The Book That Taught Me How to Write the Book

When I first started writing The Mess That Made Them, I thought I had a clear idea of what it was. It would be a book about artists, composers, and writers who struggled. Not just misunderstood geniuses, but real people who failed, got back up, and made something lasting. That was the pitch. That was the vision.

What I didn’t know was how to tell it.

The early draft was, if I’m honest, a well-meaning encyclopedia. I knew a lot about the people I wanted to write about. I knew which myths I wanted to correct. I had folders of research, a spreadsheet full of story beats, and a voice that sounded like someone trying to prove they belonged in the room. Which, of course, I was.

It wasn’t bad. It just wasn’t alive yet. It read like someone smart had done their homework. But it didn’t feel like anyone needed to say these things. It didn’t yet sound like me.

Two agents passed on the book, but both sent generous notes. One told me, bluntly, that the structure wasn’t working. That I was trying to do too much and saying too little in the process. Another said it felt like I was writing around something instead of into it. She asked what I was scared to say. I don’t think she meant it as a challenge, but it landed like one.

I sat with that for a while. And then I threw out most of the manuscript. Not the research. Not the core ideas. But the scaffolding. The tone. The version of myself that was trying to sound impressive instead of clear.

What emerged, slowly, was a different book. A sharper one. A quieter one, at times. And more honest. I found six core pressures that kept surfacing in the lives of these artists: refusal, containment, survival, exile, darkness, and reinvention. They became the spine. Each chapter found its place under one of those. Not perfectly. Not neatly. But with just enough gravity to hold everything together.

I stopped trying to include every fact. I stopped worrying about whether someone more qualified had written about these people before. I started asking why these lives had stayed with me for so long, and what they might offer to someone feeling stuck or too late or not quite good enough to begin.

The artists in the book stopped being subjects. They became mirrors. Not because I saw myself in their talent, but because I recognized something else: the uncertainty. The feeling of wanting to make something real without knowing if anyone would care. The slow erosion of confidence that happens when the world keeps asking you to be more manageable, more correct, more like what it already understands.

I didn’t want to write tidy legacy stories. I wanted to write about the people who made something lasting before the world said yes. I wanted to understand why they kept going when the outcome was uncertain. And I wanted to offer that to anyone else still wondering if the risk is worth it.

This book taught me how to write it. And not just in the structural sense. It taught me to stop performing. It taught me that voice is not what makes you sound smart, it’s what makes you sound true. It taught me that insight matters more than cleverness, and that clarity is harder than complexity.

It taught me that telling the truth, even in third person, even through someone else’s story, still costs something. And it’s still worth it.

So if you’re in the middle of a project that isn’t quite working yet, I’ll just say this: it might still be the right book. You just might not be the right writer for it yet. That doesn’t mean you’re not ready. It means the book might be teaching you how to become the person who can tell it right.

It took me longer than I wanted. I’m still not sure I got everything right. But I know what it’s about now. I know what I was trying to say.

And that is worth everything.