared in smaller, perhaps digital, formats."Know who your audience is. Be very specific about that because, again, your book is not for everyone."Writing and sharing personal stories can connect with audiences deeply, but authors should thoughtfully consider the platform and format.In a moment of vulnerability, Schmidt shares her battles with depression, shaping a compelling narrative of resilience. This particular insight is significant not only for its ...
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    34 mins
  • The past is every bit as unpredictable as the future, with Abigail Thomas

    The past is every bit as unpredictable as the future, with Abigail Thomas
    Feb 14 2024
    In this converation with memoirist Abigail Thomas, we discuss the backstory of writing Safekeeping, and that now-classic memoir was initially turned down by all the editors the book was sent, except for one. We talk about how crafting a memoir-in-fragments like Safekeeping allows a writer to depict memories in a way a more conventional structure doesn’t permit. She talks about why writing what you don’t remember is as important as what you do; and the value of following what interests and obsesses you, even if it doesn't seem to go anywhere at first.Thomas’s is one of the great voices in memoir—shrewd, warm, devoid of self-pity—and like all wise teachers, she imparts insights about a life well spent, even when talking about a book well-crafted.This conversation was recorded in 2022 and just updated.Abigail Thomas is the author of several memoirs, including Safekeeping, A Three Dog Life, What Comes Next and How to Like it, and most recently Still Life at Eighty, as well as three works of fiction: Getting Over Tom, An Actual Life, and Herb’s Pajamas.Some of my biggest takeaways“Chronological order makes little sense to me…”Most of Thomas’s memoirs eschew the conventional chronological approach, opting instead for fragmented structures that mirror the way memory works. Abigail Thomas believes that "life has been lived like a series of moments," and memoirs are stronger when they reflect that."Well, I will confess that I have a poor memory, except for the things I remember. So putting them in chronological order makes very little sense to me. It's why this now? Why am I thinking of this now? Why this memory? Write it down. You'll find out why. The trick is not to boss them around, you know. Just let them come, and they will."This memoir-in-fragments approach unexpectedly draws the reader inSafekeeping, for example, is comprised of dozens of short sections—some four or five pages, others as brief as a single sentence. Then there’s the narrator herself, frequently switching between past and present tense, or between first- and third-person.With all that lack of connective tissue, all that shifting of tenses and point-of-view, you’d expect the narrative flow to be constantly disrupted. Instead this approach creates a genuine connection with readers, in part because it invites them to piece together the narrative puzzleThe key to writing a great memoir-in-fragments is to have a strong, unified voiceMarried for the first time at 18, remarried at 27—Abigail Thomas’s life was full of wrong turns. She had a lot of living under her belt. Yet the narrator here keeps things light and crisp, avoiding self-judgment. Instead, here the persona is vulnerable, startlingly honest, unsentimental, wry, and above all, entertaining.In The Situation and the Story, Vivian Gornick writes that great memoirs feature a “truth-telling” narrator. We trust the voices of George Orwell, Annie Dillard, or James Baldwin because they seem so honest and self-aware. Thomas’s narrator is one of these."The more vulnerable you make yourself, the stronger you become”Thomas urges writers to be honest and vulnerable, since revealing truths about oneself tends to have a liberating effect. This openness serves as a conduit through which readers can see their truths reflected in the author’s life, reinforcing the fact we all tend to feel similar things inside.The key is to write without an agenda—to connect with an emotion and let go of outcomes.“You need to write about the stuff you don't wanna write about…[but] you have to find a side door, and it isn't therapy. Writing isn't therapy. But if you're truthful, and honest, and write what you need to write, it has the effect of you've made something out of it separate from yourself, you've revealed things to yourself about yourself, and it's a way of forgiving yourself, you know, and others.”“The past is every bit as unpredictable as the future”The unpredictable nature of memory can be troubling for both writer and reader. Yet, Thomas says that this unpredictability is where the real magic of memoir writing lies. The unpredictable becomes an asset, turning writing into a journey of self-discovery and an act of creative courage.“I don't believe in chronology. And the older you get, the more you don't believe in chronology or even time. What is it? I mean, I'm at the age now where I live entirely in the moment. Sometimes the moment is a good one, sometimes it's a more interesting one, but that's where I am. I never think about the future. I do have memories, and I write about them because I wrote somewhere, ‘You discover that the past is every bit as unpredictable as the future.’ And for me, the future is behind me. You know, I don't have... I just have now.”What you don’t remember can be as powerful as what you doMany writers (me included) tend to get hung up by the fact they don’t remember enough when it comes to memoir. But embracing the ...
