April 28, 2025 • 42 mins
Welcome, writers and book lovers. The Bleeders is a podcast about book writing and publishing. Make sure you subscribe to the companion Substack: https://thebleeders.substack.com/welcome
Today's guest is Elle Nash, author of Animals Eat Each Other, Nudes, Gag Reflex, and Deliver Me. This episode is an interesting peek into Elle's creative process as we talk through her body of work, the North star of writing to your taste, developing her voice alongside her editing chops, how she landed the coolest agent ever, and more. Follow Elle on Instagram @saderotic.
The Bleeders is hosted by Courtney Kocak. Follow her on Instagram @courtneykocak and Bluesky @courtneykocak.bsky.social. For more, check out her website courtneykocak.com.
Courtney is teaching some upcoming workshops you might be interested in:
Today's guest is Elle Nash, author of Animals Eat Each Other, Nudes, Gag Reflex, and Deliver Me. This episode is an interesting peek into Elle's creative process as we talk through her body of work, the North star of writing to your taste, developing her voice alongside her editing chops, how she landed the coolest agent ever, and more. Follow Elle on Instagram @saderotic.
The Bleeders is hosted by Courtney Kocak. Follow her on Instagram @courtneykocak and Bluesky @courtneykocak.bsky.social. For more, check out her website courtneykocak.com.
Courtney is teaching some upcoming workshops you might be interested in:
- Land Big Bylines by Writing for Columns: https://writingworkshops.com/products/land-big-bylines-by-writing-for-columns-zoom-seminar
- The Multi-Passionate Writer's Life: https://writingworkshops.com/products/the-multi-passionate-writers-life-zoom-seminar-with-courtney-kocak
- How to Build a “Platform” for Writers Who Shudder at the Thought: https://writingworkshops.com/products/how-to-build-a-platform-for-writers-who-shudder-at-the-thought-zoom-seminar
- Creating Your Podcast: https://www.roadmapwriters.com/products/creating-your-podcast-0
- Podcasting for Writers: How to Start, Sustain & Grow Your Podcast: https://writingworkshops.com/products/podcasting-for-writers-how-to-start-sustain-grow-your-podcast-4-week-zoom-workshop
- Start a Newsletter to Supercharge Your Platform, Network and Business: https://writingworkshops.com/products/start-a-newsletter-to-supercharge-your-platform-network-business-zoom-seminar
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
I think it really is just like I'm writing to
my taste. I'm writing about like women that I'm interested
in and experiences that I'm interested in, reading about things
I see, things I want to see, like represent emotions
and atmospheres that I can't stop thinking about.
Speaker 2 (00:22):
That's today's guest, Elle Nash. I stand any artist who
allows their taste to guide them. I mean it should
go without saying, but that's not always the case. Elle
has a super strong voice and aesthetic that I can
note with her writing, and it was fascinating to hear
how she developed that alongside her editing jobs.
Speaker 1 (00:42):
It really was just kind of like me on my
own trying to figure it out and figure out the structure.
And I did a big editing process. I would like
make note cards for each chapter, trying to make sense
of it, print it out, try and move stuff around
in the way that I needed, and then even like
editing it for backwards to the front, like starting with
(01:03):
the last chapter and working backwards to make sure that
everything made sense and that fun of thing.
Speaker 2 (01:08):
This episode is such an interesting peek into ELL's creative process,
and it's really inspiring to hear how she learned about
craft through generative work, one on one mentorships, and writing workshops.
Plus she landed like the coolest agent ever. All that
and more in today's episode, There's nothing to writing. All
(01:30):
you do is sit down at a typewriter and bleed.
Welcome to the Bleaders, a podcast and support group about
book writing and publishing. I'm writer and podcaster Courtney Cosak,
and each week I'll bring you new conversations with authors, agents,
(01:52):
and publishers about how to write and sell books.
Speaker 1 (02:02):
Hi, I'm al Mash. I'm the author of Animals, Eat
each Other, Nudes and Gag Reflex, and I'm the editor
of Witchcraft Magazine.
Speaker 2 (02:10):
So when did you first identify as a writer.
Speaker 1 (02:14):
I like wrote stories when I was in like middle
school and that kind of thing. Like I remember like
getting a little Dolphin journal and like wanting to write
a novel about a dolphin or something like that when
I was really little. I don't still have that. I
wish they did. But I didn't seriously start considering myself
(02:35):
a writer until I was in high school and I
was like discovering poetry, and I think that's when I
was like, this is like really what I want to be?
Is I want to do this somehow, or I wanted
to be like an artist of some sort.
Speaker 2 (02:47):
Did you think it was possible, like to be a
working writer?
Speaker 1 (02:51):
No, I actually, like I had no understanding of how
that worked at all, even though like I had writers
that I knew and admired, I don't think I like
got that part of it, because even through college, when
I was writing prose and that kind of thing, I
never wrote fiction, even though I loved it very much.
It wasn't until about I think in twenty twelve or
(03:12):
twenty thirteen, I started wanting to try and write a
sci fi novel, and like that ever happened. And then
I took a writing workshop with Tom Stanbauer later that
year in twenty thirteen, and it was there that like
people were talking about like literary journals and like independent
publishers and like agents and that kind of thing, and
I think that's for me. When I was like, oh,
(03:35):
like that's what you do, like you get published. And
when I was like, you get published in literary magazines,
something clicked for me. I was like, I didn't even
know that you could do this. But I was like
twenty six or something. I hadn't even thought about it.
So that was when when I like learned that could happen.
That's when I was like, Okay, this is what I
want to do, Like I want to figure out like
(03:55):
how to get published.
Speaker 2 (03:57):
And you did soon after. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (03:59):
Yeah. It was actually through taking Chloe's class, Chloe Copple's
class that I think we took that together. Did we?
Were you with Amanda?
Speaker 2 (04:09):
I have taken like three classes with Amanda and I've
taken from Chloe. Yeah, like three or four times. She's
the best.
Speaker 1 (04:15):
Yeah. I think the first one I took with her
with Amanda, I think you were in that and that's
where me and Amanda met.
Speaker 2 (04:22):
Oh funny.
Speaker 1 (04:23):
Yeah, And seeing like what Chloe did and what she
could do with her career, that's where I was like,
I was seeing what she was doing and I was like,
I'm going to figure out how to do that.
Speaker 2 (04:32):
Oh, I love it. Okay, we're going to get more
into this. What's your all time favorite book?
Speaker 1 (04:38):
I don't know, Well, it's so hard. They always change
based on like different things. Darryl by Jackie s is
like one of the best books I've read in the
last like five years.
Speaker 2 (04:49):
What's that book about?
Speaker 1 (04:50):
It's about a guy who's a cook and his experience
and living in the Pacific Northwest being a cock with
his BG. It's really good. It's amazing, incredible. It's just
written so well and it's funny and it's heartwarming and
I don't know, I just loved it. It was good,
Like the pace of it is good, at the voice
(05:11):
of it is like incredible. So yeah, nice, that's a
good one.
Speaker 2 (05:15):
Yeah, I gotta check that out. It fits within like
what I would think you would love. So that's funny.
Speaker 1 (05:22):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (05:23):
What is your dream writing routine if you could pick?
Speaker 1 (05:28):
I think if I could do it, I would wake
up at four am in the morning, and I would
work until like six or seven and then have like
get my daughter ready for school and then have my
work day, you know, and kind of do it in
the morning. I've always worked better in the morning and
then and maybe some evenings do writing, but then some
(05:51):
evenings like not do that, like actually live my life.
Speaker 2 (05:54):
You know, what do you wind up doing? What's the
real writing routine?
Speaker 1 (05:59):
So for a long time I was writing every day,
but because I just moved and I've been getting sick
a lot because my daughter is on daycare now, I
just try to get enough sleep at night, and then
I'll wake up at five, and sometimes I will do
a little bit of work. I usually tell myself like
even ten minutes is okay, Like every ten minutes does something,
no matter what it is, like writing worldwise, even though
(06:20):
it's like editing something or doing stuff for my literary
magazine or that kind of thing. And then I just, yeah,
get ready for work, get my daughter ready for school,
take her to school, go to work, come home, do
house stuff, that kind of thing. And my husband just
left to go back to the States for like half
(06:40):
a year, so now I kind of like do have
that free evening time where I'll be able to I
think like focus more.
Speaker 2 (06:46):
I have always been bad at maintaining a writing practice,
but I started doing this thing. It's called like seven
hundred and fifty words dot com or seven hundred and
fifty words dot net or whatever, and you just write
it there. And for some reason, I've done it every
day since I started, for like nice a month. But
it's just the little you get a check mark, you know,
(07:08):
it's just a plain text thing. So I copy it
over into my manuscript. But I'm like, I don't know,
it's attainable. I think that's the good thing about it.
Speaker 1 (07:17):
Yeah, you built up a momentum too, Like there was
a long period of time where I was had like
I built up a momentum after my daughter was born
for a period of about three years, and then like
twenty twenty hit and then it was like I was
obsessively working just a lot, Like I finished like three
manuscripts that year. But then it was after that I
(07:37):
just got burnt out, and I've I've been in this
weird phase where I'm like, I'm not doing it every day?
Am I okay with that? I don't know how I
feel about it. If it changes anything about like my
identity or like making me worry or question myself.
