William Morrow released Mercy House on February 11. For this edition of Beginning to End, Spine follows Mercy House from author all the way through to publicity and marketing, stopping along the way to talk to Dillon’s agent and editor, as well as the book’s designer. For our last piece, publicist Jes Lyons.

The cover of Mercy House features an angel door knocker hung on a red door, with a woman’s hand reaching for it. In the book, the angel is Mercy House’s identifying feature, signaling to victims of domestic violence that they’ve arrived at safety. Quite early in her process, designer Elsie Lyons came across a similar image, of a red door with woman’s reaching for a knocker. “At the time, I thought it might be too straightforward,” she told Spine. And so she passed.

Lucia Macro, executive editor for William Morrow/Avon Books, knew she wanted Alena Dillon’s debut novel Mercy House “the moment it landed on my desk.” For her, the decision to take on a book is often about the voice. “I respond to strong voices in the books I love, both from the characters and the author, and Mercy House delivered.”

William Morrow released Mercy House on February 11. For this edition of Beginning to End, Spine follows Mercy House from author all the way through to publicity and marketing, stopping along the way to talk to Alena Dillon’s agent and editor, as well as the book’s designer. We began with the author, and now arrive at her agent, Nicki Richesin.

Mercy House, Alena Dillon’s debut novel, centers on Sister Evelyn, a fierce, wise-cracking, and ultimately kind-hearted nun who helps run a small Brooklyn shelter for women fleeing from domestic violence. When Bishop Hawkins threatens to close the home, Evelyn fights to save Mercy House and protect its residents, a struggle which forces her to face abuse in her own past.

Dina Nayeri’s first two books, the novels A Teaspoon of Earth and Sea and Refuge, pulled in threads from her life; her Iranian childhood, her time as a refugee in Italy, her settling in America. The second book in particular flowed from mind to pen, from pen to page. “It just fell out of me,” Nayeri said. Only when she arrived at her latest book and first work of nonfiction, The Ungrateful Refugee, did Nayeri really grapple with what to say, and how. 

When Alisha Gorder arrived at the end of Hard Mouth, Amanda Goldblatt’s debut adventure novel about a woman struggling to face her father’s slow dying, she “immediately texted [Counterpoint Press] editor Jenny Alton in all caps, and with more crying emojis than words. I was devastated by the ending,” she told Spine. “And also that the book was over.”

Beginning to End is a series from Spine following a book from writing through acquisition, design and on to publication and publicity. For our second "season," we're looking at Hard Mouth, Amanda Goldblatt's debut adventure novel. We’ve spoken with author Goldblatt, her agent, Caroline Eisenmann, and book cover designer Nicole Caputo. Next up: Jennifer Alton, assistant editor at Counterpoint Press and editorial lead on Hard Mouth.

Readers of As Good As The First Time (Dafina 2018) fell in love with Sugar Lake, the small Georgia town at the heart of K.M. Jackson’s Sugar Lake series. Fell in love, and then arrived at the last page and had to leave. Nearly a year, they waited before they could return to Sugar Lake, and to Aunt Joyce’s bakeshop, Goode ‘N Sweet. Nearly a year since they met New Yorkers Alexandrea and Olivia Gale, come south to help Aunt Joyce and, in Olivia’s case, to get pulled back into a relationship she’d left behind years ago.

Artist Matt Huynh works with brush and ink, pulling technical inspiration from Western comics and Eastern sumi-e (ink brush painting). He frequently uses his art to explore and amplify stories of refugees, of migrants and asylum seekers and their communities. For the October/November issue of The Believer, Huynh created Cabramatta, pulling readers into the Australian city he grew up in. 

Literary Twitter can be a scary place. Twitter mobs engage in Twitter pile-ons, at the least hurting writers’ feelings and at the most, threatening to take down titles before they’re officially released. But Caroline Eisenmann, agent at Frances Goldin, argues that Twitter is also a force for good, at least in her professional life.

Beginning to End is a series from Spine following a book from writing through acquisition, design and on to publication and publicity. For our second "season," we're looking at Hard Mouth, Amanda Goldblatt's debut adventure novel about a woman facing—and sometimes fleeing from—her father's drawn-out battle with cancer. Counterpoint Press publishes the book this month. We begin the series by talking with Goldblatt.

Sixteen-year-old Nalah, AKA Chief Rocka, leader of the all-girl Las Mal Criadas crew and the heart of Lilliam Rivera's new YA novel Dealing in Dreams, is blinded by her vision of life in Mega Towers. The Towers, three giant and luxurious concrete apartment blocks, loom over the residents of Mega City. All of Nalah's actions on the streets — running curfew patrols, punishing stragglers, fighting other crews in public showdowns — are aimed at earning the favor of Déesse, the city's beloved leader, and a home in the Towers for Las Mal Criadas.

