This week I am talking with Julie Gerstenblatt, whose debut novel, “Daughters of Nantucket,” came out last year and was included in several most anticipated lists for 2023. Prior to writing novels, Julie was a middle school English teacher and earned her PhD so that she could teach at the college level, but she ended up leaving teaching because she wanted to be a novelist. (Her story of how she admitted this desire to herself–and her advisors–during her PhD dissertation is incredible!)

We covered:

The many contemporary novel manuscripts she wrote but could not sell

How combining something new (historical fiction) with something she knew well and loved (Nantucket) led to selling her book to a publisher

How she kept writing “Daughters of Nantucket” even after her agent broke up with her

Making time to write amidst teaching middle school, writing a PhD dissertation, and having three young kids

The specifics of her morning routine and how she gets warmed up to write

How she gets herself to leave the house

For full show notes with links to everything we discuss, plus bonus photos!, visit katehanley.substack.com.

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