Speaker 2 (07:52):
I think that's part of it too though, right, Yeah,
the ebbs and flows, that's.
Speaker 1 (07:57):
What I've heard. That's what I've heard from people who
have been writting along with me. Whether like it ebbs
and flows just like everything. So I'm like, Okay, well,
I guess I'm just not going to freak out about
it then, but I am slightly freaking out about it
a little bit.
Speaker 2 (08:11):
What is one piece of writing that makes you jealous
you didn't write it?
Speaker 1 (08:17):
I like I love feeling jealous of writing in a
way because I think part of it is because, like
from editing, if I read something and I was like,
oh man, I wish i'd written this, then I would
publish it Like that was kind of my barometer for it.
So it's hard to like have like one piece because
there's a lot. There's a lot of good writing out there,
(08:38):
but I can't think of any one thing, like, in particular.
Speaker 2 (08:42):
What's one thing that you have edited that you were like, damn,
I gotta publish this.
Speaker 1 (08:48):
There is this short story that Nikolav Mee Goldberg wrote
that I published in a Witchcraft. It's like a retelling
of Bluebeard. But the last line of the story is
There's nothing more beautiful than a girl. And I always
like wish I had written that. It's so good. It's
good for a last line.
Speaker 2 (09:05):
Yeah, okay, Yeah, it's a good one. Okay. So let's
get in to your whole body of work. So since
you were twenty six, it's like most of your adulthood.
Where how did you get from twenty thirteen? Of like, ah, yes,
(09:27):
I can literary journals. I sort of understand how this
world works. To animals eat each other, which was write
your first book in twenty seventeen.
Speaker 1 (09:38):
So I was doing every single workshop that I could
find because I was like, and my face were just expensive,
Like they were just out of reach for me. Like
I was like, there's no I'm going to be able
to do this. I did try, like one year after
I was like finishing with animals, but then yeah, I
was like I only applied to like three schools that
(09:59):
were fully funded. I was like, if it doesn't happen,
it doesn't happen, you know. But I was just taking
every workshop I could find that I wanted to take.
I was taking this one workshop with rape urand she's
a poet and it's like six month workshop and it's
literally just generative. It's not necessarily about learning, it's just
about committing for six months to have pages every month. Yeah,
(10:19):
and I wrote this short story in there. And then
I started working again with Tom Spanbauer, where I owed
him like twenty pages every two weeks, and we did
that with the short story, and what started happening was
he was like, you have like all this stuff that
you need to expand on, that you should be expanding on,
And so I started doing that until really like we
(10:43):
did that together for like two years, Like I would
just meet with him and then he would talk to
me about the war, like he would read it aloud
and we'd talk about the work and what's missing and
like what it needed. And then it was during that
time I was getting some stuff like some shorts stories
published and like meeting people, and I'd had someone reach
(11:05):
out to me and ask me like what I was
working on, and he ended up passing the manuscript to
someone at DESANC. So I got really lucky in that
it was like not one hundred percent finished, but it
was like there almost that like almost. I think it
never happens. Maybe in the indie world, I think happens
a lot more. So that was basically like it like
they were just like, yeah, like let's publish this. This
(11:26):
seems good, so amazing. So that happened. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (11:31):
So for listeners, what's the premise of animals eat each other?
Speaker 1 (11:35):
The most basic promise I can tell you is that
a nineteen year old narrator falls in love with a
couple who has a kid, She starts dating them, and
it essentially like ends up just as badly as you
think it might.
Speaker 2 (11:49):
Yep, so did you do a big editing process or
were they like more minor two weeks.
Speaker 1 (12:00):
So the thing that happened was that the book got bought,
like I signed my contract. Then the editor like disappeared
for a long time. And during that process, I was
working on other stuff, and then I moved to Arkansas,
and then there was a new editor. All of a sudden,
I guess like the previous editor in chief just had
(12:21):
to step down because like things were too much, like
there was too much going on, and it's like like
he had other personal stuff going on. He was stepping down.
So a new editor chief came in and she's really great,
but like she also wasn't the acquiring editor, and she
didn't have a lot to say about editing the book,
just kind of like minor things here and there, and
there was stuff that I knew that I needed to
(12:42):
do to complete it. So it really was just kind
of like me on my own trying to figure it
out and figure out the structure. And I did a
big editing process. I would like make note cards for
each chapter trying to make sense of it, printed out,
try and move stuff around in the way that I needed,
and then even like edit it from backwards to the front,
(13:03):
like starting with the last chapter, working backwards to make
sure that everything made sense and that kind of thing.
And I was just kind of doing that all on
my own, and then the editor in chief did like
a basic like copy edit, and so that really was
that process. So it was not that intensive, like as
far as that goes.
Speaker 2 (13:22):
It's kind of nice to get that much freedom though,
And like you're an editor, right, don't you do that
for you know, professionally, And so when you're approaching a
rewrite or an edit, what are you doing to like
diagnose what's wrong? And do you have any like tips
(13:42):
for going in and doing like when you need to
do a big overhaul.
Speaker 1 (13:45):
Yeah, editing your own work is so difficult because you're
already inside of it. I even think, like psychologically, like
there's a thing where the story is already in your head.
So you're going to be more likely to miss things
that aren't complete in the story because your brain already
has a full pick sure of it. It's not going
to like sometimes miss like the pockets, you know. But
it's really I don't want to say easy, but to
(14:08):
edit for style, what you can do is like you
have to be really hard on yourself about sound. Like
if you read something that you're writing and like there's
just something in your head that's like I am not
quite satisfied with it, then like you can't let go
of it, Like you have to have a discipline to
keep working on and like not let go of it.
And that's the part that can become really difficult because
(14:30):
that can be really time consuming in a way.
Speaker 2 (14:33):
Mm hm.
Speaker 1 (14:34):
So I could think that's one way I go into
it is just like it's a feel like if it
doesn't like if you are reading your own stuff, if
you feel bored with something that you're reading, it's yours,
Like when you're going through something like with a novel,
it's going to be boring to someone else. So it's
really just about trying to be really sensitive to like
how you feel about the thing, Like when you're writing it.
Speaker 2 (14:54):
What about first structure, Like when you're like, oh, there's
something about this structure format that's like not working. Is
there anything special you do in that case?
Speaker 1 (15:05):
So I've like gone through writing novels a couple of
different ways, but for animals, because I didn't know what
I was doing, Like I was like, I don't know
how to write, Like I don't even know like basic
elements of fiction when I was writing, like in the
traditional sense, like I was like, what is a plot like?
Or like you know what I mean, like those kinds
of things, like what is the three X structure? I
(15:27):
don't know what that stuff is. I was never taught
that kind of stuff. But I think just in terms
of like having the scenes like make logical sense, one
thing I did was they did just like write out
scenes and chapters on note cards, and that kind of
helped me organize it in my mind. So that way
I could like look at it just the basic scenes
(15:47):
right and see that that made sense. And I've also
done that with the novel that comes out next year,
where not with note cards, but I had like this
little sheet of like tracking each scene, what happens in
if anything changes, like if there's emotional residence in it,
in that kind of thing.
Speaker 2 (16:06):
Yeah, it's kind of like when I maybe have more
experienced writing screenplays, but like when you distill it back
to an outline version. If you've written a draft and
some things have changed and then you go back and
you like make an outline of that, A lot of
times you can use that to you know, this scene
is not active or like you can tell when you
(16:26):
distill it down what's wrong in a way. Yeah, okay,
So then Nudes was next. And what's the premise of Nuds.
Speaker 1 (16:44):
Yeah, it's a short stories that I wrote that I've
been writing since like twenty fourteen, but a lot of
like I mean just I think it's yeah, from twenty
fourteen to twenty twenty when the book came out. It's
just like a collection of like the stuff that I
like the most, I think fit together, like really, well.
Speaker 2 (17:03):
When did it sort of like become cohesive as a
book idea?
Speaker 1 (17:08):
I had like wanted to put together some kind of
collection since like Animals had come out, but like I'd
gotten an agent, and my agent was like, short story
collections don't sell, and so in my head I was like, well,
like okay, then you know, like but I like short stories,
so I want to figure out what I can do.
(17:29):
And like Ray, before my daughter was born, I had
done this little chat book called a Voca of just
like little vignettes of living in the American South or
the Ozarks or whatever you want to call it. And
so I kind of was like going from there, I
was like, why have these little vignettes? I have older stuff.
And I think it was when Elizabeth Allen, who like
(17:49):
I was already friends with, was like, I really want to, like,
you know, publish something of yours if you want to
send me something, and so I was like, okay, then
I want to do a collection, Like this is what
I want to do when I want to pull together something.
And it was then that I think I started working
more seriously on having like I don't know know, I
was just kind of like writing stories at the time,
(18:11):
like my baby was born and then I was like
obsessive about writing stuff. So I was like trying to
work on the stories. I'd finished the first draft of
a novel and I was tired of it. So I
wanted to get do something else that was more distracting,
and so I started working on trying to flesh out
these vignettes and these ideals and stuff that I had
in my head. And like, yeah, I just wanted to
(18:31):
like look together that way.
Speaker 2 (18:34):
It has such a strong esthetic, and like was that
always part of the vision from the beginning or did
that kind of like develop over time.
