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One month anniversary

Jen Sinclair

What a year this month has been. On September 24th, I was in an Airbnb celebrating my first day on Earth as a published author. That was followed by two major hurricanes; consecutive weekend visits to North Carolina; and fretting over my daughter’s solo weekend to see Taylor Swift (she survived!) I.Am.Exhausted.

While it’s empowering and exciting to be a published author, it’s also a business that requires a whole other level of time and work. Some of the things I’ve been doing this month, include, but are not limited to:

  • muddling through ads (spending money…check)
  • finding promotional opportunities (ditto above)
  • applying for podcasts (I know…who am I?)
  • begging for reviews (really, so important but so hard to get)
  • reaching readers (see above)
  • engaging on social media (failing miserably)
  • putting together book club questions (haven’t done)
  • looking for book festivals (me selling in person…hysterical)
  • writing this newsletter (a day late)

And of course, the most essential part of an author business is THE PRODUCT. Without writing books, I won’t have much of a career. So this month, in between life and business stuff, I’ve been working on the book I’m releasing early next year.

Does it give me a ton of time? Nope.
Am I cutting it close? Definitely.
Can I do it? I believe so.
Will I do it? I guess we’ll all have to wait and see. I’ll be wondering right along with you. Stay tuned. We’ll all be the first to know.

Just know this about me if you don’t already—one my biggest superpowers is I tend to do my best work under pressure. And while I’ve changed in many ways through the years, that fundamental part of me is still going strong. 🙂

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Dear Younger Jen,

Jen Sinclair

Hi! I know you won’t believe this, but I’m you many, many, MANY years in the future. Right now, you’re probably sitting cross-legged in our upstairs bedroom on Westminster Drive, surrounded by dolls and stuffed animals, dreaming up adventures for them. Crafting intricate plots, like the time you had Barbie’s friend Whitney talk her into sneaking out of the dreamhouse (the one you made out of a cardboard box) to steal a ride on Pegasus before Megan woke up. You see, Megan didn’t trust Whitney to take care of Pegasus, so going behind her back was the only way Whitney could get what she wanted.

You always did have a penchant for drama. For the push and pull between good and evil. For the little unexpected twist. For the ending that was only satisfying when the heroine realized she had the power to save herself and others the whole time. All she had to do was go through hell to figure it out.

I guess that’s why you really were born to be a writer. Not a pediatrician or an astrophysicist or an astronomer like you once believed.

You will eventually want to be a writer. You’ll realize that you can be anything inside the stories you create. So you’ll start writing them down. Short stories, screenplays, and eventually a novel. You won’t share a single thing for a very long time because you won’t feel like you’re any good at it. But you’ll keep writing, keep creating, keep growing.

Until one day, you’ll decide to be brave. You’ll find a community. You’ll meet friends who support you. And though you’ll go through lots of rejection, you’ll eventually choose to listen to your voice. The one that started where you are right now. The one that believed you could do anything and be anything.

And you’ll do it.

Because today, you became a published author. And that world inside your head seeped out so others could experience it as you imagined.
It may be later than you thought. It may be different than you wanted. But here we are. Doing it. Living the dream.

And it is so worth the work and the wait.

Love,

Older Jen
Author of There’s Always a Price
Available on Amazon

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What do you write?

Jen Sinclair

Aside from scary movies and haunted houses, nothing terrifies me more than someone asking me this: “What do you write?”

I mean, come on. I should be able to answer this since it’s literally what I spend hours doing every single day. But that’s not what happens. Instead, I give a nervous chuckle and then mumble and muddle through a very awful explanation.

So, what do I write? The genre I fit best in is women’s fiction. Yes, it’s an archaic term, but no one has found a good alternative. This genre has a unique feature compared to most others: the plot is advanced by the character’s emotional journey and ultimate change. While characters in many genres undergo some change at various times, they aren’t driven by it. Instead, they’re usually swept up in a huge issue happening outside them. In mysteries, it’s the crime. In romance, it’s the love interest. In horror, it’s the scary monster that’s chasing the main character.

