“It’s like I was shy and quiet for so much of my childhood, and now, I have too much to say, and the best way for me to convey my voice is through writing,” Timber Creek Talon reporter and aspiring author, Sarah Ulery, said.
Ulery has been writing for practically all of her life, since elementary school where she would write stories on pieces of construction paper and staple them together, as if binding them into a real book. She is now beginning to receive the recognition she deserves for all of her hard work. She just recently received an Overall Award of Excellence in the district level of the PTA Reflections Program and is now advancing to state with her story entitled “Strawberry Wine.” Ulery will also have an original poem and essay of hers published this March through Creative Communications.
Although Ulery is incredibly excited about this door-opening opportunity, she feels like that is mostly what it is – a door opener, saying, “I’m excited and immensely appreciative. Although, honestly, this doesn’t feel like a huge deal to me. It feels like a stepping stone. These little pieces are things I hope will help me grow, things I hope other people will recognize. I want these to put credibility to my name because, ultimately, I’m still trying to break into the traditional publishing world with my novel, ‘Renegade,’ and the following titles in the series. Having these small publications in my back pocket will be a couple more bullets – or maybe grenades – in the arsenal I’ll use to break through that ceiling.”
Despite having written previously, Ulery said that her true love of the art didn’t begin until she read Harry Potter, her first Young Adults fantasy series, and knew she wanted to write something in that genre. She buried herself in books, such as Percy Jackson, devouring as much as she could, yet she sort of lost touch with writing for while, until she signed up for a creative writing class in middle school.
“The funny thing there is that right before the semester started, I tried – and failed – to get out of the class,” said Ulery. “It’s a blessing that it didn’t work; from the first day, I wrote like crazy.”
She came up with six unique characters, and began writing – with absolutely no plot. Ulery explained that she started with one of her characters, Jeremiah, as the narrator, but then quickly changed her mind, deciding her characters were all wrong. She switched the narrator to his friend Quinn, changed some names and gave other characters bigger roles until a third person named Jeffrey became the central focus of the story.
“My main regret comes here. It’s not that I didn’t plan, no, I still don’t practice complete outlines of my story. But over that summer, I’d go a couple thousand words into my novel, and then I’d reread it. And I’d change things. And I wouldn’t save the draft before it. Now, I’m sure none of it would’ve been useful – at the point, I was still struggling to keep my writing in the same tense. But I’m nostalgic, and for the sake of that, I wish I could compare my first chapters now with my first chapters then. Lesson learned,” said Ulery.
After making herself push through to the very end, Ulery had her first full draft completed by Oct. 2013 of her freshman year. It was then that she reread her draft and discovered a multitude of holes in her story. She edited and edited, realizing once again that the center stage belonged to yet a different character – Jeffrey’s older brother, Nathan. Ulery deepened his character and adjusted the plot, rotating the point of view between three characters.
Ulery then decided to get more involved in the world of literature and competed in her first camp National Novel Writing Month, where she sped through a sequel of her first book. Not long after, she tried NaNoWriMo again, wanting to write a prequel surrounding Nathan’s story prior to the first novel. Thirty thousand words in, she scratched it, as she felt it was simply a mess. She would salvage what she could in the future.
“From there, over the summer, I began developing deeper plots and fuller characters with the help of a friend, Mackenzie Tomlinson, who still remains my closest friend. Eventually, after many incidents in which I nearly cut Quinn from the story entirely, he proved his worth and found a voice; because of this, I decided to go back to my first novel at the start of my sophomore year,” said Ulery.
Ulery took a second creative writing class with Mr. Jasso, expanding her range of writing styles while still working on her series. By March, she had a solid story with proper characters, plots and world building. She went back to her first NaNoWriMo writing but resulted in scrapping that completely and turned to writing a sequel about her original novel. Through this, new characters emerged and the previously bland Katrina took on a new life that thoroughly impressed Ulery. This discovery demanded a proper prequel set thirty years before her original story. By that Dec., she had completed her first novel.
Nevertheless, life happened and Ulery was slowed down. She began working on smaller projects for a while, muddling through two more drafts of her second novel, until she finally made a resolution at the start of her senior year.
“With fuel provided by the first Advanced Creative Writing class, I did some planning and jumped back to start a draft of the third novel in my series,” said Ulery.
She had it in her head that that was it and she had over a hundred thousand words in that novel by the end of NaNoWrimo in Nov. 2016. However, when NaNoWriMo came to an end and Dec. rolled around, Ulery realized a different goal she had: to publish her first novel.
“I couldn’t abandon it like I had each time I chased another plot bunny down another path in my own universe,” Ulery said. “I had to do something with it, to move it, and I had to fulfill my ultimate goal. I had to try to publish it.”
Ulery took into consideration both the traditional publishing track and self publishing, but knew that she wanted to go the traditional route and began to send out query letters to different literary agents, who, if they decide to sign her as a client, would pitch her story to an editor at a publishing company.
“I don’t need the movie deals, and I don’t need New York Times, and I don’t need a six figure deal. I want those things, sure, but what I need is to know that anyone who might be better from hearing what I have to say can find it,” said Ulery.
However, the industry is slow and subjective. Therefore, a response from agents can take a long time and many authors receive dozens or even hundred of rejections before ever receiving a deal. So now, Sarah Ulery must wait. While she does so, Ulery will continue working on the third installment of her series among other smaller assignments, until her novel entitled Renegade is finally published and available for everyone to experience.
So, despite the tribulation she has gone through, Ulery has been a successful writer and strives for more still.
“If there’s anybody out there who could be to me as I am to somebody like J.K. Rowling, or my favorite author Neal Shusterman, then I need to try,” said Ulery.
Excellent article, was very impressed.