Speaker 1 (18:44):
I think it just developed over time. I think it
really is just like I'm writing to my taste. I'm
writing about like women that I'm interested in and experiences
that I'm interested in, reading about things I see, things
I want to see, like representa emotions and atmospheres that
I can't stop thinking about. And I think it works
(19:05):
together because it's like from my head, you know what
I mean.
Speaker 2 (19:11):
Elizabeth Ellen keeps coming up on the podcast, and she
has been behind like a lot of my favorite books,
So I'm just kind of curious what it's like, like
the process of working with her and things that you
gleaned from working with her.
Speaker 1 (19:27):
I honestly like don't even know how to describe it.
She just has so much wisdom in terms of darkness
and edginess and knowing what makes something good. I don't know.
She also was really good at like pulling me back,
Like I think I have a tendency to go all
out with like descriptions, or sometimes I will just have
a lot of exposition in a story like that's one
(19:48):
of my bad writer habits. It's lots of exposition, and
she knows like how to like pull that back and
say like less is more with me, And she's just
she's got a brilliant, Like she doesn't really use social media.
She doesn't have a smartphone, she never had that, so
her brain isn't like rotten from like Instagram and that
kind of thing.
Speaker 2 (20:09):
And so.
Speaker 1 (20:11):
I think that the way that she looks at art
and like looks at the world is just something that
is not really common in the writer will stay. So
I think that's one thing I really treasure about it.
I think that, like a lot of social media tends
to cause us to like water down our language and
make things really flat. But yeah, Mary Gateskill just like
had a subsect about that or something which I was like, No,
(20:33):
it makes sense, Like I can see it. Everything good
that I'm reading comes out of.
Speaker 2 (20:37):
In d lit.
Speaker 1 (20:38):
Now I'm trying to remember like the last like really
big mainstream book that I was like obsessed with. Yeah,
atticust Slish At the atticust Slish book that he did
was really good. That is one mainstream book that I
really like.
Speaker 2 (20:54):
So you work just in general, like there are a
lot of interesting kind of formats that you play with
or perspectives or things like that. How do you find
that stuff and kind of decide when to use it
and when to stick with more of a standard structure.
Speaker 1 (21:11):
Oh, like different story formats and that kind of thing.
Speaker 2 (21:14):
Yeah, or like in gag reflux, you know, like live
journal stuff and like putting your calorie counts or just
having it be a different POV or something like that,
Like how do you decide when to employ those techniques?
Speaker 1 (21:28):
I think the biggest the siding factor for me in
how anything is structured comes down to how close you
are to the person's like psychic experience. So like I
think about that term a lot of psychic distance, and it's
like how far away are you from this character? I
sometimes find it really hard to enjoy a third person
because in a lot of third person's stories I tend
(21:50):
to just feel too distant from the narrator or the
character that like I'm reading about, and like I want
to like feel close to them. I want to like
forget that, like I'm a person, I want to be
experiencing this character as close as I can. So I think,
like that's a big thing I think about is when
(22:10):
I'm structuring something, is like how can I make sure
that we are as close as possible to that experience
and that there isn't distance that we're not putting like
obstacles between like reader and like atmosphere or reader and
like experience.
Speaker 2 (22:25):
So some of those things, like the calorie thing or whatever,
is like just a way to be in the head
of the person who's doing it or make it feel
like more of the experience itself.
Speaker 1 (22:37):
Yeah, yeah, Like what is more of an experience of
what it feels like to be obsessed with something than
forcing another person to like read your lists that you're
writing with these numbers that don't really maybe you don't
even matter, and like you have to read through them
again and again and see how they're crossed out again
(22:57):
and again. Like that kind of thing, Like that's what
that experience is. Like, do you feel like it's tedious? Well, congratulations,
that experience is absolutely tedious. So that's kind of like
what I think thinking.
Speaker 2 (23:08):
Yeah, exactly. No. When I saw that part, I was like,
did she publish my calorie journal or what's going on here?
Speaker 1 (23:15):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (23:16):
Because I think a lot of us have been through
that same kind of obsessive tracking and it is totally
neurotic anyway, So what was the nudes then, after you know,
Elizabeth officially bought it, what was the publishing process like
for that and the reaction after.
Speaker 1 (23:36):
It's really great. I honestly feel like I've been so
spoiled as a writer because I've had a lot of
like creative control and freedom over how I want the
stories in the book to be structured, Like I want
them to be in these different sections, right, I get
to decide that, Like I think maybe a bigger publisher
would be like, no, we're going to do like ever
(23:58):
if we think is fast, or we're going to override
this decision or something. I got to have control over
the covers, so her and I brainstormed a bunch of
different ideas and then I ended up taking the photo
for it, and then Chelsea Martin designed it. She's just
a good job the topography on it. I got to
choose the font that is, the headers and the section
(24:21):
breaks and stuff like. I got to have this creatical
control over how the book looks like once done, which
I think is something that's really great about indie publishing.
I think when you're published by a bigger publisher and
you may not always have that control, Like we've heard
about people not liking their covers or like they might
design the book and say like, well, this is the
font we're using this is how we want to lay
it out, you know. So it's nice to have control
(24:42):
over like what the book looks and feels like as
a finished product.
Speaker 2 (24:52):
Okay, so you mentioned you got an agent somewhere along
the line. How did that come about?
Speaker 1 (24:58):
So animals to each other got to start with you
and publishers Weekly, and that's I guess something that's like
they don't really hand out a lot of those per year.
And so when it got that kind of attention, I
had like three different agents just reach out to me
like within the next few days, just saying like what
are you working on? Are you looking for representation? Like
(25:19):
that kind of thing, And I didn't have anything that
was like even close to like have we done at
that point? So, like my one of my biggest pieces
of advice, I guess, like when someone's writing a novel,
is that like continue writing the next one, Because if
you hit that point where the book gets published and
then you have that agent like reach out to you, like,
(25:41):
you kind of probably want to have something ready to
go so that way you can always keep moving forward.
But I did talk with Kent Wolf, who is now
my agent. He sent me on Literary and like, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (25:56):
I showed him with shit, his list is so good that, yeah, And.
Speaker 1 (26:01):
I showed him like why I was working on and
told my ideas and he really liked he really loved it.
And I told him like what my next manuscript, like
what I was planning on doing with it and that
kind of thing, and he loved that. So he did
descent to work with me. Was I'm really grateful for
on that front. So yeah, nice.
Speaker 2 (26:18):
Yeah, okay, So which brings us to gag reflex. Were
you represented going into this book?
Speaker 1 (26:27):
No, because I really only planned for this to be
like I just wanted to be like a little indie thing,
like I kind of wasn't even thinking about it. I
feel like my agent must be so frustrated with me
because Nudes is also not represented. So I put out
two books with him as my agent, and those two
are not like he hasn't represented. They've just been like
(26:47):
little indie things. But the next book is one that
he helped with, which is good that one comes out
next year. But yeah, I just thought it. I just
was like I just want to put out something fun,
like you know when people put out chatbooks and stuff.
That was just kind of how I envisioned it, and
so I even just approached class and I was like,
I have this idea of making it a live journal,
Like I knew I would be able to work with
(27:08):
them to be like, who can you work with it
to literally make this layout look like a live journal,
you know, and they really love the idea, like they
also put out Darryl like they do such a good
job of taking a chance. I'll like experimental work. I mean,
I don't think there's anyway and how like Coment would
have been able to shop this to like Grove Atlantic
or something like that, you know what I mean. So
(27:30):
it was just like a one off thing. Like I
was like, I just want this in the universe and
I want it to be fun.
Speaker 2 (27:34):
So yeah, it's really an interesting concept. So when did
that idea kind of form and how long did the
writing process of it take and how much were you
like repurposing that you already had or whatever happened.
Speaker 1 (27:50):
I'd always wanted to write something about eating disorders, but
I didn't know how to tackle it. And then in
twenty nineteen, maybe maybe a little bit later than that,
I was talking to B. R. Yeager, who was the
author of a Magdalatropolis and negative Space, and we both
(28:11):
started talking about live journal, and I was like, I'm
gonna go find mine, and I actually could find mine
all the way back to when I was like thirteen
years old and like just starting out like having this
kind of space on the internet really like I had
aol chat and that kind of stuff before, but I
like was also making Geocity sites and stuff at like
(28:32):
the same time. But like live journal was really the
It was diary Land and live journal. But I had
live journal first, I think, and then diary Land was
like my little poetry repository while I was in high school,
and life journal was less poetry and more like my
personal life and that kind of thing. But I kind
of like just got lost in it, and like we
both were like reading our life journals, like yeah, this
(28:54):
is so like it's so two thousand and five, Like
there's nothing else like that kind of experience. I also
was inspired by nineteen eighty two Janine by Alistair Gray,
which is also one of the most incredible books I've
ever read. I had read that right before COVID started,
actually like a month more month or two like COVID
(29:16):
had started, and I just actually kind of loved the title.
It's so unique and there is like really unique topography
in it too, So I had thought, I was like,
I want to write something that's called gag Reflex two
thousand and five. Look, I kind of want to like
flight that style, but the distribution that clash has. They
had suggested not using the two thousand and five because
(29:38):
they thought that it wouldn't have as much like shelf
shelf life, yeah, shelf appeal or whatever, Yeah, like it
would be more marketable, And I was kind of like,
I don't know, but I was also like, Okay, I
see like what they're saying. I'll just try it, you know.
