I’m Back! The Writer in Me Is Back With a Book Pitch

By Barbara Falconer Newhall

It’s time. No, it’s past time for me to get busy and write something. Friends and family know all too well that I finally reached late adolescence a year or so ago, as evidenced by the fact that I finally came down with mono. Yes, mono. Apparently, it’s never too late the kiss the wrong (right?) person.

Mononucleosis and a Three-Story Ranch House

My infectious disease specialist can’t tell me whether I caught the Epstein-Barr virus while hanging out with the toddlers at our granddaughter’s day care center. Or whether the Getting Older Gang on a Viking cruise up the Douro River in Portugal was at fault. Cruise ships, she said, have a lot in common with college dormitories. You get up close with way too many people, increasing your chances of snagging a nasty virus.

Which I did.

The mono has had my  attention for months now, but so has an ambitious remodel at our house. We are planning to take our hillside mid-century-ranch-in-three-stories  into the 21st century with a master suite bathroom: Double sinks, a  shower (with bench and shampoo niche, of course). And a soaking tub with a 180-degree view of our glorious cypress tree.

[Note: Since this writing, our remodel project has been trimmed down to replacing our deck, adding a skylight and removing the wall between the kitchen and dining room. The new master bath will have to wait a while.]

Getting That Book Pitch Ready

But that’s not what I sat down to write about here. I sat down to write that I’m back. Writer me is back!

The San Francisco chapter of the Women’s National Book Association staged its annual Pitch-O-Rama on Saturday, and I was there. Pitch in hand, if not quite at the tip of my tongue, I took my next book project public to agents and book publishers. The book is still a year or so from being ready to submit, but I wanted to get some feedback now, so I can make any course corrections as I go along.

Here’s my book pitch, minus the ums and ahs and you knows I threw in for the Pitch-O-Rama book pitch takers.

My next book is a collection of personal essays gleaned from the weekly columns I wrote for the Oakland Tribune from 1989-1992. The essays are short and pithy, averaging about 740 words each, enough to make a book of 50,000 to 80,000 words, depending on how many essays are chosen.

In the vein of Erma Bombeck meets Nora Ephron [Anne Lamott? I can’t decide. You tell me], the essays limn a Second Wave feminist’s sometimes poignant, sometime humorous attempts at juggling family, career and conscience in a time of disorienting change for women. Many of the essays are nostalgic journeys back in time. Others could have been written this week. All will resonate with mothers of all ages — from Baby Boomers to Millennials, who will get the references to “Little Mermaid” and “Legend of Zelda.” The essays are linked to each other and to the present by short introductions and/or epilogues. Publishers might consider this book a Mother’s Day release.

If you like the posts on this blog, you’ll like this book. I hope. Readers who liked my “Wrestling with God: Stories of Doubt and Faith,” might wonder what I did with the God topic. God shows up in these essays, but very modestly; the columns were written for a secular newspaper, don’t forget. Instead of God, the heroes of this new book will be son Peter, daughter Christina and husband Jon, three people who threw a lot of great lines and writable crises at me back in 1990.

Let Me Hear Your Thoughts

More to come. As always, share your thoughts in the comments below. I need them. They will help the reawakened writer in me get this book finished and out the door.

More posts about the writing life at “John Donne: A Love Affair with a Poet Long Dead” and a Kirkus Review of  “Wrestling with God.”