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    29 mins
  • From Pet-Sitting to Publishing, with Chérie Newman

    From Pet-Sitting to Publishing, with Chérie Newman
    Feb 7 2024
    In this episode, I talk with author, musician and audio producer Chérie Newman about her humorous experiences pet-sitting unruly critters during the pandemic. The need to turn this one-time side hustle into a fulltime gig coincided with a more sobering reality: the way that wealthy out-of-state residents reshaped her hometown of Bozeman, Montana.Newman merges both stories into her debut memoir, Other People’s Pets: Critters, Careers, and Capitalism in Yellowstone Country. We also discuss her highly focused approach to writing, which helped her complete a first draft of her memoir in 83 days. And we delve into her decision to pursue an unconventional publishing route, one that allowed her to retain control and profits, and permitted her to get her book out quickly.Chérie Newman is a former producer and and on-air host for Montana Public Radio, and a freelance writer. She founded a weekly literary program, The Write Question, which is still broadcast on several public radio stations, and her articles and essays have appeared in many publications. She is the owner of Magpie Audio Productions, and produces The Book I Had to Write podcast. Some of my biggest takeaways:Chérie was compelled to write Other People's Pets less as a typical “feel good” story and more to explore the humorous challenges of corraling disobedient pets—and her own deep connection to animals.In this interview, Newman describes how she set about writing her memoir after frequently hearing from friends that she ought to record her stories. But while the unexpected challenges she faced pet-sitting unruly dogs made for humorous stories, the reality of her job sometimes left her unmoored. "I came away from this year of intense pet sitting with a little bit of PTSD," she says.The pandemic brought about immediate and dramatic changes to Bozeman, Montana as real estate prices soared and community dynamics shifted. Newman's memoir addresses some of the significant societal shifts she saw in her home city of Bozeman, Montana during the pandemic. And our interview highlights rapid socioeconomic changes, with real estate prices doubling and the influx of people seeking “the last best place,” as writer William Kittredge dubbed Montana.One of the drivers of this influx was no doubt a glorified depiction of Montana in shows like Yellowstone, which don’t have a lot of basis in reality, at least as Newman sees it. She juxtaposes media depictions of Montana with some of starker realities for long-term residents.People were moving here so fast that there was no place for anybody to live. We started getting, for the first time, rows and rows of RVs parked on streets that were near places that were going to be subdivisions but weren't yet. And it was just insanity.This phenomenon, fueled by the pandemic, led to a bifurcation of the local community where “there's a lot of animosity between people who've lived here for a long time and people who've moved in.”Newman set an ambitious and structured writing goal, completing the first draft of her book in less than her goal of 90 days…While Other People’s Pets isn’t Newman’s first attempt at a book, it’s one she was able to draft in record speed, thanks in part to her discipline of setting a writing schedule of (at least) 90 minutes a day for 90 days, and the transformational journey of taking that manuscript through numerous drafts.And so there were some times when it would be 7.30 at night and I still hadn't done my 90 minutes, but because I had this little chart on the wall and I was making, I was ticking off….I committed to those 90 days, and I committed to those 90 minutes, and I wasn't gonna let bad self-confidence defeat me. …But the book really came together in revisions.In this interview we also discuss the ways Newman’s approach mimicked but also diverged from strategies such as one recommended by Allison K. Williams in her book Seven Drafts: Self-Edit Like a Pro from Blank Page to Book.I did pay attention to [Williams’s] Seven Drafts but I just also went way beyond seven drafts because every time I went through it I found a way to make it better and I found a way to make it more succinct and I found a way to say what I wanted to say in a richer, deeper, clearer way.Choosing the Path Less Traveled in PublishingThe publishing journey that Newman chose reflects a rising trend among authors seeking greater autonomy. She discusses the importance of time, quality control, and financial considerations in her decision to forgo the search for an agent and large publishing deal.In her case, Newman chose a publisher that served as both a curator and distributor, enabling her to maintain control over the final product and gain a more significant portion of profits from sales.In many ways, Newman’s approach is also indicative of the changing relationship to hybrid and self-publishing, as authors now feel more empowered to make decisions that align their financial goals with...
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    33 mins
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