The most honest newsletter I’ve ever written - Part 1
what it’s really like to have your book published
Hello dear readers,
While April heralds spring back home in the UK, with warmer days and new buds on trees, here in Zimbabwe the month marks the transition from the warm rainy season to the dryer, colder months ahead. I have to say, I love it. My light jumpers finally get worn and there’s something delicious about sleeping under the weight of a proper duvet and not just a thin sheet.
April also marks a very special milestone: it has been 5 years since the publication of my debut novel Hashim & Family.
What is it like to have your book published?’
It’s a question I get asked often. And one I never really feel able to truthfully answer. People might think that writing the book is the hard bit. But for me, that’s the most enjoyable part - where it’s just me and the page. The difficult part is actually once it has been published, with all of the hopes and expectations it carries, both spoken and unspoken, and that exhilarating, terrifying feeling of sending your baby out into the world with no real control over whether it flops or soars.
Five years on since my first experience, I think I am finally ready to talk openly about how that was. Honestly, I’m a bit scared to lay it all out here. But I feel the need to say some of the harder stuff out loud. I’m hoping that writing this newsletter will be a bit like the digital equivalent of waving some sage around: cleansing all the energies in preparation for the next launch of my next book.
So, I invite you to settle in. It’s story time. X
The journey begins…
early 2017
I’d better start with some very important context. I had a rather unconventional path to publication: some might even say charmed. On a Thursday evening late in January, I went along to a ‘speed publishing’ event - where aspiring writers meet with industry professionals, including agents and editors from some of the most prestigious publishing houses and literary agencies in the world. I had only written about half of my manuscript and had no expectation of landing any kind of deal, but thought it would be a good chance to scope out who I might approach in the future once my draft was finished.
The writers went around in little groups of three or four to pitch our ideas to the professionals. I was recovering from a severe chest infection at the time, and ended up coughing and spluttering most of the way through my pitch. But the outcome from the event seemed almost like something out of a book in itself: the first person I pitched to emailed me the very next morning requesting to see my manuscript so far. Delirious with excitement, I spent the day polishing up the pages I had written and sent them over. It was a Friday afternoon. By the following Monday, I heard back. He had read my manuscript and wanted to talk on the phone. In the most exciting call of my entire life, I heard the words that I had dreamed of for so long: he wanted to buy my book.
Within 2 weeks, I had signed with an agent (I decided I needed someone to help me navigate an industry I knew nothing about - worth the 15% commission fee), secured a publishing deal with one of the industry’s ‘big 5’ publishers - Hachette, with an award winning imprint - John Murray. I went out for business lunches, and my agent educated me about the hierarchy of who paid for what (when it was just me and my agent, she paid; when my editor was there, then he paid - and I, fortunately, never had to pay). I learnt about understanding contracts, percentages, royalties, and negotiating an advance. I had no idea what the going rate for an advance was (it’s a field that is notoriously murky…) so when my agent came back with what I now know to be a pretty generous offer, especially for a debut with an incomplete manuscript, I thought about what my mum would do (‘if you don’t ask, you don’t get!’) - so I asked my agent to ask for 50% more - and she did, successfully landing us a healthy sum. Sometimes it’s better to be clueless because you’re just that little bit more reckless - with great results.
Even more excitingly, my book was chosen to be the publisher’s lead title for 2020. Being a lead title is a Big Deal: it means that the book gets a higher marketing and publicity budget, and is the priority title for the whole publisher. The major factor was that I was a ‘debut’: the industry loves a debut. And as my editor reminded me: you’re only a debut once - so we want to get it right. We agreed a publishing date for spring 2020, the season when most debut authors are thrown headfirst into the whirlwind of being first-time novelists because it coincides with all the big literary awards: the Costa First Book Prize, the Women’s Prize for Fiction, even the Booker Prize itself. The sense of my publisher’s confidence in me was intoxicating.
Everything looked so rosy. All that was left for me to do was to finish writing the book. As it turns out: the easy bit.
Failure to launch
spring 2020
A lot of life happened in the time between signing my book deal and publication: I got married, we moved to Ethiopia, and of course, I finished the book: Hashim & Family was finally ready to go out into the world.
I worked with a lovely team on all the publicity and marketing who secured my presence at a whole range of prestigious literary festivals, including Edinburgh, Bath and Stratford, as well as lining up a whole host of bookshop events and radio interviews. We sent proofs (advance copies) of the book out for early reviews and I got one, single endorsement that we put on the cover, from the lovely Catherine O’Flynn.
My book launch (a BOOK LAUNCH!) was organised to take place at Belgravia Books on 9 April 2020 - I was flying back to London from Addis Ababa for this glamorous celebration, to which I had invited family, friends, colleagues, and even my old university tutors. But on 23 March, B*ris J*hns*n announced that the whole of the UK would go into lockdown due to the rampage of a mysterious, horrifying disease: coronavirus. Later rebranded as Covid-19, the virus brought the whole world to a screeching halt.
