I received an email today from an editor congratulating me for having another National Book Award nominee. What the fuck? I didn’t even know the nominations were being announced today. I scrolled down to Publishers Lunch and there it was, right there under the fiction nominees: THe Sojourn by ANdrew Krivak (Bellevue Press). I called Andrew who said he couldn’t talk because he was driving. Citizens! I asked him to pull over, hello, but he had to pick up his son. Okay. Was he in shock? Was I? He received the call on Friday from the head of the NBA, who instructed him not to tell anyone. And he didn’t. (More restraint than I’ve managed for my entire life.) My inbox started to fill with congratulations, including from a number of the editors who had passed on the book. So gracious. Did I say I was in tears. I called to tell Patti and my mom. Guess who knew the right thing to say? Andrew called back, having gotten home and plied his three children with Graham Crackers. (My mind immediately flashed on marshmallows and Hershey bars.) We enjoyed the moment. It had been a long haul to see this book published. I never wanted to give up. More important, he never did.
Congrats, Andrew.
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So often I hear a writer say, “I have to make myself write.” I always bristle at this, even though I’ve said it myself. I bristle because I have this naive belief that “real” writers don’t have to make themselves write. That they have to write, are compelled to, no use of force required. I’m thinking of Stephen King, Joyce Carol Oates, Philip Roth, Saul Bellow, Charles Dickens, Anthony Trollope. I used to know a writer who made a pact with another writer to motivate themselves. If they didn’t complete twenty pages a week, they had to clean each other’s toilet. Do you ever think if you’re having trouble writing that you should stop, leave it alone. Or is that a cop out, that you a have to push through it to get anywhere? And do you ever actually break through, push through, write a complex sentence that is so simple, or a simple sentence that is complexity incarnate. Is is like finally mastering a drum pattern or brush stroke?
It’s not every day a beloved commenter shows up with a brilliant idea for a sly marketing ploy disguised as a guest post with a fabulous offer all rolled into one. Without further adieu, Spring Chicken, aka Andrea Dunlop. And take her up on her offer to explain publicity.
I’m returning my car to the Thrifty Rental Car Return (cause that’s how power agents roll), when two men, a woman, and a baby girl get off one of the airport shuttles and proceed to unload nine suitcases, most of them huge. The woman fills two bottles with orange juice and takes a long, slow pull off the carton, the pleasure of which registers in her neck. Her skin is so pale I wonder if she is wearing powder. Her cheekbones redefine cheekbones. Dark hair pulled into a tight pony tail, and yes some loose strands have escaped to tempt the gods.
Sitting on a plane with my manuscript next to a woman reading on her K. I realize that a year or so from now, she will be reading the book I am working on in a million pixels. But I will still be the lucky bastard who got to read it first, who offered notes and thoughts on structure, on the title, on a plot point. I will be the one who first admired this simile, that character detail. I will still live in a tactile world where raptors drag devices through the Colorado desert, where water will find its source, and the last printing machine will suffocate beneath the plexiglass, the small plaque unread. Born. Dead. What are you reading, I asked. The Help, she said.
I got up again. Got up in the dark and parked my ass in front of my computer and starting working on the screenplay that will never be optioned, sold, made or streamed. The reason I did it is because I can’t bear not to finish it. Because some tiny part of me believes that there is a Santa. And that if I want to sit in his lap, I have to be a very good girl. I also love my characters. I love them so much that I can’t believe people don’t like the main guy. I know he’s an asshole, but he’s my asshole, if you read me. I probably love the very worst parts of my screenplay even more. Here’s what I’m saying: so fucking what. Finish it. Start a new one. And then one after that. I was never Cinderella.
Saw Moneyball over the weekend. I would have enjoyed it more if I hadn’t been thinking about publishing the whole time, namely the phenomenal success of Michael Lewis: Liar’s Poker, The Big Short, The New New Thing, Moneyball, The Blind Side, etc. My daughter pipes up, “Mommy, why don’t you get Michael Lewis for a client.” Sure, sweetheart, I’ll do that as soon as grow a third leg.
People often ask me why I left editorial and became an agent. It’s a good question but I’m tired of it. Why did I leave Judaism and become and atheist, why did I quit heroin for methadone, why did I cut off my beautiful long hair for this veritable shrub? Why did I stop writing poetry for screenplays? Why Coke Zero instead of Diet Coke? Why did I cut off my left foot in favor of my right, why did I pluck out both of my eyes? Why did Celeste give up her throne? Why did Antigone die alone? Why did I change from a butterfly to a cocoon. Friends, I had my reasons.
Betsy Lerner 