By Leslie Lindsay
A curated newsletter on the literary life, featuring ‘4 questions,’ reading & listening recommendations, where to submit, more
Leslie Lindsay|Always with a Book
~MUSINGS & MEANDERINGS~
Hello…July!
I have a friend who is super-get-it-done. She doesn’t mess around. I like that about her. Sometimes I am her. Sometimes I am secretly envying her. But here’s the thing, she got me thinking that it is time to start getting my act together on my manuscript. Yeah, I’m working. Plodding along, talking about it, but now I need a…beta reader. What the heck is that?
A beta reader can provide invaluable feedback into the genesis of a publishable manuscript. They give honest feedback from a reader perspective and help you figure out what is working and what is not.
Beta-Reading does not mean it’s ‘ready to go.’
Timing-wise, this is after you have finished the first draft of a manuscript. Maybe we can call this ‘the second complete draft.’ It’s time for someone else to let you see what you might be missing. It might be to confirm/validate what you already know about your work.
Is that the same as developmetnal editing?
Nope! A developmental editor ought to have a clear background in writing craft, one your ‘average’ reader does not. A beta reader should not be expected to go into craft suggestions or tell you how to make it better. But they might if they possess both skill sets–and you ask.
How does one find a beta-reader?
The understanding here is that you give back what you receive. Typically, this means exchanging manuscripts. The caveat here is, if you are exchanging material, it’s probably assumed the other writer is well-versed in craft. It’s kind of a conundrum. Hee are a few options:
- Swap with someone writing in your genre.
- There might not be someone readily available to exchange work, so pay it forward. Read for them now and when you’re ready, they can read for you.
- You might be able to pay for a beta-read. It could be monetary or in-kind.
What to share?
This friend was so worried her manuscript wasn’t ‘perfect.’ I said, “Who cares? That’s what you are doing this!” To be clear, I was not her beta-reader, someone else was. A beta-reader is looking for big-picture stuff. They will get that the manuscript has not been proof-read or copyedited. They will understand that it’s not ready to be printed and shoved on a shelf at a bookstore. It’s not. And that’s a whole ‘nother bit of work (and a good deal of time).
Offer Thanks.
Unless you are paying your beta-reader, this lovely person is doing you a huge favor. Thank them. A handwritten note goes a long ways, but maybe even a gift card, a lunch out, a cup of coffee, or another token of appreciation.
Question:
We’ll talk more about how to prep your reader in the next ‘Musings & Meanderings,’ but for now, do you find this practice valuable? Have you done it before? Were there gaps or problems your beta-reder helped you hone in?
Respond here in a comment, or find me on Instagram, Twitter, or Facebook.
xx,
~Leslie : )
This issue of Musings & Meanderings is jam-packed with some really great stuff to get your [writing and reading] summer off on the right foot. Coaching, book recommendations, where to submit, reading recommendations, author interviews, recently published prose, and a quick 4 questions insights interview with the fabulous Shari Lapena on her newest domestic thriller, EVERYONE HERE IS LYING (Pamela Dorman Books, July 25, 2023)
By the way, I do not get any ‘kick-backs’ or other kind of payment (in-kind, or otherwise) for mentioning these classes/workshops/books/individuals. Sharing because if helps me, maybe it’ll speak to you, too.
Some Writerly Things:
- Sometimes we writers get focused on stuff that [whispers] doesn’t really matter. Lily Meyer of Relegation Books Suggests ‘keeping it simple.’ Do you agree?
- Totally thinking about signing up for this Tin House Summer Craft Intensive on experimental writing...it’s generative, which means creating new material. Taught by Marisa Crane. More HERE.
- The author of HOUSE OF COTTON, Monica Braeshares is teaching a workshop on ghost stories starting August 1. Oh fun! This is a fee-based class/workshop and I have a feeling it will fill up quickly!
Some Readerly Things:
- Looking ahead to fall, there’s a new lecture series being hosted by Tin House featuring Diane Cook. She will dive into work on the range of women’s emotionality. It’s a 4-part series and meets via Zoom, Saturday mornings Pacific Time. One scholarship is available via a lottery system. Begins Sept 9.
- Did you know the average American watches 5 hours of TV a day and reads for only 20 minutes?! That’s a little appalling. If you are looking read more, maybe subscribing to the (literary) journal-a-month club is for you? I did! It was fun to be surprised each month–you never know what you are going to get! Totally inspiring and great content. Check it out! Gift it to a friend.
