Hi Friends,
Last month I wrote that my forthcoming novel, SURRENDER, was inspired by growing up with my farmer father in rural Maine. I had a chance recently to write more about my dad, and his connection to the land, in an essay celebrating the 15th anniversary of The Common.
Dad was one of those maddeningly talented people who made hard things look easy. Sure, I can build you a bookshelf / grow you a peach tree / explain the philosophical contributions of Baruch Spinoza. And he did it all so modestly.
What I didn’t realize as a kid was how much time and effort Dad spent learning things through trial and error. One grafted apple tree would fail, and he’d try again. Over time, he racked up many more successes than failures.
While I wrote about Dad’s perserverence and love of learning in the context of starting The Common and keeping it going all these years, this determined spirit is also what inspired my protagonist Lucy Richard, the PR exec-turned-goat farmer who returns to rural Massachusetts to save the family farm in SURRENDER.
In front of one of Dad’s many apple trees in September 2021.
I also needed Dad’s grit, and equanimity, during my recent search for a new literary agent. As I write about in this essay in the Sept/Oct issue of Poets & Writers, my old agent broke up with me out of the blue just as I was finding my rhythm with SURRENDER. I spent the next two years querying agents; finishing, revising, and selling SURRENDER; writing a third novel; and finally signing with a lovely new agent. (This essay is behind a paywall, so if you’d like to read but can’t access it, let me know.) There were some dizzyingly bad and professionally desperate moments in there that I now prefer to forget, but the take-away stays with me: You only get what you try for.
I didn’t know novel #2 would center on a farmer, but after Dad died and a younger, female cheesemaker bought the house and barn, moving in her menagerie of goats, sheep, horses, and dogs, my imagination started racing. I loved interviewing her and other goat farmers (all women); I was repeatedly struck by both the joy and the difficulty of their lives. And of course, I fell in love with the goats.
What’s not to love?
I truly loved writing SURRENDER. It brought me closer to my father, to the farm life I knew as a kid, and taught me, once again, to embrace the surprises and difficulties of the creative process.
I’m excited to share this book with you! Thank you to those who have already pre-ordered. What a gift! If you haven’t yet, it’s available at both Amazon and Bookshop (which supports local bookstores).
With gratitude and love,
Jen
