“..she’s just making stuff up as she goes along ”  was what the scathing review in last week’s New York Times Book Review said of Alice Sebold’s new novel, The Almost Moon.  Of course most of us who write fiction do exactly this – make it up as we go along. Yes, novelists have an idea of where their novel is headed, what makes the characters tick, but a lot of us don’t make a detailed plot outline.  Who knows what’s going to happen until you and your character get to that point? This is the joy of writing fiction. Not being in total control in the first draft.

That said, I didn’t like The Almost Moon anymore than the reviewer did. I’ve been a great fan of Alice Sebold; she pulled off an impossible subject in The Lovely Bones, and Lucky, her memoir of being raped as a college student, is brilliant and heart wrenching. I use it when I teach memoir.  But what happened with this new novel?  I don’t think it’s impossible to write about a character who murders her mother (as her protragonist, Helen, does), but I just don’t get why Helen had to do this. Smothering her mother and then putting her body in the freezer after lovingly washing it, while shocking and riveting as the scene may be, appears to have no purpose. You’re either hoping Helen gets caught – or worse, you don’t care. And Sebold lost me completely when shortly after the murder, Helen has sex with her best friend’s son.  I’d love to hear from any of you who have read it – and if you liked it, please let us know why.

And next time you get a rejection slip that says Your work doesn’t suit our needs at the present time…or whatever it says, realize this is absolutely nothing compared to having your work discussed as “an insult to the lumber industry” in the New York Times Book Review. We all get our work rejected at some point, either in reviews or phone calls from our agents or in little notices that arrive in the mail. Just feel lucky when your rejection arrives in the mail or over the phone and you’re in the privacy of your own home. Then send your work out again. Or write something new.  Which is what I’m hoping Alice Sebold is doing right now. Because one book – or essay or story – going off the tracks doesn’t keep you from being a wonderful writer.

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FYI: I’ll be at Williams Books in San Pedro at 6:30 Thursday night, 11/1.  Thanks to all the writers in Laguna Beach who showed up at Laguna Beach Books yesterday and asked such great questions.