In women’s fiction, the monster is an internal wound deeply seated in the main character long before the reader ever meets them. It gives the character a belief, or rather a misbelief, about the world and usually about themself. This misbelief directs everything the character does from the first page through the story.

Events happening outside the character—the plot—force them to apply their flawed logic. This is where subgenres like thriller, mystery, paranormal, and suspense come in. THERE’S ALWAYS A PRICE has a romantic subplot. But the heart of the story is driven by Cassie and her misbelief that bad things happen when she chooses something she really wants.

So what do I write exactly? I love writing complicated and morally gray characters. I drop them in uncomfortable and entertaining situations and put them through hell all so they hopefully come out better in the end. They fumble and fall; they fail and succeed; they have moments of clarity and then regress into their wounded selves. In short, they’re human. And while growth and change are the goals, how they get there is where the real magic of the story happens. Kind of like life.

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These are just words

Jen Sinclair

As I prepare to launch my first book, I’ve been mulling over different ways to connect with readers. One suggestion was to create a newsletter to reach inboxes. It makes sense because while social media platforms may come and go (or change the algorithms) most of us will use the same email address forever.

This strategy presented me with a couple of problems. First, how would I, who is fairly inept at tech stuff create a newsletter? And second, what the hell would it even be about? The second problem proved harder to fix than the first (because I can do hard things when I’ve got YouTube to guide me). Coming up with a concept that would appeal to a wide audience, while remaining entertaining took a while. Especially since I held the very lofty goal of keeping it short, and for a writer this is not always easy.

But, guess what? I did it! I created a newsletter! It’s short! It’s engaging! It actually works! Don’t believe me? You should sign up and find out for yourself. Just hit the shiny new “Newsletter Sign Up” button in the footer. Or you can also click here and it will take you to the same form (though I am very proud of that Newsletter Sign Up button).

Thanks for supporting me! I’ll see you in your inbox soon. 🙂

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Grief is a gift

Jen Sinclair
Tim Lynch

It’s been a year since I woke up to missed calls and texts from my sister and mom, asking me to call as soon as I got up. Yes, mom was okay. Yes, my nephews were fine. This was about my brother, Tim.

I remember my brain interpreting, “…the police are there, and Tim’s gone,” as he was missing, and we needed to find him. Until the words, “he passed away in his sleep,” sunk in and gave way to the shock, disbelief, and denial that ushered in my old friend, grief.

I’m no stranger to it. Is anyone? Loss and grief are universal, touching every person at some point. Whether it’s the end of a relationship or a life, grief slides into the picture when someone we love leaves it.

Life changes in the shadow of death. The grief descends, darkening everything else. It’s all-encompassing and inescapable. And yet, even in the darkest of times, I’ve found comfort. Grief didn’t make me darker: it blurred out the things that were no longer important so I could see the things that were. It framed my life with the perspective that time is uncertain and that I needed to change what I could to live the life I always wanted.

So that’s what I started to do.

One year later, his death remains a bruise embedded in my heart, and the pain of his absence throbs with every beat. But in that pain is a call to action to love harder, appreciate more, and live with a greater purpose, and to share this message:

Grief is a gift.
It moves me to feel.
It pushes me to breathe.
It wants me to live.
It reminds me I’m strong.
It grants me courage.
It fills me with hope.
It wipes away doubt.
It encourages my dreams.
It slows my anger.
It renews my faith.
It inspires me to live.

The best way I can honor my brother is to embrace the life that comes with grief. As long as I talk about him, write about him, paddle his kayak, crank up good music, dance at concerts, and live—Tim is still here. And he always will be.

