The Big Break
“Writing a book is a horrible, exhausting struggle, like a long bout of some painful illness. One would never undertake such a thing if one were not driven on by some demon whom one can neither resist nor understand.” —George Orwell
I was standing in my kitchen here in northern Michigan feeling impressed with the fact that after thirty plus days without the sun I was still relatively cheerful when I remembered that this year 2023, marks the twentieth year since I was given the keys to the kingdom, a book deal with a massive publisher, a six-figure advance, a marketing budget, the potential for a supported career in novel writing. However, something told me not to quit my job teaching high school English although I did reduce my schedule to part-time as there were things that needed to be done to support the book and I felt obligated to continue to teach with the same passion and diligence. I was rewarded with resentment by my colleagues, almost the same amount of work while losing my chance for tenure.
However, I will never believe that being told by your agent that after thirteen years of rejection since your second novel was published that your book was going to auction was anything less than wonderful. Mind you, the night before while my then boyfriend, now husband, was combing lice eggs out of my hair when I said, “I will never get another book published,” his response was silence. Driving to the first day of classes I checked my voice mail and there was a message from my agent telling me two major publishers wanted my novel. I spent the day handing out syllabi and fielding memos about work obligations immune to snarky comments from my students, afraid to answer the phone. I drove to the gym as my son was with my ex-husband and when I was about to enter, the phone rang with the news of this incredible deal. I told the man sweeping leaves from the entrance but I’m pretty sure he was a non-English speaker, took a class that made me cry from its difficulty and drove home in a combination of joy, dread and anxiety.
I wondered how my friends and family would react to this news. My father, a brilliant novelist who had loved this book, had never been given this sort of support. My sister who was unable to deal with any good fortune that befell me, my ex-husband who was an unsettling combination of good feelings and competitive backbiting, and my boyfriend the ironworker who never read anything besides an instruction manual. I feared becoming famous and being on the cover of national magazines because I thought people would hate me for beating the odds. Basically, I had a minor breakdown, took the first advance check and put it in an envelope without any explanation and mailed it to someone who had no reason to receive such a check. I slowly told people and was mainly greeted with kindness and love. My anxiety increased, I went on an anti-depressant and searched in vain for the happiness that should accompany such good news.
Despite the fact writing this novel had required three years of rising at five am, writing from five to seven and then leaving to teach all day in a massive urban high school, I felt guilty. I downplayed the discipline required to produce the manuscript to the point that an attendee at one of my readings commented that I seemed to just be lucky. I wasn’t lucky. It had taken every part of me to persist through rejections, the crisis of motherhood, a sad divorce, a retraining to teach high school English instead of college adjunctIng, more rejections, my parent’s neediness, and the public’s feelings about my writing which was very moving but also hard to accept after so much isolation.
Stone Garden produced a hugely positive full-page NYT Sunday Review and my being chosen as a NYT Notable book. I received fan letters from people that told me they had never laughed or cried so much reading any other book and some that said it was the best thing they had ever read.
Now, twenty years later I have written four rejected novels, rejected at times by my agent and others by publishers after an agent submitted the novels. Each has taken years to write. After the initial blow I have put those books away and continued to work. Last week I sent a new novel to my new agent hoping he will feel it deserves to be submitted to publishers but fully aware he might not think there is a market. This is the reality and the glamor of my writing life. I delight in teaching, in writing essays and yes, in writing these novels but lest one thinks the work is anything other than heartbreaking and difficult I would strongly suggest paying better attention to the life of most writers. We are privileged and doomed and mainly searching for the truth in our work and the work of others. Our refusal to surrender may be the strongest indication we should continue to try.
—Molly Moynahan, author and writing coach