Read Part 1 and Part 2 of The Story of Writing a Novel.
Can’t be bothered to read? Let me read for you. SKIP INTRODUCTION 3:15
It was May 2022, and Poetry Ed and I were in the Covered Market in Oxford, thinking up names for a blog I wanted to start.
“What about Jelly Duck?” I said. Poetry Ed scrunched his nose. I crossed ‘Jelly Duck’ off the list. “Ok…What about Woodstock Pigeon?”
“Woodstock Pigeon?” Poetry Ed repeated back in a disapproving way. I sighed and crossed it off. We had been set free for the summer to do our final assignment for our Creative Writing MA. Our task was to write the first 18,000 words of a novel by the end of September. I thought I might as well start a blog too. It was a good way to practice, and as I didn’t have anything published, it was something I could show someone – if they ever asked. But first, I needed a good title.
“Peachy Pigeon?”
“Please stop.”
A few days later, I decided on The Oxford Quack. It was going to be a weekly blog featuring short real-life stories and observations. My first post was about an interaction with one of my neighbours regarding the recent death of someone in the block of flats that I had just moved into. She told me the funeral details as if I should be attending. It reminded me of the Friends episode when Ross moved into his apartment, and he was expected to care about Howard the handyman’s retirement.
I was nervous about posting the first blog, but I seemed to survive it—partly because only my mum and Poetry Ed read it. After that, I wrote posts about my creative writing course and my tour-guiding job.
Parading tourists around Oxford lent itself to peculiar moments. One tourist tried to kiss me, another thought I could help get their child into Oxford (I could not), and I was bollocked by a librarian for being too loud in front of my tour group. I wasn’t even in the library. It made me cry, but it was excellent Quack content.
When I wasn’t marching tourists around the city, I was in my flat, slowly working on my MA assignment. The novel was about an awkward physics teacher, Amy Elman, trying to reignite her sex life with her fiancé before the wedding day. I called it Alpha Female.
I wrote in the morning before the world could distract me with headlines about Pete Davidson and texts from Sausage. I invested in a fold-away bed desk, so I didn’t even have to leave my bed. Once I had done what I thought was a good writing session, I put on my headphones and marched around the city listening to Taylor Swift. Well done, me.
Alpha Female was handed in on time. The grades came back in December. And to my surprise, I got a distinction. I never get distinctions. I was ecstatic. Maybe I wasn’t the worst writer in the world.
The Anthology followed: a collection of extracts from everyone’s final projects compiled into a book and sent to agents. There was a launch, where we could read our pieces aloud in a classroom at Brookes University, where an agent or two might or might not be present. Past students had been signed from the back of this launch and had gone on to publish real books. If there was ever an opportunity, it was now. I felt like Eminem in 8 Mile.
As the likelihood of agents turning up was slim, I set up a live stream and emailed the link to over 100 agents. Two agents tuned in, but that was enough. I immediately received an email after reading my extract, requesting that I send my complete manuscript once I finished it. Boy, was I smug.
I spent the summer furiously writing Alpha Female with a buzzing feeling in my gut. This was it. Whenever friends asked me what I was doing, I’d say with swagger, “I’m writing a full manuscript for a literary agent. A real one. She requested it. Yah. Yah. Yah.”
By the end of October, Alpha Female was ready for the big send. My work was done; all I needed to do was wait a day or two for the agent to read it, and then the signing could commence…
One month later, I was refreshing my inbox again and again. No reply. I sheepishly sent a chase-up.
“Hi there! I hope all is going well. I know you’re very busy, but just checking you received my manuscript… ”
A month went by… nothing. Was I being ghosted? I would lie awake at night, thinking about what a turd of a story I must have written to be blanked completely. I had visions of them reading the first page, rolling their eyes, and deleting it.
After another week, I grew bitter. ‘Fine if you don’t want Alpha Female, someone else will!’ I sent it to five other agents. Hahahaha!…I was met with silence.
I entered 2024 with an unwanted manuscript. I had been working on it for almost two years (on and off). Alpha Female was dangerously close to being buried on my iCloud alongside Can of Worms. My Microsoft Word was rapidly becoming a graveyard for novels.
I spoke to someone who spoke to someone, and managed to get on a video call with a very kind indie publisher, who had previously worked as an agent. There were a lot of questions.
“Would you get the ick if a manuscript were 69,000 words?”
“It’s a little short…”
“Do I need to be an influencer to be published?”
“No, just write a good book.”
“I haven’t won any writing contests, does that matter?”
“No, just write a good book.”
After a deep breath, I loaded up Alpha Female and reread it with fresh eyes. It wasn’t terrible, but I could see that the middle was problematic. I deleted a quarter of it and started again.
Just write a good book. Just write a good book. Just write a good book.
The following months were what I refer to as my ‘Cringe Era.’ I wasn’t sure if I was writing myself out of a hole or just digging deeper into one. My poster of cartoon Louis Theroux stared at me disapprovingly from the wall as I rewrote chapter after chapter. I imagined him saying in his curious voice, “Some people might think you’re wasting your time writing this, Mary. W-what do you think?”
SHUT UP LOUIS!
I spent some Saturday nights writing like a loner and had days without seeing anyone. I could hear a faint ticking noise and realised it was my biological clock. I tried a date or two, but I wasn’t any fun. I’d tell them I was writing a book, almost apologetically. It felt cringey to be doing something so indulgent.
“Oh, don’t tell me you write in coffee shops?” One guy asked.
Sometimes.
“No.”
I decided to put dating on hold. I couldn’t risk wasting time on real men when I had fictional men to worry about. I was just going to have to ignore the sound of my biological clock for a little longer.
It was around June when I felt the manuscript was ready. Taking inspiration from ‘Piglet‘ and ‘Fleabag‘, I retitled my book ‘Lab Rat’ and sent it to a fresh bunch of agents. Two got back and told me it wasn’t for them. I began to panic. Louis Theroux glared at me from the wall. “I told you so.” SHUT UP, LOUIS! But then one morning, an email popped into my inbox.
“I absolutely loved Lab Rat. Could you send me the full manuscript, please?”
I literally screamed.
PREORDER AMY ELMAN DOESN’T FEEL SEXY
THE QUACK 