I was a media escort.

With those five words, John McNally begins his fictional biography of Jack Hercules Sheahan, a once promising graduate of “The famous Iowa Writers Workshop”. Jack, is suffering one of the greatest bouts of writers-block and underachievement to come out of The Workshop since its founding in 1939. For those blessed (or cursed) with the need to write, the travails of Jack Hercules Sheahan will be, if not memories, nightmares and fears that keep one up at night. Jack, who had his story, “The Self-Adhesive Postage Stamp”, published in The New Yorker and selected for The Best American Short Stories prior to graduation from “The Workshop” has not written one word on his post-MFA novel in ten years. (Now that is an impressive block by any writer’s standards.) Jack, remains in Iowa City in a small Victorian apartment near the campus, barely surviving by escorting authors around Iowa on book tours. The media escort, as Jack describes it, is the lowest rung of the publishing industry. Through Jack we get a glimpse of the quirky and often barely sane beings commonly called “writers”.

John McNally knows his subject well, having been a media escort and holding an MFA from the Iowa Writers Workshop. But McNally, unlike his fictional protagonist, has several critically acclaimed works to his credit, including, America’s Report Card (2006) and The Book of Ralph (2004).

The travails of Jack Sheahan will resonate with anyone compelled to write, or in love with books. This novel is a peek behind the curtain to see how writers create (or don’t create) art. McNally’s tale of Jack’s adventures in trying to locate a missing writer he is escorting who may have gone over the edge, his encounter with a best-selling author who has been hiding out for ten years and may have caused Jack’s writers-block, are as humorous and engaging as his dealings with his perpetually nude neighbor, M. Cat during a raging Iowa blizzard.

John McNally broke away from his current writing long enough to answer a few questions about After The Workshop, and talk about what he is currently working on.

Rocky Cole: What has been the initial response to After The Workshop, and did writing this book alter your approach to writing or to book tours?

John McNally: The initial response from pre-pub reviews (PW, Booklist, Kirkus) and readers has been very positive so far. I couldn’t be happier about it. It took a while for the book to get picked up by a publisher for fear that it was “too insidery,” but to me the book has always been about a guy with a crappy job who wonders if it’s too late to do something with his life, which almost everyone I’ve ever known, in every walk of life, has dealt with and wondered at some point. There’s definitely some “insider” stuff in the book, but my hope has always been that a reader who isn’t a writer can still appreciate the book. I was happy to see (today, in fact) a non-writer Amazon reviewer say just that.

I had a great time writing this book. It’s the first time a novel of mine has fallen into place. What you read is pretty close to what the first draft looked like, with a few exceptions. The actual writing of the book reminded me of why I wanted to be a writer in the first place — because it’s something I enjoy doing.  It’s easy to forget that and to focus all your attentions on publication, but I’ve always had better experiences when I don’t think about publication and take pleasure in the act of writing itself.

And it has changed my approach to writing. I’ve returned to writing fiction long-hand, which I’d quit doing about twelve years ago, and I just bought a refurbished IBM Selectric typewriter, so that I can type up my handwritten drafts and revise them in that form before transferring everything onto a computer. In other words, I’m getting back to those things that attracted me to writing in the first place, and I’m trying to be more patient about it all.

RC: How have your peers from the Iowa Writer’s Workshop responded to the book?

JM: I haven’t heard anything yet.

RC: This book seems to be very different than what you have written before (The Book of Ralph) – have you already started on a new work and can you say anything in general about where your next project is headed?

JM: I’ve taken a break from a long historical novel to write a short novel that’s very different from anything I’ve written before. All I can really say about it is that it’s from the points-of-view of several women, and I’ve used a classic book as a springboard, not unlike how my character Tate Rinehart writes novels, much to the irritation of my novel’s narrator, Jack.  The new one is a twisted little novel, and I’m having a great time with it. The novel is set in L.A., where I lived for a year not too long ago.

RC: And I understand that you have a new book on the craft of writing that is forthcoming?

JM: Yes…I have a book coming out in September that seems right up the alley of your website. It’s titled THE CREATIVE WRITER’S SURVIVAL GUIDE: ADVICE FROM AN UNREPENTANT NOVELIST, and will be published by the University of Iowa Press.

RC: Since reading “After The Workshop”, I am eager to get my hands on your next book, Good luck with the book tour and don’t be too tough on your media escorts.