I Turned in My Book Manuscript!

Wonderful friends, ice cream, and writerly celebrations

I wrote my first book over ten years ago. When I turned it into my editor, my husband came into the room and said, “you did it! We should celebrate!” And I promptly started to weep. Bless the hearts of the partners of writers.

I don’t even remember what it felt like to turn in my second book. I worked on it piece by piece, submitting short portions of the manuscript to my writing coach and editor, so I didn’t have the experience of turning in half or the entire manuscript at once. I probably still cried a little bit.

Last month I turned in the last half of my manuscript for my next book, having turned in the first half last fall. It felt momentous turning in the second half, like after all this writing and facing my insecurities and wondering why I did this to myself and laughing out loud at some of the stories I was writing for the book, I’d finally finished the whole book. A whole first draft.

This book is especially emotional to me because it will be my first book outside of Christian publishing. After publishing two books with very little support. After my Christian literary agent broke up with me because I was getting too “progressive.” After I started working with my new agent and couldn’t get a book idea together to save my life. After I called my new agent crying because I couldn’t figure out what I wanted to write about and when I’d have capacity to write it.

My literary agent listened to me blubber for a while and when I was quiet, she said, “I don’t want you to work on the book right now. Don’t force it. Take care of yourself. Heal. Rest. The book will arrive when it’s ready.” So I did. I rested. I healed. I wrote on someone else’s book project (which I can’t tell you too much about because NDA NDA NDA).

The person I was working with was hilarious and bold and unapologetically themselves. We worked on an early draft of a book project that never saw the light of day. But something about working on that project helped me return to my own voice. Helped me to find my funny. Helped me to see the freedom in writing a story just because not because it had to have a sermon at the end or because it had to include church small group questions.

I took some of my favorite poems that I’d written. My agent encouraged me to write some essays in between so I sat at my computer and thought about all the things I’d always wanted to say but didn’t feel like I could. I wrote and when I wrote it felt like playing and writing hadn’t felt like playing to me for years. I sent this writing to my agent and the book had arrived.

Book writing is hard. It makes me cuss and eat brownies and have various mini existential crises. But I also had fun writing this book. It made me laugh. It made me cry. It made me smile. It made me so damn proud of myself for taking this current slice of who I am and reflecting her the best I could in these pages. It brought me joy to think about writing something that would bring joy to Black women as they read it.

I turned in my manuscript on a Friday and invited my friends to hang out with me at an event other friends were hosting. We ate tacos and sang and rapped the lyrics to our favorite songs and my friends hugged me and told me they were proud of me and I smiled until my cheeks hurt. My husband brought me donuts and we went to Jeni’s and ate ice cream.

It will soon be time for me to start working on the next draft of this book manuscript. Carbs and identity crises will await me. But I am being ME in this book. Fully me! And that is some good shit to celebrate. I can’t wait for y’all to read it!

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UPCOMING ATL SHOW: I’m working out some of my new poems and stories at Eddie’s Attic on Sunday 4/13. Get your tix here: https://eddiesattic.com/event/amena-brown/.

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I’m watching…90 Day Fiancé The Last Resort…GASP!

I’m reading…How We Do it: Black Writers on Craft, Practice, and Skill edited by Jericho Brown

Feeling inspired by…docuseries Number One on the Call Sheet

Shoutout to…SPRIIIIIING

Things I’m working on…my new set for my poetry show!