The Anxiety is Real

You can’t swing a Blackwing pencil without hearing another creator worrying about generative A.I. And we get it—the ubiquity of generative A.I. tools has soared over the last two years. In this episode we aim to take a deep breath and discuss the topic from a candid but calm position: why authors are worried, why we should be worried and what to do about it (besides anxious posts on social media.)

Things to freak out about: a Two Part List

In service to our measured discussion, we lay a bit of background. Sarina tells us why The Authors Guild is suing OpenAI, and why you should join the Authors Guild.

Then we mine two different veins of anxiety:

* Column I: Billion dollar AI tools stole our intellectual property to train their models, and…

* Column II: AI might take my job.

We delve into both these concerns, discussing ongoing litigation, the potential for licensing content to AI companies, and more. We also discuss how AI tools are affecting other parts of the publishing industry (such as audio book narration) and the pervasiveness of generative AI in our everyday lives.

#AmReading

KJ: The Paradise Problem, Christina Lauren

Jess: The Widow on Dwyer Court, Lisa Kusel

Sarina: Nora Goes Off Script, Annabel Monaghan

The Love Hypothesis, Ali Hazelwood

Hey readers—KJ here. This episode of #AmWriting is brought to you by my latest, Playing the Witch Card. I wrote this at a moment when I needed more magic in my life—but it turned out to be a book about how until we know who we are and what makes us happy, even magic doesn’t help. My main character, Flair, is a total control freak who fears the chaos created by her family deck of Tarot cards and the cookies it inspires her to make until she decides that she can harness their power to control the world and people around her—but that’s not what the cards are for at all. I was inspired by what I see as the real magic of Tarot cards—and tea leaves and palm reading and every form of oracle: they help us to see and understand our own stories. As someone for whom stories are pretty much everything, I love that. You can buy Playing the Witch Card on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Bookshop.org and my local indie—and I hope you’ll love it too.

Today we’re talking about the need for a writer to be resilient over the long haul of a career and my guest is A.S. King

A.S. King has been called “One of the best Y.A. writers working today” by The New York Times Book Review and is one of YA fiction's most decorated. She is the only two-time winner of the American Library Association's Michael L. Printz Award (2020 for Dig and 2024 for The Collectors) and has won the LA Times Book Prize for Ask the Passengers. In 2022, King received the ALA's Margaret A. Edwards Award for her lifetime achievement to YA literature and 2023, she accepted the ALAN Award for "artistry, courage and outstanding contributions to YA literature."

Amy – which is her real name – has taught for years in MFA programs and is working on her PhD in creative literature

I wanted to talk to Amy because I heard from a mutual friend – Caroline Leavitt – that Amy’s publisher had made a change to her promotional team just weeks before the launch of her newest book, Pick the Lock, which one reviewer described as "a punk opera, a primal scream, and a portrait of a family buried in lies."

Many of our listeners are trying to get their foot in the door with their first book, or to get a career off the ground with their second or third and here is someone who has written 15 books, who is at the top of her game, and who still has things like this happen – which is to say things that go wrong, things that don’t go her way.

I thought a conversation about what it feels like at this stage in a career would be illuminating – and was I sure right. Let’s get to it.Find A.S. King at AS-King.com

Heads up!

Join me—KJ—for Novelmber, which is very hard to pronounce but is my word for reclaiming my writing space in November. Think NaNoWriMo, our version—daily challenges and stretch goals, formatted by you, for you.

There will be write-alongs, posts, a massive Google spreadsheet for sharing goals and updating progress, thoughts on how hard this is, and more than you want to know about why I need this regroup so badly. All writers, every genre, welcome.

This is sign-up only—I don’t plan to spam the whole #AmWriting community with my wails of writerly distress daily for an entire month—but it’s also for everyone who wants in. I hope you’ll join me—I don’t want to go this alone.

Don’t worry, signing up is simple! Here’s how:

Click here to go to your #AmWriting account, and when you see this screen, toggle “Novelmber” from “off” (grey) to “on” (green).

THAT’S IT!

Once you set that up, you’ll get all future Novelmber emails. Any audio or video will show up in those, along with write-along schedules.

