On MFAs, sustainable writing paces, indie publishing, and the joy of writing
When I’m struggling with writing, I like to write essays about my writing. My husband laughs about this. “So instead of writing, you’re writing about writing?” But that is exactly what I’m doing. It helps me to untangle my thoughts and understand what it is I’m really feeling and what it is I need to do.
The title of this piece is a bit of a list–and that’s because I’ve got a lot of different things going on in these ramblings. I’ve tried to divide it into three parts though, for readability, but really, the parts just make one big story between them.
Part One – On MFAs
Before I signed up for my MA, which I then extended to an MFA, I Googled whether it was worth doing an extra degree in writing. So many websites told me not to. That it wouldn’t get you published. That it was a waste of money.
I was already traditionally published and agented at that point anyway, so the first point didn’t really bother me. I could also get a student loan for the fees, so that wasn’t as big of as a problem as it could’ve been. And I really want to study writing more. I’d been extremely unwell for several years and I needed something to give me structure. I like learning, and I like improving my writing craft.
When I got accepted onto the distance learning Creative Writing MA at Kingston University, I was so happy. Studying this part-time for two years gave me structure in my life. It gave me access to tutors and lectures and other students serious about writing. But most importantly, in the MA, I was introduced to new ways of writing.
“Critical Challenges” is the module that’s said to be the hardest in Kingston’s MA, and I opted to take it in my first year. I love being challenged, and yes, I found this module hard. So difficult. At times, I couldn’t make sense of some of the theoretical readings. But then I was introduced to a book that changed my life: Meander, Spiral, Explode by Jane Allison. In it, experimental and unconventional story patterns are analysed, and I couldn’t read this book quickly enough. I felt like I’d been awakened.
One of the assignments in the Critical Challenges module was to write an experimental piece employing a pattern that Jane Alison talks about in this book. I chose the spiral pattern, and the work that I produced in that assignment really spoke to me. It was graded at a First, and it really boosted my confidence. I ended up showing the creative piece to my agent who also loved it. It’s a story called “Nylon Bed Socks” and it examines asexuality, mental illness, and assault. It was a really important story for me to tell.
For a while, I’d been thinking how I’d love to participate in an asexuality-themed YA anthology, and now I had this piece that I’d written which would be perfect for such an anthology. I talked to my agent, and we decided to put together an anthology proposal, using “Nylon Bed Socks” as the writing sample.
Less than a year later, we had a book deal with Page Street Kids for Being Ace. Dr Wendy Vaizey, module leader for Critical Challenges, was so excited when I told her!
This anthology releases next year, and I spent the summer of 2022 working on edits for the anthology and my MA dissertation, as well as an indie publishing project and planning our wedding/getting married (it was the busiest summer ever!). But I know for sure if I hadn’t signed up for the MA, I’d never have written “Nylon Bed Socks” and got my first ever book deal that was announced in Publisher’s Marketplace and Publishers Weekly. Getting this book deal really boosted me. It made me believe in my writing and myself so much more.
I owe so much to the MA course, to the Critical Challenges module, and to Jane Allison for her book. I’ve found myself rereading that book so many times since. And when I got the opportunity to join WOW-Women on Writing as a creative writing instructor and was asked to design the syllabus for a new class, I knew I was going to do something around narrative patterns and use Jane Alison’s book with my students. It was a life-changing read for me, and teaching this book would allow me to revisit this text and over and over–thus, my Narrative Structures course was born. it’s a six-week course that I’m currently teaching for the fourth time.
Part Two – On Sustainable Writing Paces & Indie Publishing
It was the Critical Challenges Module that made me realise how much I’d needed to do the MA. How it was the right decision. And it was the writing workshop modules that allowed me to take time and thought with my work. In my first two years at Kingston, I took a writing workshop each year with Diran Adebayo, and my writing craft improved massively.
For my MA dissertation module at the end of the second year, I was supervised by Dr Adam Baron, and I worked on my first ever YA horror story. I worked at a pace of about a chapter a week, and I loved having this structure. This is when I really fell in love with novel-writing again. Let me explain:
We’ll go back to when I first got published in 2015. I was with a small press and had about 18 months between releases. This was a good pace for me as I could take time creating my art and also have breaks and work on other things to keep my mind entertained and focused. It worked well with my illnesses too, and it worked well enough with sales.
But then after my second novel released, the small publisher closed. My books were part of a series, and I’d already written the third one. I had readers waiting, so I decided to self-publish the third one and rerelease the first two with matching covers. This was my introduction into indie publishing.