“NO-ONE DOES SUBURBAN PARANOIA LIKE SHARI LAPENA”
—RUTH WARE
New! Featured Author|Insights
Internationally bestselling author
Shari Lapena
EVERYONE HERE IS LYING: A Novel
Who took Avery Wooler? Nothing will prepare you for the truth.
Leslie Lindsay:
Without responding in complete sentences, what would you say EVERYONE HERE IS LYING is about?
Shari Lapena :
An affair; the disappearance of a difficult, oppositional child; secrets, lies, revenge.
Leslie Lindsay:
Where did you write EVERYONE HERE IS LYING? Do you have any special writing routines or rituals? Do they change with each project, or remain constant over time?
Shari Lapena :
We moved to a farm about a year and a half ago, about an hour and a half outside of Toronto. Now I have a proper office in what used to be the maid’s quarters, and that’s where I wrote Everyone Here Is Lying. There’s a back staircase from there that goes directly to the kitchen, which is handy.
I don’t have any special writing routines or rituals because I think that sets you up for disaster. What if you can’t have those conditions? Does that mean you can’t write that day? What I do instead is try to write in the morning—that’s when I’m at my best—but if I can’t, then I’ll write in the afternoon. I aim for 1500 words a day, because I find that keeps the book ticking along nicely. I never seem to have trouble making that quota, but if I’m having a very distracting day, with a lot of other things going on, I just won’t write that day. I am very disciplined though. The only unshakeable part of my routine is that I drink decaf coffee and eat dark chocolate. If I didn’t have that, I’m not sure I could keep going, so I keep a good selection of chocolate in my desk drawer.
I’ve remained pretty true to my morning, quota, chocolate routine over the years. The only difference is my quota has gone up from 1000 words a day to 1500. And I’ve had to be more conscious of my chocolate consumption—I can’t get away with as much as I used to, sadly. I am a creature of habit, so the only thing that’s really changed much is the view outside my window—from city to rural. I see a lot of deer.
Leslie Lindsay:
If you weren’t writing, you would be…
Shari Lapena :
Napping? I like to nap a bit in the afternoons. I find it refreshes me creatively. Or that may just be an excuse. I like an afternoon nap.
Also, I have taken up horseback riding again, which I did as a kid. One of the joys of being out in the country is that the barn is only ten minutes away. So I part-board a horse and ride one or two times a week. I even do the odd horse show, but the jumps are low.
Leslie Lindsay:
What book did you recently read that you can’t stop thinking about?
Shari Lapena :
I’d have to say Strange Sally Diamond, by Liz Nugent. Her books are always so good, but this one is her best yet. Reclusive Sally is strange—she survived a horrifically damaging childhood, so she’s not quite right. She’s hiding from the world. But when she tries to incinerate her dead father, and the press finds her again, she can no longer hide. And now that she’s been found, she’s also being plagued by a sinister voice from a past she does not remember. I can’t get her or this book out of my head.
[Leslie’s note: I just added this to my ‘can’t wait to read in 2023’ bookshop, because this is right up my ally! See what else made the cut]
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Shari Lapena is the #1 internationally bestselling author of six suspense novels including The Couple Next Door, A Stranger in the House, An Unwanted Guest, Someone We Know, The End of Her, and Not a Happy Family. Everyone Here is Lying is coming in July 2023. A former lawyer and English teacher, Shari now writes full time from a farm in Ontario, where she lives with her husband and cat. She doesn’t want you to be able to put her books down.
- For more information, or to purchase a copy of EVERYONE HERE IS LYING, pop over to my Bookshop.org
- You can connect with Shari on Instagram
- Or visit her website
Browse my Bookshop.org see what I’m reading in 2023, and other titles featured on Insights|Musings & Meanderings …and more!
You can find me, Leslie Lindsay, on Instagram for more bookish news, book unboxing reels, artsy flatlays, and book talks.
Some Recently Published Interviews, Prose, Etc.:
- A double-interview featuring Cassandra Jackson and Jasmine Brown and their respective books, THE WRECK: A Daughter’s Memoir of Becoming a Mother (Viking, May 2023) and TWICE AS HARD (Beacon Hill, February 2023) ran in Hippocampus Magazine. See how and why I chose to pair these two titles and my connection to the material.
