Three Things No One Tells You Until Your First Book Comes Out

My first book Fire Girl: Essays on India, America, & the In-Between was the culmination of the strongest, most urgent dream I have had since I was six-years-old. Not for me a dream husband or a dream wedding. That I did well on those fronts is a bonus. But there’s never been a time of my life when I have not wanted a book with my name on the cover, and every step I have taken has been towards this goal.

Now, with the publication of my newest book, Women Who Misbehave, and with the pandemic still very much around us, I am in a reflective mood. Here are some lessons I learned from that first time thanks to Fire Girl.

ONE

Until your first book comes out and you are signing copies for the first time in your life, you don’t realize that there are two kinds of folks who show up to readings. The first, those who are interested in what you have to say and they want to get to it, so if you would just sign quickly and let them be on their way. They are not particularly keen to hang around and chit chat. The second kind of folks are those who want to have a meaningful conversation with you while standing in line. Mind you, they are not inconsiderate. They are mindful of your time and that there are others in line behind them but they still want a chat that’s more than small talk, and while you are chatting, they also want you to write something meaningful, something more than “Happy Reading” and your signature.

I know this second kind of person intimately because I have often been this person. Whether I am there to celebrate the author’s first book and excited to discover a new voice, or I have read their previous works and I am a huge fan, I hope they will remember our exchange at the signing table. That later that day they will think, Oh-so-and-so said that so-and-so-unmissable thing!

There are authors who really love the solitary life that writing demands. There are those who are anxious in crowds or who have the next book to write mapped out already and they must absolutely get to it. I am a little bit of all them, but I also love readings and signings and talking about books that aren’t even mine with fellow readers. I am ecstatic and excited and grateful when someone buys my work because in that purchase they are saying, “I see the years that have gone into this. I see the rejections, the everyday sacrifices that nobody asked you to make but you did because that is what makes you you.”

TWO

Until your first book comes out, no one tells you that no one needs your book. You walk in to homes of your friends and family, especially those who love to read, expecting to see your title peeking out from a shelf or stacked on the coffee table. At first glance when you don’t see your book, you slow down, and you read the words on each spine carefully. When you still don’t see it, you are taken aback. There’s a sinking feeling in your stomach. You want to ask the obvious question, and sometimes, you do, letting go of all notions of self-respect and embarrassment. You hope you will hear something like, “I loaned it to my colleague” or “my sister saw it and took it home.” What you don’t expect are answers that range from “I have already read some of your writings online so I didn’t think there was any point,” or “I will get to it someday” or “I haven’t had any time.”

Until your first book comes out, you don’t realize that just because you are reading at an event or bookstore, you don’t have to mean more than just another name to the organizers. All you may be to them is how many chairs have to be set out or how many display copies put up in the window, if there even needs to be an announcement about you on their Instagram.

You also don’t realize that just because you are reading, anyone actually has to show up for it, even if you have friends in the city and they liked your status when you posted about it or even went so far ahead as to promise you that they will definitely be there. So you learn to do the next best thing. You thank the organizers, you make jokes to ease their discomfort, and you let your skin absorb their pitiful gaze. If it’s a bookstore, you buy other books from them, then you walk out and keep walking until you exhaust yourself.

THREE

Until your first book comes out, you don’t know the full extent of how grace can come from completely unexpected places. That someone you met once, and that too fifteen years ago in New Delhi, will show up to your reading in California. That a friend from childhood you have not been in touch with for twenty years will buy multiple copies to distribute. That strangers from unexpected places will write to you to thank you for your words. That you will be invited to read at intimate gatherings and book clubs and you will laugh until your sides ache. That unexpected allies will prop up online and they will interview you or share about your book in ways you could have only hoped. That your book will be taught in universities and you will be invited to deliver lectures, and afterwards, shy students will email you with their questions, and you will have the best exchange ever.

Until your first book comes out, you do not realize the full measure of why you write in the first place. Not for sales or readings or anything else, but because you have to do it for yourself.

