What We Can Learn From Susan DeFreitas, a Book Coach Who Died Way Too Young
Remembering a dear colleague and friend
I met Susan at the Willamette Writing Conference maybe 8 or 9 years ago. She was an author and a freelance editor who was hustling up every job she could — and she had a lot of questions for me about my book coach certification program. She was interested, but she was smart and discerning and she wasn’t going to jump into anything without knowing it was right.
I didn’t know it at the time, but Susan put the tuition for my course on her credit card — something I would have vehemently argued with her (or anyone) not to do. I now know better than to question. We can’t know what people value, or what they want to spend their money on, or what they imagine for their future. Their actions are not ours to question — and Susan knew exactly what she was doing.
She became one of our earliest certified book coaches and then she set about building her business.
She wanted to support writers who were writing fiction about social and environmental justice.
She wanted to teach people what MFA programs so rarely do about story and structure, and writing for the reader, and approaching the marketplace.
She wanted to help fiction writers master the nuances of writing great stories.
She wanted to lift up the voices of people who are traditionally underrepresented in publishing by making her programs as accessible as possible, while still honoring herself and the work she had put into them.
She did all of that (you can see her courses and teaching HERE) and more.
She was a brilliant teacher. She wrote a ton of newsletters for Jane Friedman, was a featured presenter at the Writer Unboxed conference, taught masterclasses in her own community, and continued to hone her voice and her ideas about writing.
She also wrote herself — a novel called Hot Season and a collection of pieces in tribute to Ursula K Leguin called Dispatches from Anarras.
Some of the most powerful writing she did was about her own illness — a brutal and fierce type of cancer. She shared with her newsletter followers what was happening with her health and her indominable spirit.
Susan was engaged in many different writing, creative, and entrepreneurial communities, including ambitious business owners in Rachel Rodgers’ Hello Seven community dedicated to helping women of color earn big cash money and the Author Accelerator book coaching community, where she was always urging people on, helping them, guiding them, showing them the way.
She and I often brainstormed about ways she could improve her impact and ways I could improve mine. She was a fantastic student of business, writing, and life. She was that rare person who could see the possibility — and the story — in everything.
I use her as an example of what a book coach can achieve because she was uncompromising in her vision, her values, and her desires and I am convinced all of this is what led to her incredible success.
What a tremendous impact she had! I have heard from her friends, book coaching colleagues, and writers in the last few days, who are all so gutted by her death.
We loved her. We respected her. We followed her. We cheered for her. We learned so much from her.
I didn’t think she would die. Not because her illness wasn’t bad — it was. But because she was such a force of nature. It seemed impossible to think her light could go out. But it did.
So what is there to learn from this untimely death?
In reading the comments in the Author Accelerator community about Susan and in the posts I see online, what strikes me is that you can FEEL Susan’s very specific and immense impact.. Everyone is saying the same kinds of things I am saying here — that this was a person who knew herself, and knew her power, and knew her mission, and did not compromise.
She cared so deeply about good writing and about other people. She was so fierce (as Dani Abernathy said, “She was intimidating AF”) but also so generous.
What we can take from Susan’s example is to fully inhabit our own lives. To let our beliefs guide our work. To not be afraid to WANT things and to strive for things. And to do it with love and energy as long as we can.
Her life and her work is an inspiration.
I’m going to miss her so much.
I vividly remember the moment you found out she’d put it on her credit card, Jennie. I was on that call as a prospective student. It told me that if an incredible woman like her would invest in this programme in that way, I needed to invest my savings. And I remember tearing up when minutes later she spoke of the meaning of stories for her, of the injustice stories can fight. I signed up to become a book coach immediately after. She was vital in the course of my life in that way and was always so kind about my work.
We need her and her activism now more than ever and it breaks my heart that she isn’t here. The world needs her dammit! Her family does!
My condolences to you, Jennie. I know you lost a dear friend. And our community lost a fierce advocate for the power of storytelling. I miss her and her words already. X
I'm gutted by the news. I've been working with Susan on my manuscript, and the idea for a new one, only 2 weeks ago. Nothing was going to stop her. She was a warrior and an inspiration. She knew how to give feedback that made sense, she understood what I was trying to accomplish like no one else. She knew how to lift you up when you felt overwhelmed. When she admitted in her blog that things had taken a turn for the worse, I sent her an email telling her how grateful I was - am - for having worked with her, and what a fabulous coach she was. Thank goodness I did it then.
I will miss her very much.