I read up on the secrets of being an indie author and how to be successful with self-publishing, and one thing I found over and over again was that everyone said you had to release books rapidly. Some advocated for every month. Some said no longer than three months apart.
And so I went from one book every eighteen months to two or three a year. At first, I managed it quite easily. I already had other books I’d been working on. I found that setting up preorders was vital for a series so when a reader finished one book they could preorder the next.
Soon, I was setting up preorders six months or a year out—before I’d written the books, as this was what so many people advised so you don’t lose out on sales. I felt under insane pressure to write books fast. People kept telling me that I was a prolific writer, which kind of felt like a curse, because then I had to live up to this.
I was also told to write to market. Write what is currently selling well, because you can write and publish quickly. Doing this made me stories seem less personal to me. I began to think of my books more as products than as art. And yes, you have to view your art as products when selling it, but viewing them as products in the writing stage just did me no favours.
Writing became a chore, in many ways. I didn’t have the luxury of taking my time with these stories. I knew how to write and so I told myself I had to do it, faster and faster. So, I ramped up my process even more, working out ways to become more time efficient. I’d write 10-20k words a day. I’d frequently become burned out and have a break for a week or so, then I’d be back at it, feeling guilty that I’d taken any time off. I began teaching more writing classes and taking on more freelance editorial projects too. I felt bad when I wasn’t working as I felt like I couldn’t call myself a writer if I wasn’t writing every available moment.
My agent was supportive of my self-publishing. I explained to her that I was writing these books to market and treating it more as a regular job to bring in income that would then allow me to spend longer on the books of my heart that she’d shop around. And having my indie titles release boosted me a lot during one particular year when the manuscript my agent was submitting to publishers got some close interest but no bites. Being able to hold a new book I’d written in my hands helped me a lot.
I had set up new pen names for my indie works which weren’t continuing my first series, and I wrote these books to extremely tight deadlines—deadlines that were getting tighter and tighter. While I wrote these books quickly, I was still confident in them. They were being shortlisted and nominated for awards. Libraries were ordering them, and schools were even using some of them in lessons. I had book shops contacting me, asking to be supplied with stock. Readers wanted audiobooks of these titles.
I felt invigorated by this, but it was also so much pressure. I wrote the whole of The Rhythm of My Soul in two months—that’s including multiple drafts, start to finish. I was sending the first half to editors and sensitivity readers while I was still writing the ending, which made it chaotic. Emails would arrive in my inbox with marked up work and editors asking for the rest of the MS, and I remember one particular day when I just cried at my laptop. I was exhausted, drained. I wanted a break. But I needed to upload the finished ebook manuscript by KDP’s deadline else I’d lose the ability to set up preorders. KDP had even already pushed the release date back twice for me with no penalty, and it couldn’t be done again.
I only just met my preorder deadline, and it meant I was editing for most of Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, and Boxing Day. I barely took any time off with my family, which I regret. I remember my aunt poking her head around my door and asking how it was going on Christmas Day, and I was trying to be optimistic. That evening, I took a break to play board games with me parents, brother, and aunt. It was a relief to be away from the manuscript, but I remember feeling so bad about it too, knowing I was giving myself more work the next day.
But I made the extended deadline, and I said to myself then that I never wanted to write under that pressure again. But at the same time, I also felt fuelled by this, that I’d written this book which I absolutely adored so quickly. I’d proved I was getting faster. I had readers waiting for the next one in the series within weeks, and readers really were loving it! I was sure this was the most amazing book I’d written—and I was sad that I’d written it so quickly. That I hadn’t savoured the moment. But I told myself it was okay that I hadn’t, because I was savouring other moments to do with my writing career. This all happened at the same time as when my agent was getting the book deal for Being Ace (so we’re almost up to the present day now) and I felt like I could only savour the trad-pub moments. My indie writing was a 9-5 (or rather 8-11) job.
And then my illnesses worsened.
In Jan and Feb 2022, I was in hospital having treatment for five continuous weeks. Even when there, I was telling myself, “This is like a holiday! A writing retreat! I can write a whole book here!“
But I was too sick to write. I felt guilty for not writing. The only writing I did during this time was, firstly, for a book I’d put up for preorder but then had to cancel when I realised I wasn’t well enough to write it on time, and secondly, for my MA assignments which felt much easier to me. There was less pressure with those. I could take my time with those (while still meeting the uni’s deadlines). I found I was enjoying writing again, but only when it was my uni work. When I wasn’t under the pressure to produce it in a matter of weeks and publish it a month later.