My book launch was cancelled. As were the bookshop events and literary festivals. Nobody knew what was happening, or when things would open up again. And then the UK government declared that most diplomats and their families would be ‘drawn down’ back to the UK for the foreseeable future. Avi and I packed our things and headed back to the UK, with no idea for how long we’d be there, or what situation we were heading into. Because of the quarantine rules, we did not move back in with our parents: instead we rented a tiny cottage in a beautiful Cotswolds village that we called home for several months. It was about as far away as we could imagine from the dusty roads of Addis Ababa with its gridlocked traffic and constant noise.
The book stuff rapidly slid into irrelevance: the world was dealing with a crisis, healthcare workers were dying, we were all masked and forbidden to socialise. There was no vaccination at the time, no known cure. On top of that, I was also pregnant and placed into the ‘vulnerable’ category, meaning that the risk of doing anything felt even greater. The future of my little book didn’t matter when the entire world was in freefall.
But…guiltily, to me it still did.
Like many industries, the world of publishing was thrown into chaos. Employees were placed on furlough meaning that entire teams working on marketing and publicity were slashed. Zoom was still unfamiliar and online events were virtually unheard of. Although my big ticket events were cancelled, there wasn’t time, or the expertise, at the time, to refocus these to a virtual online space at the same scale. Bookshops were closed and there was no opportunity to see my book on the shelves, as I had dreamed about for so long.
But still, there were real glimmers of hope - and as the weeks went by, there were movements of people coming together organically to set up festivals and events. The Stay At Home Literary Festival kindly hosted an event where I was in discussion with Dr Pragya Agarwal whose first book, a non-fiction title, Sway, came out the same week as mine. I still feel so much gratitude to those people who attended those first events, supportive and encouraging, even as the world seemed to be crumbling around us.
Of course, I wasn’t alone in what I was experiencing. Most of my cohort of fellow spring 2020 debut authors also suffered. Books and authors who should have had much more recognition didn’t receive it. Others were blessed by the zeitgeist, and catapulted to success. I’m still in touch with a few of ‘the class of 2020’, some of whom have already brought out second and even third books. But I’m not sure any of us have had an open conversation or acknowledgement about our experience, and the grief we felt about our debut journeys. (As I write this, I am wondering if we should have a relaunch somehow - 5 years on, a very delayed celebration. Watch this space…)
A tranquil retreat
Despite everything, Avi and I were so fortunate to have a very idyllic few months during that first lockdown in the UK. From our sweet stone cottage, Avi worked remotely, and I did bits and pieces of publicity for Hashim & Family where I could, and tried to write articles and short pieces. We had milk delivered to our doorstep in cold glass bottles, the top few inches of which were made up of glorious, thick cream. My main pregnancy craving was milk, and I drank that beautiful farm fresh stuff by the gallon. There was a fish and chip van that pitched up every Friday in the village car park, and Avi went and picked up our fish suppers which we enjoyed after our usual jummah/shabbat Friday night service we did at home together. We went on walks through the countryside, saw red kites soaring overhead, and chatted with locals from a ‘safe distance’ when we were out and about. The weather was beautiful, and I could feel our baby starting to kick - which he did, enthusiastically and often. I had so much to be grateful for.
And yet, far from a sense of achievement, I felt restless, disappointed - even embarrassed. Everything had fallen flat. The promised launch and publicity campaign never quite materialised as we had imagined. I was glued to my laptop, seeing reviews appear on Goodreads and Amazon week by week. Obviously, I read each one, most of them thoughtful and generous with their stars - but fixated on the one and only 1 star review I got from a charmer by the name of ‘Ronald English’.
The real kicker was the first major review I got in print. The Irish Times printed a review by Lucy Sweeney Byrne that described my book as ‘a perfectly fine book that delivers nothing new’. It was accompanied by an unnecessarily large photo of me that made it feel even more personal. I was mortified. And then enraged. I lay awake at night concocting revenge fantasies where I would encounter her at an event (ironically, we shared the same agent at the time) and confront her. In real life, I didn’t tell anyone about the review except a few close people - I was too ashamed.
Five years on, I recently re-read the review in preparation for writing this newsletter and it made me cackle. Maybe one day I’ll print it out and frame it and defiantly hang it in the downstairs guest loo. In it, LSB draws parallels between two of my main characters, Helen and Rofikul, as being like Bridget Jones and Daniel Cleaver - an assertion as hilarious as it is mind boggling. (Less amusing was the criticism that the book ‘disregards the very real contrasts in the thought patterns and ethical constructs of different national identities’ - a bit of a dodgy take, to declare that thoughts and ethics fundamentally differ between nationalities: I think there’s a word for that…) On the plus side, the whole episode resulted in solidarity from other authors who I didn’t even know personally who had caught the review and were outraged. I realised that there are gems in the industry too, and that while reviews come and go, community is for keeps.
