Sixteen-Year Road to The Peach

It was sixteen years ago when I made a choice—to begin writing my survival story, The Peach, A Memoir of Trauma, Survival, and Forgiveness. I had no idea, though, what it would take not only to complete that story, but what it would take to release it into the wide-open world. Perseverance, plus a whole lot of “yes, you’ve got this” from family, friends, and writing mentors, is what it took. With The Peach less than one month from its release date, I should feel nothing but primed with enough ecstatic energy to put the Energizer Bunny to shame. While I am pinch-me excited, I am also afraid—afraid of how readers will respond, of what readers will think of me (because, after all, it is a memoir, and it reveals some messy, vulnerable stuff). Mostly, I’m uneasy about what comes after The Peach.

I spent sixteen years in a relationship with The Peach—from seed to fully ripened, ready-to-publish story. Year after year of one draft after the next, all dumped into the not-good-enough file. Year after year of submissions to literary agents and publishers. Year after year of “Sorry, your memoir is not a good fit . . . your writing is powerful, but . . . ” Year after year of my internal judge trying to convince me to give it up and get a “real” job. Year after year of writing workshops and conferences, where I dared to show early drafts of The Peach, which I naively believed would soon be on bookstore shelves, blurbs and all. When, at age forty-three, I told one of my MFA advisors that my goal was to publish The Peach by the time I turned forty-five, she gave me one of those smiles that means, “Are you delusional? You really don’t have any idea.” Then she wrapped her arms around me in a full hug that felt much like one wanting to squeeze the illusion out of every single early-writer cell in my body. If the smile wasn’t enough to break me out of my spell, I suppose the squeeze-hug should have done it. So what if it took me another decade, or more, to stop beating myself up for not publishing my memoir sooner?

So, here I am, two months from turning sixty, and while I’m afraid of how The Peach will be received, and what comes next, I am 100% happy that it has taken sixteen years from draft one to book publishing. Why? Here’s why: when I look back at some of the old drafts, I shiver at the thought of them being read by anyone. Also, because I can look back at all the sweet writing milestones along the way:

Writing the first sentence of The Peach

Completing the first draft of The Peach

Being accepted into an MFA writing program

Receiving an MFA in writing

Reading parts of The Peach in a writing workshop for the first time and listening to critical feedback

Pressing the send button, marking the first personal essay submission to a literary journal

First essay rejection by a literary journal

First essay acceptance by a literary journal

Agents at a writing conference publicly calling me out for using the word “amorphous”

First op-ed acceptance by an international newspaper (The Jerusalem Post), then major U.S. newspapers (The Washington Post, USA Today)

Sending my first query letter to a literary agent

Essay acceptance by Chicken Soup for The Soul

Applying for a writing grant and being told my work is “not literary enough”

Receiving the grant after applying for it again a few years later

First personally written rejection letter from a literary agent with helpful feedback

Receiving a merit grant from the Vermont Studio Center

Manuscript acceptance from a literary agent

“Sorry, this is no longer working out,” from the same literary agent

Editor at an independent publisher interested in my story

I sign a contract with that independent publisher!