When I came out of hospital, I thought I’d be back to writing and publishing my indie books at the same rate, immediately. But I had months where I couldn’t write my books following this. I had major writer’s block—I was simply burnt out. I couldn’t face writing my indie work.
But I was writing a little, working on and off on my MA dissertation, this YA horror novel, at a pace of a chapter a week. And I loved this pace, loved being able to give the story time to breathe and germinate and grow organically. And time for me to relax and ‘recover’ after each writing session. Because writing is draining. It’s emotional. It can make you go to dark places, especially when you are drawn to writing about dark and sometimes disturbing things. This dissertation novel was horror, after all.
But there was also a dark cloud hanging over me when I was working on my dissertation novel and writing nothing else: I had more preorder deadlines looming that I’d set up the year before. Books due to release that I’d barely written. I was trying not to think about them.
And this is where I began thinking properly about what I wanted out of my writing. I think my MA dissertation novel is the best thing I’ve ever written—but it’s not finished yet, and I’m at peace with this. I know I will finish it. It’s miles better than any of my other work. When I was writing that, I felt like I was being the writer I am meant to be. I learned so much from Adam, my supervisor, and so when I found I could extend the MA into an MFA and have an additional year at Kingston I realised I needed to do that.
Part Three – The Joy of Writing
Last week, I handed in my MA dissertation (the first 15,000 words of the horror novel, alongside a critical piece that examines my learning and writing process, the horror genre, and my novel’s structure), and I’m now two weeks into the MFA year. I’m writing a new novel for the MFA, an adult crime thing that might be a psychological thriller. It’s fresh and exciting. And I’m aiming to do one chapter a week. I’m taking my time with it and I’m having fun.
I spoke with Dr Joshua Bullock, a criminology lecturer, yesterday as part of my research for this book, and I came away with a reading list, research topics, and new ideas for my story. I’d forgotten how much I loved research. The last time I took my time with book research and spoke to professors was when I was writing my second novel. The slower pace of traditional publishing allowed for that. My indie works generally required less research as I was writing about things I knew—which meant I wasn’t having as much as fun. I love to learn when I write.
I realised yesterday that this is the way I want to write going forward—to take my time and research and have fun. I don’t want writing to be a chore. I cannot sustain the pace at which I was indie publishing. It’s not just the writing schedule—it’s all the other things that come with indie publishing: sourcing editors and proofreaders, booking cover artists, uploading files for printing, buying ISBNs, sorting out order problems, supplying bookshops, etc. Because when I think about how much writing I was cramming in each day, that wasn’t the only thing I was doing. I also had all the other work, the work of being a publisher.
I want to continue just with traditional publishing. I want to be just a writer again. I’ll still teach writing and edit freelance, but I don’t want to be my publisher as well. I want to give myself permission to write slower, and I don’t think I can do that with indie publishing.
But I’ve still got three indie preorders to fulfil. One is The Threat of the Hunt, releasing later this month. I’ll still do that. The book is nearly finished, and I’ve taken two years in writing this one (because I kept pushing back the release date, when I felt the story wasn’t sitting right with me. It’s the final book set in the series that started off traditionally published, so I’ve felt like this book needs to be amazing. Plus I was sad about writing the last sentence set in that world. So I took longer with it, and I felt like I could give myself permission to do this. The readers of that series had waited years between books anyway. And this new one does feel a lot better and more organic than some of my other indie books, precisely because I’ve been working on it for longer. I am happy with it. It’ll be my fifteenth novel, and you know, it actually feels like it’s my fifteenth book, in terms of how strong I think it is. This is because I took time with it.
I didn’t take my time with my ninth, tenth, eleventh, and twelfth books, in particular. And, well, I feel like my craft stopped improving there. They don’t feel like my books at all. I prefer the stories I was writing before them. (It’s also worth noting books nine through twelve were a different genre too that I don’t naturally gravitate towards but felt I should write for the market—these are my books written as Elin Annalise. The romances. And while I do care for these stories because they have ace romance rep, and I like that I wrote them, I didn’t like the act of writing them.)
The thirteenth book was where I began stepping back to my natural genres. This one was an intense redrafting of a novel I wrote when I was sixteen which I adored, so that was easier for me to revise and edit and felt more like me. My fourteenth was The Rhythm of My Soul and that felt like a step up from the previous five (like number thirteen, it was closer to my natural genres but I also fell in love with the premise which made a huge difference), but I feel my quick production limited that story.
This fifteenth book feels miles better than them all, and it’s a story I desperately wanted to write, so that’s why I’m not worried about this new one releasing. Because yes it’s indie, but it wasn’t written at breakneck speed. It wasn’t written to market. It was written for me. And I allowed myself the time to improve both my writing and the story.
