What Happens When You Stop Fighting Nature

Hi friends.

I meant to check in with you yesterday but whenever I sat down to type my fingers failed me, and frankly the day before that too. Instead all week I’ve been handwriting just for myself, writing to myself, assessing where I’m at, lessons I’ve learned lately not just through this year’s 1000 Words but through all the talks I’ve given during my time as a writer-in-residence here in Asheville. Also I’ve been thinking about all the books I’ve read in the last two months and what I’ve gained from them. Hopefully I’ll be able to share more of that with you in these coming weeks once I get back home to New Orleans in July.

(We will miss it here.)

One thing that did stick in my mind though was how at every event this past month someone asked me which of my books were my favorite. A fun question to think about especially as I just hit the 20-year-anniversary of the publication of my first book. But also an impossible question to answer.

I understand how people could ask me that, though. Maybe they asked it because they wanted to see if my answer matches their impression of my books but more likely it’s because they haven’t read me before and want to know which book of mine to start with. (I always think you should start with the one that feels best in your hand.)

Anyway lately my answer to this question has been that it’s hard to pick a favorite because each book was the answer to a particular kind of problem I was trying to solve. Like how to write a novel about where I grew up versus how to write a short, funny, zippy novel, versus how to write historical fiction, etc. They were all challenges for me, nuts I was trying to crack, and also particular risks I was taking.

What would a book like that look like coming from me? That is always one way I think about writing.

Pick a challenge. Make it interesting. Make it count.

And so, this week, I have been thinking a lot about all these projects I have cooking right now—tens of thousands of words and they are all viable projects—and how to choose which one to focus on now that 1000 Words is over and my time is all mine again. I generated 15,000 words on a new project during those two weeks but is that the one I want to work on next? I need to determine which will most thrill me or intrigue me. Have you been thinking about the same?

If the world is burning down, we might as well write what we want.

And finally I should mention I’ve still just been thinking a lot about bears, as they truly have become a weekly, sometimes daily presence in my life here. One day I came home from walking the dog and I saw a mama bear sprawled out happily nursing her four cubs on my front lawn. I thought: there is some real abundance surrounding this house.

It was then that things sort of flipped for me, and instead of thinking I was witnessing all this nature around me I began to realize I was actually in the fishbowl myself. I was a part of this neighborhood, even if it was just for a few months. I felt something relax in me.

It always gets so much easier when you stop fighting nature, I find.

More soon—

Jami

You are reading Craft Talk, the home of #1000wordsofsummer and also a weekly newsletter about writing from Jami Attenberg. I’m also on bluesky and instagram.