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Father’s Day is hard

Jen Sinclair

I dread Father’s Day. Not because I don’t like showering my amazing husband with love and attention and gifts (although I am by far the inferior gift-giver in our relationship). Celebrating him is the easy part. It’s the other father stuff that creeps in and makes it suck.

My father died seven years ago, but our relationship ended long before that. It had become a difficult one, marked by a final shouting match many years before his death in which I went low and he went lower. We hadn’t talked in a very long time due to those big emotions that often rule in relationships like ours, namely pride and anger. Pride kept him from accepting any apology I attempted, because how dare I say that thing to him. Anger came to my rescue because how could I not say it after what he said.

It wasn’t until I was sitting by his hospice bed, the bubbling of his breath the only indication that there was still life in him, that I realized all that anger was grief in disguise. The years I spent resenting him because he let me down. The time I wasted wondering what I ever did to make him not love me. The memories I swallowed because I didn’t understand why there weren’t more. I finally understood what they all meant. My father gave me what he could. He simply wasn’t capable of being what I wanted or needed or deserved. And while it wasn’t my fault, or maybe even his, it was the truth.

So in the hours before his rattling breath stopped, I put down some of that heavy baggage, took his hand, and told him I understood. In those moments alone with him, I turned away from anger and leaned into gratitude. I thanked him for being my dad and for giving me so many gifts:

My brothers and sisters who are some of my best friends;

My mom whose unconditional love more than made up for the absence of his; and

My life.

The tender bruise etched in my heart will always burst with fresh pain whenever I wonder what it might have been like if things were different and if he was different. But the lessons I learned from him, both the good and especially the bad, have helped make me the person and the parent I am today.

So thanks, Dad, for always having quarters so I could play Pacman. Thanks for taking me to get my driver’s license and teaching me about baseball, football, over-medium eggs, and French toast. And thanks for giving me life. Happy Father’s Day.

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The hardest thing I’ve ever written

Jen Sinclair

No assignment or submission has ever been as hard to write as my brother’s obituary. As with any death, the loss has left a gaping hole. I am both relieved that Timmy did not suffer and angered that his sudden loss has made it impossible to say goodbye. All the moments we’ll never share and all the things we’ll never do have taken center stage in my heart and mind. I won’t be able to wish him a happy birthday in two days (and remind him of our 15-year age difference, as only a little sister can.) I can’t tell him about the last concert I attended or sit at my window seat and swap wildlife pictures across the miles.

Instead of doing the things I can’t, I did the one thing I can: write. And while he’ll never see it, or anything else I write from here on out, I know he appreciates the sentiment, the tears I typed through to get the words out, and the message of love and loss and hope I’ve tried to honor him with.

LITTLE EGG HARBOR, N.J. — Timothy P. Lynch passed away on May 8, 2023, at the age of 60. Tim will be remembered as an avid outdoorsman, who preferred the woods and waterways of the Pinelands to anywhere else. He was an artist in his career as a stonemason and in his photographs of nature. Tim’s pictures will serve as a constant reminder of his enduring love and appreciation for the wildlife that calls New Jersey home.

Tim was an eternal prankster. He smiled brightly. He laughed fully. He loved with his whole heart. He was a giver with no expectation of getting anything in return. He went out of his way to help anyone who needed it. Tim loved his dog, his garden, his kayak, his iPod full of music, and above all else, his family.

Tim was welcomed into heaven by his brother, Tommy, his uncles Bill and Jack Bergen, and his father, Thomas P. Lynch, Sr. He leaves behind his mother, Marilyn Lynch, sisters, Kathy Elliott, Laura Lynch, and Jen Sinclair, as well as numerous nieces, nephews, cousins, and friends.

Timmy will be missed, and his loss is not easy to accept. But we take comfort in knowing that he is shining his light down upon us and blessing us with his protection and presence every day until we meet again.

“Life without you…all the love you passed my way. The angels have waited for so long…now they have their way. Take your place.” Stevie Ray Vaughan

Rest in peace, Timmy.