You’ll also want to add yourself to the Google Sheet where we’ll all record our overall goal, day’s goals, daily progress and what we’re feeling. I’ve started it off.Join me, help me, let’s make Novelmber WORK!

I couldn’t resist the subtitle, kids, sorry. It’s not that shocking—but Tim’s journey was definitely only for the bold.

I’ve known Tim Grahl—or known of him—for more than a decade. I watched him help writers like Dan Pink launch their non-fiction books onto the best seller list, and devoured and followed his excellent advice about launching my own books (which you can find here at booklaunch.com). Then I watched—or rather, listened—as he pivoted into the world of fiction, enlisting editor Shaun Coyne to join him on a podcast and help him use Coyne’s Storygrid method to work on what eventually, after many revisions and a whole lot of failing in public, became Tim’s first novel, The Threshing. At the same time, he and Shaun were building Storygrid into what’s not just a business, but a huge community of writers and editors. He’s just published his second novel, The Shithead, a very different book from the first… I call it The Firm meets The Alchemist; Tim prefers Fleishman Is In Trouble meets Faust. Both work.

We talk Tim’s sideways journey into fiction, and then we talk craft—in particular, how to learn what you don’t know, the myth of the lone writer in a cabin and the importance of feedback and then we dig into a passionate discussion of theme.

You can check out The Shithead here.

Links from the pod

Booklaunch.com

Storygrid

Shaun Coyne’s book, Storygrid

The Prince of Tides, Pat Conroy

The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon

The Accidental Tourist, Breathing Lessons by Anne Tyler

(KJ also mentions Redhead by the Side of the Road)

The Husband’s Secret, What Alice Forgot by Liane Moriarty

Heads up! This is probably the only time you’ll see this.

Join me—KJ—for Novelmber, which is very hard to pronounce but is my word for reclaiming my writing space in November. Think NaNoWriMo, our version—daily challenges and stretch goals, formatted by you, for you.

There will be write-alongs, posts, a massive Google spreadsheet for sharing goals and updating progress, thoughts on how hard this is, and more than you want to know about why I need this regroup so badly. All writers, every genre, welcome.

This is sign-up only—I don’t plan to spam the whole #AmWriting community with my wails of writerly distress daily for an entire month—but it’s also for everyone who wants in. I hope you’ll join me—I don’t want to go this alone.

Don’t worry, signing up is simple! Here’s how:

Click here to go to your #AmWriting account, and when you see this screen, toggle “Novelmber” from “off” (grey) to “on” (green).

THAT’S IT!

Once you set that up, you’ll get all future Novelmber emails. Any audio or video will show up in those, along with write-along schedules.

You’ll also want to add yourself to the Google Sheet where we’ll all record our overall goal, day’s goals, daily progress and what we’re feeling. I’ve started it off.

Join me for the first write-alongs HERE. (That’s a link to my Zoom Room.) I’ll be sitting there:

Friday, November 1 10:30-12:30 (ALL TIMES EST)

Tuesday, November 5, 2:00-4:00

Friday, November 8, 9:00-11:00

More times coming. Join me, help me, let’s make Novelmber WORK!

Hi all! Jess here. When I wrote my first book proposal (for The Gift of Failure), I had a foggy idea of what a “comp” was. A book just like the book you want to publish, right? Not exactly. Comps are a really important part of pitching any book - nonfiction or fiction - because it helps an editor understand your vision for the book and consequently, what the publishing house’s vision for the book could be. What does the market for this book look like? Who is on the shelf already? Why is this book similar or different?

Like I said, an art.

Come with me while I explore the parameters for comps and help you write a better “Comparable Titles” section for your next book proposal.

I use the comp section from the proposal for The Gift of Failure to discuss comps in this episode, so here’s what the formatting looks like in that document:

Hey readers—KJ here. This episode of #AmWriting is brought to you by my latest, Playing the Witch Card. I wrote this at a moment when I needed more magic in my life—but it turned out to be a book about how until we know who we are and what makes us happy, even magic doesn’t help. My main character, Flair, is a total control freak who fears the chaos created by her family deck of Tarot cards and the cookies it inspires her to make until she decides that she can harness their power to control the world and people around her—but that’s not what the cards are for at all. I was inspired by what I see as the real magic of Tarot cards—and tea leaves and palm reading and every form of oracle: they help us to see and understand our own stories. As someone for whom stories are pretty much everything, I love that. You can buy Playing the Witch Card on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Bookshop.org and my local indie—and I hope you’ll love it too.

