It's A Book Thing Presents: An Interview with Virginia (Ginnie) Isaacs Cover, author of Supplemental Needs

Author’s Bio: Virginia (Ginnie) Isaacs Cover grew up in Minnesota. She holds a Master of Social Work from the University of Michigan and has worked throughout her career with children and adults with complex medical conditions and developmental disabilities. She is an advocate for those with disabilities and their families, and published a widely read guidebook for those affected by X and Y chromosome variations, Living with Klinefelter Syndrome, Trisomy X, and 47, XYY. Turning to fiction, she explores the impact of a prenatal diagnosis on a young family in Supplemental Needs: A Novel. Cover and her husband live in the Washington, DC, metro area.

 

Deliah Lawrence: What inspired you to write your book?

Virginia Issacs Cover: I first got the idea about writing a fictional account of a prenatal diagnosis and subsequent experience accepting that our child had a disability from The Mouse Proof Kitchen by Saira Shah, whose account of her daughter’s birth and infancy. The daughter had severe neurological disorders that required a process to accept, in the midst of numerous other family and career challenges. I realized that fiction almost never covers childhood disability.

 

DL: How do you overcome the challenges of writer’s block?

VIC: The novel progress was slow, characterized by brief spurts of writing followed by months of sitting in the computer untouched. I decided to work on the craft of writing at the Writers Center in Bethesda and took up the novel again. When the Novel Year workshop opened, I enrolled. That was key. We met every other week and the peer pressure to submit writing and progress was effective, along with the critical comments from other writers and our instructor. By the end of the year, including 24 workshops, it was completed.

 

DL: What is your writing process?

VIC: Some of it is fairly mechanical and not terribly creative. When I wrote my first book, a guide to X and Y chromosome aneuploidy, I wrote a very detailed outline of the contents. I then got a second cup of coffee every morning at 9 am and sat down at my computer. I wrote until at least 11 am, and if I was on a good run, I continued until I was done.

 

DL: What elements do you think make a compelling story?

VIC: I like an opening event that draws you in, along with two or three interwoven story lines. The scenes need to be descriptive so that I can view them in my head while reading. I have to be able to “see” the characters and the setting.

 

DL: Is there a specific author or book that influenced you in any way either growing up or as an adult?

VIC: When I was three, my mother began taking me to the library in the small city in Wisconsin where we lived at the time. I attended story time where the librarians read to the children. One day the librarian introduced us to Madeline, a book about a little girl who lived in Paris. I was hooked by the idea of another country and another city. I checked out the book, had my parents read it repeatedly, and renewed it several times. My parents bought me my own copy. This started me on reading and on using literature to expand my world.

 

DL: What was the most valuable piece of writing advice you’ve ever been given?

VIC: Don’t strive for perfection in writing the first draft. It is important to get the words on the paper and a structure that you can edit.

 

DL: What strategies do you use to successfully market your book(s)?

 

VIC: My two books have focused on X and Y chromosome advocacy. Most of my marketing of the guidebook was directed at families and adults affected by these conditions, which impact 1 in 500 individuals. I also targeted genetic counselors, educators, and the “helping” professions of social work, psychology, and other human services.

 

For Supplemental Needs I am focused not only on these groups, but also on Jewish readers, because the young family is Jewish, and one of the story lines concerns LGBTQ issues and the Jewish community.

 

DL: What tips would you give to aspiring writers?

 

VIC: Writers are doing their work to tell a story or promote an issue to readers. It is quite impossible to judge how well you are doing without active feedback. You need to be in a writing group and you also need to work on your craft. Many think that words will flow magically and create a great American novel. That isn’t true. It takes skill, feedback, and revisions to get a work to where you want it. The more help that you can pull in through formal instruction and other readers, the better.

 

DL: What new projects are you currently working on?

VIC: I have just begun to plan the second edition of my guidebook, Living with Klinefelter Syndrome, Trisomy X, and 47, XYY. I have had a passion since my younger son was in preschool to promote public knowledge about this surprisingly common genetic condition. There is some stigma that seems to attach to these diagnoses and keeps families silent, wishing to protect their children. That doesn’t make it easier; it results in family isolation.

 

DL: Where can readers learn more about you and purchase your book(s)?

VIC: Readers can learn more here:

• Website: https://www.virginiacover.com/
• Amazon Author Page:  https://tinyurl.com/2v5eprbb
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/virginia.cover

DL: Thanks so much for being here with us today. I know my readers will enjoy getting to know you and your work.

VIC: Thank you.