"The best thing you can do is be nice, get to know a small-ish group of writers well, and make real friends with them."
Donna Freitas, author of over 25 books (!), opens up on Second Chapter about how she moved from academia to being a full-time writer.
When
recommended a 90-Day Novel Writing Class with last year, I knew I needed to sign up. I was on a deadline to finish my first draft by the end of 2023, and I thought this course would give me that last little push to get it done. And it did - I finished the first draft of my novel by mid-December!But it gave me much more than that. Every other week for three months, it gave me a group of women to talk to, commiserate with, and problem solve together. And we were all connected through Donna, an established author with over 25 books (!!!) published. Having been through it all, she was the honest and kind sounding board and cheerleader we all needed.
I’m thrilled to have Donna on Second Chapter this week to talk about how she moved from academia to writing full-time.
Let’s start in the past. Tell us about your pre-author career journey.
I didn’t know I wanted to be a writer until very late in life—around when I was 28 or so, when the opportunity arose via my life as a professor to write a trade book. It wasn’t until I wrote that first book (my “training wheels book”) that I thought to myself: Hey, I really love writing this way (for a wide audience) and I’d like to do it again. Then I put together a proposal for another nonfiction book, and sold it. But I never thought I’d write novels—that came later for me too.
I didn’t have too many ideas about a writer’s life—I didn’t know any at the time when I started doing this. What I knew was academia and the professor’s life—that’s it.
Can you set the scene for what your life looked like when you started writing your first novel? Did that change as you starting writing more novels?
When I wrote my first novel, at the time I was a full time professor of gender studies and religion—so I was teaching students at a university. I wake up very early and at the time, I’d just wake up and play around with this novel I’d started writing. I taught novels in my university classes, and I sometimes reviewed novels in essays, and one day I decided to try and write one myself.
At the time, my mother had just died, and honestly, I had no plans for this novel to go anywhere. It was a comedy, and I was writing it to escape, and to make myself laugh, and to feel close to my mother. It was partly based on her stories of being a girl growing up in a big Italian immigrant family in Rhode Island.
Did your first career help in your writing at all?
I would say that my first career (being a professor) certainly helped me to publish my first nonfiction books, but if anything, it hindered me writing a novel! Academics are notoriously bad writers, and I had no training whatsoever in creative writing. I’d never taken a writing class before. I was just studying other novels on my shelf and asking what those writers did and going for it.
A huge element of writing and the path to publishing comes from a cultivated community. What is your writing community like?
It was really when my first novel came out (The Possibilities of Sainthood, Farrar, Straus & Giroux 2008) that I began to meet other writers and make writer friends. And ever since then my life has been populated by so many writer-friends and editor friends too. In Brooklyn where I’ve lived since 2005 there are writers everywhere so it’s easy to go to writer happy hours and book events and things.
But since the pandemic, I’ve met lots of writers via Zoom and a bit on Instagram and certainly since I started my Substack (
), which is, in fact, how I met Cori! I have enjoyed expanding my contact with writers beyond just the people who live in NYC because of how we can connect online now. I’ve also enjoyed hosting in-person retreats in Barcelona and in and around NYC and New England. That’s been so wonderful too!Advice-wise, I’d say: try not to social climb. The best thing you can do is be nice, get to know a small-ish group of writers well, and make real friends with them. Those writer friends will support you and read for you in ways that others won’t—and that part of the writing life has been so crucial to me.
You've had so many books published! Could you tell us a bit about how you got published? And how has it evolved as you've published more books?
I think I’ve got about 25 books under my belt at this point, but I sort of stopped counting! Many of them are novels, some are nonfiction—many of the nonfiction books come from my life as a professor and researcher, and then two are memoirs.
When I was starting out, I don’t know if self-publishing even existed! Probably, but not like today and I knew nothing about it. But everything about my early writing career was a bit of a stumble—I stumbled into the publication of my first nonfiction trade book, because the head of a publishing house was in the audience at one of my academic talks, and she came up to me to tell me I should write a book—and she meant it! She published my first book. And the novels were a bit of an accident too.