About once a season, I have a speaking experience that doesn’t go exactly the way I want it to, but I’ve learned how to keep these experiences (and the negative feedback that can result) from keeping me awake at night while fueling positive change. Well, that once-a-season occurrence happened earlier this fall, and it felt awful. I usually text Tim or KJ and Sarina with, “well, that felt off” and they reassure me that the audience probably did not notice, and sometimes - sometimes - that’s true. Whether the audience noticed or not, I did, and I need to walk off stage feeling like I nailed it, that I reached people, planted seeds for positive change, and made the best use of the audience’s (and my) time, not to mention the client’s investment of time and money.

This episode contains advice on how to prepare for events and catch potential mistakes before they happen, redirect yourself on stage when you feel things getting out of control or heading in the wrong direction, and some productive ways to cope with and respond to negative feedback.

No matter how good you are, no matter how experienced you are, you will have bad days on stage. I hope my experience with failure flattens your learning curve.

Unlike the photo at the top of this post, this picture is of me in mid-death spiral. This was almost ten years ago but I remember the event and the nausea vividly. I walked off stage feeling as if I’d squandered an incredible audience and wasted their time, but I keep this picture to remind me of how far I’ve come and why I have to keep improving.

“As I said in my earlier email, you have so much to work with here. First off, your premise is gold. Easy to summarize, clear conflict, big stakes. I’m envious! When you’re ready, agents are going to sit up and take notice—which is all the more reason to have a rock solid thing to give them when they ask (and they will ask—don’t send a single query until you have a full, completed, polished manuscript ready to press “send” on, because I think you will get requests immediately).”

That’s from my October 2021 developmental edit* for guest Erin Quinn-Kong. This month, Hate Follow is out from William Morrow & Company—because Erin knocked the revision out of the park. In this episode, we dig into what it felt like to get those (tough love) notes, how she worked with them, querying and the big moments that came next. You’re going to love it—PLUS, Erin has agreed to let us share the full 6 page edit letter with supporters who purchase a copy of Hate Follow in any format and send us their receipt. (Details on how to do that below.)

As I tell Erin in the pod, I knew from what was on the page (and from her journalism experience) that she COULD do this revision. It wasn’t an easy lift, though. Not every one would have wanted this kind of edit or been willing to work with it. (Honestly, I’m sitting on one RIGHT NOW and not sure I can stomach what it needs to get it there.) But Erin did it—with amazing results. Here’s a little more from the letter:

“I have no doubt that you can do it, either. Even though this is still in draft form, I didn’t want to put it down, especially in the more polished first half. (I knew what I was getting! That’s not a criticism of the less finished section. It’s in the perfect place for this stage of the process.) I wanted to know what would happen, and that is so much of the battle won right there. There’s great conflict and drive in these pages.

And fundamentally your writing is really excellent. In the sections that are more complete, you strike a good balance between inner dialogue and action, you move the story, your chapters end in good places. There’s also a solid cause-and-effect thread pulling the reader along—although, as you’ll see, I think that drops in a few places and needs some shoring up. But those issues aren’t as big as they sound.”

This is a great episode—huge thanks to Erin for being willing to play along. Follow her (but don’t hate her!) at @erinquinnkongwrites on Instagram or subscribe to her email: The (Writing) Group Chat on Substack.

Links from the pod

The Only Game in Town, Lacie Waldon

Episode 402: How Bad Can a Good First Draft Be

*from KJ: I did a developmental edit for Erin while doing the Author Accelerator Book Coaching program, but although I’m certified, I don’t offer coaching services.

How can you read Erin’s developmental edit letter? For starters, you need to be a paid supporter—and we’re offering a super-quick October surprise special. Head to https://amwriting.substack.com/halloween2024 for 20% off your next year.

