A Fool's Gambit

By Amy MacKinnon
Don't mess with success. Write what you know. Stay within your genre. Focus on one project at a time.

I am a fool. I'm a scared fool. A bit of a wreck even. I'm doing everything wrong, I know this, and yet I keep doing it.

Right now, I'm writing two books. One is so dark, I'm not sure there's a market for it, though Jon Clinch assures me there is, right there alongside him and Cormac McCarthy. Have you read Finn, Blood Meridian? Brilliant books written by brilliant writers. Already I'm being warned not to go too dark, to be careful.

The other I have no business writing at all. None. It is an homage to a classic, one I've read countless times over the years, a story I know in my bones because I've lived it firsthand. But the author of the classic is a literary titan. When I told a close friend what I was attempting, he was aghast. Be careful, he said.

But it's not my job to be careful, to play it safe and write the same book over and over again. It's my duty to myself and my writing to reach beyond whatever skillset I have today, to stretch, and then follow my instincts.

Last week at Writers Read for Twain, I was talking to one of my favorites, Stewart O'Nan. He's the author of many, many books including the little gem Last Night at the Lobster. I say little, not because of the story, it's bigger than the jacket can contain, but because I doubt it's more than 40,000 words. I asked if his publisher worried that it was too short, if people along the way urged him to flesh it out. He nodded vigorously.

But you refused, I said.

Yes, he said (and I'm paraphrasing here), I believed in it.

He was right to do so. Lobster represents a return to simple elegance in storytelling. Stewart O'Nan broke all the rules and won; his book was both a commercial and literary success. He took a magnificent risk.

I hope I'll be able to say the same some day.

Right or Wrong

By Amy MacKinnon

I saw him standing toward the back. It was Saturday afternoon and I was doing my first reading of the day at Barnes & Noble in Hingham. He shifted his weight from left foot to right, and then back again. One hand was on his hip and his expression was unfathomable. He never faltered when I stared back at him, though I did. He didn't smile, he didn't glower, he didn't appear pleased or displeased. But that fidgeting had me worried.

To be honest I wasn't certain it was him. I'd met him only once, about two years ago when it was clear my novel would be set in Brockton, Massachusetts, featuring Brockton cops. I called the police department to see if I could have a tour, I needed to know the layout of the building, smell it, feel the grit that coated every surface, and have a sense of the people who inhabited the place. I was patched through to Officer Al Gazerro.

He gave me hours of his time, showing me every nook and cranny, introducing me around to everyone from the dispatchers to the detectives to the chief. I took notes, I inhaled the place as best I could, and then went home to try to convey it all on the page.

Details matter. They matter to your readers, to the authenticity of your story, they should matter a great deal to you. I wanted desperately get it right. And there, toward the back, was Officer Gazerro who was about to tell me if I got it wrong.

He was last in line to have his book signed. As he got closer, I knew it was him.

"Do you remember me?" he asked.

"Al Gazerro," I said, waiting.

"I love your book." Finally he smiled.

He said his daughter got him a copy, that they now had three at home. He told me I got it exactly right, even the woman detective's shoes, the detective's unit, the homes he so often goes to while on duty. I got it right.

I hugged him, I had to. I so badly wanted to please him, to honor his vocation, and repay the faith he had in me. So far, it's been the highlight of my booktour.

All along there've been two people I've feared disappointing with this book: Al Gazerro and my uncle, the funeral director. I've waited on tenterhooks for their feedback, knowing I'd hear about it if I got it wrong. It's the sort of thing that gets under people's skin, isn't it? The relief is huge, knowing Officer Gazerro is pleased. Now I just need to hear from my uncle...

Five Remembrances

By Amy MacKinnon

I've written in this space before about the Five Remembrances of Buddha:

The Five Remembrances
1. I am of the nature to grow old. I cannot escape growing old.
2. I am of the nature to have ill-health. I cannot escape having ill-health.
3. I am of the nature to die. There is no way to escape death.
4. All that is dear to me and everyone I love are of the nature to change. There is no way to escape being separated from them.
5. I inherit the results of my actions in body, speech and mind. My actions are the ground on which I stand.

Though I'm not a person of faith, these aphorisms appeal to my sense of perspective on the world. To some, they may appear bleak. To me, they are a way of coping with the inevitable. Acceptance is a powerful thing.

How does it all apply to this writing life of ours? When we dream of the possibilites of having our words appear in print, we may include buckets of money, best-seller status, glowing reviews in the New York Times, scads of charming notes from readers, and, if we are so bold, a place on a certain talk show host's nightstand and then her bookclub.

And so you should dream. Dream beyond all reason, but be prepared to balance out the glory with the guts of this business. Prepare yourself so you don't succumb to either the glory or the guts of this business. Seek balance. Know that you're never as good as the sycophants claim, nor are you ever as dim as the critics proclaim.

As many wonderful experiences as I've had over the past ten months, and I know just how blessed I am, I am prepared for the downside of putting myself out there. One week before publication and already people are wondering about the details of my personal life, how they measure up to the trauma of my protagonist Clara Marsh. Others will criticize the writing, the subject matter, the overall quality. I am now fair game. For someone who's spent most of her life hiding among the shadows, I expect some days the naysayers will engulf me. This is the price we pay.

So here are my Five Remembrances for Publication

1) I am of the nature to become irrelevant. I cannot escape being irrelevant.
2) I am in the business of being harshly critiqued. I will be cruelly critiqued.
3) I am of the nature to fail miserably. There will be times when I will fail.
4) My words are of the nature to be misinterpreted by those who cannot understand their intent. There is no way to prevent this.
5) I inherit the results of my actions in body, speech and mind. My actions are the ground on which I stand.

You'll notice I didn't change a word of the fifth one. No need. From this point forth, that's all I can control.

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A big thank you to blog friend and dear, dear reader Larramie. Your post on Tethered is the most magnificent review a writer could ever dream of. I count it among the dearest gifts I've yet received.

Happy launch day, Kristy Kiernan! You know her as the author of Catching Genius, but her second novel, Matters of Faith, is out today and you will love it. It's already an IndieBound pick for September. If you haven't pre-ordered it, I urge you to run out to your local indepedent bookstore today and grab one for yourself and another for your best friend.

Freedom to Fall

By Amy MacKinnon

Any Alicia Keys fans in the house? She's my girl. A musical savant, but even more, a philosopher.
Sarah Rodman, one of my favorite music critics, had an awe-inspiring, hit-me-upside-the-head, everyone-needs-to-read-this kind of interview with Alicia Keys in this past Friday's Boston Globe.

"Everything's not always going to be perfect or exactly the way you wished it was going to be, and the way that you handle that is what shows the growth you're going to have," says an upbeat Keys from New Orleans.

Now sit back a minute and read that paragraph a second time. Going to have. Now that's forward thinking. This coming from a 27-year-old woman. Ready for more?

"...the one thing I really want above all is to feel proud of the choices I made. And I also want to feel if I made any bad choices that I was able to learn from them."

Alicia Keys is telling you, me, the world, and most important of all, herself, that it's okay to fail. She is saying choose wisely, but if you don't, that's okay, learn from it and keep moving forward.

We know this already, don't we? We know that our failures teach us more than our successes. We know as writers, we will be faced with rejections, criticisms, acid-tongued Amazon reviewers. But we forget, too. In the moment, when faced with it, we can feel only the sting of the fall and forget it's a journey of a thousand steps this life we chose. We'll all fall, some of us spectacularly, others in silent torment. Just remember when you do fail -- and you will -- you tripped in the footsteps of those who went before you -- and they kept going. Will you?

Just watch her go.