Those of you saw my review of Anne Goodwin‘s debut novel Sugar and Snails will be delighted to read the following guest post from Anne on how much of her real self is contained within her novel. I find it a fascinating subject myself, as I know my own novels are strange conglomerations of true, hypothetically true, and utterly fanciful, with the reader (hopefully) never being certain which is which. I’ve been toying with this a lot in my third novel, The Other Three of Us, the first part of which comes out next week, and I’ll admit it can be a bit frightening. My story is actually told from the point of view of the author, which essentially invites the reader to assume that it’s autobiographical even when it’s not. Anne, too, has taken a brave step here in writing about a character whom many readers will assume represents Anne herself. This is the risk we take with fiction, and Sugar and Snails has done it amazingly well.

Is it autobiographical?

Apparently, most first novels are thought to be autobiographical, so I’m anticipating some fun when my readers start wondering how much of my character Diana’s life overlaps with mine. Fun because there’s an interesting secret at the heart of her identity that might make friends and acquaintances look at me in a different light.

When my husband read a proof copy a couple of months before publication, having lived with the story for the past seven years but, until then, never having read a word, he also wondered whether people would think it autobiographical. I asked whether he’d mind. After giving it some thought, he told me he wouldn’t because people would think he was Simon (Diana’s not-quite-partner) and Simon’s a decent guy.

It’s the fact that Diana’s story isn’t mine that gives me the freedom to tell it. I’ve no desire to open up the events of my own life to public scrutiny; nor do I have the capacity to write an autobiography or memoir in an engaging way. But, in writing about a character on a very different trajectory to my own, I’ve drawn deeply on my own experience. Diana isn’t me, but I’ve written her as if she could be. She’s an alternative version of me.

The best response I’ve come across to that awkward question, Is it autobiographical? (although, unfortunately, I can’t remember from where I’ve stolen it) is No, but it is personal. I’m very attached to this fictional alter ego of mine, very protective of her. Although I’m aware that, because of her anxiety about her secret, she can be irritating, I’ve found myself getting defensive when anyone criticises how she behaves. Well-intentioned (and useful) feedback from peer reviewers, especially in the early stages when I was just getting to know her, could be challenging. Why couldn’t they accept her as she was?

Most writers are personally involved in their characters at some level, but perhaps this felt particularly difficult for Diana (and me) because her journey towards self-acceptance is largely what the novel’s about. She fears that her friends (including decent-guy, Simon) will desert her if they discover who she really is. Of course, as her creator, I’m going to be sensitive to any hints of rejection.

While I don’t share the exact details of her biography, I do identify with her emotional experience, and it’s this that particularly interests me as a writer. I too have felt inadequate, ashamed of being me. I too have wished I could scrub out my old life and start again. I too have felt a yawning gap between how I see myself and how I feel I ought to be. Perhaps you’ve experienced this too?

Reflecting on this emotional connection, I wonder what people mean when they ask if a novel is autobiographical. Are they looking for a merging of author and character in terms of life events or life themes? The more I think about it, the less I comprehend what the question means. Perhaps, should anyone ask, I’ll pass the question back to them the way that therapists are prone to do, What do you think?

Reading through my novel for the final time before publication, checking for any errors that had escaped the notice of editors and proof-reader, I was surprised to come across the odd scene I’d borrowed from my own life. Not the big events, but small things, slightly tweaked to fit the story. Why should I be surprised when it was me who had put them there? As crazy as this might sound, it feels as if, having given those minor incidents to Diana, they no longer belonged to me. Hoping readers would discover connections between Diana’s life and their own, I didn’t expect that I’d discover them too.

Ever since I’ve been writing fiction seriously, I’ve been aware of the fuzzy boundary between fiction and real life. The moment someone asks me if Sugar and Snails is autobiographical, it’s going to get a lot fuzzier still.

Anne Goodwin writes fiction, short and long, and blogs about reading and writing, with a peppering of psychology. Her debut novel, Sugar and Snails, was published last month by Inspired Quill. Catch up on her website: annethology or on Twitter @Annecdotist.

Want to read more of Anne’s guest posts regarding her novel? Visit other stops on her month-long blog tour:

Last week I finished reading Anne Goodwin‘s debut novel Sugar and Snails. While I have been a fan of Goodwin’s writing for some time, it’s difficult to anticipate whether someone who writes wonderful short stories will also have the skills required to assemble a novel. Goodwin most definitely does. I highly recommend that you give her novel a try – you will not be disappointed.

Below is the five-star review I am posting on Amazon and Goodreads:

A coming-of-age story unlike many others

I picked up Sugar and Snails without having any idea what it was about (details below under the Spoiler Alert), and I have to say that I was delightfully surprised by both the storyline and the style of writing. I loved the way the author slowly unravels the story behind the youthful Diana’s mysterious life-changing decision, picking away it, probing her memory and subconscious for details, just like the psychologist her main character portrays. It’s a classic example of form fitting function, and it drew me deeply into the story even as I was drawn more and more deeply into the depths of Diana’s mind.

The writing is smooth and expertly done, with characters who are imperfect and three-dimensionally drawn. I was reminded of the novels of Graham Greene in both the manner in which the story unfolds and the realistic characterizations of the people involved. Ostensibly this is a book about Diana’s decision, a decision that she made when she had neither the knowledge nor experience to make it, a decision that has dogged her every year of her life since she was fifteen. It takes her thirty years to comes to terms with that decision, but ultimately, you’re proud of her for how she handles it, and proud of her, too, for how she decides to move forward.

SPOILER ALERT!

In a day in which Caitlyn Jenner is gracing the front cover of Vanity Fair, transgender issues are at the forefront of the collective consciousness. We are entering an era of great social change, an era in which we are coming to acknowledge that trans people, like homosexuals, have little choice but to be who they are. What is so powerfully moving about Diana’s story is that it harkens back to an epoch before there was any tolerance at all for gender that was not one hundred percent “man” or one hundred percent “woman”; she demonstrates with painful yet not pitiful eloquence how difficult it can be merely to exist in a world in which one must identify oneself solely with one or the other, and ultimately, how we all suffer from trying to adhere to this strict dichotomy of gender. Hers is a coming-of-age story unlike many others, yet it cries out to be told, to join the stories of other youths who have suffered crises of sexual or gender identity in a world that has often been hostile to them. Yet, it, too, offers hope, for if, in the modern era, a forty-five-year-old woman can at last find peace, if a sixty-five-year-old woman can find peace, then perhaps the young people who follow in their footsteps will never have to know the suffering that the older generation endured; peace may be theirs without their having to find it.