KJ here, team. In this episode, Jennie asks the questions, and I walk us through the whole thing from start to finish—the options, the renewals, the moment we thought we were getting the rights back and the big calls that finally convinced me this was really going to happen—and then of course what it’s like when it DOES.

Above are a few glam shots from the premiere screening, which will never not be one of the biggest nights of my career. I’m not sure how you top it. You can watch The Chicken Sisters—an 8 episode series starring Schuyler Fisk, Genevieve Angelson, Lea Thompson, and Wendie Malick on Hallmark Plus (or Amazon Prime) now. Here’s a little preview on YouTube, too.

Hey readers—KJ here. This episode of #AmWriting is brought to you by my latest, Playing the Witch Card. I wrote this at a moment when I needed more magic in my life—but it turned out to be a book about how until we know who we are and what makes us happy, even magic doesn’t help. My main character, Flair, is a total control freak who fears the chaos created by her family deck of Tarot cards and the cookies it inspires her to make until she decides that she can harness their power to control the world and people around her—but that’s not what the cards are for at all. I was inspired by what I see as the real magic of Tarot cards—and tea leaves and palm reading and every form of oracle: they help us to see and understand our own stories. As someone for whom stories are pretty much everything, I love that. You can buy Playing the Witch Card on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Bookshop.org and my local indie—and I hope you’ll love it too.

Hey #AmWriters, Jennie here. I'm excited to welcome editor and publishing strategist, AJ Harper to the show to talk about the art of helping writers do their best work.

AJ helps nonfiction authors write foundational books that enable them to build readership, grow their brand, and make a significant impact on the world. She was part of the writing coaching team for TEDx Cambridge, one of the largest TED events in the world. As a ghost writer and a developmental editor, AJ has worked with business writers of all kinds, guiding them to bestseller lists and to many millions of copies sold. She's worked on 10 books with business writer Mike Michalowicz, including Profit First: Transform Your Business From a Cash Eating Monster to a Money Making Machine.

Her own book on writing came out in 2023. It's called Write A Must Read: Craft a Book That Changes Lives, Including Your Own. This book is one of the best books on writing nonfiction I've ever read and it's one of the best books on writing period, which is why I wanted to have AJ come on and talk to us. Our conversation will be incredibly helpful for anyone writing nonfiction, but also for people writing fiction and memoir. AJ is just really smart about story structure, thinking about the reader, and fine tuning your ear for good writing. Her story about how she stepped out from behind the ghostwriting curtain to raise her own voice and claim her own authority is riveting.

Books mentioned in the episode:

Little Women, Louisa M. Alcott

The Trumpet of the Swan, E.B. White

Caddie Woodlawn, Carol Ryrie Brink

Hey readers—KJ here. This episode of #AmWriting is brought to you by my latest, Playing the Witch Card. I wrote this at a moment when I needed more magic in my life—but it turned out to be a book about how until we know who we are and what makes us happy, even magic doesn’t help. My main character, Flair, is a total control freak who fears the chaos created by her family deck of Tarot cards and the cookies it inspires her to make until she decides that she can harness their power to control the world and people around her—but that’s not what the cards are for at all. I was inspired by what I see as the real magic of Tarot cards—and tea leaves and palm reading and every form of oracle: they help us to see and understand our own stories. As someone for whom stories are pretty much everything, I love that. You can buy Playing the Witch Card on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Bookshop.org and my local indie—and I hope you’ll love it too.

Sarina here! There was a scramble over who got to interview Lyndsay Rush about her poetry, but I raised my hand first.

I’ve always thought of poetry as the fustiest kind of writing, but the moment I opened A Bit Much, I knew that Lyndsay was here to change my mind. Not only is her poetry gorgeous, her path to becoming a published author was unusual in all the best ways.

Tune in to hear how she accidentally became a poet. And how she accidentally accumulated over 140,000 Instagram followers.

We ask her about that magic moment—when she suddenly realized that this Instagram poetry habit of hers was going to be a whole big thing. It’s a publishing story for the ages!

Or just skip to the good stuff and find A Bit Much at Bookshop, Amazon, or Barnes & Noble.

Lindsay on Instagram. Lindsay on Tiktok. Lindsay on Threads.

