THIS IS GOOD

G.P. Gottlieb

Long before I started writing books, when I was focused on creating, teaching, and performing music, I was plagued by a little voice continuously telling me that I wasn’t good at any of it. That voice never shut up. When I was raising children, I never felt like I was the best mother, and years later, when I began inventing recipes, I questioned whether I had it in me to get the flavors right. 

Over the years, I wondered where my self-doubt came from. Did a teacher make a passing remark that stayed with me? Did my parents tell me once too often to pipe down or stop repeating the same song on the piano? Was I always comparing myself to far more accomplished bakers, musicians, or authors? 

Whether I’m starting a new novel or inventing a new recipe, I hear a voice in my head suggesting that someone else has already written it or invented it. And their version is superior to anything I could ever conceive of. 

My first editor, S.L. Wisenberg (Sandi), is an accomplished author with degrees and a body of work to show for it. She used to read the pages I brought her each week, her red pencil ready to circle things that needed to be moved, or cross out extraneous verbiage. It was humbling in the beginning – my writing was an undisciplined mess.

That’s why I remember the first time she looked up at me across the table and said, “This is good.”

She was only saying it about one sentence, or maybe it was just a fragment of a sentence, but it’s all I needed. Just that small bit of validation was enough to recharge me, and I’m still thinking about that moment a decade later, with four mysteries under my belt.

 Over years of editing sessions, Sandi has drawn many smiley faces and underlined many a passage that worked well, but the first time she praised me, I sat up straight and gasped. 

Not to say she didn’t also cross off huge swaths of dialogue, or ask why extraneous characters were in the scene, or wondered if the red herrings that mystery writers use are supposed to redirect readers enough to pull them out of the story. When Sandi “wondered” something, it meant she had a firm opinion about it but wanted to know how to approach her argument against whatever it was that I did.

What I usually did was give too much information, present that information at the wrong time, or go in an unexpected direction. If I’m writing a story about a character fending off being kidnapped as a child and then I mention that she ran home, sat on the porch and nibbled on one of those long red licorice ropes, you might want to know what happened next. But if I veer off into an irrelevant tale about the girl’s grandmother telling her that licorice causes cancer because of Red Dye #3 in the 1960s, I’ve just taken you out of the original story. Sandi would have circled the whole grandmother’s part and suggested moving or deleting it.

I have three traditionally published culinary mysteries under my belt and a fourth launching in the summer of 2026. Although there was a kerfuffle about my first publisher and my books are now being reissued by a second publisher, I’ve amassed lots of reviews and sold over a thousand books. You’d think that would make me a little less tentative about my ability to write, wouldn’t you? Nope.

I’ve learned by now that my first draft is always abysmal, but I still search my memory for traces of Sandi’s encouragement. I keep fixing this essay, for example, revising, changing the title, clarifying my thoughts until I can muster up the courage to submit it. It might not be perfect, and an essay about low self-confidence isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, but at least I can tell myself, “This is good.”

—

G.P. Gottlieb is the author of the Whipped & Sipped Mysteries (Battered, Smothered, and Charred, Anamcara Press). She is on the Sisters in Crime Chicagoland board, a member of Blackbird Writers, and has interviewed over 275 authors as host for New Books in Literature, a podcast channel on the New Books Network.

CHARRED

Murder is on the menu-served warm with muffins and lattes.

At the Whipped and Sipped Café, Alene Baron knows how to handle a kitchen fire-but this blaze may burn far beyond her control.

When a suspicious fire draws Alene, her loyal friend Kacey, and Kacey’s boyfriend Kofi to a charred property in search of salvaged wood, they expect nothing more than a little trespassing and a lot of soot. Instead, whispers of arson swirl through their tight-knit community-and before long, a body turns up amid the ashes.

Kofi fears the police will come knocking. Kacey fears someone saw them. And Alene is caught in the middle, torn between protecting the people she loves and telling the truth to her partner, homicide detective Frank. Shaw Because in this town, secrets don’t stay buried. They smolder.

As suspicion spreads and tensions rise, Alene must sift through half-truths, family loyalties, and long-simmering grudges to uncover what really happened the night of the fire. With her café bustling, her children and father offering heartfelt (if sometimes chaotic) support, and a community on edge, she’ll need every ounce of patience-and every recipe in her arsenal-to keep things from going up in flames.

Rich with mouthwatering dishes, sharp dialogue, and emotional depth, Charred serves up a mystery that’s both frightful and fun-complete with a twist that will leave readers deliciously stunned.

Book 3 in the Whipped and Sipped

Cozy Culinary Mystery Series

BUY HERE

Tags: featured, women writers

Category: On Writing