Jane Doucet

1. Please tell us a bit about yourself and your work.
I’ve been a print journalist since 1993 in Canada, first based in Toronto, Ontario, where I worked on the editorial staff of several magazines, and then from Halifax, Nova Scotia, my home province, where I’ve been freelancing full-time  since 2000 for a broader client base. I never planned to write fiction, but in 2003, when I looked for a lighthearted novel about motherhood indecision that didn’t end with “She had a baby and lived happily ever after”, I couldn’t find one - so I decided to write one myself!

In 2017, I self-published my debut novel, The Pregnant Pause, which was shortlisted for a 2018 Whistler Independent Book Award. In 2021, Vagrant Press, the fiction imprint of Nimbus Publishing in Halifax, launched my second novel, Fishnets & Fantasies. Vagrant re-released The Pregnant Pause in spring 2023 and published my third novel, Lost & Found in Lunenburg, in fall 2023.

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2. Has writing always been a focus for you or was it a Plan B? 

Writing was a Plan B. After I graduated from high school in 1986, I earned a dance performance studies diploma at a Toronto college, then spent one semester studying ballet at the Washington School of Ballet in D.C. I quit when I was 20 (my knees hurt) to enrol in journalism school at the University of King’s College in Halifax, earning an honours journalism degree in 1993. I had intended to become a dance reviewer, but I never did; instead, I ended up working on award-winning Canadian magazines for most of my career, which was wonderful.

Although I was a professional writer when I wrote The Pregnant Pause, I only decided to write a novel based on my own experience struggling with motherhood indecision. If I wasn’t going through that personally, I don’t think I ever would have written a novel. I had a story to tell - my story - and I felt really alone, but I knew I couldn’t be the only woman in the world feeling alienated because she didn’t have children. I hoped my novel would comfort others feeling the same - and make them laugh, because all of my novels are written with humour.

3. How do you explore ideas or find inspiration for your work?
All of my ideas come from my own experiences or topics I’m interested in: motherhood indecision (The Pregnant Pause); aging and sex (Fishnets & Fantasies); love and loss (Lost & Found in Lunenburg). If there are fictional areas I don’t know anything about, I research them using my reporting skills. For example, for Fishnets & Fantasies, about a married couple in their late fifties who open a sex shop in a tiny coastal town, I called a sex-shop owner in a small town in Nova Scotia to ask her questions.

4. What does the process of writing involve for you?
I wrote all three of my novels 'on the side' of my Monday-to-Friday freelance-journalism work, which pays my bills; my novels are my fun side hustle. So I’d write in the evenings after my workdays ended, on weekends and even on some vacations. Now that I’m in my mid-fifties, however, I’m finding it harder to find the energy to write on the side. For my fourth novel, I’m hoping to take some time off from freelancing to focus exclusively on my manuscript. I’ll dip into my savings, but I’m also fortunate to have a supportive husband with a regular paycheque.

5. And what does writing then also give you in return?
Not a robust bank account, that’s for sure! The best part of being an author is the connections I make with readers, both people I know and strangers. Nothing lifts my spirits more than reading a message from a reader telling me how much my novels have moved them - made them smile, laugh and cry.

6. Has seeing your work in print changed how you view yourself, and also how you view your NoMo status?
I don’t think it has changed my view of myself, except sometimes I look at my books and think wow, how did I ever do that? What a lot of hard work! As for my NoMo status, I’m childfree by chance (I couldn’t find a willing partner during my childbearing years), so I don’t wear that badge in the same way as women who are childfree by choice. Yet, I do still wear it (metaphorically speaking), and I chose to tell my story through The Pregnant Pause, where I could have kept quiet.

7. Tell us about the wider reception that you’ve had to sharing your story - has it changed how others have viewed you and your identity as a non-parent?
Not only has sharing my story changed how people I know view me and my identity as a non-parent in the best possible way, but both mothers and fathers have told me that it gave them a better understanding of what it’s like to live a full life without kids, and perhaps be a bit less self-righteous about glorifying parenthood. Some mothers messaged me to tell me they were equally conflicted as my protagonist about having a baby, and when they did have one, although they love their child, it wasn’t like angels sang - parenting a newborn was tough - so they didn’t have another. I’ve heard all kinds of stories. I feel like I’ve given women a safe space to have these discussions.

8. How do you feel about the current representation of childless and/or childfree people in literature?
It’s all over the map, but more and more stories are being told about women without children, which is positive. One example I love is Jo Marsh in Little Women, which is set in 19th-century Massachusetts. She aspires to be a writer and decides never to marry or have children because she wants to pursue a career that, at that time, was male dominated. And the author, Louisa May Alcott, never married or had children.

9. What would you like the publishing world to know about non-parents, both as writers and readers, and our stories?
That non-parents are not 'less than' parents in any way. Childfree women have myriad other ways to 'mother'- we can mother our nieces and nephews, our friends’ kids, our elderly parents and close neighbours, and our beloved animal companions.

10. What future plans do you have, especially for your writing?

I’m just starting to write a cozy murder mystery, which will be challenging (all those red herrings, twists and turns!) but hopefully fun, too.