You guys ready to see where Kate Moretti does her magic?  — Orly

In May of 2015, I officially transitioned my day job. I didn’t exactly “quit” per se, but rather reduced my schedule and my responsibilities to make room for writing, and of course, my family. My girls were coming to an age of school plays and softball games and class parties and I was missing all of it while trying to keep a stranglehold on two careers.

May 15, 2015 was my first day of my new job. It looked like this:

It was clean and blank and uncluttered and I spent more for that gorgeous aqua chair than I’d ever care to admit. It was SO PRETTY. I was sure that BRILLIANT THINGS were going to be written here

That’s both true… and not true. To be honest, the most brilliant strokes in my manuscripts are written here:

I look at that first picture and sigh. Everything was possible! Oh, the genius that was sure to come in that stunning space.

But now? Clutter. Boxes of books and giveaway items. A poster. Several coffee mugs (some from the same day. Hopefully). A haphazard bulletin board. An empty candy jar, now stuffed with candy wrappers. Year old shelves bought with so much promise, left to languish, unhung. The chair, too heavy to move and the arms too long to fit comfortably against the desk itself until I exchanged it for a comfortable (and clunky and boring) thing I found on Amazon.

Sometimes, when I’m stuck on a plot point, I spin in circles, both figuratively and physically.

When I look closer:

A thank you note from a book club. Notes from my girls. My two writing mottos, torn and pinned in a frenzy when I needed them the most: The Writing is the Thing and Forever Forward. A newspaper article, laminated and sent to me by my local representative Marcia Hahn. A sticker reminder of my tribe.

I’ve come so far. And yet, I still stare wistfully at that first picture. My space, before it really became mine. Like the manuscripts that are written here, the beginning is full of promise. The reality is messy.

I have to remember that they’re BOTH gorgeous. But the hard work is done in the second, which makes it all the more beautiful.

But still. That chair.

About Kate
Kate Moretti is the author of Binds That Tie, the New York Times Bestseller Thought I Knew You, and The Vanishing Year. She lives in Pennsylvania with her husband, two kids, and a dog. She’s worked in the pharmaceutical industry for ten years as a scientist, and has been an avid fiction reader her entire life.

More on Kate’s bio page.