Interview with J. E. Weiner, Author of The Wretched and Undone

 

J. E. Weiner is a writer and novelist based in Northern California. Her debut novel, The Wretched and Undone, is a searing and genre-bending Southern Gothic tale set in the heart of the Texas Hill Country and inspired by real people and actual events. The book manuscript was named a Killer Nashville Top Pick for 2024 and a Claymore Award Finalist for Best Southern Gothic. 

Weiner’s previous work has appeared in the literary journals Madcap Review, Five Minutes, HerStry, and Chicago Story Press, as well as the recent grit-lit anthology Red-Headed Writing (Cowboy Jamboree Press, 2024). Weiner is a founding member of the Pacific Coast Writers Collective, and while living and writing in blissful exile on the West Coast, her heart remains bound to her childhood home, the Great State of Texas. 

Learn more about J. E. and her writing at her website: www.jeweiner.com

Follow her on social media: Facebook: @J.E.Weiner  | Instagram: @jeweinerauthor

When did you begin writing? 

There is a Russian idiom “to write into the drawer” (zapisat' v yashchik), which, I think, best captures how all of this started. Over the years, I have always kept journals–or really just scraps of paper stuffed into notebooks or desk drawers–capturing strange and humorous encounters, snippets of dialog eavesdropped, and observations formed as a result of chronic people-watching. The idea for this story emerged over time and over many trips to visit family in the Texas Hill Country. I kept telling my husband that someday I wanted to write a novel about Bandera, the self-proclaimed “Cowboy Capital of the World,” and its history. He finally forced my hand, signing me up for a Stanford Continuing Studies course titled “How to Start Your Novel and Keep It Going.” I wrote the first chapter of The Wretched and Undone in the spring of 2018 and haven’t looked back since. 

Do you write during the day, at night, or whenever you can sneak in a few moments? 

With a hectic day job, finding the time and headspace to write has proven to be my greatest challenge. At a moment of particular frustration, I remembered when my mother was writing her Master’s thesis while teaching full-time and raising young children. She would wake up at 4 o’clock in the morning every day and write for two hours before we all woke up, and then use whatever energy she had left in the evenings to edit. I have adopted a variation of that approach. I spend a good part of every weekend writing generatively and editing in the evenings during the week. 

What is this book about? 

The Wretched and Undone is a love letter to the Texas Hill Country. It is a story–as quirky and funny as it is tragic–about a place and time few people beyond the town of Bandera know much about. It is both a hard-nosed telling of brutal truths about a difficult time in American history, lifting up voices often silenced and lessons still not learned from the past, and a poignant saga that explores the tensions between the protection of family and community (found and otherwise) and the struggles of individuals to chart their own paths and reconcile their own fears, joys, failures, and successes. Ultimately, this is the story of the resilience, but not the infallibility of the human spirit. 

What inspired you to write it? 

One icy winter night while visiting my sister on her cattle ranch on the outskirts of Bandera, Texas, she shared the story of a “woman in white” who often came to call, drifting across the fields and hills or imploring sleepy guests for help. That ghost drew me to this story, and the ruggedly beautiful Texas Hill Country drew me to the place. It was only a matter of time until the trained historian in me uncovered the complex and fascinating history of Bandera and the region. The intrepid pioneers who crossed the Atlantic on a cramped steamship and endured a 300-mile trek by oxcart from the Port of Galveston to Bandera on the eve of the American Civil War had no idea what awaited them at the tough and morally ambiguous crossroads in the history of Texas and the United States. Ghosts? Cowboys? Times of troubles? This was a story that needed to be told.

 Was the road to publication smooth sailing or a bumpy ride? 

Bumpy, for sure, as it is for all new writers. The barriers to entry into the traditional book publishing market are nearly impossible to overcome without a perfect alignment of the right agent, the right publishing house contacts, and the right project at the right time. However, with challenges also come opportunities, and the democratization of the publishing industry in recent years has allowed newcomers like me to break through. That said, the bar is also ever-higher in these emerging publishing lanes. There is no lack of great stories that need to be told, but the stories (and the writing) also need to be great. 

What is one piece of advice you would like to share with aspiring authors everywhere? 

I would have waited a beat longer to begin submitting my manuscript. When you type “The End” on the final page of your draft, the reality is it is just the beginning. 

What is up next for you? 

I am on to my next novel, a story inspired by the still-unsolved murder of eight men at Tragedy Tree in Bandera County in 1863. 

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