Writing in Community for Introverts

I sat down with Cammie Fuller inside The Open Book, her bookstore in Warrenton, Virginia, surrounded by the shelves she has spent years filling with exactly what this community wants to read.

Cammie grew up moving frequently, and in every town, there was a bookstore or library that became a kind of home base. When she and her husband settled in Warrenton and watched both the Borders and a beloved used bookstore close their doors, she faced an old, familiar choice. She could move again to a town with a bookstore, or she could build one herself. She sat down with Maria Del Rosso, the head of the local public library, and asked whether the community had it in them to support a shop. The answer was yes, this town is full of readers.

The Open Book opened in March 2019, and one year later, on the day of their grand opening, Cammie posted a notice closing the doors to walk-in customers. The online store kept the business alive, with an employee delivering books to people's front doors for free during those months of lockdown. Cammie remembers hearing the same thing again and again: children jumping up and down at the sight of a bag of books left on the step.

Craft, Business, Community: How the Book Club for Writers Found Its Shape

I got to know Cammie primarily through her Book Club for Writers. She and her good friend Alison Zak built the club from a free-form reading and feedback gathering to have a focus around three pillars instead. Craft is the ongoing work of writing and refining, and the club studies several authors and works each semester to learn craft techniques. Business is understanding the paths a manuscript can take, so members are not caught off guard by traditional or self-publishing routes they did not expect. Community is the piece that turns a solitary craft into shared experience.

The club now runs each fall and spring, has sold out every single session for roughly five years, and caps enrollment at twenty to twenty-five people. Cammie values the intimacy the small group allows, the warmth in the room that lets people share work that gets personal without feeling exposed.

If you know me, you know that I’m an introvert. To an introvert, the word “community” inspires anything from eye rolls to shivers. I never thought I wanted or needed a community of writers, but honestly, that is the absolute best part of the book club. It’s one thing to choose solitude, but there are times in solitude when you stop to wonder if you are truly alone, as in, no one else feels the way that you do or struggles with the same things.

During a recent challenge at the shop, writers gathered at nine each morning to write for an hour, aiming for one thousand words per day. One day, Cammie was certain her pages were worthless. When the hour ended, another writer admitted to the same feeling about her own work. The next morning, however, both of them left with something worth keeping. Cammie's takeaway is simple. You do not always know how many other people are standing exactly where you are standing, and community is what normalizes that. Come back to the page even after you’ve had a bad day, and know that you’re not the only one who has off days.

When I started attending the Book Club for Writers, I had to read pages of the book I’m writing out loud to strangers. That was terrifying, but it ended up being so affirming. They mostly liked it! They were kind. They wanted to know what happened next. They had good pointers and asked illuminating questions.

Then, they had to read to me. I had to listen carefully and think about how to help them make their work better. A door was unlocked. I cared about these people, and I cared about their works. I could rely on these people intellectually in a way I hadn’t been able to do since I was in college. The connections with other writers who were rowing in the same direction made me feel like I wasn’t the only person trying to figure it out.

You may, understandably, eschew “community” because it can be a word someone uses to get you to do something you don’t want to do, or you’re an introvert who finds interacting with strangers awkward, or you’ve been burned before by a group that was more critical than supportive.

I challenge you, though, to seek out true community, where what you give is received with gratitude and delight, rather than entitlement or criticism. That could be a book club, a writer’s group, a musical ensemble, a gardening club, a D&D group, who knows? It can also be this community of lifelong learners seeking deeper meaning and beauty in our lives.

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Feed the Lake

Creative work gets easier to carry when you are not carrying it alone.

Hear the full conversation with Cammie Fuller on the Growing Inspiration podcast on this site or your favorite podcast player and on YouTube @GardenofMyDelights.