The power of community
As the world outside seemed to shrink, the desire to forge and maintain personal connections expanded. It started slowly, and then gradually gained momentum. Readers from all over the world uploaded and tagged me in photos of the book in far-flung places: from Malmö to Melbourne to Manchester, which brought about its own Instagram hashtag: #HashimAroundTheWorld
And opportunities to promote my book came about through real personal connections. I was invited to take part in online book festivals, including the South Asian Literature Festival, and Ilkley Literature Festival where I was interviewed by the Keighley lad, playwright and BBC radio presenter, Nick Ahad. I recorded a podcast with my former tutor, Dr Emma Smith, of Hertford College, Oxford. I was featured on BBC Front Row via a recommendation from a journalist friend who knew the producer. I appeared on various BBC local radio stations and the Asian network, again, through recommendations from presenters and producers who really wanted to champion my work. My publicist secured my first piece for the Observer Food Monthly which came out in July with the striking cover of a waitress wearing a mask.
The Guardian’s Not the Booker Prize is famously chosen through a public vote, and I was incredibly moved to have Hashim & Family shortlisted through this act of people power and incredible, loyal supporters. In fact, the popular love for the book led Stylist magazine to declare that ‘Hashim & Family has won an army of ardent readers’ (a quote we promptly slapped on the paperback cover). In the months that followed, favourable reviews appeared in publications like The Times and the Guardian, and Hashim was even declared one of the Observer’s Best Books of 2020.
But none of these much longed for endorsements compared to a message I received on Instagram from a young British-Bangladeshi man who reached out to tell me that Hashim & Family was the first book he had ‘ever willingly read’.
‘I didn't know I could feel such emotions from writing.’ He wrote to me on Instagram.
It meant the world. Buoyed by this, I started keeping a Word document of the lovely things people wrote to me about Hashim & Family - emails from strangers from the USA, Australia, Indian, Bangladesh and beyond. I took part in virtual book clubs with readers who had gathered to read and discuss *my* writing(!): from a group of new mums based in Scotland, to a Muslim-Jewish interfaith group, to a vibrant and chatty group of American ladies who kindly made and sent me Hashim & Family themed crafts including a miniature fridge magnet and keyring!
My editor promised me that a book always finds its readers…I was relieved to find that he was right.
A very welcome distraction
late 2020
As we all know now, the pandemic and lockdown continued into autumn and winter of 2020. It was a long time before I was able to see my book ‘in the wild’ on shelves in actual bookshops.
I gave birth to my son in ‘covid conditions’ - everyone masked, no visitors. We stayed in the UK until he was four months old, when we finally moved back to Ethiopia. Parenthood, unsurprisingly, shifted my priorities completely. While I still did online book clubs and events, and appeared on virtual discussion panels, whenever I could, my work was no longer the only, or even the main, focus of my day. I granted myself a year of ‘maternity leave’, where I would not force myself to write - but if I did, it would be a bonus. I threw myself instead into raising our baby…marvelling at his chubby knees and gurgling laugh, and despairing over his refusal to take naps. Happily, in between bleary stretches of sleep deprivation when I felt stretched to my absolute limit, came moments of inspiration: episodes where I felt that my writing was enriched by this transition from just ‘writer’ to ‘writing mother’.
And I understood things in a bit more perspective now. It’s a bit like with babies: although your book is the most important thing in your life, it really isn’t the most important thing in anyone else’s. Not even your agent, or editor, or publicist: as much as they care, they also have other authors and books that they are working on and championing. This isn’t a criticism, but it is a reality check.
In February 2021, Hashim was published in paperback with a new cover that I absolutely adored. The next chapter in what I hoped would continue to be a long and fruitful writing career.
Let’s go round again…
Writing and getting published is a bit like having a baby. What is this amnesia that kicks in to make us do it all over again? Why put yourself through all of the pain and anguish? Ah yes…because it’s really, really worth it.
There are so many things that I have learned, areas in which I’ve gained confidence, knowledge, and purpose. Which is why, in time, I was ready to do this all over again. The next installment will talk about exactly that: how it feels to be doing this the second time around. And why it’s really, really, worth it.
Join me next week for Part 2 of The Most Honest Newsletter I Have Ever Written.
Thank for reading,
Shahnaz x
Thank you for mentioning our little book club and the crafts that Mary Catherine made! The vibrant & chatty ladies will be thrilled.
I cannot wait for the book club meet of Jackfruit Chronicles!
Beautifully expressed.