To Be More Than One Thing: One Writer’s Introduction to Publishing

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by Domanie Spencer. www.KerningEditorial.com

“I wouldn’t worry about it – just use a pen name. Get your writing out there!”

Couched within this exuberant advice from a well-published writer, the too-easy flippancy of it all escaped me. Of course! I thought naively. A pen name for every way to tell a story will solve all my problems. Fiction will know me as A, nonfiction will know me as B, and I shall submit poetry under C. There was indeed a way to be more than one thing. I was overjoyed. Marvelous plan.

But, no. Not really.

“Pen names are used widely, but each one needs to have a life of its own on social media,” the presenter said. This news deterred most folks within the Zoom squares on my screen, but I warmed to the opportunity of being three distinctly separate people. A delicious idea, I thought, my imagination bursting with soon-to-be personas… “But,” the presenter continued, absurdly not stopping at the good news, “agents won’t like it. It will be a tough road to establish credibility.” Hmm, this sounded serious. They should have led with that…

And then came the genre-boxes (not an official term). At any writerly forum – in the name of reader clarity, book sales, and industry roadmaps – discussions regarding the boxes writers must fit themselves into erupt and gaily continue, unhindered and unresolved. General debate still exists on the definition of creative nonfiction vs. nonfiction. Another exists on how long a successful personal essay should be before it’s considered “flash.” Then there’s migraine-inducing genre-bending: speculative/flash, narrative/spiritual, atmospheric/magic, etc. If you attempt fiction while your real estate is currently located within the neighborhood of nonfiction, what are you? If you sprinkle a little magic in telling the story of your walk in the woods, is it blasphemy? While reeling within this dust-devil of abundance a writer must choose from, I wondered: Could neighborhoods simply co-mingle? Frowned upon, apparently.

“Pick a lane – don’t confuse the reader,” say some. “Don’t forget the tropes! You can’t possibly engage all the tropes if not fully immersed and committed to the one thing;” say others. “You’ll lose your reader and, worse, never find an agent,” say the most helpful.

The more I learn about writing for publication, the murkier it becomes. The quest to be a writer of more than just one thing has grown spikes and become less of a quest and more of a startling obstacle course. 

With gratitude, I appreciate the existence of step-by-step guides, charts, graphs, webinars, TED talks, craft books and magazines, clubs, coaches, critique groups, and conferences that attempt to clear up the murk. The remote access at my fingertips to all of this is a gift to any writer, as are writer-friends. I’m certain I have grown several new brains to help with the sheer enormity of information available on publishing. Thankfully, within the past few years of self-education in my quest-turned-obstacle course, I have landed on a few simple truths: hold on to the basics, make them your own, and keep writing. The thing I have learned I must be in all the different ways no matter which genre-boxes beckon or push me away – is resilient.

I keep writing and continue in my determined quest to write more than one thing. I have successfully co-mingled my neighborhoods because they are mine to do so. Whether this approach will be successful in the world of publication, with or without pen names, remains to be seen. Most importantly, I no longer allow it to stop me in my tracks and beckon me down the rabbit hole of doubt. Rather, I give it a polite wave and note its location.

I protect the spark that appeared in my childhood when I wrote like no one was watching. I have found a home for the spark and surrounded it with barbed wire so no one, not even I, can sabotage it. I have a secret password (one that makes me laugh). It lets me enter when I need to be reminded why I write.

I’m in the throes of arranging decades’ worth of personal essays that will make up a collection squarely within a world of creative nonfiction. I happily share poetry under a pen name. Simultaneously, I’m writing a fictional story that keeps feeding my creativity – which is ravenous after 20 years of shooting off pointed emails in “corporate speak.” I have become more than one thing.

In fleeting flashes, I miss my past world of bottom-line-driven corporate laypeople who went to bars after work and not once spoke of genre, subgenre, cross-genre, genre-bending, or multi-genre.

“What do you do when you’re not working?” they would ask.

“I write,” I would say. Their wholehearted surface-interest response?

“Wonderful! Cheers!”

That was it. It was a simpler time.

Domanie Spencer writes with a grateful heart. She finds humor in life’s quirks as she learns to grow things from seed and make things from scratch while running a small editorial business. More information on her blog and business can be found at: KerningEditorial.com