Coffee and a Newsletter
The perfect Sunday morning combination
Good morning!
Welcome to this week’s edition of Quinn Writes, my weekly newsletter where I’ll be tracking my first novel’s progress as I take it from rough draft to (hopefully) published product. It’s week 21… and it’s also three days late. Sorry about that.
But I’m going to make the case for why this is actually an excellent turn of events. Let me paint you a picture: It’s Sunday morning. You wake up and roll over, soaking in the morning light seeping in through the window. The sheets are soft and smooth against your body, and your head has sunk just the right amount into your pillow. Bed is an excellent place to be, but there’s also a whole day of possibilities ahead.
Shaking off the remnants of sleep, you scoot out of bed, wincing slightly as your feet hit the cold floor. You shuffle into the kitchen, still a little groggy. Luckily, you’re about to fix that. You brew a steaming cup of dark brown coffee – ah, that smell! You sit down at the kitchen table with your mug full of liquid energy and open up your phone to see what’s new today.
In your inbox, see an exciting email… it’s from “Quinn Writes.” The subject line? “Coffee and a Newsletter.” Sounds like the perfect morning. You click in, and you’re immediately immersed in a gripping catalogue of all that Quinn has been up to this week.
I mean, that pretty much sums up my ideal Sunday. Now that we’ve set the scene, let’s dive in…
What am I reading?
This week, I read Danny O’Dea’s The Last Man in Cleveland. If you recall last week’s newsletter, I talked a little bit about the impact that Danny had on me as an aspiring author. Danny and I know each other from college, and seeing him successfully write and publish an impressive debut novel made me so much more confident in that possibility for myself. It’s just the cherry on top that The Last Man in Cleveland is a seriously amazing book.
I love novels that do something new and unexpected, upending my idea of what a novel is “supposed” to be. For me, The Last Man in Cleveland does just that. With short chapters, a highly unique narrative voice, and some asides directly from the book’s “Writer” character, The Last Man in Cleveland is a modern, riveting piece of apocalyptic fiction that I honestly could not put down.
I mean that literally… my sister was visiting me for the weekend and while she was on TikTok, I was flying through Danny’s novel. I’m incredibly excited to see what he’ll put out next.
Some other good news? Danny is actually going to be on my podcast (Books on Books on Books) this coming week. We’ll be discussing The Last Man in Cleveland (or rather, I’ll be shouting its praises) and talking about Danny’s journey to publishing his first novel. I think it’ll be an excellent conversation, and I can’t wait to share it with you all.
If you’re an aspiring novelist like me – or just a person who appreciates a good book – I think there will be lots to appreciate in this upcoming episode. Stay tuned on Wednesday morning!
My next book (which I’m already about halfway through) is Taylor Jenkins Reid’s Maybe in Another Life. It’s such a good one and it has a really interesting format – I’ll share more about it in the next newsletter once I’ve actually finished it!
Here’s my updated reading goals tracker for the year. If you remember from the beginning of the year, my goal was to read two books each month – or 24 in the course of 2023. I would say I’m more than on track to do that.
I love reading, and my podcast and this newsletter have sort of forced me to pick up my pace and always be reading something. After all, how else will I provide you with a new and interesting “What am I reading?” section week after week. Honestly, it’s the best kind of motivation.
What am I writing?
Over the weekend, I finished Scarlett’s Countdown to Christmas. Well… almost finished. The actual text is done, but I still need to make front and back cover designs. Then I’ll be ready to write some query letters and send it on to publishers.
For those of you who aren’t as familiar with the writing and publishing world, a query letter is a one-page letter that writers send to agents and publishers in order to pitch their book ideas. I don’t have an agent (yet), so the first thing I’m going to be doing is sending some queries to agents to try to convince them to represent me.
Why do I need an agent? Well, most traditional publishing routes require one. That’s especially true if you want to publish with one of the “Big Five” publishing houses: Penguin Random House, Hachette, Harper Collins, Simon and Schuster, and Macmillan.
At one point, the collective wisdom was that for children’s books, authors didn’t really need agents. However, that idea has definitely changed. So my first step will be querying agents in order to get the representation I need to sell Scarlett’s Countdown to Christmas. In an ideal world, I’d actually be able to make this a series centered around the Scarlett character.
I’ll keep you posted about the querying process! If nothing else, it will be good practice for when I query my actual novel.
Remember that old thing? I got a spark of inspiration this week, and I picked up my novel again! I have finally begun rewriting Part Two. It’s actually amazing how much easier it is to work with Part Two and Part Three than it was to rewrite Part One. I think that my writing matured so much from the time that I started the book to the time that I reached the first section division. Part One needed a lot of help, but hopefully the latter half of the novel will be more well-developed to begin with.
Stay tuned to hear more about my writing process as I go forward! I’m excited to finish up this rewrite and move onto the next phase of making this novel into a reality.
What am I doing?
I’ve been up to my usual shenanigans this week: working on my children’s book, working on my novel, recording my podcast, running my startup. You know, generally having too many irons in the fire.
But all jokes aside, I’ve been wildly overwhelmed recently. I’m not going to lie: It’s hard to build a company from the ground up while also working on two book projects and all the other things I have going on. It’s not an easy task. So why do I keep adding more things onto my plate?
In some ways, I’m the ultimate multitasker. I’m actually very good at focusing on more than one project at a time. But on certain days, I feel like I’ve floated back down to Earth and suddenly realize just how many pots I have on the stove.
For those of you who don’t know this about me, I struggle a lot with anxiety. I’ve been taking Lexapro for a while now, and I’m so grateful for everything it has given me. I’m much better equipped to take on the average day since I began using that medication. But as anyone else out there with anxiety knows, medication is a helpful aid – but not a cure-all.
There are still days when I feel like my chest is unbearably tight and I can’t breathe. There are days when I feel like I’m just barely getting by and I’m balancing on a tightrope trying to manage every project I’ve taken on. And there are days – like this past Wednesday, when I was supposed to be writing my newsletter – that I felt so overwhelmed that I accomplished literally nothing.
Anxiety is a bitch. And this week, it really got in the way. But hey, here’s hoping that next week is a better one. If anyone else is going through something similar, just know that you’re not alone. And feel free to reach out. We can be anxiety buddies and get through it together!
So what did I do this week? I managed my anxiety. And sometimes, that’s more than enough.
TLDR…
It’s Sunday morning, and on my timetable, this newsletter is about to hit your inbox. Which means that it’s time for me to go do some reading (looking at you Maybe in Another Life) and make something delicious for breakfast. Of course, can’t forget about a nice, hot cup of coffee!
I hope that you all have an amazing rest of your weekend. And if you get bored, might I suggest that you go listen to the podcast? It’s a gem. I have a suspicion that you’re going to love it.
As always, thank you so much for reading week twenty-one of Quinn Writes! Knowing that there are people out there reading my newsletters is part of what keeps me excited to write them. Until next Thursday!
Happy reading,
Quinn