On “Puddles of Time”
How do you write a book and raise kids in a difficult world? How do you turn your lens on the most complex personal relationships and make them into art?
Lilith longtime fiction editor Yona Zeldis McDonough (a.k.a. Kitty Zeldis), whose most recent of 9 novels is The Dressmakers of Prospect Heights, sat down with Lilith executive editor Sarah Seltzer, first-time author of The Singer Sisters—a Jewish folk-rock family saga out this August—to chat about novels, Jewish mothers in fiction, and making writing and family work together.
YONA: How does it feel to be on the cusp of publishing your novel? Has it been what you expected?
SARAH: After I spent years editing the manuscript, the last year or so has felt a bit thumb-twiddly and passive compared to my expectations. But now that the summer of publication is here and I can actively spread the word (and enjoy the sunshine and beach when I get stressed!) I’m trying to enjoy the ride. You only debut once. So I tell myself. Yona, do you remember your debut?
YONA: I do! I was thrilled about having the book come out, and every little step along the way was so exciting. I felt like the book was my daughter and I was helping her get dressed on her wedding day—smoothing her hair, adjusting her dress. But the publication was not long after 9/11, so there was also a sense of dread that accompanied; I often felt like something terrible would happen—to me, to New York City—and that the publication would not happen. Fortunately, all went smoothly and the novel, The Four Temperaments, came out on schedule in September 2002.
Let’s talk about music because The Singer Sisters feels like it’s written by an insider. Has music played a big role in your life?
SARAH: Both my parents had classical, folk, opera, Motown, Broadway playing basically all the time when we were kids—my mom had been one of the screaming girls outside the Plaza when the Beatles arrived! But I have to be honest and say that meeting and marrying a professional music journalist kept that flame of intense teenage fandom alive for me longer than it does for most people. We went to so many shows and watched so many concert films in our 20s and early 30s, and that musical saturation is what inspired me to write about a family of folk rock musicians and all their rivalries and betrayals.
YONA: Have you ever performed professionally?
SARAH: Nope! I took piano lessons for a year or so and flubbed a song at my big recital. I wasn’t even nervous. My interest in music is that of a pop culture obsessive and a lover of the poetry of it all, rather than a musician.
YONA: Speaking of poetry, how did you find your way into writing all the lyrics in The Singer Sisters?!
SARAH: I wrote and studied poetry fairly seriously in college but ultimately I was too corny and prosaic to really take it on as my genre, so song lyrics are kind of perfect for me. They flowed right out.
YONA: You could describe this book as a meditation on mothers and daughters. Elaborate?
SARAH: Well, unlike my novel’s characters with their long silences and grudges, my mom and I are pals: before I had kids we spent a lot of time doing everything together; shopping, hanging out, also hiking, biking and running. We were never estranged for more than half an hour and we still text daily! And yes, she’s also one of my primary babysitters. But what does carry over into the book, from my relationship with my mom and also hers with her mom, is the intensity and primacy of the relationship. That need for approval vs. the desire to differentiate oneself. I know you also tackle mother-daughter relationships in your novels. Why do you think we Jewish feminists are so attracted to the topic?
YONA: Good question! There’s so much written—lots of it bad—about Jewish mothers and how controlling, neurotic and guilt-inducing they are. If we can push aside all the negative tropes, it becomes clear that we are a force within the family, and that our so-called “neurosis” is part of that power. So that draws us, or some of us, as writers—exploring those relationships in a nuanced, thoughtful way. You yourself are a mother to two young sons; how do you manage the work/parenting balance?
SARAH: It’s impossible, really. One of the reasons there are passages in the novel where Judie, the protagonist, tries to make art and just can’t do it because her kids aren’t sleeping or whatever is because I came out of Covid thinking that it was all impossible, feeling so much bottled frustration.
The one silver lining I’ve found is that when I do have a stretch of uninterrupted childcare or a week or so with a “normal” schedule I can be ruthlessly efficient, writing or promoting the book before work in the morning or after they’re in bed, or even on a long subway ride. But when life becomes full of doctors appointments and field trips and sore throats and I don’t have those little pockets of time, I’m just dropping all the balls all the time, and just picking them back up when I am able to. I will say that on this topic, you’ve given me some of the best advice (about accepting that kids come first). Can you share it here?
YONA: I started my first novel when I had young children—they were, respectively seven and four—and at first, I despaired of ever being able to complete it; I did not see an unbroken expanse of time until oh, say when the youngest turned eighteen and had gone off to college. But I realized that instead of looking for that ocean of time, I could make use of lakes, ponds or even puddles. I gave myself a deadline of writing two pages a day, five days a week, when they were in school. I always stopped working when I picked them up because I felt they deserved a mom who didn’t say what? in a cranky tone when they wanted to ask or tell me something. Some days I could exceed the two-page quota; other days I couldn’t. But as long as I stuck to it, kept my hand in it, I thought it would work, and it did. Also, and this is really important, I understood that whatever else I yearned to do, the kids came first. I had brought them into the world, and I had to make them a priority. And oddly enough, accepting that made the juggling, if not easy, then easier.
SARAH: Puddles of time. That’s perfect.
