Pre-Pub Jitters, Family Balance, and West Coast Adventures – Writer Diary
Jessica Elisheva Emerson is obsessed with cooking beans, growing food, eating pie, sleeping in on Shabbat, and working toward a better world. A Tucson native, Jessica spent twenty-two years in Los Angeles before returning to the Sonoran Desert, where she lives with her husband and children. Her stories and poems have been published in numerous journals, and she's a produced playwright.
This diary represents a week in her whirlwind life as a writer balancing family, work, and the excitement of the launch of her book, Olive Days (Catapult).
Sunday, September 8 (Tucson, AZ)
7 am - Wake up and have family breakfast. My son requested pancakes and we do it! Gluten-free (I’m a celiac) with buttermilk and huge, fresh blueberries. And a decaf iced latte, as usual, but since it’s almost fall I’ve started making a salted maple whipped topping. So good.
9:30 am - My husband and I drop our little guy at his supplementary Jewish school and then head to the gym together, like we do most Sundays.
12 pm - Pick up little guy, grab some lunch.
1 pm - Pack! I pack a few different dress options for the next two nights, and their various accompanying bras and underthings.
4 pm - Arrive for a family-only birthday party for my middle niece, who just turned ten. My niece and I are both celiacs and I usually make her a special dessert, but I’ve been given a pass this week. My brother made an epic ice cream cake. We swim, we eat, we sing, people ask questions about the book tour. It’s a great night.
8:30 pm - My husband, middle kid (in college but local…oldest is in college and across the country) have a chill night together, a little calm before the storm.
10 pm - Before bed, I update the interviews/reviews/media hits page on my website and respond to a few book-related emails.
Monday, September 9 (Tucson, AZ)
6:30 am - Alarm goes off, help get my little guy ready for school.
7 am- A calendar alert reminds me to send marketing emails to NYC and DC friends and colleagues about my book tour next week. I hit send.
8 am - Hug goodbye to little guy, drink my iced coffee, water my plants, draft a marketing text to land on 112 phones tomorrow…I purchased a cheap, one-time service.
9 am - First work meeting of the day. I’m miraculously able to focus. Luckily, I love my job.
10 am - Second meeting of the day. It’s getting harder to focus. TOMORROW IS PUB DAY!
11 am - Take a quick break from work to post about the book and upcoming events in five Facebook groups, the positive comments and questions immediately start rolling in and I have to tune them out and focus on my job.
3 pm - Parent/Teacher conference. Yup! That happened to fall this week. My husband had special tee-shirts made for himself and the kids, like concert tour shirts but with my book tour dates. My little guy wore his to school today and I don’t hate telling his teacher what it’s all about. He’s thriving in school. Huzzah.
4 pm - Get my hair blown out. The People magazine that features Olive Days is on top of the pile of magazines, and I also don’t hate showing the stylists why I need a blowout. One of them orders the book on the spot, the other reserves it at the library which is how I find out that 36 people are already waiting for Olive Days at my local library! On my drive home I call my husband and have him check out other libraries we’ve been members of. Waits all around.I love libraries! I’m sorry people will have to wait!
5:15 pm - Leave home for my pre-pub-night event! The coolest local bookshop in Tucson, Stacks Books Club, got permission to host me a night early. They sold out the event at 70 tickets, and I am wearing a black dress, yellow ballet flats to match my cover, and adorable Olive Days book cover earrings my dear friend Talia had made for me.
6 pm - We arrive at the bookstore and I marvel at the enormous stack of my book. MY BOOK! Then, I grab a glass of white wine and head to a little office in the back to talk to the local author who is going to moderate a conversation. We get aligned and she mics me so that she can air the conversation on her podcast.
6:30 - It’s time! The place is packed with family, friends, and a bunch of people I don’t know! The reading, conversation, and audience Q&A go great. I’m worried I won’t remember the names of everyone whose faces I recognize, but the bookshop puts notes in the books before I sign and I actually remember the people I know. A lovely woman I’ve never met has made Olive Days friendship bracelets and gives me one. I am taken aback by how many people want a photo with me, it’s just something I hadn’t considered.
9 pm - My husband and I are peckish, so we stop at a restaurant on the way back to our house and run into some folks from the reading. We join them for a lovely late dinner.
11 pm - Back home I catch up on work emails and Slacks and then update my website to get rid of all references to preorder. In one hour it’s technically pub day! I have to leave for the airport quite early, so I get to bed before midnight.
Tuesday, September 10 (Tucson, AZ / Los Angeles, CA / Orange County, CA) PUB DAY
5:30 am - Alarm. I’m a published author.