Photo courtesy: Annie Spratt @anniespratt via Unsplash

Photo courtesy: Annie Spratt @anniespratt via Unsplash

On a Sunday Afternoon in Italy

I have a new essay out today in Sweet literary magazine. The essay combines several pieces of my heart: Italy, food, my husband, and my parents….of course, not necessarily in that order. But the essay is also about homesickness and loneliness. In a city as beautiful as Viterbo, located two hours away from Rome, one might think there shouldn’t be any room for negative emotions. I mean, Viterbo contains numerous gelaterias, medieval churches, and plenty of great food and natural beauty. It is extremely pedestrian-friendly, and every door, every doorknob, every step is imminently photographable.

But you can only take so many pictures. You can only go on so many tours of the churches. What do you do when you don’t speak Italian beyond the very rudimentary ciao, buongiorno, and grazie?

Photo Courtesy: Andrew Scherle @andrewscherle via Unsplash

In all, I was in Italy for about two months, and for the first ten or so days, I was mostly miserable. I was the only Visiting (and non-Italian) instructor for that semester; I could neither hang out with the students, nor with the folks I had just met. And even though I have lived and traveled by myself many times in my life, Viterbo made me realize that up to that point, they had all been to countries where I know the local language. Here, I met very few locals who were fluent in English, and so loneliness settled like a heavier burden than usual.

However, after the first ten or so days I aggressively went about making friends with my colleagues. They too extended warmth and hospitality. And of course, once loneliness lifted, everything improved.

Another Morning, Another Story

I almost got gang-raped when I was 22. The setting was a bus, and the conductor had tricked me into thinking the last stop would suit me better than the one I had in mind. I didn’t know that he, the remaining handful of passengers, and the driver, were all in this together. I have written about this here, and I have neither the energy nor the desire to revisit it.

Of course, my saying that I don’t want to revisit it does nothing. I revisit it every day. I cannot hear a specific accent on TV and films without recoiling. I cannot attend any event without knowing exactly where the exits are, and how and when and with whom I am getting home. I have lived by myself many times, and I have traveled to heaps of places by myself too, but I am always careful, always watchful of people around me, and when I return home or to the hotel, I check behind every curtain, every door, and stay on the phone with someone, always, always, always. Because it just takes one time for your world to shift completely, and it doesn’t matter what you are wearing, what you look like, what you say or do or eat or drink or inhale.

Yesterday morning, I woke up to yet another story of unimaginable violence against a young woman. I have stopped reading the specifics of such cases. For the sake of my own sanity and functionality, I cannot stomach them because they play in a continuous loop inside my head. Is my attitude escapist? Am I being a coward? Am I running away without confronting the news? Am I dishonoring the human being to whom this was done?

For the longest time, I thought so too. So, I read, and read, and processed. No more. If my reading of fiction and nonfiction, and subsequent teaching of creative writing has taught me anything it is this…there is no end to what we are capable of doing to each other. We can’t bring back the life lost, but we can tell their stories, all their stories, and not just the one of how they were pulled apart at the seams and ended.

And that’s why we need to keep telling our stories as well, all of them, the good, the bad, the hopeless, and the hopeful.

Last year, in my Writing Horror class, on the first day, I asked my students, what horror could they see themselves capable of perpetrating. Nearly everyone said, if their friends and family were in danger, or if they saw vulnerable people under attack. That’s probably true for all of us. But I also don’t think the answer is that simple or straightforward. I ask myself this question often, what is the worst I can imagine doing to another human being. I don’t know the answer.

Three Gazes of Attention

Learning English was one of the most confusing times of my life. Here's an essay on that weirdness, with apologies to my Ma, for my unending questions & stubbornness. "Shortly after my fifth birthday, Ma began teaching me English. It made zero sense. Least of all, the words “he” and “she,” because in Bengali, my mother tongue, nothing and no one has any gender, and if you say “he” and “she” quickly and together, the resulting word “he-she,” means to piss, something Ma had taught me just a few days ago to not shout out loud, especially when we were in public, but to come to her side and whisper. And yet, here she was flouting her own rules, telling me these words were not only okay to say but that without them I would never learn to speak English. What did that even mean? Why did I need to speak in English? What was even English?"

Thank you, Pangyrus, and editor extraordinaire Artress Bethany White, for giving this essay a home! Also, I LOVE the accompanying picture! The yellow background, the white mug, and the coffee—they have my heart.