Why Being Proud Of A Book Means Including The Uncomfortable
Kyra Semien / WABE
Last time best-selling author Joshilyn Jackson joined “City Lights” for “Writer to Reader,” she was up against a deadline for her latest book, “Origin Story,” had asked her publisher for an extension, and was setting out to revise a lot of her book so the end would be “present and surprising and inevitable from word one onwards.”
After using her month-long extension to its fullest, Jackson has finally turned in “Origin Story” and is back to discuss why she was not proud of her initial draft of the book.
“I knew I was shying away from writing the painful or controversial parts in quite a few scenes,” she explains.
While she had the option to simply turn it in despite these misgivings, Jackson did not want to lose the level of control she still had over the book. “If I had turned it in, the publication wheels would have started and I would have been on a timer and I don’t ever want a book I’m not proud of, a book I don’t love, to come out under my name because I lost control of it too early.”
So she went back and got uncomfortable.
“I could see the book I wanted it to be,” Jackson says, “floating in some flabby, obfuscating, apologetic, weaselly scenes.” And while Jackson admits this avoidance of the uncomfortable has always been a problem for her, this time she caught herself and took the time to go back before turning it in, resulting in a book she was truly proud of.
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