Beyond Body Positivity

By Danielle Jackson, author of The Accidental Pinup

I knew when I first started writing The Accidental Pinup that I wanted the heroine of this book to be confident. It didn’t matter what she looked like, how she wore her hair, or what the world perceived her to be… Cassie Harris was going to love herself and know her worth. The fact is that other people—other characters on page, even—discount Cassie because she’s a plus size Black woman business owner trying to catch her big break to take her career and boudoir photography studio to the next level. But Cassie knows from the start that she’s the best and she deserves to be respected for the job she’s been hired to do.

But when that job morphs from being the photographer to the photographed? Even Cassie, a confident woman who loves her body and curves, has her doubts. Because it’s not just any old photo shoot she’s now starring in… It’s a sexy lingerie ad campaign. Now, Cassie has experience with lingerie photography; she’s the owner of Buxom Boudoir, Chicago’s premiere boudoir and pinup photography studio. She makes her clients feel comfortable and powerful and beautiful at their most vulnerable. And when she has to model dreamy lingerie in front of Reid Montgomery, a fellow photographer with a bit of a bad boy reputation, Cassie isn’t insecure about how she’s going to look, she’s worried about doing a good job in a situation she wasn’t anticipating. 

It was important to me that Cassie didn’t just practice body positivity, but body acceptance. Cassie’s hot and she knows it. But though she’s used to calling the shots on set and aside from goofing off with her friends, she hasn’t been a model. To bring her vision fully to life for the photo shoot in question she has to pose, scantily clad, outside… in winter. In Chicago! But beyond thinking she looks great, Cassie also has to feel it. It’s through these photo shoots and seeing the photographs after the fact that Cassie really embraces that she’s beautiful, powerful, and in charge of how the world is going to see her. 

And the fact that Reid thinks all of this, too, is icing on the cake. But that’s an entirely different blog post ;-) 

Body positivity, body neutrality, and body acceptance are all different things—yes, we should find different bodies beautiful. Yes, we shouldn’t judge people based solely on their outward appearance (because you really don’t know what is going on with someone, the size of their body notwithstanding). But above all, we should accept people as they are. It’s easy to judge someone by what is presented to us first and foremost, and it’s often hard to go beyond the surface. But we owe it to each other to get to know people and understand their values and motivations. And I hope, through this fun love story, more people start to do exactly that. 

Danielle Jackson is a contemporary romance author, avid reader, lackluster-yet-mighty crafter, and accomplished TV binge-watcher. Once upon a time, she was a publicist in publishing and continues to cultivate her love of books and reading by chatting with the best authors in the business as an event coordinator at an independent bookstore and as the co-host of the Fresh Fiction podcast. She also moderates panels, interviews authors, and hosts a romance book club. Danielle lives in Chicagoland with her very own romance hero husband, darling daughter, and two tempestuous cats. For more information, visit https://daniellejacksonbooks.com/ and follow her on Twitter and Instagram, @DJacksonBooks.

Is Fiction Ever Really Fiction?

By Dianne C. Braley

There is a saying in fiction writing that nothing is entirely fiction. I’d be interested in speaking to someone who disagrees with that statement. Even in writing the wildest of science fiction or fantasy, there are sprinkles of people and pieces of places with which the author is familiar; I’d venture a guess. In my women’s fiction novel, The Silence in the Sound, I knew I was writing fiction, but there were undoubtedly some things inspired by events, places, and people in my life. What I didn’t realize was the twists and turns it would take, and I ended up writing a much different story than the one I set out to write. It’s odd because I ended up in the same place, and the ending was what I envisioned, but I took a much different road to get there. I began writing from a child’s eye, the child being me and my perspective of mine and my father’s relationship. I had intended to touch on this, but I did much more than touch after thousands of words and many chapters later. 

It doesn’t take a genius to figure out why this may have happened. I clearly had a lot on my mind. My father’s and my relationship was complex, and when I found I was able to tap into my feelings from then, those thirty-five years ago—Yikes. . . I kept going until I was done. Of course, a sea of emotions flooded me. Writing about all of this now as an adult, I felt vulnerable and raw, but I continued, moving through it and being gentle with myself. Oh, and I also reached back out to my therapist but writing this all was more cathartic for me than the best of therapy. I tapped into a place that I didn’t think was possible; my character’s relationship with her father was more accurate than I anticipated, and being under the guise of fiction, it somehow felt safer. 

 I grew up in an alcoholic home. My father was not any functioning alcoholic, and my mother would say that we were lucky because of him being the way he was, we couldn’t hide him the way others sometimes do. That way, we were forced to seek help—us going to Children-of-Alcoholics and her to Al-anon. While I don’t deny these did help, although I resented every minute of it, I never felt lucky. My brother and I just wanted to be normal, like the other kids, and with any luck, we hoped we would one day, and one day, we were. Dad got sober and stayed that way for seven years. That was lucky.

