A writer’s wife or husband can see their writer struggle, but they might not know how to help. If you’re truly interested in the care and feeding of your writer, you should know that it isn’t helpful to ask when that “best seller” will finally be done, joking about sudden wealth and fame. It isn’t helpful to comment about how the writer isn’t pulling their weight on the income or domestic front, and better shape up. A story about the wild success of a competitor is less inspiring than you might think. The odds of success are never good, but a partner can make it better or worse.

This is a photo from our early years, but some things never change. Integrity. Support. Empathy.

Luckily, I don’t have to deal with any of the above because Lyette knows instinctively what I need. If I take regular beat downs from indifferent journals and publishing houses, I’d rather not have the beatings continue at home. Even if I produce a quality product, identity politics, current trends, good old obscurity, and the lack of a million Instagram followers all stand between me and success. A great review does not guarantee the sale of a single copy. Any book-length project is going to take a significant chunk of my life and may never be published. (Should someone hire me to give pep talks to emerging writers?) But like a startup, with a 90% chance of failure, the odds are not likely to discourage attempts by writers or entrepreneurs. They have it in their blood.

How does a supportive partner who witnesses egregious levels of procrastination not get frustrated with an underperforming writer? Simply by knowing that writers are like that sometimes. Yes, the work may involve many hours of staring off into space, or doodling, or studying the second-by-second gyrations of the stock markets, when that time might have been better spent washing the dishes or doing the laundry. The big payday, a laughable concept for all but the top one percent, is not likely to come from writing alone, but rather a patchwork of teaching gigs, grants, editing, and other side-jobs not directly related to advancing the latest book.

Here’s a list of things Lyette has done for me in 2020. Some of these are specific to her background in advertising, but a few can apply to any writer’s partner who is patiently waiting for good things to happen next week, next year, or next decade.

  1. Getting friends and family to buy the book.
  2. Shamelessly using any opening in conversation to bring it up.
  3. Setting up advertising campaigns on Facebook, CBC Books, and Google to spread the word.
  4. Coordinating with my publisher to build digital ad creative.
  5. Monitoring and obsessing about my sales stats so I can monitor and obsess about other things.
  6. Celebrating wins and minimizing losses.
  7. Providing a sane counterbalance to emotional flip outs, paranoia, and doomy prognostications.