GHOST TRAIN is Natalie Jacobsen's debut novel that she started writing in 2010. After a long, storied journey of its own, it publishes October 2024.
By: Natalie Jacobsen
It was spring quarter of my third year in undergrad at the University of Oregon in 2010 when I first started writing GHOST TRAIN. At the time, I was enrolled in a number of Japanese literature and film courses, and learning all about mythology, folklore, and history, and how they wove into their art. Simultaneously, I was enrolled in a screenwriting class in which I, inevitably, needed to write a script.
Combining my interests, I took inspiration from the Japanese courses and wrote a screenplay based on an urban myth I'd learned about an apparition shaped like a locomotive in rural Japan. My goal was to write the "next Ghibli movie," so naturally, I wrote about three rambunctious boys who toyed with yokai. My professor — Chris Matheson, writer of every millennial's favorite animated film, A Goofy Movie, and Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure — was encouraging, but in a reflection letter, he told me to take some time and "go about this in a different way."
I was stubborn and took criticism hard, so I stopped writing and abandoned the project entirely. This was not my journey to take — not now. I got off at the soonest stop. I was not ready to go on this journey, which would prove to be a long track to publication.
A few months later, I graduated and moved to Japan. For over five years, I called Hokkaido, Tokyo, and Kyoto "home." There I met thousands of people who each taught me something different about their culture, way of life, perspective of self and perception of the world. I studied in Japan's ancient capital, worked on television and film sets, wrote for magazines and newspapers, connected with students of all communication levels, and traveled up and down the island nation extensively, exploring its mountains, deserts, cities, bays and beaches, snowy summits and caves. I was taking the scenic route.
Along the way, I gained a deeper understanding of the origins of language and mythology, and their societal influences through belief systems and sinews of history. People revealed their superstitions, taught me the roots of urban legends, and talked about ghosts and yokai as if they were real; simply infused in their lands and existing side-by-side with the living.
I took these lessons and insights back to the United States, all the way to Virginia, where my husband and I lived while he attended law school. Shortly thereafter, we moved to and settled in Washington, DC, where we both found new careers that took us even further from our years spent in Japan. Our twenties were now behind us, and the adventures abroad remained inside a shut book on a shelf.
It wasn't until the pandemic struck, that life for us finally stood still long enough for me to dust off old memories as I did a deep-clean, and uncovered my feedback letter from my professor on GHOST TRAIN. I almost tossed it, but had a realization: I'd forgotten the three boys entirely. I had thought all along I'd written about a young woman named Maru. I have no idea where she came from. But I never forgot the original urban myth that inspired the story -- conductors haunted by ghostly locomotives late at night as they built new railroads during Japan's own industrial revolution in the Meiji Era.
My heart warmed, and I idly revisited memories of Japan, flipping through the dozens of articles I'd written, photos I'd taken, blogs I'd drafted, and short stories I'd played around with. And suddenly, words started to shout at me, demanding to be written. It was as if I had found a crumpled ticket in my pocket, and I was ready to board this train again and resume the journey onward.
Maru made her debut on the page. She took off running so fast, I could hardly keep up with her. I wrote the entire first draft of 350K (yes, 350K) words in just 5 months. It had no capitalization, and no punctuation. The tenses were mixed up. Half the characters didn't have names. This story was a runaway train that had been bursting to be written for over ten years. And I was finally listening to my heart and professor's advice, and "doing it right." The layover in my journey had given me a chance to be ready for this next leg.
Throughout 2021 I rewrote the story entirely, and edited it dozens more times. That's when I started bringing on alpha readers, and my first editor. A few months into 2022, I started querying (a journey you can read about here). I quickly realized querying a 350k book was not going to end well, so after some helpful advice from a couple of kind and patient agents, I paused to restructure GHOST TRAIN into three parts, and focused on refining the first book to be stand-alone, in case only it would be picked up. By summer, I was back to querying, this time armed with referrals, a better letter, and a story that was only 120k, which I thought was more than palatable, given all of the revisions it had gone through. Wrong! This version was not ready for publication either.
After a series of full requests, the Writer's Digest Conference in New York, and more feedback from alpha readers, I was advised to knock it down even further. I worked with two more editors and a critique partner, and got it down to 95k. Finally. The letter had improved too, with a narrowed focus. I could see a light at the end of the tunnel.
I pivoted to start including small publishers. I took longer pauses in between query batches, allowing time for feedback to roll in, and exercising patience (the anxiety compensated for by sheer stubbornness.) Most rejections were kind and offered a little advice, or adoration for the atmospheric vibes, descriptions, and natural-sounding dialogue between characters. I was overjoyed by the praise, but discouraged that my journey was fraught with dead ends and failures.
Then, at the end of 2022, I was introduced to Select Books, a publisher based in New York. I was invited to query them after learning they wanted to expand beyond nonfiction and build their young adult and fiction categories. Founded and run by a Japanese-American family, I was hopeful that maybe the work would connect with them.
