At first this was a research project studying how would it feel to be the author of a dispensable romance novel. To find the answer, I wrote a book called Sexy Librarian that was mostly true to my life, but that was modeled after romance novels that had been thrown away from public libraries: trashy love stories, in the trash.
When my manuscript was picked up I took my first full time job. I hoped it would supplement my prior research; the position involved writing reference biographies of contemporary sculptors for big leather-bound encyclopedias. The entries I wrote were edited specifically with the public library user in mind. As a result, the changes made to my articles illustrated a how-to for factualizing the histories of practioners who have complicated relationships to their own stories. The quote: "You know, you think you want just romantic love, but what's actually keeping us going is all these different kinds of love," was struck by the editorial staff from the first biography I wrote.
Sexy Librarian is many firsts deep. On these initial pages the virgin steps pertain to admitting to promiscuous, disease-ridden romps. But perhaps this doesn't count: firsts aren't really for fiction, and only non-fiction is true.