Writing Talk with Renee Lehnen - Plain Talk Book Marketing

Renee Lehnen is a registered nurse by profession and a writer by passion. Her short stories have been published in the anthologies “Dark Secrets” and “Murder! Mystery! Mayhem!” In addition, she was the 2019 winner and 2020 runner-up of Stratford Rotary’s short story contest. In 2023, her Victorian romance novel, “What Love Demands”, was released by The Wild Rose Press under her pen name, Renata North. Renee lives in Stratford, Ontario with her husband.

Do the characters all come to you at the same time or do some of them come to you as you write?

Usually, I have two or three characters formed in my head and a scenario to put them in and I go from there. The supporting cast is invented and inserted ad hoc.

What kind of research do you do before you begin writing a book?

I research as I go. For fiction, usually the great Google reference library and archives suffice.

What do you think about the current publishing market?

It’s frustrating to find a traditional publisher. They are not eager to take a risk on a new novelist, especially if his or her work crosses or – gasp – defies genres. One could wallow in the muck of bitterness, but I think for a writer in that position, self-publishing is the way to go. Entrepreneurialism is a useful mindset to adopt in this world.

As an author, what’s your day like?

As I’m an insomniac, I wake up early and I write. Then, when the rest of the world wakes up, I get on with my non-writing day.

What advice do you have for new authors?

I have three bits of advice:

Keep your day job. People rarely get rich as writers.

Exercise outdoors every day so you don’t wind up stoop shouldered, nearsighted, and vitamin D deficient from spending too much time at your desk. Being physically healthy will help you withstand the emotional toll of rejection that all writers face.

Rejection is to be expected – remembering that will ease some of its sting.

What is your writing process? For instance, do you do an outline first? Do you do the chapters first?

I don’t outline because I’m incapable of predicting what my characters will do. I start with two or three characters, a scenario, and a vague direction, and off I go, chronologically, chapter by chapter, letter by letter. No skipsies.

What are common traps for aspiring writers?

Too much scene setting. The story is what matters most. Also, everyone has seen a sunset. Don’t waste paper, ink, and photons on poetic descriptions of the sun sinking at the western horizon because writing stuff like that is boring and self-indulgent.

Do you try more to be original or to deliver to readers what they want?

I try to write what the characters think and sometimes that aligns with what I think. When I write to avoid offending people or to deliver a product, the writing is dull. It takes courage to write originally and honestly, but it’s more interesting for readers. My greatest fear isn’t in offending people; it’s in boring them.

If you could tell your younger writing self anything, what would it be?

It’s okay to wait to write until you have something to say. Experiencing life – going on adventures, trying new things – is grist for the mill. I wouldn’t have had much to say as a young woman. I was childish and melodramatic. It’s just as well I waited to write. Maybe that’s a common phenomenon.

How long on average does it take you to write a book?

I’m a very slow writer as I don’t outline a plot. Rather, I create the characters and a scenario, and then I wind up the characters and watch what they do. The characters are a step ahead of me and I write their story by following them. Then, to really bog down the process, I edit and polish as I go. I wind up with a manuscript that is close to ready in one or two drafts. Using this arduous process takes me a year to write a book. It’s slow but I haven’t found a better way to write.

Do you believe in writer’s block?

Not really. I haven’t experienced it myself, although I have times of laziness or resistance. “Writer’s block” seems like an excuse not to write. If I find myself resisting writing, I find something else to do and return to writing later. Truth is, I wouldn’t use “block” as an excuse to stop taking care of patients – that’s my job as a nurse – so similarly, if I just get on with the work of writing, I find the “block” is only in my imagination. It isn’t real.

Nice to meet you Renee, much success with your book.

About the Book

Elmington by Renee Lehnen

Genre: Social Satirical Fiction

No good deed goes unpunished in a willfully blind, technocratic society.

Gordon Gray, a retired librarian, only wishes to chain smoke, read twentieth-century novels by dead white men, and at the time of his choosing, shuffle off his mortal coil. Everyone from his thanatophobic doctor to his New Age neighbour has an opinion on what Gordon should want and how he should be treated. When his daughter Martha arrives from the West Coast, she finds Gordon disheveled, wheezy, and cantankerous in his squalid bungalow. She remains in Elmington to negotiate with his meddlesome entourage and look after him. Seven months later, Gordon is dead, and Martha is in police custody for the crime of caring unconventionally.

Winner of the Crime Writers of Canada Award of Excellence for Best Unpublished Manuscript in 2022

Praises for Elmington

“Very engaging, great dialogue, great dark humour and social commentary.” – Crime Writers of Canada Judges

“The central characters in Elmington crackle with complexity and conflicted feelings as they navigate the minefield of end-of-life decision making. As Renee Lehnen’s pitch perfect prose animates the fictional town, the tensions simmering just below its gleaming surface emerge. This timely and unforgettable book confronts the most difficult choices a family can be asked to make – and the constraints within which those decisions are forced to unfold.” — Judith Harway, author of the memoir Sundown and three collections of poetry.