Hey everyone, I'm Jennie Nash, and if you're interested in becoming a book, coach, I have a special offer for you. It's a free pass to a mini course called The One Page Book Coaching Business Plan. This course walks you step-by-step through how to envision your future book coaching business and it leads to a one-on-one strategy session with me! Go to bookcoaches.com/ABC and at the bottom of the page, you'll find a link to the course. That's bookcoaches.com/ABC.  You can use the code FROMJENNIE to get in free. That's FROMJENNIE all caps and make sure you spell my name out: J E N N I E. We're going to be raising our prices in 2025 so now's a great time to get certified if you think it's something you want to do. I look forward to speaking with you.

Hey readers—KJ here. This episode of #AmWriting is brought to you by my latest, Playing the Witch Card. I wrote this at a moment when I needed more magic in my life—but it turned out to be a book about how until we know who we are and what makes us happy, even magic doesn’t help. My main character, Flair, is a total control freak who fears the chaos created by her family deck of Tarot cards and the cookies it inspires her to make until she decides that she can harness their power to control the world and people around her—but that’s not what the cards are for at all. I was inspired by what I see as the real magic of Tarot cards—and tea leaves and palm reading and every form of oracle: they help us to see and understand our own stories. As someone for whom stories are pretty much everything, I love that. You can buy Playing the Witch Card on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Bookshop.org and my local indie—and I hope you’ll love it too.

It’s a new Booklab: First pages episode! At some point—maybe next week—these episodes will go out only to our fellow Stickers (supporters of the podcast). Want to join that crew, where you’ll be able to send in your own first page for the pod, join write-alongs and get AMAs from our hosts and guest book coaches?

I’m a sticker! Or I want to be. Also I get that y’all need support to get this out here and I love that it’s here so yeah.

On today’s episode, we discuss the first pages of SAILING TO THE MOON: THE TWO YEARS AT SEA THAT SANK MY MARRIAGE, a memoir and The Pie Window, a novel. Would we turn the page? Opinions are mixed, but good advice for improving—these first pages and yours—abounds. THANK YOU to the writers willing to submit their work for our discussion.

Did you like First pages? Have ideas for how we can make it better? We’d love to hear it and we’ll talk back, so comment away.

We offered some comps to our first submitter:

Jennie offered Between Two Worlds: An Inspiring Story of a Kiwi Woman Who Left Her Heart in Uganda

Jess offers Wind, a movie from her teenage years

And to our second submitter:

The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, Taylor Jenkins Reid

The Twisted Ones, T. Kingfisher

A Prayer for Owen Meany, John Irving

PS to the second submitter: we also wanted a little hint about the pie window on that first page!

Want to submit a first page to Booklab? Fill out the form HERE.

Theme music credit: “Circle,” by Phoebe Lahey

Hey everyone, I'm Jennie Nash, and if you're interested in becoming a book, coach, I have a special offer for you. It's a free pass to a mini course called The One Page Book Coaching Business Plan. This course walks you step-by-step through how to envision your future book coaching business and it leads to a one-on-one strategy session with me! Go to bookcoaches.com/ABC and at the bottom of the page, you'll find a link to the course. That's bookcoaches.com/ABC.  You can use the code FROMJENNIE to get in free. That's FROMJENNIE all caps and make sure you spell my name out: J E N N I E. We're going to be raising our prices in 2025 so now's a great time to get certified if you think it's something you want to do. I look forward to speaking with you.

Hey readers—KJ here. This episode of #AmWriting is brought to you by my latest, Playing the Witch Card. I wrote this at a moment when I needed more magic in my life—but it turned out to be a book about how until we know who we are and what makes us happy, even magic doesn’t help. My main character, Flair, is a total control freak who fears the chaos created by her family deck of Tarot cards and the cookies it inspires her to make until she decides that she can harness their power to control the world and people around her—but that’s not what the cards are for at all. I was inspired by what I see as the real magic of Tarot cards—and tea leaves and palm reading and every form of oracle: they help us to see and understand our own stories. As someone for whom stories are pretty much everything, I love that. You can buy Playing the Witch Card on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Bookshop.org and my local indie—and I hope you’ll love it too.