Speaker 2 (29:57):
So I feel like gag Reflex is so strong on
its own. I like the nostalgia piece of it, but
I get what they were saying too. Yeah, you've mentioned
it a little bit of it. But what's the premise
of gag Reflex?
Speaker 1 (30:10):
So? Gag Reflex is a live journal from a girl's
last semester in high school through summer in which she's
just dealing with an eating disorder and kind of trying
to unravel like sort of the root of that suffering
on her own in a way.
Speaker 2 (30:31):
And then how big of an edit did you do
with Clash.
Speaker 1 (30:35):
I'm trying to think it wasn't like too intense, But
Christoph had really good things to say in terms of
like if he thought something was missing, or in terms
of like the pacing and that kind of thing. Like
there wasn't a ton of editing that he did on
voice because I just I did like a pretty thorough
calm of that like several times through. But he would
(30:56):
be like, this post feels like it. He's feel like
we need to have a different kind of post after
the spread and the rhythm and stuff, And so that
was something that I worked on with him. And then
just making sure every single detail was correct was like
really a task. Like the layout has to be correct
because it's all hand laid out. It's not like it's
like a template with a master page. It's literally like
(31:18):
every page is unique, and you have to make sure
the time stamps are correct, and you have to make
sure that the way the music is laid out is the
same and all that kind of stuff, like it all
has to chronologically make sense. So that was a process. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (31:33):
Yeah, And then you mentioned that you have upcoming another book,
but is it deliver me? Is that the one I
saw that on your.
Speaker 1 (31:41):
Website that comes out next October.
Speaker 2 (31:43):
What's that one about?
Speaker 1 (31:47):
So, I'm like trying to think of a way to
succinctly talk about it.
Speaker 2 (31:52):
You haven't had to start a pitching it yet.
Speaker 1 (31:55):
Well, I just don't want to like give away the
story to it.
Speaker 2 (31:57):
Yea, Yeah, whatever you have to say.
Speaker 1 (31:59):
It's a little bit of a thriller. It's like kind
of like thriller slash body core. So this girl is
basically an ex evangelical, Like she grew up in the
United Pentecostal church and she works at a chicken factory
and she wants really badly to have a baby, but
(32:22):
she can't get pregnant. And during this time, her former
best friend moves back to town, whom she was also
kind of in love with, and so it's kind of
about her being with her boyfriend and trying to like
hold onto him and then also like contending with her
obsession with her best friend who is pregnant, and then
(32:45):
she ends up faking her pregnancy as well. So it's
kind of just about the poll between like those characters
in that experience.
Speaker 2 (32:55):
Interesting, Yeah, when did you get the idea? I love
that you you have like a certain working class sensibility
that doesn't always get repped as a girl from a
small town in Minnesota. So where did you get the
idea for that? And like are you done? Where are
(33:15):
you at in the process.
Speaker 1 (33:17):
So in twenty fifteen, there was a really horrific crime
in the city I was living in. That's like a
really fringed crime, and I was like, I cannot stop
thinking about this story. Like I was just obsessed with
it and like kind of just like being inspired by
(33:38):
living in the Ozarks in a way, there's something really
special about Arkansas. Like I really did love living there.
I would never live in Little Rock, but like Northwest
Arkansas was like perfect. It's like a little gem of
a place that people are wonderful. The weather it's like
beautiful that kind of thing. There's never really any bad tornadoes.
It's like it's just on the outside of Brinato Alley.
(34:00):
And I was so I just love living there, like
so much. So I think that was really where both
of those things kind of like coalesced. And it was
like right after having my baby, I was like trying
to write this. I was actually trying to write a
story about this girl and like dealing with eating disorders,
and I was like, I can't do this. I was
trying to rewrite it several times. I remember sending it
(34:20):
to Elizabeth and then she was like, I think you've
overwritten this. It doesn't feel as dark and intellectual as
like you normally do. And I was gutted. But I
was like in the fog of like having a newborn
and stuff, so I was like fuck it, like I'm
just gonna write my basic bitch plauted novel. And I
read a book about like how to make a plot,
(34:41):
like how to like do something in a traditional way,
right right? So then yeah, right, So like all those
years later, Elle learns what the fuck a plot is
and like the three x structure and like tries to
write a book. So that was like kind of the
outcome like of that process.
Speaker 2 (34:58):
It doesn't see like a basic bitch book.
Speaker 1 (35:00):
When I finally finished it, I was like, no, this
is actually it is becoming more of like what I
feel like is me, you know, and it isn't done yet.
I'm just doing final edits right now so soon.
Speaker 2 (35:13):
Yeah sounds cool. So you mentioned like the fog of motherhood.
I'm curious how just in whatever way is becoming a
mom has changed your writing for better or worse.
Speaker 1 (35:26):
So how has it changed it? When my daughter was firstborn,
I did it really obsessive and just like wrote as
much as I could all the time. It was really
hard at first because you are kind of in a
brain fog, just like hormone wise, like there's literally nothing
you can do about it. It is. I think it
is absolutely biological, specially like with breastfeeding and stuff, because
(35:48):
this is how the hormones are working in your body.
And then I kind of like came out of that
and like I hit a period of like this peak production.
And I think one thing that is good about it
is that it's really deep in my understanding of like
human nature. I don't know how to describe it exactly.
(36:09):
Being a parent has like stretched me in a way
where it's like that phrase like digging deep. Right, It's
like when you know you have to do something even
though you don't always want to. I've just gotten a
lot better at that side of it. And so like
when it comes to like doing difficult things, I guess
you know, writing is no longer like the difficult thing,
(36:33):
you know what I mean? I also, yeah, I also
learned like you can't just like write when the inspiration
strikes you, like you have to be able to when
you only have like ten minutes. You have to be
able to sit down and just like force yourself even
when it's bad.
Speaker 2 (36:46):
Those are good lessons. So you teach, And we mentioned
before you're an editor, how does that kind of stuff
inform your writing process? And what is textures? Like that's
your writing lab right.
Speaker 1 (37:04):
Yeah, So it's on hold right now just because like
I have to work on an normy job. I'm living
in Glasgow currently, so that way I just can get
stable and so like my husband can get his fast
visa and that kind of thing. But editing and teaching
has like taught me about writing without making me realize
I was teaching myself about writing. It's just made me
(37:26):
more observant as a writer. And I've gotten like a
lot better and faster at editing in general because of it,
And I think it really is one of my favorite things.
I love running workshops. I love working one on one
with someone where like we're trying to talk out the
reason why sentence isn't working and then like talking it
through and then seeing like their eyes light up or whatever,
(37:47):
like making connection. I think that's such a good feeling.
I really love that about just working stuff out in general,
because I think sometimes like you get the best stuff
when you're just trying to talk out with something means,
you know what I mean, when you're trying to tell
some something like what was just like what is this
metaphor mean? And you're like talking out you're actually like, oh,
that is actually what I just said is actually one
hundred percent better way to say it than this dumbass
(38:10):
metaphor that doesn't work. Yeah, you know, Like I love
that about workshopping. And so when Textras runs, it's a
three month program and you get new lessons every week
and then we like edit a certain amount of pages
every month, and then we'll do like one on one
I'll do like one on one mentorships via video or
(38:30):
whatever where it's like this is where the pages are, like,
tell me what you're struggling with, what kind of obstacles
can like we help you overcome. It's like that kind
of thing.
Speaker 2 (38:40):
So I love that. Well, I've gotten so much out
of just any of the workshops that I've done, you know,
in a literary space, and it sounds like you did too,
and it's cool that you're like helping the next generation.
Speaker 1 (38:54):
Yeah, yeah, it's good. I love it.
Speaker 2 (38:56):
Okay, so our wrap up questions. I guess do you
have any bucket list.
Speaker 1 (39:01):
Goals, like overall in life for your writing? I want
to publish a story about a juggallette in the Paris Review.
That's my bucket list. I want to get ICP and
a hygrow culture. That's what I want.
Speaker 2 (39:25):
I love it. Yeah. What's one piece of writing advice
you wish you could give your former self?
Speaker 1 (39:32):
Maybe like less is more or like use less metaphors. Honestly,
I would say that, yeah, stop being like so purple.
Speaker 2 (39:43):
Yeah interesting. One tip for writers trying to get a
book published, I.
Speaker 1 (39:50):
Would say, don't spray and pray when it comes to
doing queries. But also the number one predict your success
in publication is perseverance, it's not talent.
Speaker 2 (40:05):
Good tip. What's your all time favorite piece of your
own writing.
Speaker 1 (40:10):
One of my favorite stories is Catworld. I just love
that world and the time and that story so much.
I was really proud of that story. It took like
five different iterations in like three years before I was
like happy with that story nice and people liked it,
so that made it even better. So it's like cool, yeah.
Speaker 2 (40:33):
Awesome, Well, thank you so much. And how can listeners
connect with you on the internet.
Speaker 1 (40:39):
So I'm on Twitter at sat Erotica, I'm on Instagram
at sata Ratica, and my website is l nash dot
net and right now it's like it's two thousand and
five on my website, and I also have a MySpace
page on it if you can find it. That's how
you can connect with me.
