R. Eric Thomas: I’m Always Looking for Hope
R. Eric Thomas is the bestselling author of Here for It: Or, How to Save Your Soul in America, a Lambda Literary Award finalist, and the YA novel Kings of B’more, a Stonewall Honor book. Both books were also featured as Read with Jenna book-club picks on Today.
He is also a television writer (Apple TV+’s Dickinson, FX’s Better Things), a Lambda Literary Award-winning playwright, and the long-running host of The Moth in Philadelphia. For four years, he was a senior staff writer at ELLE online, where he wrote the popular “Eric Reads the News” column. Follow him on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram.
R. Eric Thomas
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In this post, Thomas discusses what inspired his most recent book, what surprises him the most about many writers, and more.
Name: R. Eric Thomas
Literary agent: Anna Sproul-Latimer at Neon Literary
Book title: Congratulations, the Best Is Over!
Publisher: Ballantine
Release date: August 8, 2023
Genre/category: Nonfiction/Memoir
Previous titles: Here For It, or How to Save Your Soul in America (Ballantine); Reclaiming Her Time: The Power of Maxine Waters (Dey Street); Kings of B’more (Kokila)
Elevator pitch for the book: In this coming-of-middle-age collection, R. Eric Thomas reflects on returning to his hometown (under duress), establishing a new identity in the early years of marriage, battling the natural world in the quest for the perfect garden, and navigating life’s hardest transitions in an ever-changing world.
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What prompted you to write this book?
I’m always looking for hope. I’m a real silver lining, Pollyanna, zippity-doo-dah kind of guy. But I started writing this book at a time when I was really struggling to hold on to any kind of upside to the present.
I know you can’t write yourself to a happy ending, however, so what started as an exercise in changing my thinking became an often funny, but also quite vulnerable reflection on change, on loss, and what happens after happily ever after, and, yes, on hope.
How long did it take to go from idea to publication? And did the idea change during the process?
I think the seeds of this book started before I even finished my first book, Here for It. I started taking note of stories and themes that might fit in another collection. I wasn’t really thinking seriously about it then, say 2019, but started in earnest in 2021. That’s when I started my Scrivener file so I knew I meant business. The book was originally called Determined to Enjoy Myself and the essays were less linked than they are now.
My father-in-law died while I was working on the book and for a long time I thought that it was too fresh and too recent to write about. But after about a year, I realized that it had shifted everything in my world, of course, and that a small part of it was asking to be let into the book. That unlocked a new shape to the book and helped it become what it ended up.
Were there any surprises or learning moments in the publishing process for this title?
While this is my fourth published book, it’s my second book of essays so it sort of felt like a follow-up to my debut in a lot of ways. The anxiety that that produced was very educational, as were the places where I found surprising confidence.
I’ve learned how crucial booksellers and librarians are. As someone who always wants the approval and friendship of every bookseller and librarian I meet, this was both an encouragement and a new goal.
I also learned that while I’m lucky to have a really wonderful relationship with my incredibly smart editor Sara Weiss, that every book seems to be a completely different beast and that there are things to learn about the way we work together each time.
Were there any surprises in the writing process for this book?
I found surprising new ways to mine humor and to show up fully on the page. This was a great exercise in growing and expanding as a writer for me, daring myself to be bigger, bolder, more open, and fearless.
I thought this book would be easier to write, especially since I’d had such a relatively unencumbered path in writing my YA novel. But I found that this book took different stuff, which was a challenge, but ultimately a rewarding one.
What do you hope readers will get out of your book?
As always, I hope they see themselves. I hope they see their worlds and this world that we share different, more expansively, more hopefully, and with more possibility. I hope they also share my appreciation for the Mrs. Peacock speech from Clue, which serves as an epitaph and the theme of at least two essays. It’s a really great speech.
If you could share one piece of advice with other writers, what would it be?
I’m surprised by how many writers tell me they don’t read that much, or don’t read in their fields. That feels basic to me.
But beyond that, I find it so helpful to read what confounds you, what feels beyond your grasp as a writer, what inspires you but exists far outside your chosen field. Read the thing you could never write because it will help you to write the thing you can’t yet conceive of.
While there’s no shortage of writing advice, it’s often scattered around—a piece of advice here, words of wisdom there. And in the moments when you most need writing advice, what you find might not resonate with you or speak to the issue you’re dealing with. In A Year of Writing Advice, the editors of Writer’s Digest have gathered thoughts, musings, and yes, advice from 365 authors in dozens of genres to help you on your writing journey.