Melissa Rivero's debut novel The Affairs of the Falcóns, published April 2 by Ecco, centers on Ana, an undocumented Peruvian immigrant, as she navigates work and motherhood and marriage, intrafamilial classism and colorism, and 1990s New York City, all while managing a growing debt load and avoiding deportation.

Moving along a chronological path interspersed with flashbacks, the novel is written in close third-person. Readers follow Ana as she progresses through her life, just as Rivero followed Ana as she progressed through her writing.

Back in 2014, writer Mira Jacob's six-year-old son Z became obsessed with Michael Jackson. He wanted to dance like Michael, he wanted to look like Michael, and what began as Z's questions about his pop-star obsession spread into deeper questions about skin and color and race and family. Jacob is East Indian and her husband is Jewish, and Z wanted to understand who he was.

When Z learned about the killing of Michael Brown, a black man shot to death by a white police officer in Ferguson, Missouri, the questions grew more complex, and carried fear.

Writer Kris Waldherr's novel The Lost History of Dreams launches from Atria Books next month. The book, best if not fully described with the genre-centric words "romance," "Gothic," and "mystery," follows post-mortem daguerreotypist, historian and widower Robert Highstead as he seeks to carry out a cousin's dying wish, a quest that pushes him through his own grief into someone else's ghost-infused love story.

Like all 21st century authors, Waldherr is working hard alongside her publisher's publicity team to create advance buzz around her novel, and is tapping into her full skill set to do so. "I'm both a designer and an author," she told Spine. "I'm using all my design mojo to help my novel fly in the world."

Beginning to End is a series from Spine following a book from acquisition to publication. For our first "season," we're following Light from Other Stars, about a young astronaut hopeful and an invention that alters time. The novel is author Erika Swyler's second, following her much-lauded 2015 debut, The Book of Speculation. Bloomsbury will publish the book in May, and the publicity team — Senior Publicist Lauren Hill, Senior Marketing Manager Nicole Jarvis, and Digital and Trade Marketing Director Laura Keefe — is already at work generating buzz. Keefe spoke to Spine about their efforts.

Reading forward through a short-story collection, a reader hopes to be moved uniquely by each piece, but also to arrive at book's end having undergone a singular experience. Writer Chaya Bhuvaneswar's White Dancing Elephants, described by author Jimin Han (A Small Revolution) as a "daring mix of ancient, contemporary, and dystopic stories," provides such a cumulative read.

Beginning to End is a series from Spine following a book from acquisition to publication. For our first "season," we're following Light from Other Stars, about a young astronaut hopeful and an invention that alters time. The novel is author Erika Swyler's second, following her much-lauded 2015 debut, The Book of Speculation. Bloomsbury Art Director Patti Ratchford designed the cover, which features art by Marc Burckhardt. Bloomsbury will publish Light from Other Stars in May.

Lorena Hickok was plain. Plain, Hick was, hardscrabble born just before the 19th century turned, risen up and away from her abusive father, away from South Dakota, into a career as a straight-spoken newspaperwoman, into the White House, into the bed of Eleanor Roosevelt, First Lady of the United States. Plain Hick was, and straight she spoke, straight words, but as imagined and written by Amy Bloom, words also strong and compelling, language sometimes spare, sometimes sharp, often lovely like the lovely of a winter beach.

Justine Bateman absolutely, one hundred percent could have written a celebrity memoir. You know the ones with the catchy titles, the People Magazine prose, the quirky-but-always-pretty photos splashed across the front. One of those. Bateman could have written one — publishers were pushing her to write one — and you know, it would have been easy.

Beginning to End follows a book from acquisition to bookshelf. For this "season," we're honing in on Light from Other Stars, about a young astronaut hopeful and an invention that alters time. The novel is author Erika Swyler's second, following her much-lauded 2015 debut, The Book of Speculation. In our first article, we spoke with Swyler's agent Michelle Brower. Next up: Lea Beresford, senior editor at Bloomsbury Publishing, working with Swyler to ready the book for publication next year.

In Julia Dixon Evans' debut novel How to Set Yourself on Fire, 30-something Sheila and her 12-year-old neighbor grow increasingly obsessed with letters to Rosamond, Sheila's recently deceased grandmother, from Harold, a lovestruck neighbor. While Sheila's voice provides the book's primary viewpoint, Harold's voice adds a second narrative rhythm.

Later in the book, Sheila, whose own life tends towards chaos, attempts to impose order by hanging the letters on laundry lines strung around her apartment. Evans's own creative process involved a similar moment of organizational imposition.

Each author struggles with her own worst stretch of creation. For some, fanning the spark of an idea into a fully formed concept stands out as most agonizing. Others get caught in the middle stages, struggling to find a way out of narrative tangles and research rabbit holes and multiple storylines. While each phase of her book Heartland had its challenges, writer Sarah Smarsh told Spine that the hardest might have been final edits—letting go of a book she’d worked on for some 16 years.