Speaker 2 (40:56):
Thank you so much, Elle. That conversation was a blast
and I learned a ton. Thank you for joining me
for this episode of The bleedersh writing is so much
better with friends. I'm your host, Courtney Cosack, and hey,
let's connect on social media. I am at Courtney Cosak
last name is Kocak on Twitter and Instagram. And make
(41:18):
sure you're signed up for the Bleeders Companion substack for
all kinds of newsletter exclusives. There's so much good stuff
that I send out to my free list, and I
actually just launched a paid subscription with some extra goodies
where I take you behind the scenes of all my
best buylines. I published a post about my return to
stand up comedy and how I got ready to crush
my showcase. I wrote about MFAs and whether or not
(41:42):
I think it is worth it. I also did one
of my favorite workshops I've ever taught. It's a manifestation
workshop that I did for the New Year, but it's
really good anytime of the year. So there's so much
good stuff for free subscribers and even more for paid subscribers,
And there is a link in the description for that,
(42:03):
and join me again next time for another all new episode.
In the meantime, Happy Bleeding
I think it really is just like I'm writing to
my taste. I'm writing about like women that I'm interested
in and experiences that I'm interested in, reading about things
I see, things I want to see, like represent emotions
and atmospheres that I can't stop thinking about.
Speaker 2 (00:22):
That's today's guest, Elle Nash. I stand any artist who
allows their taste to guide them. I mean it should
go without saying, but that's not always the case. Elle
has a super strong voice and aesthetic that I can
note with her writing, and it was fascinating to hear
how she developed that alongside her editing jobs.
Speaker 1 (00:42):
It really was just kind of like me on my
own trying to figure it out and figure out the structure.
And I did a big editing process. I would like
make note cards for each chapter, trying to make sense
of it, print it out, try and move stuff around
in the way that I needed, and then even like
editing it for backwards to the front, like starting with
(01:03):
the last chapter and working backwards to make sure that
everything made sense and that fun of thing.
Speaker 2 (01:08):
This episode is such an interesting peek into ELL's creative process,
and it's really inspiring to hear how she learned about
craft through generative work, one on one mentorships, and writing workshops.
Plus she landed like the coolest agent ever. All that
and more in today's episode, There's nothing to writing. All
(01:30):
you do is sit down at a typewriter and bleed.
Welcome to the Bleaders, a podcast and support group about
book writing and publishing. I'm writer and podcaster Courtney Cosak,
and each week I'll bring you new conversations with authors, agents,
(01:52):
and publishers about how to write and sell books.
Speaker 1 (02:02):
Hi, I'm al Mash. I'm the author of Animals, Eat
each Other, Nudes and Gag Reflex, and I'm the editor
of Witchcraft Magazine.
Speaker 2 (02:10):
So when did you first identify as a writer.
Speaker 1 (02:14):
I like wrote stories when I was in like middle
school and that kind of thing. Like I remember like
getting a little Dolphin journal and like wanting to write
a novel about a dolphin or something like that when
I was really little. I don't still have that. I
wish they did. But I didn't seriously start considering myself
(02:35):
a writer until I was in high school and I
was like discovering poetry, and I think that's when I
was like, this is like really what I want to be?
Is I want to do this somehow, or I wanted
to be like an artist of some sort.
Speaker 2 (02:47):
Did you think it was possible, like to be a
working writer?
Speaker 1 (02:51):
No, I actually, like I had no understanding of how
that worked at all, even though like I had writers
that I knew and admired, I don't think I like
got that part of it, because even through college, when
I was writing prose and that kind of thing, I
never wrote fiction, even though I loved it very much.
It wasn't until about I think in twenty twelve or
(03:12):
twenty thirteen, I started wanting to try and write a
sci fi novel, and like that ever happened. And then
I took a writing workshop with Tom Stanbauer later that
year in twenty thirteen, and it was there that like
people were talking about like literary journals and like independent
publishers and like agents and that kind of thing, and
I think that's for me. When I was like, oh,
(03:35):
like that's what you do, like you get published. And
when I was like, you get published in literary magazines,
something clicked for me. I was like, I didn't even
know that you could do this. But I was like
twenty six or something. I hadn't even thought about it.
So that was when when I like learned that could happen.
That's when I was like, Okay, this is what I
want to do, Like I want to figure out like
(03:55):
how to get published.
Speaker 2 (03:57):
And you did soon after. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (03:59):
Yeah. It was actually through taking Chloe's class, Chloe Copple's
class that I think we took that together. Did we?
Were you with Amanda?
Speaker 2 (04:09):
I have taken like three classes with Amanda and I've
taken from Chloe. Yeah, like three or four times. She's
the best.
Speaker 1 (04:15):
Yeah. I think the first one I took with her
with Amanda, I think you were in that and that's
where me and Amanda met.
Speaker 2 (04:22):
Oh funny.
Speaker 1 (04:23):
Yeah, And seeing like what Chloe did and what she
could do with her career, that's where I was like,
I was seeing what she was doing and I was like,
I'm going to figure out how to do that.
Speaker 2 (04:32):
Oh, I love it. Okay, we're going to get more
into this. What's your all time favorite book?
Speaker 1 (04:38):
I don't know, Well, it's so hard. They always change
based on like different things. Darryl by Jackie s is
like one of the best books I've read in the
last like five years.
Speaker 2 (04:49):
What's that book about?
Speaker 1 (04:50):
It's about a guy who's a cook and his experience
and living in the Pacific Northwest being a cock with
his BG. It's really good. It's amazing, incredible. It's just
written so well and it's funny and it's heartwarming and
I don't know, I just loved it. It was good,
Like the pace of it is good, at the voice
(05:11):
of it is like incredible. So yeah, nice, that's a
good one.
Speaker 2 (05:15):
Yeah, I gotta check that out. It fits within like
what I would think you would love. So that's funny.
Speaker 1 (05:22):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (05:23):
What is your dream writing routine if you could pick?
Speaker 1 (05:28):
I think if I could do it, I would wake
up at four am in the morning, and I would
work until like six or seven and then have like
get my daughter ready for school and then have my
work day, you know, and kind of do it in
the morning. I've always worked better in the morning and
then and maybe some evenings do writing, but then some
(05:51):
evenings like not do that, like actually live my life.
Speaker 2 (05:54):
You know, what do you wind up doing? What's the
real writing routine?
Speaker 1 (05:59):
So for a long time I was writing every day,
but because I just moved and I've been getting sick
a lot because my daughter is on daycare now, I
just try to get enough sleep at night, and then
I'll wake up at five, and sometimes I will do
a little bit of work. I usually tell myself like
even ten minutes is okay, Like every ten minutes does something,
no matter what it is, like writing worldwise, even though
(06:20):
it's like editing something or doing stuff for my literary
magazine or that kind of thing. And then I just, yeah,
get ready for work, get my daughter ready for school,
take her to school, go to work, come home, do
house stuff, that kind of thing. And my husband just
left to go back to the States for like half
(06:40):
a year, so now I kind of like do have
that free evening time where I'll be able to I
think like focus more.
Speaker 2 (06:46):
I have always been bad at maintaining a writing practice,
but I started doing this thing. It's called like seven
hundred and fifty words dot com or seven hundred and
fifty words dot net or whatever, and you just write
it there. And for some reason, I've done it every
day since I started, for like nice a month. But
it's just the little you get a check mark, you know,
(07:08):
it's just a plain text thing. So I copy it
over into my manuscript. But I'm like, I don't know,
it's attainable. I think that's the good thing about it.
Speaker 1 (07:17):
Yeah, you built up a momentum too, Like there was
a long period of time where I was had like
I built up a momentum after my daughter was born
for a period of about three years, and then like
twenty twenty hit and then it was like I was
obsessively working just a lot, Like I finished like three
manuscripts that year. But then it was after that I
(07:37):
just got burnt out, and I've I've been in this
weird phase where I'm like, I'm not doing it every day?
Am I okay with that? I don't know how I
feel about it. If it changes anything about like my
identity or like making me worry or question myself.
Speaker 2 (07:52):
I think that's part of it too though, right, Yeah,
the ebbs and flows, that's.
Speaker 1 (07:57):
What I've heard. That's what I've heard from people who
have been writting along with me. Whether like it ebbs
and flows just like everything. So I'm like, Okay, well,
I guess I'm just not going to freak out about
it then, but I am slightly freaking out about it
a little bit.
Speaker 2 (08:11):
What is one piece of writing that makes you jealous
you didn't write it?
Speaker 1 (08:17):
I like I love feeling jealous of writing in a
way because I think part of it is because, like
from editing, if I read something and I was like,
oh man, I wish i'd written this, then I would
publish it Like that was kind of my barometer for it.
So it's hard to like have like one piece because
there's a lot. There's a lot of good writing out there,
(08:38):
but I can't think of any one thing, like, in particular.
Speaker 2 (08:42):
What's one thing that you have edited that you were like, damn,
I gotta publish this.
Speaker 1 (08:48):
There is this short story that Nikolav Mee Goldberg wrote
that I published in a Witchcraft. It's like a retelling
of Bluebeard. But the last line of the story is
There's nothing more beautiful than a girl. And I always
like wish I had written that. It's so good. It's
good for a last line.