In my first dream of the New Year, I found myself standing in a small office surrounded by stacks of leaning books, strewn manuscripts and pages, and three people standing around. Someone was holding my manuscript, asking "What do you think?" And the other person was furrowing their brow as they read my pages.
In Japanese culture, the first dream of the New Year is meant to serve as a prophecy for your year ahead.
Then in early February, I received a phone call. It was Kenzi Sugihara, the President and Founder of Select Books. He apologized for the delay in responding to me (it had only been two months, which to me was short in my experience with the publishing industry — some agents had my query or full manuscript ("fulls") for 9 months before I heard back!), and asked me more about it. We chatted for an hour before he asked to read the full thing. I sent it, and disclosed I had a few more agents still reading it. He said it was fine, and to let him know by spring.
Spring 2023 came. More fulls, more rejections. I was certain Kenzi had forgotten me, and I was too embarrassed to call back. I was afraid of more rejection. It had been a full year since my querying had began (albeit, healthy breaks throughout), and my energy was waning dramatically. This book was made with my whole heart, and I couldn't just "shelve it." I couldn't possibly abandon a book I'd written from my heart. I'd written six whole books, and started seven others in my life. But GHOST TRAIN was meant to be The One that made my publishing dreams come true.
As my personal life started to accumulate more chaos and changes that interrupted my creative flow, I finally decided I would turn my focus and revisit GHOST TRAIN later. I surrendered; it was time to shelve it and return to "real life."
Just thirty minutes after I accepted my decision, I got a phone call. It was Kenzi. He asked if GHOST TRAIN still needed a home.
And I said it did.
Only a few weeks later, we were sitting at a table together in New York over sushi and tea, talking about the editorial vision he had for the story. He gave some advice and feedback, and then said he would send over a contract.
I was numb, but I didn't have long to process before the next phase began.
The contract was signed, and I began the process of satisfying his request for tone edits. I tinkered with my prose for two months before sending over the "final draft" of the manuscript. Then, the editorial edits commenced. Those spanned a couple of months, with me and the editor sending it back and forth, redlining and questioning and revising it over and over and over. In conjunction, I worked with the marketing team on the cover, publicity planning, Advanced Reading Copies ("ARCs"), advertising, endorsement-seeking, and other partnerships and publishing aspects. Between signing in June and December 2023, there was work to do every single day.
And now it's 2024. GHOST TRAIN's publication journey is almost complete.
In February 2024, the editor and I finalized the edits to the manuscript (of course, throughout summer, we would continue to find a comma or a typo here and there). And, while I was relieved to have that aspect of the publication process behind me, the marketing program was moving full steam ahead. By April, I had sent out over one hundred endorsement requests by authors, and had started to generate interest. While other authors graciously read my work, I was juggling the other aspects of marketing the book. With the publisher, we worked on an advertisement investment plan, and I started to make connections with book influencers, bloggers, and bookstores that could potentially host me for an author talk or other book-related event.
Throughout the summer, I sent hundreds of emails. I thought receiving rejections in the querying process was hard; yet, here I was, years later, still seeing hundreds of rejections a month from those I reached out to for support. There were times in the summer it became especially difficult and demoralizing; many times I wondered how much more rejection one person could take. Publishing, as it turns out, is truly not for the faint of heart.
Yet, my publisher was ever-encouraging, and we pushed on. We finalized the cover spread, received the final endorsements from six wonderful authors, and secured advertising opportunities. We both put up ARCs for early readers to read and review it; and between us, we got almost two hundred. I started planning PR Boxes and ordering supplies to put together GHOST TRAIN-themed kits to send to influencers. Things, by end of summer, were really rolling. The map was laid out, and I knew all of the stops that were coming up.
One of our biggest causes for celebration was the securing of book events. Such process was one of the hardest. But after those hundreds of pitches were sent out, we had a dozen bookstores and venues interested in hosting events related to GHOST TRAIN - a win for a debut author. Slowly but surely, my checklist was getting taken care of. I have been worn down and weary, yet suffering from insomnia and anxiety relentlessly. But with each small win, I feel my flame grow a little brighter.
And as the early reviews come in, I also feel my confidence grow. I'm finding the right readers for GHOST TRAIN, and to my surprise and relief, readers are falling in love with Maru and love walking through Kyoto in 1877. Imposter syndrome is a cruel affliction, but those words of support are the cure. I know these years of hard work will have been worth it.
While we work together on making final plans for its release and my debut, I pause now to reflect on my journey and how long it has been since I first boarded. Though the terrain was rough, I am grateful for those who supported me, collaborated with me, and encouraged me onward. I am grateful for the stops along the way. I am most grateful that in the end, GHOST TRAIN is pulling into the right station to call home.
GHOST TRAIN will be available October 15, 2024, by SelectBooks, online and in bookstores everywhere.
Comentários