What's in a Novel?

It's tough out here for a writer trying to get a foot in the door of the publishing world. Getting the agent, finding an editor, I knew that it would not be easy but also thought that for me, it wouldn't be. I think we all think that on some unconscious level. I know I write well, but there are many who write well. There are all these stories about what people had to go through to get a book in print. Horror stories really. Even Peter Straub's daughter had to peddle her wares like a regular carnival salesman to get her books published. I am one of many, and it just sucks.

The word from my agent is that the five editors who have seen my book thus far were into it. Two or three (half the panel isn't bad odds) really liked my writing and my character development. They thought I showed promise. They were very invested...

And they'd love to see a novel from me if I have one. Short stories, even interconnected stories, are not commercially viable. None of them seemed to appreciate the novel-in-stories overarching narrative. When it came down to it, my book went down as stories. And stories don't sell.

Now I know that stories are a hard sell, but I didn't see that story stigma carrying over to the novel-in-stories format. There have been a great number of novel-in-stories lately that seemed to make a fairly decent go of it: Olive Kitteridge, A Visit from the Goon Squad, Knockemstiff. Take a look a little farther back and there's Jesus' Son, Later at the Bar, Trailerpark, and the old classics of Winesburg, Ohio and Dubliners. Apparently, I was wrong in assuming that meant anything.

I have one of two options: keep it as is and hope or rewrite it, organizing it into a "real novel." I'm going to try my hand at the "real novel" option. Lord knows it would be an easier sell. If not, I don't know. It's sad to think that despite the praise it received, my book won't get an audience, not because it's bad but because it's not easy. I have no idea how to go about this rewrite, but I'm trying to figure it out. I'll, of course, save a copy of the book as it is now just in case. I know there comes a point when the rewriting because a detriment rather than a benefit.

Here's hoping.

The Risks of a Novel Told in Stories

I'm not the sort of reader who skips short stories in a collection. I read them straight through. I am the same with magazines, reading them cover to cover, one page at a time. In this regard, I am not what one would call a "rule breaker." I dabble in skipping about in literary magazines, but I always feel guilty afterwards.

It is for this reason that I find myself stalled on my summer reading. I don't want to start something new, but I'm not into the next story/chapter up in Jennifer Egan's A Visit from the Goon Squad, which I believe is not labeled as a novel-in-stories but very much feels like one to me. 

It's not that the story is poorly written, as Egan is a masterful craftswoman. It's not that the premise is bad, as its a neat twist in which a fake news article is used to further the plot/characterization of the novel. No, I'm just not in the mood to read an entertainment magazine article at the moment, real or fake, but I can't in good conscience skip it, nor do I want to put the book down and read something else. I want to finish Egan's book first. This is my dilemma.

This is the risk you run writing a novel-in-stories type of book. It gives the reader these changes in genre, character, verb tense, and narrative distance, and each change risks turning the reader away. This is what I'm learning about my chosen book structure as I read more and more books that use a similar setup. Does it doom a book to failure? No. Some of the best books I've read in quite a while are told through stories, but the structure does carry its risks. I'm learning that and hope that my future readers, when they hit a change that takes them aback in my novel, will have the same patience with me that I am currently providing to Ms. Egan.

Because this book is fantastic (just like all of her other works), and I'm not giving up on it just because it's making me work for the payoff.