Speaker 2 (09:05):
Yeah, okay, Yeah, it's a good one. Okay. So let's
get in to your whole body of work. So since
you were twenty six, it's like most of your adulthood.
Where how did you get from twenty thirteen? Of like, ah, yes,
(09:27):
I can literary journals. I sort of understand how this
world works. To animals eat each other, which was write
your first book in twenty seventeen.
Speaker 1 (09:38):
So I was doing every single workshop that I could
find because I was like, and my face were just expensive,
Like they were just out of reach for me. Like
I was like, there's no I'm going to be able
to do this. I did try, like one year after
I was like finishing with animals, but then yeah, I
was like I only applied to like three schools that
(09:59):
were fully funded. I was like, if it doesn't happen,
it doesn't happen, you know. But I was just taking
every workshop I could find that I wanted to take.
I was taking this one workshop with rape urand she's
a poet and it's like six month workshop and it's
literally just generative. It's not necessarily about learning, it's just
about committing for six months to have pages every month. Yeah,
(10:19):
and I wrote this short story in there. And then
I started working again with Tom Spanbauer, where I owed
him like twenty pages every two weeks, and we did
that with the short story, and what started happening was
he was like, you have like all this stuff that
you need to expand on, that you should be expanding on,
And so I started doing that until really like we
(10:43):
did that together for like two years, Like I would
just meet with him and then he would talk to
me about the war, like he would read it aloud
and we'd talk about the work and what's missing and
like what it needed. And then it was during that
time I was getting some stuff like some shorts stories
published and like meeting people, and I'd had someone reach
(11:05):
out to me and ask me like what I was
working on, and he ended up passing the manuscript to
someone at DESANC. So I got really lucky in that
it was like not one hundred percent finished, but it
was like there almost that like almost. I think it
never happens. Maybe in the indie world, I think happens
a lot more. So that was basically like it like
they were just like, yeah, like let's publish this. This
(11:26):
seems good, so amazing. So that happened. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (11:31):
So for listeners, what's the premise of animals eat each other?
Speaker 1 (11:35):
The most basic promise I can tell you is that
a nineteen year old narrator falls in love with a
couple who has a kid, She starts dating them, and
it essentially like ends up just as badly as you
think it might.
Speaker 2 (11:49):
Yep, so did you do a big editing process or
were they like more minor two weeks.
Speaker 1 (12:00):
So the thing that happened was that the book got bought,
like I signed my contract. Then the editor like disappeared
for a long time. And during that process, I was
working on other stuff, and then I moved to Arkansas,
and then there was a new editor. All of a sudden,
I guess like the previous editor in chief just had
(12:21):
to step down because like things were too much, like
there was too much going on, and it's like like
he had other personal stuff going on. He was stepping down.
So a new editor chief came in and she's really great,
but like she also wasn't the acquiring editor, and she
didn't have a lot to say about editing the book,
just kind of like minor things here and there, and
there was stuff that I knew that I needed to
(12:42):
do to complete it. So it really was just kind
of like me on my own trying to figure it
out and figure out the structure. And I did a
big editing process. I would like make note cards for
each chapter trying to make sense of it, printed out,
try and move stuff around in the way that I needed,
and then even like edit it from backwards to the front,
(13:03):
like starting with the last chapter, working backwards to make
sure that everything made sense and that kind of thing.
And I was just kind of doing that all on
my own, and then the editor in chief did like
a basic like copy edit, and so that really was
that process. So it was not that intensive, like as
far as that goes.
Speaker 2 (13:22):
It's kind of nice to get that much freedom though,
And like you're an editor, right, don't you do that
for you know, professionally, And so when you're approaching a
rewrite or an edit, what are you doing to like
diagnose what's wrong? And do you have any like tips
(13:42):
for going in and doing like when you need to
do a big overhaul.
Speaker 1 (13:45):
Yeah, editing your own work is so difficult because you're
already inside of it. I even think, like psychologically, like
there's a thing where the story is already in your head.
So you're going to be more likely to miss things
that aren't complete in the story because your brain already
has a full pick sure of it. It's not going
to like sometimes miss like the pockets, you know. But
it's really I don't want to say easy, but to
(14:08):
edit for style, what you can do is like you
have to be really hard on yourself about sound. Like
if you read something that you're writing and like there's
just something in your head that's like I am not
quite satisfied with it, then like you can't let go
of it, Like you have to have a discipline to
keep working on and like not let go of it.
And that's the part that can become really difficult because
(14:30):
that can be really time consuming in a way.
Speaker 2 (14:33):
Mm hm.
Speaker 1 (14:34):
So I could think that's one way I go into
it is just like it's a feel like if it
doesn't like if you are reading your own stuff, if
you feel bored with something that you're reading, it's yours,
Like when you're going through something like with a novel,
it's going to be boring to someone else. So it's
really just about trying to be really sensitive to like
how you feel about the thing, Like when you're writing it.
Speaker 2 (14:54):
What about first structure, Like when you're like, oh, there's
something about this structure format that's like not working. Is
there anything special you do in that case?
Speaker 1 (15:05):
So I've like gone through writing novels a couple of
different ways, but for animals, because I didn't know what
I was doing, Like I was like, I don't know
how to write, Like I don't even know like basic
elements of fiction when I was writing, like in the
traditional sense, like I was like, what is a plot like?
Or like you know what I mean, like those kinds
of things, like what is the three X structure? I
(15:27):
don't know what that stuff is. I was never taught
that kind of stuff. But I think just in terms
of like having the scenes like make logical sense, one
thing I did was they did just like write out
scenes and chapters on note cards, and that kind of
helped me organize it in my mind. So that way
I could like look at it just the basic scenes
(15:47):
right and see that that made sense. And I've also
done that with the novel that comes out next year,
where not with note cards, but I had like this
little sheet of like tracking each scene, what happens in
if anything changes, like if there's emotional residence in it,
in that kind of thing.
Speaker 2 (16:06):
Yeah, it's kind of like when I maybe have more
experienced writing screenplays, but like when you distill it back
to an outline version. If you've written a draft and
some things have changed and then you go back and
you like make an outline of that, A lot of
times you can use that to you know, this scene
is not active or like you can tell when you
(16:26):
distill it down what's wrong in a way. Yeah, okay,
So then Nudes was next. And what's the premise of Nuds.
Speaker 1 (16:44):
Yeah, it's a short stories that I wrote that I've
been writing since like twenty fourteen, but a lot of
like I mean just I think it's yeah, from twenty
fourteen to twenty twenty when the book came out. It's
just like a collection of like the stuff that I
like the most, I think fit together, like really, well.
Speaker 2 (17:03):
When did it sort of like become cohesive as a
book idea?
Speaker 1 (17:08):
I had like wanted to put together some kind of
collection since like Animals had come out, but like I'd
gotten an agent, and my agent was like, short story
collections don't sell, and so in my head I was like, well,
like okay, then you know, like but I like short stories,
so I want to figure out what I can do.
(17:29):
And like Ray, before my daughter was born, I had
done this little chat book called a Voca of just
like little vignettes of living in the American South or
the Ozarks or whatever you want to call it. And
so I kind of was like going from there, I
was like, why have these little vignettes? I have older stuff.
And I think it was when Elizabeth Allen, who like
(17:49):
I was already friends with, was like, I really want to, like,
you know, publish something of yours if you want to
send me something, and so I was like, okay, then
I want to do a collection, Like this is what
I want to do when I want to pull together something.
And it was then that I think I started working
more seriously on having like I don't know know, I
was just kind of like writing stories at the time,
(18:11):
like my baby was born and then I was like
obsessive about writing stuff. So I was like trying to
work on the stories. I'd finished the first draft of
a novel and I was tired of it. So I
wanted to get do something else that was more distracting,
and so I started working on trying to flesh out
these vignettes and these ideals and stuff that I had
in my head. And like, yeah, I just wanted to
(18:31):
like look together that way.
Speaker 2 (18:34):
It has such a strong esthetic, and like was that
always part of the vision from the beginning or did
that kind of like develop over time.
Speaker 1 (18:44):
I think it just developed over time. I think it
really is just like I'm writing to my taste. I'm
writing about like women that I'm interested in and experiences
that I'm interested in, reading about things I see, things
I want to see, like representa emotions and atmospheres that
I can't stop thinking about. And I think it works
(19:05):
together because it's like from my head, you know what
I mean.
Speaker 2 (19:11):
Elizabeth Ellen keeps coming up on the podcast, and she
has been behind like a lot of my favorite books,
So I'm just kind of curious what it's like, like
the process of working with her and things that you
gleaned from working with her.
Speaker 1 (19:27):
I honestly like don't even know how to describe it.
She just has so much wisdom in terms of darkness
and edginess and knowing what makes something good. I don't know.
She also was really good at like pulling me back,
Like I think I have a tendency to go all
out with like descriptions, or sometimes I will just have
a lot of exposition in a story like that's one
(19:48):
of my bad writer habits. It's lots of exposition, and
she knows like how to like pull that back and
say like less is more with me, And she's just
she's got a brilliant, Like she doesn't really use social media.
