"...working from home in sweatpants."

Susie Orman Schnall on parenting, writing, and self-publishing on the road to multi-genre success.

Susie has always impressed me. Not only is she one of the most visible and respected members of the historical fiction community, she has also published contemporary women’s fiction. Pubbing in two genres like this is very hard to do! Not only is it challenging to switch between voices and genres, it’s not something many agents and publishers even want writers to do. “Stay in your lane” is the cliché that applies here. And thank goodness Susie hadn’t listen to any of that, and has supporters in the industry who accept her genre-hopping.

She’s broken some other rules, too, as you’ll see from her great interview below. In addition to being something of a mid-life publishing phenom, she is the mother of 3 boys, and she’s been married for 28+ years to her college sweetheart. Plus, she likes climbing mountains, endurance events, and arts & crafts. Indulging her love of he visual arts, she also recently started a new business called Graphics for Authors

VITAL STATS:

• Your age when your first novel published, and the title of that novel: 43, On Grace

• Your age now: 53

• How many novels you published to date: 4. My 5^th comes out June 4, 2024

• What’s your next novel and its pub date if you have it: Anna Bright Is Hiding Something on June 4!!

INTERVIEW:

1. How many novels did you complete before the one that became your first published novel?

The first one I completed is the first one that was published. BUT… that makes it sound easy. It wasn’t easy and it wasn’t traditionally published.

2. What kinds of jobs did you have to support yourself while you wrote?  Are you still doing one of them?

I was fortunate to be the primary caregiver of my kids so I didn’t have another job outside of the home. So while they were in school, I could focus full time on my writing. I started writing my first novel when my boys were 6, 7, and 9.

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?

I started by taking a fiction writing course through Media Bistro (amazingly enough – my instructor was Kristin Harmel!). So the weekly rhythm of attending the class and doing the homework structured my pacing. By the end of the class I had several chapters and was on my way. The writing of the first draft was the quickest part – probably a few months. But then it was the editing. It’s always the editing ;)

4. What was your darkest moment before selling your first novel?

I couldn’t get an agent. I queried for over a year and kept hearing the same things over and over – that the book was too quiet and thus too difficult to sell in the oversaturated women’s fiction market. So then I had two choices: self publish or put the novel in the drawer. I had no idea at the time how common it was for authors to put one or more novels in a drawer before they sign with an agent and sell their first book. I didn’t give myself that option, actually. So, I decided to self publish ON GRACE. Pretty quickly, it ended up getting picked up by SparkPress and they published it as one of their first novels. Needless to say, my entry into the publishing world didn’t go as I had hoped, but I was off and running and started working on my second novel The Balance Project right away. I eventually did get an agent and signed with the wonderful Carly Watters (pssst! Carly has a great Substack!) for my third novel, The Subway Girls.

5. What advice about writing helps you stick with it?

Two things: my favorite advice — write a shitty first draft (Anne Lamott) — really helps me. I tend to have very high expectations of myself (I’ve gotten easier on myself with age) so if I give myself permission to just write a shitty first draft, then I’ve released a great deal of the pressure.

I also love the advice I receive from books about plotting and structure – especially Save the Cat Writes a Novel by Jessica Brody. Setting out the beats (at least what I think they’re going to be – it always changes as I write) for my novel, helps me a ton.

6. What is your favorite part about the writing life?
The other authors who I’ve met – many of whom I’ve become close friends with. I have surrounded myself with such an amazing group of smart, kind, talented, mostly female author friends who have supported me through the highs and lows of this oftentimes challenging business. AND the working from home in sweatpants 

Thanks Kerri!

Thank YOU, Susie! I am also a fan of shitty first drafts (and ALWAYS assign that chapter of Lamott’s Bird By Bird to my students). And parenting is a FULL TIME JOB! Writers who are full times parents: don’t let anyone tell you otherwise! Writing while parenting is no joke.