I’d like to welcome writer and blogger Jenny Milchman today. I first got to know Jenny when I did a guest blog post for her inspirational and popular Made It Moments column and found her to be just as inspirational as the authors she features on her blog. While engaged in her publication journey, Jenny has worked to connect writers and readers in an ongoing discussion of craft.
She is founder and co-host of the series Writing Matters, which draws authors from as far away as New Hampshire and South Carolina to events held at an independent New Jersey bookstore.
She blogs about the writing life at suspenseyourdisbelief.com where she created the Made It Moments forum, which features everyone from Edgar winners to authors published by micro presses, all talking about the process of finding success in this business. Jenny speaks about life as an emerging writer at conferences and for New York Writers Workshop, and has appeared on radio shows as well.
Jenny, I know you’re very busy now with the writing life. What were you doing 25 years ago?
JENNY: Because I was in high school twenty-five years ago, I decided to play it a little loose with the whole number thing, and write about what happened to me twenty-SIX years ago.
After all, high school kids don’t often have a lot of great writing moments to share (aside from the rock stars who published actual books by then)!
But first, a little background. Twenty-seven years ago I was in eighth grade and had just written (and I do mean written, as in by hand) my first novel. It was 98 pages long, had illustrations, and would’ve been classified as YA, I suppose. It was about a girl who had to move right at the end of middle school.
The first lesson you learn in creative writing classes is to write what you know. I wrote about what I wished would be.
That has changed, but that’s for another post.
So, anyway, writing was what I loved to do, what I’d always done. I can still remember entertaining elementary school friends with stories.
And when I turned fifteen, I found out about a NJ-based program called Summer Arts Institute, for high school kids who excelled in theater, music, dance, visual art, and … writing.
I remember that once your initial application, which included writing samples, made it to the next round, you had to stand before a panel of actual authors and sort of audition. It was like something out of “Fame.” I was hooked.
Not just on the writing itself – always the biggest rush (until it comes time to revise, that is) – but on the process of sharing my work with however much of the world I could reach.
I didn’t have such an exciting moment again until an editor at William Morrow wanted to sit down with me and my agent and talk about my first novel. It was something of a mess, and didn’t sell, but this editor took it seriously enough to ask us to lunch, and what can I say? I’m still hooked.
Writing is a business of rushes and disappointment. The road is not meant for plodding along but for clambering uphill with all your might and, more rarely, whooshing down, breezes lifting your hair. I’ve been on it for more than twenty-five years now.
I hope I never have to get off.
Thanks for a great post, Jenny! Be sure to visit Jenny on her blog to discover more about this talented author.
