We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Sarah Tomlinson. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Sarah below.
Alright, Sarah thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. So let’s jump to your mission – what’s the backstory behind how you developed the mission that drives your brand?
At heart, I am a storyteller. Although I write professionally in several different areas — fiction, ghostwriting, screenplays, journalism, personal essays, memoir — I am always thinking about how I can tell a meaningful story that will connect with as many readers as possible. In my experience, the best way to create an impact is through vulnerability. This goal can be difficult to meet, as I think it is very human to be tempted to show others only a filtered version of our experience, especially in these social media-driven times. I try to always reassure myself that all of my writing, like my life, is a work in progress. One way I keep this in mind is through my business name, which is “As Is Enterprises,” a cheeky reminder to myself that all writing is always in process, and that I must accept that there is no perfect ideal. When I am working with clients on their ghostwriting projects, I try to bring this ethos to them and encourage them to find their own version of authenticity through vulnerability.
Sarah , before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?
I was 16 when I took my first fiction workshop and knew I wanted to be a novelist. Then, I spent the next 30 years learning how to make this dream happen. What at first seemed like an obstacle — needing to find other means of supporting myself through my writing while I worked on becoming a better novelist — actually turned out to be the best thing that could have happened to me. First, I decided to go to journalism school, which led me to freelance for a number of excellent daily newspapers, including The Boston Globe and The Los Angeles Times. I was mentored by some incredibly talented writers and editors, and I learned how to go out into my community and gather stories to be shared with our readers. Ultimately, I became a music journalist, which allowed me to tell the stories of other artists and helped me to think about my own path as an artist and shape it more consciously. From there, I became a celebrity ghostwriter, which was another career that was about being in service to the stories of others. Again, I was lucky enough to be mentored by gifted editors. And I learned so much from working closely with my clients, who were often leaders in their fields, whether it was entertainment or business. Finally, I combined all of this professional experience and what I had learned about the craft of writing into my debut novel, “The Last Days of the Midnight Ramblers,” a mystery novel centered around a ghostwriter who pens a memoir set in the music world. It was published by Flatiron Books on February 13. 2024 — truly the culmination of three decades of dreaming and working toward this goal!
We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.
When you are a baby writer, you are warned by teachers and more experienced professionals in your field that you will need to face a great deal of rejection on your path to publication. This difficult experience is considered a rite of passage, and some writers collect their rejection letters, because they know they will probably need to amass quite a few of them before they realize their dream of publishing a book or having a script produced. It is one thing to understand, intellectually, that rejection is a necessary and maturing part of the process. It is quite another thing to actually weather all of the rejections that do come. And you must try to learn from any helpful feedback you receive about your writing, without taking the “no’s” personally and allowing them to make you believe you are not a good writer or will never see your work out in the world. For me, it was only my fourth novel that was accomplished enough to be published. That meant putting three earlier novels in a drawer, after they were either rejected within the industry, or I personally realized they were not strong enough to be published. In order to metabolize this rejection and keep writing, I consciously cultivated a powerful support system of other writers whose work I admired, who were also facing their own rejections. Together, we commiserated about our disappointments and celebrated our wins. I don’t think I could have kept writing new material for long enough to finally see my debut novel be published this year, without their advice and support.
Looking back, are there any resources you wish you knew about earlier in your creative journey?
I wish I had known earlier that it is possible to find inexpensive and very inclusive writing retreats, or to put them together myself by gathering a few fellow writers with a great work ethic and renting a space where we can go to work on our creative projects together. When I was a young writer, I wasted time and emotional energy applying for the more prestigious writers’ residencies, and when I didn’t get chosen to attend them, I took it personally. While I know from friends who have gone to these residencies that they can be a great opportunity to write and to network, I didn’t need to attend them to get my own writing and networking done in other ways. It was only in the past few years, through the advice of other writers, that I found easier means of going away for a week at a time to work on my writing.
Contact Info:
- Website: sarahtomlinson.com
- Instagram: instagram.com/@duchessofrock
- Facebook: facebook.com/sarahtomlinsongoodgirl
- Twitter: twitter.com/@duchessofrock
Image Credits
Author Photo: Diana Koenigsberg PS Readers Festival: Jason Blitman Ramblers: Jason Blitman PEN: Personal photo Audible recording: personal photo