But the other two I have up for preorder? They’re both sequels. And they are both books where I love the genre more—they’re the sequels for my thirteenth and fourteenth novels which were both book ones in new series. But although I like these new series better, I don’t know what’s going to happen to them yet. This is the tricky thing.
I was talking to my husband about them last week, telling him how I was under pressure to write the sequels as people had preordered despite me doing no marketing and I hate having unfinished series. But it was just a handful of preorders for each. The real numbers would come when I began marketing the series. And I told myself I wouldn’t do that until maybe a week or so before the releases, when I had more of the books finished and back from my editors.
“No,” my husband told me. To him, cancelling the remaining preorder books was simple. “You’re not going to write a book just for a few people. That’s silly.”
I resisted that at the time. I didn’t want to let people down. I felt like I owed the world these stories, especially as they continued existing series. My husband told me to cancel at least one of the preorders. He told me to focus on the writing I want to be doing. I told him maybe I would cancel them, thinking I wouldn’t. I hate admitting to myself that I can’t do things. That I can’t write these books on time.
But yesterday and today, I’ve been thinking more about this and what Dr James Miller, one of the MFA lecturers, said. That it’s hard to write 50k good words in a year. That creating good work often takes time. And I can see that with my own work. I feel so much better about my MA dissertation novel and my MFA novel that I’m working on, than my indie books (even including The Threat of the Hunt). Sure, readers have loved them, and they’ve been nominated for awards, but most of them don’t feel like my books. They’re not books of my heart, even though they could’ve been if I’d taken more time with them. Because when I think of them, I remember the stress of writing to near-impossibly tight deadlines. The feeling of things stacking up around me, walls getting taller. The sheer mental exhaustion that these books caused me.
I don’t want to burn out again. I need to look after my health. I want to enjoy writing and feel like I’m writing to the best of my ability. I don’t want to feel like I have to write when I’m in hospital. My MFA has taught me I need to take my time writing. I cannot keep up with the pace of indie publishing. I want to look forward to writing and rediscover that delicious feeling where I can’t stop writing. Where the words just tumble out and don’t have to be painfully extracted. I want to be able to write for fun again, and not because I feel I have to.
There are other manuscripts I’ve started on the MA modules that I am desperate to finish because I am excited by them. There are other books I want to write. And so I’m going to take a more relaxed approach with my book production now. I’m going to step away from indie publishing. I want to be fully traditionally published again, because I know now this route works better for my mental health and well-being. I don’t want to be an indie writer working at breakneck speed anymore. I don’t want to be dealing with the admin side of publishing.
This means I will be postponing the releases of Swans in the Dark (Roseheart Ballet Academy 2) and Blood of the Phoenix (Spirit of Fire 2). I will still write these at some point, but I will take my time. I need to fall in love with these stories. I need to look after myself. These books could take me a while. I want to do them justice, and I’m not well enough to sustain my previous pace and schedule.
But, more importantly, I want to focus on the books I’m sending to my agent, the books of my heart. Those will be my primary focus. Continuing my indie series will be something I do that is secondary to this. And what about my next Elin Annalise books? Well, I don’t know if I will write anymore romances at this stage. But the manuscripts I will send to my agent will have ace characters. I may do another ace romance. I don’t know at this point, nor do I know if I’d write it as Elin Annalise. It would probably be a darker story in any case, so that it’s more in-keeping with what I personally like to write.
I think stepping back from indie publishing is best. Best for my health, best for my family, best for my writing, and best for my readers.
So this is what my MFA has taught me: how to pace myself and why I need to take time with my books. Because yes, some indie writers can write quickly and enjoy it, but I am not one of those writers.
Publication order:
- Untamed (Untamed 1)
- Fragmented (Untamed 2)
- The Curse of the Winged Wight
- Divided (Untamed 3)
- A Dangerous Game (Dangerous Ones 1, set in Untamed world)
- Destroyed (Untamed 4)
- Captive
- This Vicious Way (Dangerous Ones 2, set in Untamed world)
- When We Were Young – as Elin Annalise
- In My Dreams (Aces in Love 1) – as Elin Annalise
- My Heart to Find (Aces in Love 2) – as Elin Annalise
- It’s Always Been You (Aces in Love 3) – as Elin Annalise
- Spirit of fire (Spirit of Fire 1) – as Elin Dyer
- The Rhythm of My Soul (Roseheart Ballet Academy 1) – as Elin Dyer
- The Threat of the Hunt (Dangerous Ones 3, set in untamed world)
