Newsletter from Jay Wilcox - July 2022: On Cotton Candy

Good morning/afternoon/evening!

I have no idea how a cotton-candy machine works. The operator dips their paper cone, and a cloud of candy spins to life. The summoning of something from nothing--therein lies the magic.

I see writing similarly. Every day, you show up and run through your rituals, stirring the air until something crystallizes. Your machine doesn't run on inspiration. It needs discipline and routine and faith in the process--faith that something will appear, if you keep showing up. During the pandemic, I've written multiple drafts of multiple novels, multiple failed attempts. I set the newsletter aside to devote all my writing efforts to these drafts, and the more I worked, the more I failed.

With such an intensely narrow focus, how could I keep missing the mark?

I brought the newsletter back because I wanted to write for people again. Writing is a solitary pursuit, but it can also inspire connection, and I want to make these sorts of connections with others at least once a month. Bad writing grows in a vacuum. There's no friction in that sort of vacuum--no feedback, no future version of a project that might be better than the last. A newsletter, however, forces my ideas to make regular contact with the world. Plus, if you want to write a novel, I think it's good to simultaneously write things that aren't novels. Be your own friction. Feel the heat between one project, one mode of writing, and another.

I brought the newsletter back for want of a thesis statement. My failed novels consistently lost focus some fraction of the way through. The sentences are okay, but what's the point? What am I trying to say? With a newsletter, I have to focus. I am concretely writing about something here, and that intentionality translates to writing longer fiction.

Of course, I've written novels that I consider successes. In fact, I'm actively pitching my novel MOTEL RITUALS to literary agents and have gotten requests for the full manuscript. I brought the newsletter back because I want you to buy my book when it comes out. I want your readership and support--and I want to keep in touch along the way. It's so easy to feel isolated and even hopeless these days, but if I'm writing a newsletter this month, odds are good I'll be writing another the next. 

In the meantime, you're always welcome to write back. I hope you're well.

Infinite Regards,

Jay