I got my agent via another writer I knew who said she was wonderful and connected us. At the time things were very different—there were three agents interested, I had to send out physical manuscripts to people, and we had phone conversations. The market was completely other than it is today.
As far as editors go—it’s different depending on fiction and nonfiction. Often, for my nonfiction, I already know the editors. But otherwise, my agent will introduce me to editors—that is their job, to match-make writers with editors. And I’ve worked with many editors over the years simply because I do so many different kinds of books. Though a number of those editors I’ve done many books with (like my nonfiction book editor, at Oxford University Trade). My first editor (Frances Foster at FSG) I worked with on novels until she passed away. Editors switch publishers, all kinds of things can happen over a long career as a writer!
Regarding revisions: I feel like, in the end, I do maybe 9-10 revisions (including copyedits, page proofs, etc) before a book is out in the world. And even still, I often end up editing the hard copies of my books when I do readings!
Traditional publishing-wise, I’d say: find yourself a good agent. And to do that, you have to be willing to do many, many drafts of that first book that goes out. Agents have so many writers pitching them today, and your book needs to be in amazing shape for them to pick you up, I think. I also believe that is why so many writers are hiring private editors these days (which I’ve been doing lately, and I very much enjoy it!).
To be able to pivot any career, there’s usually a financial element tied to it. Whether that’s to support carving out time dedicated to your writing through a pay cut, financial support from someone else, or paying for more training to support developing your craft. Did you have any financial support that helped you on your journey? Could you share what that looked like?
I actually wrote an entire Substack article about finances and writers!
But many years ago (maybe around 2010/2011) I got to a point where I was pretty miserable as an academic (I was in a very sexist, male field—on the religion side of things), and writing was making me so happy. Plus, I realized that I was almost making more money as a writer than as a professor (professors don’t make a lot of money, fyi)—that I could swing it financially if I jumped ship. So it was really a leap of faith—and hope. I wanted a life that I loved, and I was not loving my life as a professor. But I’ve loved my life as a writer. It has its ups and downs of course, but I’m so glad I made the switch.
Though I will tell you: I thought I’d be a traditional college professor for the rest of my life. If you had told me when I was finishing my PhD that one day I’d be a full time writer—and on top of this a novelist—I would never ever have believed you!
Okay, time to put on your wise Hindsight Glasses. What advice would you give to aspiring authors?
I would say: read, read, read in your genre. I’m always so shocked by how many aspiring writers I meet who don’t read—almost anything. Not even in the genre they’re writing! So first, read as much as you can.
But the most important thing I think, is community: meeting other writers at different stages of their careers ideally, who can be there for you, answer your questions, read for you, support you when the going gets tough. I think that has been so crucial to my longevity as a writer.
And like I said—be nice! Don’t social climb/use people. Don’t turn your back on a newer or less famous writer or an unpublished person because they aren’t as connected as someone else—find the people you most connect to, regardless of how famous or not famous they are and be there for them, as they will be for you. Those are the relationships that will help you have a long career. And in the middle of it all, you will end up helping each other out!
Thanks so much, Donna! If I had to summarise her Second Chapter interview in one word, I’d choose community. I loved her advice of finding a true and authentic community of writers not chosen by their popularity or success.
To help her own community, Donna pays it forward on her own Substack, The Plot Doctor, by writing about the industry, pay, and interviews with literary agents. She’s also planning another novel writing group soon, so follow her along for that update!
Donna has a rich back catalog you can stuck into, from memoirs to young adult to middle grade to fiction. Her latest book, STEFI AND THE SPANISH PRINCE, came out this summer and if you want a steamy, fun romance that has royals, Barcelona, and secrets, pick it up now.
If you liked this Second Chapter interview, please consider liking, commenting or sharing with your friends and family who love to write and / or read. Appreciate all the support we can get! :)