Author Profile: Erika Erickson Malinoski
The Spun Yarn works with and provides beta readers and manuscript critiques for all kinds of authors. Our Author Profile series highlights some of the successful authors we’ve worked with, getting insight into their process so other writers can learn from their experience.
Erika Erickson Malinoski grew up in Michigan and now lives in New Jersey with her multi-generational family. In between, she earned a Masters in Public Policy from the University of Michigan, taught secondary math and sex ed in California, and realized that the universe is very strange. She is also a devout Unitarian Universalist.
Perfect for fans of Dragon Riders of Pern and The Left Hand of Darkness, Erika Malinoski’s debut novel, Pledging Season, brings to light the inequalities of sexism and gender discrimination in a gripping alternate reality where gender norms are turned on their head in a powerful matriarchal society.
Tell us about your book.
I once saw science fiction described as “a love letter to our time,” and I just adore that description. Although Pledging Season is set on a colony world of Earth in the distant future, it’s really about modern day gender and what would happen if it were done differently. Often science fiction books about gender posit some sort of biological change, but I wanted to play with gender purely as a social technology. What stories do we tell about what is or is not “natural”? Who do those stories serve? How do they shape assumptions about who can do what? This book follows a young man who is coming of age in a fictional matriarchal society and is striving to pursue his dreams despite the sexism embedded in his culture. I hope readers will find that his journey makes the strange familiar and the familiar strange!
In addition, I wanted to write a book that doesn’t use violence to solve its major problems. Which is a challenge! There’s a very strong message in American media that having a climactic battle and either destroying or locking up the bad guy is what fixes things. When I look around at the big problems of today, though, whether it’s the pandemic, climate change, or rising inequality, they’re not things that can be solved that simply. One of my goals in this book is to help carve out a little more of the imaginative space for how we could do things differently.
Where did you get the inspiration to take on gender dynamics, which has become one of the big issues of our society?
Years and years ago, someone I respected wrote an essay arguing essentially that gender dynamics in our society are the way they are because of biology, and the hurt that happens as a result of them is just the way things have to be. I remember sitting at the dining room table one weekend furiously typing up a response, but I wasn’t able to finish it. My family was waiting for me to go on a trip, I had lesson plans to make (I was a teacher at the time), then packed weeks of teaching intervened, and I never returned to it.
The impulse to respond stuck with me, though, and eventually crystallized into a thought experiment to try to show exactly why those arguments were nonsense. Could I take the exact same biological variation related to reproduction that exists in current humanity (and even many of the same stereotypes) and use it to explain why entirely different patterns of power and privilege were “natural”? How would such a society come about? What would their struggles for gender equality look like? By the time my anger cooled, I’d started reading a lot of non-fiction about gender, especially by trans people, and digging into all the layers just got more and more fascinating. Playing around with the different ramifications grew into an entire world.
Tell us about your writing process.
Throw everything at the wall and see what sticks!
For this book, the cultural setting came first, then I built the story to explore the impact of that.
But I try so many things! I outline, then rewrite everything, then stick post-its all over the walls of my house, then rewrite the whole thing again. I think I went through seven or eight major rewrites of this book. There was a spreadsheet phase. I do try to keep my eye on the ball in terms of the themes I’m trying to get at, but everything else is all over the place. It’s only really in the final draft that I can look back and realize, “Oh, that’s what I was trying to say.”
Since what I write is so much of a deep dive into how changing one aspect of how we organize society ripples outward, I also do an enormous amount of reading and research. In this particular book, once I started tugging on gender, that thread led me to a whole host of other cultural assumptions about who is “deserving,” how gender is shaped by other identities, what is justice, etc.
What do you enjoy most about the writing process?
Two things: One is getting to talk to cool people about interesting stuff. The other is when unexpected characters show up on the page and I’m just like, “Oh, hello, I have no idea where you came from, but you’re pretty awesome.” Some of my test reader’s favorite characters showed up that way.
What's the biggest challenge for you in the writing process?
Knowing when to stop. I love rewriting things, I could keep tinkering with drafts forever! Every draft, I look back and see how much better it was than the prior one, and I always think that if I just revised it one more time then it would be so much better. But eventually it’s time to shove the thing out the door and be done with it.
How was your experience with the Spun Yarn?
Really helpful! The Smart Start Report in particular came at a crucial time for me and gave me some key encouragement as a baby author. It was the reassurance I got from my readers that I was onto something that gave me the confidence when my husband’s job moved us across the country, to go into writing full-time instead of seeking out another teaching job.
How did you find your publisher/agent?
I’m self-publishing through several different e-book and print on demand retailers. I really like the level of control it gives me, and I also enjoy the variety of running my own business.
What's your favorite quote about writing?
“I write for myself, but I publish to have an impact on others.”
It helps me let go of things when I get to the pruning phase of the manuscript. Some things I need to get out for my own benefit, but when it comes to revisions, the key is to think about and be compassionate toward my audience.
What encouraging words or advice do you have for other authors?
Keep at it! When I first submitted a manuscript to The Spun Yarn for feedback, I thought I was almost done. That was two-and-a-half years and seven drafts ago. Writing is a much longer process than I initially anticipated, which feels intimidating. But keep at it and keep revising, you’ll get there!
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Learn more about Erika Erickson Malinoski and her book, Pledging Season, at eemauthor.com. Sign up for her mailing list to read the first sixteen chapters of her book for free!
You can also find her on Twitter at @EEMauthor.
To learn more about The Spun Yarn and see how you can use their manuscript beta reader program for authors to help make your writing even better, click here.