"As a first time novelist, I had to continue polishing..."
Fiona Davis on pushing through discomfort and sticking to a word count.
I first encountered Fiona Davis when I was querying agents for my own first novel, The Kennedy Debutante. I was reading as many comp titles as I could, and scouring the Acknowledgments pages and author websites to find out agent names and contact info. I was totally blown away by The Dollhouse, a gorgeously written and captivating dual timeline novel set in the famed Barbizon Hotel, and I set my sites on becoming just like Fiona Davis.
Fast forward 8 years, and Fiona and I are actually friends and colleagues (it can happen to you, too!). We’ve been on panels together, enjoyed lunches and phone calls, and even blurbed each other’s books.
I couldn’t be happier that Fiona has enjoyed all the success that she has - New York Times Bestseller status, multiple bestselling titles, and a Good Morning America Book Club pick! It truly could not have happened to a nicer, more down-to-earth writer. It’s hard to keep up quality and write at the pace Fiona does, and somehow she manages to do it. Book after book, she writes a gem of a page-turner set in one of the great buildings of New York City. I learn so much reading her novels at the same time that I get swept into a story that makes the world fall away.
VITAL STATS:
Your age were your first novel published, and the title of that novel: 49 years old, The Dollhouse
Your age now: 57
How many novels you published to date: 7 novels
What’s your next novel: The next book, The Stolen Queen, is set at the Met Museum and will be out January 2025.
In the meantime, I have an audiobook novella called The Gimlet Slip out March 5, which was cowritten with Greg Wands.
INTERVIEW:
1. How many novels did you complete before the one that became your first published novel?
I tried writing a couple of novels in my 20s and 30s, and, even if they weren’t very good, they helped me understand what it was like to achieve a long-term writing goal – to start from page 1 and slog away until you reach page 300. One was a mystery and other was historical, which helped when I decided to try writing about the Barbizon Hotel for Women for The Dollhouse, which essentially combined the two genres. Later, I took a few in-person and online writing courses at the Gotham Writers Workshop in order to figure out how to up my game, which was a very necessary step. Being critiqued by other students as well as studying their own stories to analyze what worked and what didn’t helped me immensely.
2. What kinds of jobs did you have to support yourself while you wrote? Are you still doing one of them?
In my 20s, I was acting in New York City and in between jobs I’d work as a legal secretary, which was great because on slow days I could sit at a desk and play around with story ideas and basically get paid for it. After going to grad school for journalism, I worked as a freelance journalist at the same time as I wrote fiction, writing short pieces for magazines like Oprah or Women’s Health. I’m very lucky in that I can write fiction full time now.
3. What was the writing routine in which you wrote the novel that became your first published? How long did it take to write that book?
For The Dollhouse, I set a daily word count for the first draft and followed the outline/synopsis that I’d drawn up. That helped me see the long game, and there was nothing better than checking off “write 1200 words” from my to-do list at the end of the day. At the same time, I was pitching, researching, and writing freelance articles, so it took about a year to do research on The Dollhouse and finish a first draft, which was followed by many rounds of edits. Total time was about two-and-a-half years.
4. What was your darkest moment before selling your first novel?
Probably the darkest moment was when I re-read the first draft and realized how much work I had yet to do. It needed more description, more deep POV, smoother dialogue. After I signed with my agent, she suggested sending the manuscript to a freelance editor for another deep dive. Thank goodness, as that bumped it up yet another level. The idea of setting a novel at the Barbizon Hotel for Women was a hot one that we knew would capture the attention of editors, but as a first-time novelist I had to continue polishing until the writing was on par with the pitch.
5. What advice about writing helps you stick with it?
The actress Laura Linney has said that every time she does a play, there’s a point in the rehearsal process where she’s certain she’ll fail, that she won’t be able to find the character or do a good job. Eventually, though, she realized that that’s just part of the process and if she pushes through the discomfort, it all works out. For me, I find that about seventy-five percent of the way into the first draft I want to toss the entire manuscript out the window, but now I understand it’s an inevitable stage in the creative process and nothing to be alarmed about.
6. What is your favorite part about the writing life?
I love connecting with other authors, whether at book festivals or just a lunch date. Our job is so solitary by nature, and there’s nothing better than sharing your trials and triumphs with someone who understands exactly what you’re going through. The community of authors I’ve met – many of whom came late to the career as I did – is truly wonderful.
Thank you, Fiona! I love what you said about taking a class and upping your game - giving and receiving feedback is often the biggest paving stone on the road to publication. It also helps us find our fellow writers!
Pushing through the discomfort: YES! So easy to get snagged there and to make it mean more than it means.
That advice from Laura Linney is the best! Great interview, Kerri. x