From my notes on editing Wild to Wise by Geraldine Carriere.

What's wild to me is that she's done all of this pretty well all by herself. I really was there to ask questions and take notes, but at the end of the day, it was her writing this. It was me just trying to keep up with and do right by her writing.

I think the pressure on me as an editor is that I'm not just using my flavour and my idea of what is interesting. Instead, I'm sticking with what is true and real for her and trying to discern that, which is incredibly difficult. It meant connecting with the person directly in real time and taking a moment to reacclimate and remember: why are we here? What are we doing here?

I think that editing this book taught me a number of things that editing fiction couldn't. With fiction, there's this desire to get the vision correct, but that has a completely different shorthand than a memoir, especially with this particular book. It isn't just straight memoir. There are obviously loads of memoir elements to it, but it's so much more than that. It's a self-help book, a manifesto in many ways, and a memoir.

I really do think that what she's created here speaks really honestly and authentically to her experience and what she's managed to gain in terms of lessons and experiences from her world.

There is so much care and love that went into this book. I am so proud of everything that Ger has done. It is incredible and remarkable, given the sheer volume of work and commitment she has adhered to throughout this whole process. She carried out and finished an Executive MBA, for God's sake, during the process of making this, and she sat down and did it. She made it happen, and I did not make it easy for her. I did not. I refused to let her off the hook ever, and I'm happy and proud of myself for being there for her.

It was a very long process. It always is with books, and that's how it should be. Frankly, we're all trying to make things happen so goddamn quickly. I refused to make that happen, and so did she.

Publishing this book makes it possible for V13 Press to step up to the plate and put its money where its mouth is. Not that there's much money in small publishing these days. No, this is not a profit-making exercise. This is a labor of love, but publishing this means that we are who we say we are. This is us living by our values, and we're not doing this just for the fun of it or for the profit behind it.

We are literally doing this for the author that she is and for the authors who will follow. I wanted to turn this into something I can actually assist others with, help them, and foster their voice, because I know what it's like to be alone without anyone to care for you. Creatively speaking, I know what that's like and how hard it is when you cannot find a single soul to read your work with a view to actually making it better and taking you seriously as a creative.

Before you open this, there are years of effort, toil, sweat, and tears, literal and figurative, that have been poured into this. I think what she's come up with is even stronger than her previous work, so much so that I really do think this is a new era for her. I'm really looking forward to you reading it.

Wild to Wise is out now: $19.99 USD / $24.99 CAD in paperback, $9.99 USD / $12.99 CAD as an ebook.

Everything about the book is here.

∴ If this newsletter has done anything for you, it would mean everything to me to hear it. Hit reply and tell me what you think. One sentence is enough.

Regardless, thank you for reading. Thank you for reading in an age of increasing illiteracy, cultural stagnation and attention divestment. You are doing something revolutionary. ∴

You're reading Verse & Vision — V13’s literary newsletter.

If you like this, maybe you’ll like our other newsletters: