This Creative Life with Sara Zarr Sara Zarr

I’m so happy to be back with one my favorite contemporary novelists, Michelle Huneven. I love the compassion, humor, and reality in how she renders life and relationships.
She’s got a brand new book out, Search, which we talk about along with her other books, her background, and process—including the 20-year circuitous journey to the publication of her first novel, Round Rock. I hope you enjoy the episode and, if you’re not already a fan, go explore her catalog.
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It's launch day for the This Creative Life ebook, with the paperback close behind! I was recently on Jenn Laughran's Literaticast digging into the content and ideas in the book, and she graciously let me crosspost the ep into the TCL feed.  The Literaticast on Apple Podcasts
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Get 30% off the book with this link and this code: QWBODLO8MX
Or find it just about everywhere that sells ebooks! B&N, Amazon, Kobo, Google Play, Apple. All the links at www.sarazarr.com

Jo Knowles is one of my favorite book people, and she has a new one out this week. That inspired me to pull her 2013 episode up from the archives, where it’s been under lock and key for awhile. Jo writes for and about almost all ages on the young reader spectrum, from picture book (Ear Worm) to YA (Read Between the Lines) to Middle Grade (See You at Harry’s). Her latest, Meant to Be, sounds like it has a lot in common with A Song Called Home. Which doesn’t surprise me a bit—Jo and I have always been interested in similar themes and settings in our work. Check out her work if you don’t know it, and enjoy this trip back in time!
Selected Show Notes Jo Knowles online
Jo and other guests at the TCL Bookshop shop
NEW! thiscreative.life
Theme music by Dave Connis

A lot has happened since the last episode! Namely: A Song Called Home and The Temps are both out in the world and no longer under our control, if they ever were. We’re already no longer in our pub-day month; new books come out, people move on. Our role as authors is pretty much done.
So, what’s next? As you’ll discover in this episode, neither Andrew nor Sara are sure. Whether it’s Andrew trying to decide what project to focus on now, or me pondering a complete exit from the whole endeavor, we’re both tired and looking for some clarity in the breath-after-pub.
We also talk about: checking sales numbers, Sally Rooney’s bucket hat, and how we’d describe “the arc of a launch.” And there’s still one more book left to launch in this series! The This Creative Life book is off to the copyeditor and soon to meets its publishing fate.
A Song Called Home
The Temps
Coming-of-age as apocalypse - Andrew’s piece at LitHub
Julia Fox at the Oscars
This Creative Life - the book!
Theme music: Creative Commons Deep Friendship by Lobo Loco is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0

As Andrew and I wait through the last few weeks before our books come out, we digress ever so slightly into an incomplete history of self-publishing, from its reputation as “vanity publishing” to where it converged with the advent of ebooks and e-readers to arrive at its present day status as a messy juggernaut. Also: why every writer should consider learning how to self-publish in the 21st century.
Sara’s book now comes out on 3/15; Andrew’s is still scheduled for 3/29. Neither are at the bottom of the ocean!
0-13:30: Updates on our books
13:35-1:07:00: The incomplete history of self-publishing (including diversions to e-readers, the aspiring writer industrial complex, and remembering “New Adult” in its innocent infancy)
1:07:00 - end: Closing thoughts and coming attractions
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Theme music: Creative Commons Deep Friendship by Lobo Loco is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0

Laurel Snyder is the author of numerous books for young readers, including Orphan Island, My Jasper June, and the Charlie & Mouse books. 
In this episode, we talk about staying fluent in the language of childhood, the “ghost of brokenness” when writing from a sad place, how Laurel works with the all-or-nothing cycles of her writing process, being an extrovert in an introvert’s career, and the difficulties of writing about faith and religion.
Around minutes 53-58, this turns into a Real Housewives podcast. We’re not sorry!
Theme music by Dave Connis. This podcast is ad-free. Find out how to support it here. Thank you!
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