6 am - Text my childhood babysitter in Orange County and let her know I likely won’t have time for coffee before the reading this afternoon, but I’m thrilled that she’s coming.
6:15 am - Say goodbye to my sleeping little love and leave for the airport in my car… I’ll park there, my husband will Uber tomorrow to join me in L.A., and we’ll come home together.
6:30 am - Take a work meeting from the car and while I unload at the airport. Do not turn my camera on.
7:09 am - Flight departs, buy wifi and work on plane.
9:00 am - Take a work meeting from LAX, while shuttling to rental car lot. Do not turn on my camera. The rental car lot is like the old Seinfeld joke, they can take a reservation they just can’t keep it. Eventually I’m in a car and on my way.
10 am - First stop, a local upscale liquor shop in the Pico-Robertson neighborhood, where my book is set. I’m buying slivovitz (plum brandy) for tomorrow night’s L.A. book launch. When the delightful older gentleman asks why anyone would need two bottles of Slivovitz, I tell him. He goes “what’s the name of your book?” I tell him. “I’ve heard of it!” he says. I tell him I don’t think so, it’s only just out. I’m wrong. He and his wife read the glowing review in the Los Angeles Jewish Journal and he knows all about it. He asks for a selfie. I am dying.
10 am - Stop at my favorite bakery in the neighborhood (Bibi’s) where my friend Dan-the-baker has made me an epic book cover iced cookies. I pick up a small batch, and will pick up twice as many tomorrow.
10:30 am - Stop to buy paper plates, napkins, and compostable shot glasses for the readings. Take photos of my copy of Olive Days in a few locations from the book.
11 am - 2:15 pm - Had planned to drop luggage at hotel and work from the lobby, but my room is ready! Get in a few hours of work before I have to depart. Sometime in the afternoon my first chapter goes live on Playboy… which, whoa.
2:30 pm - Depart for Orange County. I need to be there at 5, half an hour before the event starts. It’s only a 45 minute drive with no traffic, but I don’t want to risk it. I lived in Los Angeles for nearly 23 years, but what follows is the worst drive of my life. It takes three hours, and I have to leave the freeway several times and drive through vast industrial cities I’ve never seen before, where the surface street traffic is also stop-and go. I drive through a massive UAW strike (honk for workers!). I am driving towards enormous plumes of smoke, wildfires are raging. I am sweating. I call the evening’s moderator, a dear friend, and tell him I might be late for my own event. Cortisol running high.
5:30 pm - Arrive at bookstore for launch event on the dot. I am parched and I have to pee. It’s the night of the presidential debate and people are evacuating their homes due to the wildfires only 15 minutes from the charming bookshop we are in, and I can see right away that it’s going to be a small crowd. But there are six people, including some wonderful old friends, and we do the event! The book shop owner’s two young girls are there, too, and I have to answer some questions… delicately. There are a lot of plot points about sex in Olive Days. I feel extremely guilty about the pile of Olive Days the bookshop has. I leave them a box of cookies and some cocktail-recipe postcards to give out with sales (I hope?) the next day.
6:30 pm - Grab dinner with my friend the moderator across the street from the bookshop, then head over to his house to visit with his wife and young daughter.
9 pm - The drive home takes 42 minutes flat. I get an old fashioned at the hotel bar, and head up to my room to catch up on a little bit of work.
11 pm - Lights out after a giddy phone call with my husband, tomorrow is going to be so exciting.
Wednesday, September 11 (Los Angeles, CA)
6 am - Wake up, realize I took the day off of work. Sleep for 30 more minutes. Call my husband and kids to say good morning.
8:30 am - Text my husband to bring an extra set of socks and some tampons (unrelated requests). Hope he hasn’t left for airport yet.
9 am - Leave hotel and head east to get hair blown out (yes, again, I’m hopeless with a blow dryer, okay?). My stylist asks “so what are you getting ready for?” and I tell her, excitedly, showing her the spread in the People Magazine sitting at her exact station, just as in my hometown, and she cannot even feign interest. A little deflated, but my hair is bouncy.
10 am - Head to The Grove, an L.A. icon. Sign book stock at the flagship Barnes & Noble. Get a decaf espresso. Take pictures of my book at the famous fountains, in a patch of yellow flowers, and with the Farmer’s Market tower in the background. Get a couple thousand steps in walking around. Take a 40 minute call with the marketing guru at my publisher to discuss upcoming events and plans. Buy adorable plants to gift to my agent, publisher, and editor at the event tonight.
11:30 am - Head to my all-time favorite bakery, Cake Monkey, and get their divine gluten free summer camp cookies (I used to require them weekly during my last pregnancy) and some treats for my husband.