She doesn't have a smartphone, she never had that, so
her brain isn't like rotten from like Instagram and that
kind of thing.
Speaker 2 (20:09):
And so.
Speaker 1 (20:11):
I think that the way that she looks at art
and like looks at the world is just something that
is not really common in the writer will stay. So
I think that's one thing I really treasure about it.
I think that, like a lot of social media tends
to cause us to like water down our language and
make things really flat. But yeah, Mary Gateskill just like
had a subsect about that or something which I was like, No,
(20:33):
it makes sense, Like I can see it. Everything good
that I'm reading comes out of.
Speaker 2 (20:37):
In d lit.
Speaker 1 (20:38):
Now I'm trying to remember like the last like really
big mainstream book that I was like obsessed with. Yeah,
atticust Slish At the atticust Slish book that he did
was really good. That is one mainstream book that I
really like.
Speaker 2 (20:54):
So you work just in general, like there are a
lot of interesting kind of formats that you play with
or perspectives or things like that. How do you find
that stuff and kind of decide when to use it
and when to stick with more of a standard structure.
Speaker 1 (21:11):
Oh, like different story formats and that kind of thing.
Speaker 2 (21:14):
Yeah, or like in gag reflux, you know, like live
journal stuff and like putting your calorie counts or just
having it be a different POV or something like that,
Like how do you decide when to employ those techniques?
Speaker 1 (21:28):
I think the biggest the siding factor for me in
how anything is structured comes down to how close you
are to the person's like psychic experience. So like I
think about that term a lot of psychic distance, and it's
like how far away are you from this character? I
sometimes find it really hard to enjoy a third person
because in a lot of third person's stories I tend
(21:50):
to just feel too distant from the narrator or the
character that like I'm reading about, and like I want
to like feel close to them. I want to like
forget that, like I'm a person, I want to be
experiencing this character as close as I can. So I think,
like that's a big thing I think about is when
(22:10):
I'm structuring something, is like how can I make sure
that we are as close as possible to that experience
and that there isn't distance that we're not putting like
obstacles between like reader and like atmosphere or reader and
like experience.
Speaker 2 (22:25):
So some of those things, like the calorie thing or whatever,
is like just a way to be in the head
of the person who's doing it or make it feel
like more of the experience itself.
Speaker 1 (22:37):
Yeah, yeah, Like what is more of an experience of
what it feels like to be obsessed with something than
forcing another person to like read your lists that you're
writing with these numbers that don't really maybe you don't
even matter, and like you have to read through them
again and again and see how they're crossed out again
(22:57):
and again. Like that kind of thing, Like that's what
that experience is. Like, do you feel like it's tedious? Well, congratulations,
that experience is absolutely tedious. So that's kind of like
what I think thinking.
Speaker 2 (23:08):
Yeah, exactly. No. When I saw that part, I was like,
did she publish my calorie journal or what's going on here?
Speaker 1 (23:15):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (23:16):
Because I think a lot of us have been through
that same kind of obsessive tracking and it is totally
neurotic anyway, So what was the nudes then, after you know,
Elizabeth officially bought it, what was the publishing process like
for that and the reaction after.
Speaker 1 (23:36):
It's really great. I honestly feel like I've been so
spoiled as a writer because I've had a lot of
like creative control and freedom over how I want the
stories in the book to be structured, Like I want
them to be in these different sections, right, I get
to decide that, Like I think maybe a bigger publisher
would be like, no, we're going to do like ever
(23:58):
if we think is fast, or we're going to override
this decision or something. I got to have control over
the covers, so her and I brainstormed a bunch of
different ideas and then I ended up taking the photo
for it, and then Chelsea Martin designed it. She's just
a good job the topography on it. I got to
choose the font that is, the headers and the section
(24:21):
breaks and stuff like. I got to have this creatical
control over how the book looks like once done, which
I think is something that's really great about indie publishing.
I think when you're published by a bigger publisher and
you may not always have that control, Like we've heard
about people not liking their covers or like they might
design the book and say like, well, this is the
font we're using this is how we want to lay
it out, you know. So it's nice to have control
(24:42):
over like what the book looks and feels like as
a finished product.
Speaker 2 (24:52):
Okay, so you mentioned you got an agent somewhere along
the line. How did that come about?
Speaker 1 (24:58):
So animals to each other got to start with you
and publishers Weekly, and that's I guess something that's like
they don't really hand out a lot of those per year.
And so when it got that kind of attention, I
had like three different agents just reach out to me
like within the next few days, just saying like what
are you working on? Are you looking for representation? Like
(25:19):
that kind of thing, And I didn't have anything that
was like even close to like have we done at
that point? So, like my one of my biggest pieces
of advice, I guess, like when someone's writing a novel,
is that like continue writing the next one, Because if
you hit that point where the book gets published and
then you have that agent like reach out to you, like,
(25:41):
you kind of probably want to have something ready to
go so that way you can always keep moving forward.
But I did talk with Kent Wolf, who is now
my agent. He sent me on Literary and like, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (25:56):
I showed him with shit, his list is so good that, yeah, And.
Speaker 1 (26:01):
I showed him like why I was working on and
told my ideas and he really liked he really loved it.
And I told him like what my next manuscript, like
what I was planning on doing with it and that
kind of thing, and he loved that. So he did
descent to work with me. Was I'm really grateful for
on that front. So yeah, nice.
Speaker 2 (26:18):
Yeah, okay, So which brings us to gag reflex. Were
you represented going into this book?
Speaker 1 (26:27):
No, because I really only planned for this to be
like I just wanted to be like a little indie thing,
like I kind of wasn't even thinking about it. I
feel like my agent must be so frustrated with me
because Nudes is also not represented. So I put out
two books with him as my agent, and those two
are not like he hasn't represented. They've just been like
(26:47):
little indie things. But the next book is one that
he helped with, which is good that one comes out
next year. But yeah, I just thought it. I just
was like I just want to put out something fun,
like you know when people put out chatbooks and stuff.
That was just kind of how I envisioned it, and
so I even just approached class and I was like,
I have this idea of making it a live journal,
Like I knew I would be able to work with
(27:08):
them to be like, who can you work with it
to literally make this layout look like a live journal,
you know, and they really love the idea, like they
also put out Darryl like they do such a good
job of taking a chance. I'll like experimental work. I mean,
I don't think there's anyway and how like Coment would
have been able to shop this to like Grove Atlantic
or something like that, you know what I mean. So
(27:30):
it was just like a one off thing. Like I
was like, I just want this in the universe and
I want it to be fun.
Speaker 2 (27:34):
So yeah, it's really an interesting concept. So when did
that idea kind of form and how long did the
writing process of it take and how much were you
like repurposing that you already had or whatever happened.
Speaker 1 (27:50):
I'd always wanted to write something about eating disorders, but
I didn't know how to tackle it. And then in
twenty nineteen, maybe maybe a little bit later than that,
I was talking to B. R. Yeager, who was the
author of a Magdalatropolis and negative Space, and we both
(28:11):
started talking about live journal, and I was like, I'm
gonna go find mine, and I actually could find mine
all the way back to when I was like thirteen
years old and like just starting out like having this
kind of space on the internet really like I had
aol chat and that kind of stuff before, but I
like was also making Geocity sites and stuff at like
(28:32):
the same time. But like live journal was really the
It was diary Land and live journal. But I had
live journal first, I think, and then diary Land was
like my little poetry repository while I was in high school,
and life journal was less poetry and more like my
personal life and that kind of thing. But I kind
of like just got lost in it, and like we
both were like reading our life journals, like yeah, this
(28:54):
is so like it's so two thousand and five, Like
there's nothing else like that kind of experience. I also
was inspired by nineteen eighty two Janine by Alistair Gray,
which is also one of the most incredible books I've
ever read. I had read that right before COVID started,
actually like a month more month or two like COVID
(29:16):
had started, and I just actually kind of loved the title.
It's so unique and there is like really unique topography
in it too, So I had thought, I was like,
I want to write something that's called gag Reflex two
thousand and five. Look, I kind of want to like
flight that style, but the distribution that clash has. They
had suggested not using the two thousand and five because
(29:38):
they thought that it wouldn't have as much like shelf
shelf life, yeah, shelf appeal or whatever, Yeah, like it
would be more marketable, And I was kind of like,
I don't know, but I was also like, Okay, I
see like what they're saying. I'll just try it, you know.
Speaker 2 (29:57):
So I feel like gag Reflex is so strong on
its own. I like the nostalgia piece of it, but
I get what they were saying too. Yeah, you've mentioned
it a little bit of it. But what's the premise
of gag Reflex?
Speaker 1 (30:10):
So? Gag Reflex is a live journal from a girl's
last semester in high school through summer in which she's
just dealing with an eating disorder and kind of trying
to unravel like sort of the root of that suffering
on her own in a way.
Speaker 2 (30:31):
And then how big of an edit did you do
with Clash.
