I started writing this book in 2021 so I feel as if I've been working on it FOREVER (said ever so dramatically). No offense to my darling book baby but I am seriously more than ready to yeet you out of the nest. Fly, little bookie, fly!!!
Am I nervous? Of course. But so far the response to book baby has been just wonderful. With starred reviews from Booklist and Library Journal and heady praise from Publisher's Weekly, I feel as if I accomplished what I set out to do with this novel.
What did I set out to do, you ask? Okay, you probably didn't, but I'm me, so I'll tell you anyway :) First and foremost, I wanted to craft a romcom around witty banter (I live for witty banter between a hero and heroine and heroine and friends and hero and friends and heroine and family and hero and...you get the idea). I also felt the need to examine how our families shape us, both good and bad on purpose and by accident. It was important to me to have characters with audacious dreams that they decide to go after one hundred percent. And I wanted my characters to grow enough to see themselves through each other's eyes and understand that what makes them different is also what makes them amazing. I feel as if I achieved that and I am so very grateful for the support and encouragement I received along the way, which includes you, Reds and Readers!
Below is an excerpt if you're keen and I'm including a buy link HERE because of course I am!
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I hurried into the house and quickly fashioned him a cocktail just like mine. I might have been a bit more careful with his, not that I was trying to impress him or anything. Okay, yes, I totally was, which was ridiculous because for all I knew he was married or had a girlfriend. Never mind that he was obviously a book person and I wasn’t. I pushed all of that aside and went back to the porch.
“Here you go.” I handed him the drink.
I watched as he lifted the glass to his lips, which were puckered ever so slightly. I glanced away. Staring is rude, you know, and I imagined that ogling a librarian was even worse than that. Sort of like checking out a nun. I picked up my own glass and took another sip. The hint of vanilla was subtle but it mellowed the tartness of the lemon perfectly. I really thought I had a winner here.
“This is good,” Ben said. He glanced at me and nodded. “Really good.”
“Not too girly?” I asked. “I don’t want to be re-inventing the appletini.”
He laughed. “It’s not as macho as a scotch, neat, but the lemon provides a nice punch. So, I’d say it’s no more girly than a mojito. It’s the name that’ll clinch it. You need a very gender neutral name.”
“I was thinking of calling it Liquid Sunshine,” I said. I frowned. “That will never fly with the XY chromosomal set.”
“Probably not,” he agreed. ‘You need something more manly like Scorched Earth.”
“Sounds delicious,” I said. “I’m imagining subtle notes of ash.”
“And dirt,” he added with a laugh. It was a good laugh.
Jenn McKinlay: As you probably know by now, because I’ve mentioned it a bajillion times, my next women’s fiction romcom SUMMER READING (June 2023) features a neurodivergent (dyslexic) heroine. This was quite an undertaking because getting it right matters and dyslexia is a tricky bugger manifesting differently in everyone who has it. Suffice to say, I did my homework and I learned a lot along the way. My biggest takeaway was a statistic that stopped me in my tracks – one in ten people have dyslexia. Huh. A little more research and I learned that there are dyslexic friendly fonts. Double huh.
Naturally, when I turned in my manuscript, I made my pitch to have the book published in a dyslexic friendly font. I used all the buzzwords in my argument, you know, accessibility, inclusion, representation, etc. I waited and then I received my publisher’s response. Not only were they on board, the book designers WERE EXCITED to rise up and meet the challenge. Not gonna lie, it felt like a win. I mean, writing a novel about a dyslexic and not printing it in a dyslexic friendly font would have made me look like an a-hole. Seriously.
You can see from the image below how the bottom of the letters are thicker, this is one of the ways to make the letters easier to interpret for dyslexic readers.
Of course, now I always notice when things aren’t printed in a dyslexic friendly font. It seems shocking to me, given the high number of people who struggle to decipher words. Now that I know this, I can never unknow it, which I think is terrific.
Here's a short video from YouTube on what words look like to a dyslexic.
How about you, Reds? Have you learned something while writing a novel that changed your perspective?
HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: Wait, I’ll offer my ignorance right up front. I had no idea about a dyslexic-friendly font. So I looked it right up, and now I am gasping. Jenn, you should explain it! But this is a life-changing post, thank you. And I am happy to join you in never unknowing it.
And I do think I have learned things in novels that have changed my perspective. Once I typed that someone had gone off the reservation–and I sat there for a moment, the cursor blinking. Delete delete delete. It made me realized how blithely we type things without thinking about the origin or derivation. Or who we might hurt. I am much more careful now.
JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: I also went to look up dyslexic-friendly fonts, and I’m down with using sans serif type but I draw the line at Comic Sans. No civilized person should be subjected to that.
I should mention here my younger brother was diagnosed with dyslexia in kindergarten, one of the first generations being taught by teachers exposed to concepts of neuro-atypical learning. The benefit of a whole school career working with and on his dyslexia? A Bachelors and an MBA.
Hank makes an excellent point about being aware of how the language changes in ways that make it more inclusive and user-friendly. As for what I’ve learned writing, I think I did it backwards… after getting to know a lovely young trans girl, I included a transgender woman in my last novel. I like being able to introduce readers to people they might not have met before, if that makes sense.
JENN: LOL. Sorry, Julia, despite the universal loathing for it, Comic Sans is actually the third most dyslexic friendly font. That may explain why it remains popular -- not with graphic designers, however.
HALLIE EPHRON: Dyslexic-friendly font! Who knew!? Thank you, Jenn. And Kudos to your publisher. (So forget my old standby, Times New Roman.) One thing I’ve become more aware of is text size, trying to err on the larger side. But Blogger can be ridiculously obstinate when I try to change or enlarge the font. Fortunately online readers can usually enlarge, if they know how. I am struggling with the boundaries between being “inclusive” vs. “appropriating.” Anyone have any light to shed there? Maybe it’s all about doing your homework when you write about someone who isn’t you.
JENN: Such a good question, Hallie. I think it comes down to context. Is the representation of an ethnicity, disability, or lifestyle meaningful or mercenary? Is the content creator out to make a buck or are they trying to raise awareness or show appreciation? I'm sure there are better ways to determine where the line is, but that's my metric.
DEBORAH CROMBIE: Jenn, I was diagnosed as dyslexic when I was fourteen.
The specialists who tested me said they didn't know how I'd learned to read. I still struggled, dropping out of high school at sixteen. I could not (and probably still can't!) take bubble-fill standardized tests. I did a couple of years of special ed training and was eventually able to not only get my GED but to graduate from a good college with honors, if a couple of years older than my classmates. It got easier, at least for me, as an adult. You learn coping strategies, and you also aren't constantly challenged to do things that are especially difficult for you (in my case, standardized tests and algebra!)
As to Hallie's question, I am wholly on the side of inclusive! I think it's terrific that Jenn's educated herself, and will educate her readers, about dyslexia.
LUCY BURDETTE: Count me in as one of the clueless. Debs, how in the world are you writing all these amazing novels with a learning disability? And also wondering, Julia, how did the dyslexia manifest itself in kindergarten?
JENN: Thank you so much for sharing that, Debs. I had no idea and now I am in awe of you. Of course, now I have to ask you to be a beta reader for Summer Reading :)
How about you, Readers? Has your perspective been changed by a story that you've read or written?
Jungle Red Writers has been named one of the top 101 Best Websites for Writers by Writers Digest, one of the top 50 mystery blogs by CourtReporter, and one of the top 100 creative writing blogs by Best Colleges Online