11:45 am - Drive over to Larchmont Village to sign stock at Chevalier’s, the oldest indie bookshop in Los Angeles. There’s a farmer’s market setting up on Larchmont, and I have to circle the block seven times to find a meter. Chevalier’s moved across the street since last I visited, which was before Covid. The staff is so incredibly welcoming and generous. They take me to the back to sign copies, put stickers on them, and then move them from their ALREADY great spot up front to an even better spot.
1:40 pm - After another really long drive across Los Angeles, pick up my husband at LAX.
2 pm - Head over to Zibby’s Bookshop in Santa Monica. It’s on Montana, and my husband and I get the weirdest nostalgia. We used to have some friends who lived north of Montana, in one of the most gorgeous neighborhoods in Los Angeles, and a couple times during Covid quarantine we drove to the neighborhood, parked the car, and took our then-toddler for long walks down the wide sidewalks, enjoying the scented gardens and cut-grass smells of the beautiful homes.
2:30 pm - Have a short but great visit at Zibby’s, where I sign stock. My podcast with Zibby Owens is going to drop tomorrow, and I can’t wait, we had a great time chatting. Zibby isn’t at her book shop today, but I’ll meet her later this fall at one of her writers’ retreats in Arizona. We have to pee, so we buy a gorgeous box of frozen mochi at a boutique next door and use their bathroom. They pack it up for us in an insulated bag with ice, just like they did on our trip to Japan earlier this summer.
3:30 pm - Pick up a fresh batch of custom cookies at Bibi’s Bakery, then head back to the hotel.
5:30 pm - Get ready! Olive Days is a very L.A. book, and we have a huge community in L.A., tonight feels like a big deal. My husband sends texts to friends who are going to catch up with us after the book event, letting them know to text him instead of me, because I’ll be signing books.
6:20 pm - Arrive at BookSoup …the only time I’ve ever had a reserved spot in West Hollywood, and I love it! Set up the Slivovitz, plates/napkins/cups and cookies at BookSoup, meet the staff. I’ve been to so many readings at BookSoup, amazing that this one is for me.
7 pm - By event start time the rooms are incredibly full, and I’ve greeted tons of friends, old and new. Friends from across the scope of my entire life are here, including a few surprises that take my breath away. By 7:10 there are more than fifty people, and it’s standing room only. We get started.
8:50 pm - There are still people waiting for signatures and the BookSoup people warn me they are about to close. A bottle and a quarter of Slivovitz are gone. I sign faster. My husband and several others head to a bar called The Mint, where we’ve reserved a private room for a little afterparty.
9:15 pm - My best friend and I arrive at The Mint. I change into more comfortable shoes and walk into a room filled with people I adore, including my editor and agent. We spin a playlist of mostly surf music (the Olive Days playlist I made is too sad for this type of deal). A few more friends trickle in over the next several hours. I’m too tired to drink, so happily volunteer to be DD. My husband happily has three strong drinks.
1 am - We leave with our last four friends, hugging goodbye along a nearly silent Pico Boulevard.
1:30 am - Arrive back at hotel, pack a few items, collapse into bed without showers.
Thursday, September 12 (Los Angeles, CA / Tucson, AZ)
5:45 am - It hurts when the alarm goes off. Immediately think, it’s my kids’ school picture day back in Tucson, will the babysitter dress him right? We get up, get ready, leave the few remaining cookies with the hotel staff, gas up the rental car, and arrive at LAX. Where we promptly remember that we left those gorgeous mochi in the hotel fridge. Sadness.
8 am - Intend to Zoom into a Salesforce training for work, but it’s too hectic. My podcast episode with Zibby for her Moms Don’t Have Time to Read Books dropped, and I click download so I can listen later.
9:15 am - Onboard the tiny plane and there’s no wifi, working bathroom, or working outlets, so I have 90 minutes to listen to the podcast, admire Zibby, cringe at my own voice, and reflect on the past two days. Instead, once the episode is over, I work on the plot of my new book in my head.
10:58 am - Our flight lands in Tucson two minutes before I have to be on a planning meeting for work. I Zoom in as we get luggage, load up, and drive home. This time, I do turn my camera on.
12 pm - Weekly 1:1 with boss (who is awesome)... Arrive home just in time to switch from phone to computer. It’s only noon and my phone is already at 51%.
4 pm - Cannot help it, close my eyes for 30 minutes.
4:30 pm, okay, just kidding, 4:45 pm - Write thank you notes to publisher, editor, agent, moderators, book stores, and people who went out of their way for me in the past three days. Call my mother. Get back to work.