- I had the honor and priviledge of chatting with Priscilla Gilman, author of the memoir, THE CRITIC’S DAUGHTER (W.W. Norton, February 2023 for The North American Review. We talk about Guess jeans (with ankle zippers!), being the responsible older sister, challenging parents, and more. Gilman is the daughter of renown literary agent Lynn Nesbit and Richard Gilman, Yale School of Drama professor and theater critic.
- This poem, CLOTHES ON THE LINE was published in Abandoned Mine and was inspired by my fascination with ancestors. It’s speaker is a young girl in a dreamy, almost flow-of-conscious voice.
- A hybrid piece, AMERSAND & EPHEMERA was published in the latest print issue (vol. 16) of DASH Literary: Futurisms, and it’s a gorgeous issue all around. It’s a bit of a centro in which I cobbled together titles from spines of books on a shelf into a cohesive memoir-poetry-catalog.
- This piece, MODEL HOME: A Study Under Compression, in On the Seawall, is something I am so proud of. It was conceived in a craft store when I wandered down the model train aisle. At home, I already had the moss and tiny house and vials. I wanted to depict something with words and photography that would spotlight my family falling into disarray…my mother’s mental illness, the ‘perfect’ home, the family divided. This was my answer. It’s my first text + image publication. Here’s a sampling:
- I am bowled over by the reception my poem, CREVASSE, received by Luke Johnson in the Spring 2023 issue of Ballast. Check out our dialogue about one another’s work HERE. Also, that landing page! Swooning.
- Two pieces of poetry, TRUNDLE and HISTORY OF PRESENT ILLNESS were published in Neologism Poetry Journal and both have to do with mental illness, one is particularly emotional; it has to do with my mother’s first psychotic episode when I was ten and Dad had to lock me in my room for safety.
- You can find some of my other poetry at Empyrean Literary Journal. This piece was conceived in a workshop at StoryStudio Chicago in which the prompt was to combine two totally different things with one’s childhood street. I chose my grandfather’s profession as stained-glass artist and the year 1989. The resulting piece is COLLAPSE.
- Thrilled to have this byline in LitHub! Here, I chat with 82-year-old poet Pattiann Rogers about her new collection, THE FLICKERING (Penguin Poets, April 2023).
- Speaking of Apraxia: A Parents’ Guide to Childhood Apraxia of Speech, 2nd edition (Woodbine House, 2021) through some online retailers, your local library, used bookstores (it’s now officially out-of-print), and the audio edition is downloadable (with additional PDFs, resources) through Penguin Random House.
There’s more to this newsletter. Keep scrolling.
What’s Obsessing Me:
- Stationery products/markeing/promo
- How to find more time to read (and not fall asleep!)
- Restructuring my time.
- Yoga
What I’m Listening To:
I just finished a podcast about a woman who’s mother died by gun suicide. She had a long and fraught relationship with bipolar disorder. My mother did too, only her suicide was by overdose, The feelings this woman shares in the podcast were jarringly real and authentic. Trigger warnings, of course, but if this appeals, you can find it on Wondery/Theis is Actually Happeneing “What if You Couldn’t Keep Her Safe?”
You are reading Musings & Meanderings, a consistently inconsistent weekly newsletter about the literary life from Leslie Lindsay, and home of an archive of bestselling and debut author interviews. I’m also on twitter and instagram. I try to answer comments as best I can. Feel free to find my book suggestions on bookshop.org, and also check out the authors I’ve hosted in in-depth interviews HERE.
In the meantime, catch me on:
Reviewing books and talking about them with others on-line and in-person is one small way to engage with & support the literary community.
Thank you for letting me guide you on your bookish journey.
Let’s walk this bookish path together.
THANK YOU!!
Some of you have been reading my reviews, interviews, and meanderings for more than a decade now. That’s huge and I am so humbled. Thanks for being here.
More than 2,800 folks read Musings & Meanderings.
Wishing you much renewal & sunshine
Created by Leslie Lindsay. I’m a proud book nerd. Let’s connect on Instagram, and Twitter. See what I’m reading on Bookshop.org. Find my reviews & ratings on GoodReads. I’m also a Zibby Books Ambassador, part of the Riverherd with Riverhead Books, a proud supporter of the Between the Covers podcast hosted by David Naimon and produced thru Tin House, and an early reviewer of Penguin Random House titles. My book, SPEAKING OF APRAXIA: A Parents’ Guide to Childhood Apraxia of Speech (2021), is available in audio only by PRHaudio.
Learn more HERE.
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Leslie A. Lindsay 
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