During that time and even in the darkest times, my relationship with my father was much more profound than most would expect. We navigated his disease. I showed him my anger, disappointment, and resentment freely and loudly, and him, already feeling that way about himself, could deal with this, and we’d talk. For him, it was much easier to deal with someone who had given up any hope for you than to deal with someone who didn’t, as he didn’t have any hope for himself in active disease. The rest of my family had the hope, the one thing I learned early in life you should never have when dealing with addiction. I gave up on that at the ripe old age of eight. And when he got sober, it was the biggest surprise, but I did the second thing I found you should never do when dealing with the disease of addiction. I got too comfortable, and then seven years later, after my father became a drug and alcohol counselor and helped countless people in their disease picked up again and not long after succumbed to his. I wished for so long he was here to talk, even in our anger and resentment way that we did. In writing about him, I finally was able to; inspired by him and me and our way together.   

While The Silence in the Sound is a women’s upmarket coming-of-age novel with some celebrity and love and is set on Martha's Vineyard, its premise is about growing up in addiction and the devastating and long-lasting effects. Actual events inspired the book as I was the nurse for Pulitzer-prize winner William Styron, author of Sophie's Choice on the island, and caring for him inspired me to become an author. 

What's incredibly exciting is I have partnered with the Robert F. Kennedy Community Alliance organization here in Massachusetts, and part of the proceeds will go to their division that helps children and families affected by addiction. I think it's so essential for the public to hear from both those who suffer from addiction and the children and others in their lives. While we each have our own experiences and opinions, mine expressed here are mine alone; I think we can agree the children affected by this disease need much more support. My mission is to give them a voice, and I hope that I've done so in my work. I’ll let you; the readers be the judge. 

Dianne C. Braley is a registered nurse with a passion for music, poetry, and literature. Dianne has been featured in various online and printed publications, including Today’s Dietician and Scrubs Magazine. Her nursing blog, Nursing the Neighborhood, was named one of the top nursing blogs of 2018 by Nurse Recruiter.

Editors are not Optional

By Helena P. Schrader

I am often astonished when I hear of people who believe they can write and publish a full-length book without the aid of an editor. In my experience, editors are more essential than publishers. After all, nowadays, it is possible to self-publish a book. But no one can self-edit. Editors are not only essential, they should also be your friends, your fans and your harshest critics. Let me explain.

No one, absolutely no one, is capable of complete objectivity when looking at their own creations. Nor should they be! The same object drawn by different artists will always look different and that is that subjectivity that makes art so intriguing, exciting and inspiring. 

Yet our subjectivity also makes us blind both to outright errors and features that might offend, bore, irritate, or outrage some viewers/readers. Thus, editors have two broad purposes and help an author at two levels. 

First, at the pedestrian and most obvious level, editors help by catching unintentional errors. No matter what our message, poor grammar, bad spelling, incorrect formatting, missing words or misplaced punctuation will not help get the message across. It doesn't matter how brilliant an author is, or how nit-picking and good he/she is at finding the mistakes of others. No one sees all their own errors all the time.  You see, as authors, we know our own text so well that we are inclined to see what we meant to write rather than what we wrote. E.g. since an author knows that the text should read "she was not there,” but in haste writes "she was there," the author will literally see "she was not there" when proofing the manuscript. 

On a higher level, however, a good editor can also guide an author to develop a book to its greatest potential. A good editor challenges the author's original concept, asks provocative questions about structure, character development, setting, back-story, pacing, plausibility, historical context, themes and more. Receiving negative feedback before a manuscript is published, gives an author the chance to correct and revise before investing in printing, ebook formatting and marketing — and then seeing those crushing reviews on amazon and from important review sites like Kirkus.

No editors aren't cheap. They shouldn't be. They are professionals providing a valuable service. The question is: what will cost more? A good editor or bad reviews?  

When I first started publishing, I expected my publishers to provide detailed feedback on the content of my books. I thought the publisher would point out apparent contradictions, areas that needed 'tightening up' or more explanation, etc. It didn't happen. All I ever received from a publisher was proof-reading, and that only up to a point. I continued to find errors in the sixth and seventh proof. 

When I first started self-publishing and hired free-lance editors, I was pleased by the meticulous proof-reading they did, but it took me three editors before I found one that was willing to be critical of the content. Finally! At last, I had a reader who was willing to challenge me, question me, and make me justify my writing decisions. Critically, I was having this discussion at a point when I still had the chance to re-write, refine, and so improve the manuscript. Furthermore, I was having this discussion with someone who cared about the book.  

A good editor doesn’t take money for services, they invest their time, skills and reputation into your book. They get absorbed in the story. They care about the characters. They want to see the book published and praised. They want the book to succeed.  They are the authors' first fan and the more critical they are, the more they help make the book the best that it can be. Never underestimate them and never, never try to do without them!

Helena P. Schrader earned a PhD in History from the University of Hamburg with a ground-breaking biography of a leading member of the German Resistance to Hitler. She served in the financial service industry before joining the U.S. diplomatic corps, where she served in a variety of posts in Africa and Europe. She retired in 2018. She has since published numerous works of fiction and non-fiction, several of which have won one or more literary awards.