5:45 pm - Send afternoon babysitter home. Order Indian food for dinner. Tidy up the house, fold the laundry, play with kid, kiss his little face off.
8 pm - After dinner and kid bedtime, hop back online to continue my job.
9 pm - My college kid comes home from work and we catch up while I unpack, run laundry, and reorganize for the next rip..
9:45 pm - Create a few social media posts for the next day, respond to messages about the book, spend 40 minutes updating my author expenses form and filing receipts for tax time next spring. Drink a La Croix and consider an old fashioned.
10:45 pm - I am disgusting. Take a shower. Take a sleeping aid. Unpack and do a little reorganizing of toiletries and carry-on because I leave for a long east coast trip in four days. Run laundry.
11 pm - Sleep a profound sleep.
Friday, September 13 (Tucson, AZ)
6:30 am - Alarm goes off and my little guy comes to snuggle me. He’s sad that I’m leaving next week on a much longer trip, an 11-day east coast visit where I’m combining work and book tour. I water the plants and help get him ready for school.
8:30 am - First work meeting of the day! Most of my colleagues are east coast, so this is typical. I try not to talk about the book too much at work, but everyone is asking lovely questions and being very kind.
10 am - Zoom meeting with the head of the Jewish Book Council.
11 am - Playboy interview. They are going to run an interview about a week after they serialized the first chapter of Olive Days, and the journalist asks thoughtful questions. I have existential questions about my feminism. This book has gotten coverage from People to Playboy, which feels pretty special.
12 - 5:45 pm - Work, work, work, work, work. Writing white papers, responding to emails, taking ad-hoc meetings, working on strategic priorities, organizing my calendar, developing a budget for a major upcoming project. As part of my job I also get to read books sometimes, and I browse a couple of short stories.
6 pm - Head to my parents’ house for Shabbat dinner with the little and my husband. Middle kid will meet us there, and one of my nieces will also be over. They all want to talk about my week, and my dad shows me a (minor) typo he found in the book. Que sera. For dessert, we eat the rest of the Olive Days cookies I brought home from L.A.
Saturday, September 14 (Tucson, AZ)
8 am - My little guy slept in! He comes to snuggle me in bed and it’s glorious.
9 am - I finally roll out of bed. I rarely sleep this late, and I appreciate that no one bothered me. My husband, as always, has a beautiful iced decaf waiting for me.
10 am - Finish the watering, the laundry, and tidying and make our weekend to-do list. No big projects around the house or yard this weekend, I need to focus on catching up on more work, getting the house in order for my 10-day trip, and spending time with my family.
11 am - While my husband and little are on a bike ride, I write out piles of notes for each member of my family. These are love notes…some sappy, some funny, and on Monday morning I’ll hide them all over the place to be found while I’m gone. I also send my husband and middle kid calendar reminders for tasks I usually do, so they don’t forget. Then I make a 12-day meal plan and order all the groceries they’ll need. Finally, I write a very long inscription in a copy of Olive Days for my husband…I’ll hide it where he’s likely to find it after I leave on Monday morning.
12 pm - Lunch with the family, cheese crisps, a weekend favorite.
1 pm - Sit down to work. A bit of work work, a bit of book work.
3 pm - My at-home IV guy arrives! When you’re immunocompromised, an IV with some vitamins can work wonders, especially before strenuous travel. I get a bag of saline + a super Myers’ cocktail and I immediately start feeling better.
4 pm - My husband forgot to pick up his pre-paid copy of Olive Days at the big Tucson event Monday night, so we head up to the nearby Oro Valley (where the bookshop is) to pick it up.
5:30 pm - Nearby the bookshop is a location of one of the best Mexican restaurants in the world, El Charro. We sit down for an al fresco dinner. I usually cook dinner six nights a week, this feels bizarre.
7 pm - We watch a few episodes of Bluey with my little guy, get him bathed, read stories and tuck him in.
8:30 pm - My husband and I watch an episode of Only Murders in the Building over old fashioneds.
9:30 pm - Pack! While I lay out clothes, my husband steams the dresses that didn’t make it to the dry cleaners post Los Angeles. It takes about 90 minutes, but before bed my luggage is ready for Monday morning, which will make tomorrow so much easier.
11 pm - Log back onto work and reply to a bunch of messages. Schedule send for Sunday night so that I don’t interrupt colleagues’ weekends, but east coasters have it first thing Monday morning. Rewrite my out-of-office messages.
12 am - My husband reads the latest Shouts and Murmurs from The New Yorker aloud as I drift off. It’s been such a busy and surreal week. I can’t wait to keep introducing Olive Days to more readers.
Week in Photos
