花季传媒

If one word describes Chris White鈥檚 journey from writer to published author, it鈥檚 鈥減erseverance.鈥�

鈥淧erseverance,鈥� she said, 鈥渋s all. 鈥� So much of it is sticking with it, and believing in it, believing in the project even during those hard times.鈥�

White, a 花季传媒 professor of English, is the author of 鈥淭he Life List of Adrian Mandrick,鈥� a novel that she worked on for 15 years before it was published in 2018. 聽

This was after her first agent quit the business and her second decided her manuscript wasn鈥檛 sufficiently commercial.聽

鈥淚 had just given up on it, honestly,鈥� she said. 鈥淚 was lying in bed one night and I said, 鈥榊ou know what? I think you may need to accept that this isn鈥檛 going to happen. How are you going to do that? How are you going to emotionally position yourself to accept that?鈥� And it was probably two days later that my agent said, 鈥榶es, Simon & Schuster wants the book.鈥欌��

Or maybe the watchword is 鈥渞esearch.鈥� Hundreds of hours. 鈥淩esearch was paramount,鈥� White said. 鈥�... Research isn鈥檛 just for getting things right. It鈥檚 also a generative process. You can get actual direction in your plot or reveal things about your character or characters or location that changes plot 鈥� things that you never would find otherwise. 鈥�

鈥淚 found my best research often happens talking to people,鈥� who 鈥渞eally want to talk about what they know.鈥� Because her protagonist is an avid bird-watcher, she spoke to a dozen top birders, two of them repeatedly. Doctors helped her understand anesthesiology, her main character鈥檚 occupation. She researched locations, opioid addiction and Army Rangers.聽聽

Or perhaps the right word is 鈥渞evision.鈥� In the book鈥檚 early iterations, its style was more lyrical and experimental; the prose included journal entries about body parts and marriage.

White鈥檚 own learning and inclination, as well as suggestions from agents and other readers, led to substantial revisions. Adrian had been the antagonist, switched after novelist Robert Boswell, at 花季传媒 for the Kelly Writers Series, read the manuscript and told White 鈥測ou just have to admit it; he has taken over the whole book.鈥� Boswell also pointed out that 鈥渟ome of the best stuff in your book 鈥� has got to go.鈥�

Said White: 鈥淚 sent him a bottle of scotch and then started rewriting again. 鈥� It鈥檚 probably inconceivable for people who maybe haven鈥檛 gone through that process to imagine how much revision was involved.鈥� She estimated she wrote 50 drafts.

鈥淚 really love the revision process; I genuinely do,鈥� said White, who is working on her second novel. 鈥淭he painful part for me, really, is writing the initial drafts. Once you have something, it鈥檚 fun to mess with it and try to get it right.鈥