Speaker 1 (30:35):
I'm trying to think it wasn't like too intense, But
Christoph had really good things to say in terms of
like if he thought something was missing, or in terms
of like the pacing and that kind of thing. Like
there wasn't a ton of editing that he did on
voice because I just I did like a pretty thorough
calm of that like several times through. But he would
(30:56):
be like, this post feels like it. He's feel like
we need to have a different kind of post after
the spread and the rhythm and stuff, And so that
was something that I worked on with him. And then
just making sure every single detail was correct was like
really a task. Like the layout has to be correct
because it's all hand laid out. It's not like it's
like a template with a master page. It's literally like
(31:18):
every page is unique, and you have to make sure
the time stamps are correct, and you have to make
sure that the way the music is laid out is the
same and all that kind of stuff, like it all
has to chronologically make sense. So that was a process. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (31:33):
Yeah, And then you mentioned that you have upcoming another book,
but is it deliver me? Is that the one I
saw that on your.
Speaker 1 (31:41):
Website that comes out next October.
Speaker 2 (31:43):
What's that one about?
Speaker 1 (31:47):
So, I'm like trying to think of a way to
succinctly talk about it.
Speaker 2 (31:52):
You haven't had to start a pitching it yet.
Speaker 1 (31:55):
Well, I just don't want to like give away the
story to it.
Speaker 2 (31:57):
Yea, Yeah, whatever you have to say.
Speaker 1 (31:59):
It's a little bit of a thriller. It's like kind
of like thriller slash body core. So this girl is
basically an ex evangelical, Like she grew up in the
United Pentecostal church and she works at a chicken factory
and she wants really badly to have a baby, but
(32:22):
she can't get pregnant. And during this time, her former
best friend moves back to town, whom she was also
kind of in love with, and so it's kind of
about her being with her boyfriend and trying to like
hold onto him and then also like contending with her
obsession with her best friend who is pregnant, and then
(32:45):
she ends up faking her pregnancy as well. So it's
kind of just about the poll between like those characters
in that experience.
Speaker 2 (32:55):
Interesting, Yeah, when did you get the idea? I love
that you you have like a certain working class sensibility
that doesn't always get repped as a girl from a
small town in Minnesota. So where did you get the
idea for that? And like are you done? Where are
(33:15):
you at in the process.
Speaker 1 (33:17):
So in twenty fifteen, there was a really horrific crime
in the city I was living in. That's like a
really fringed crime, and I was like, I cannot stop
thinking about this story. Like I was just obsessed with
it and like kind of just like being inspired by
(33:38):
living in the Ozarks in a way, there's something really
special about Arkansas. Like I really did love living there.
I would never live in Little Rock, but like Northwest
Arkansas was like perfect. It's like a little gem of
a place that people are wonderful. The weather it's like
beautiful that kind of thing. There's never really any bad tornadoes.
It's like it's just on the outside of Brinato Alley.
(34:00):
And I was so I just love living there, like
so much. So I think that was really where both
of those things kind of like coalesced. And it was
like right after having my baby, I was like trying
to write this. I was actually trying to write a
story about this girl and like dealing with eating disorders,
and I was like, I can't do this. I was
trying to rewrite it several times. I remember sending it
(34:20):
to Elizabeth and then she was like, I think you've
overwritten this. It doesn't feel as dark and intellectual as
like you normally do. And I was gutted. But I
was like in the fog of like having a newborn
and stuff, so I was like fuck it, like I'm
just gonna write my basic bitch plauted novel. And I
read a book about like how to make a plot,
(34:41):
like how to like do something in a traditional way,
right right? So then yeah, right, So like all those
years later, Elle learns what the fuck a plot is
and like the three x structure and like tries to
write a book. So that was like kind of the
outcome like of that process.
Speaker 2 (34:58):
It doesn't see like a basic bitch book.
Speaker 1 (35:00):
When I finally finished it, I was like, no, this
is actually it is becoming more of like what I
feel like is me, you know, and it isn't done yet.
I'm just doing final edits right now so soon.
Speaker 2 (35:13):
Yeah sounds cool. So you mentioned like the fog of motherhood.
I'm curious how just in whatever way is becoming a
mom has changed your writing for better or worse.
Speaker 1 (35:26):
So how has it changed it? When my daughter was firstborn,
I did it really obsessive and just like wrote as
much as I could all the time. It was really
hard at first because you are kind of in a
brain fog, just like hormone wise, like there's literally nothing
you can do about it. It is. I think it
is absolutely biological, specially like with breastfeeding and stuff, because
(35:48):
this is how the hormones are working in your body.
And then I kind of like came out of that
and like I hit a period of like this peak production.
And I think one thing that is good about it
is that it's really deep in my understanding of like
human nature. I don't know how to describe it exactly.
(36:09):
Being a parent has like stretched me in a way
where it's like that phrase like digging deep. Right, It's
like when you know you have to do something even
though you don't always want to. I've just gotten a
lot better at that side of it. And so like
when it comes to like doing difficult things, I guess
you know, writing is no longer like the difficult thing,
(36:33):
you know what I mean? I also, yeah, I also
learned like you can't just like write when the inspiration
strikes you, like you have to be able to when
you only have like ten minutes. You have to be
able to sit down and just like force yourself even
when it's bad.
Speaker 2 (36:46):
Those are good lessons. So you teach, And we mentioned
before you're an editor, how does that kind of stuff
inform your writing process? And what is textures? Like that's
your writing lab right.
Speaker 1 (37:04):
Yeah, So it's on hold right now just because like
I have to work on an normy job. I'm living
in Glasgow currently, so that way I just can get
stable and so like my husband can get his fast
visa and that kind of thing. But editing and teaching
has like taught me about writing without making me realize
I was teaching myself about writing. It's just made me
(37:26):
more observant as a writer. And I've gotten like a
lot better and faster at editing in general because of it,
And I think it really is one of my favorite things.
I love running workshops. I love working one on one
with someone where like we're trying to talk out the
reason why sentence isn't working and then like talking it
through and then seeing like their eyes light up or whatever,
(37:47):
like making connection. I think that's such a good feeling.
I really love that about just working stuff out in general,
because I think sometimes like you get the best stuff
when you're just trying to talk out with something means,
you know what I mean, when you're trying to tell
some something like what was just like what is this
metaphor mean? And you're like talking out you're actually like, oh,
that is actually what I just said is actually one
hundred percent better way to say it than this dumbass
(38:10):
metaphor that doesn't work. Yeah, you know, Like I love
that about workshopping. And so when Textras runs, it's a
three month program and you get new lessons every week
and then we like edit a certain amount of pages
every month, and then we'll do like one on one
I'll do like one on one mentorships via video or
(38:30):
whatever where it's like this is where the pages are, like,
tell me what you're struggling with, what kind of obstacles
can like we help you overcome. It's like that kind
of thing.
Speaker 2 (38:40):
So I love that. Well, I've gotten so much out
of just any of the workshops that I've done, you know,
in a literary space, and it sounds like you did too,
and it's cool that you're like helping the next generation.
Speaker 1 (38:54):
Yeah, yeah, it's good. I love it.
Speaker 2 (38:56):
Okay, so our wrap up questions. I guess do you
have any bucket list.
Speaker 1 (39:01):
Goals, like overall in life for your writing? I want
to publish a story about a juggallette in the Paris Review.
That's my bucket list. I want to get ICP and
a hygrow culture. That's what I want.
Speaker 2 (39:25):
I love it. Yeah. What's one piece of writing advice
you wish you could give your former self?
Speaker 1 (39:32):
Maybe like less is more or like use less metaphors. Honestly,
I would say that, yeah, stop being like so purple.
Speaker 2 (39:43):
Yeah interesting. One tip for writers trying to get a
book published, I.
Speaker 1 (39:50):
Would say, don't spray and pray when it comes to
doing queries. But also the number one predict your success
in publication is perseverance, it's not talent.
Speaker 2 (40:05):
Good tip. What's your all time favorite piece of your
own writing.
Speaker 1 (40:10):
One of my favorite stories is Catworld. I just love
that world and the time and that story so much.
I was really proud of that story. It took like
five different iterations in like three years before I was
like happy with that story nice and people liked it,
so that made it even better. So it's like cool, yeah.
Speaker 2 (40:33):
Awesome, Well, thank you so much. And how can listeners
connect with you on the internet.
Speaker 1 (40:39):
So I'm on Twitter at sat Erotica, I'm on Instagram
at sata Ratica, and my website is l nash dot
net and right now it's like it's two thousand and
five on my website, and I also have a MySpace
page on it if you can find it. That's how
you can connect with me.
Speaker 2 (40:56):
Thank you so much, Elle. That conversation was a blast
and I learned a ton. Thank you for joining me
for this episode of The bleedersh writing is so much
better with friends. I'm your host, Courtney Cosack, and hey,
let's connect on social media. I am at Courtney Cosak
last name is Kocak on Twitter and Instagram. And make
(41:18):
sure you're signed up for the Bleeders Companion substack for
all kinds of newsletter exclusives. There's so much good stuff
that I send out to my free list, and I
actually just launched a paid subscription with some extra goodies
where I take you behind the scenes of all my
best buylines. I published a post about my return to
stand up comedy and how I got ready to crush
my showcase. I wrote about MFAs and whether or not
(41:42):
I think it is worth it. I also did one
of my favorite workshops I've ever taught. It's a manifestation
workshop that I did for the New Year, but it's
really good anytime of the year. So there's so much
good stuff for free subscribers and even more for paid subscribers,
And there is a link in the description for that,
(42:03):
and join me again next time for another all new episode.
In the meantime, Happy Bleeding
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