Wendy J. Fox: On the All-Consuming Job of Motherhood
In this interview, author Wendy J. Fox discusses women’s paid and unpaid labor with her new novel, The Last Supper.
Wendy J. Fox is the author of five books of fiction, including the forthcoming novel The Last Supper. Her linked stories What If We Were Somewhere Else, which won the Colorado Book Award, received a star for excellence in the genre of short-stories in Booklist, and called “heartfelt” by the New York Times. Her novel If the Ice Had Held was a notable audio pick for LitHub. She has written for many national publications including Self, Business Insider, BuzzFeed, and Ms. and authors a quarterly column in Electric Literature focusing on independent books. A lifelong resident of the American west, she currently lives outside of Phoenix. Follow her on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and Bluesky.
In this interview, Wendy discusses women’s paid and unpaid labor with her new novel, The Last Supper, her advice for other writers, and more.
Name: Wendy J. Fox
Book title: The Last Supper
Publisher: SFWP
Release date: April 7, 2026
Genre/category: Literary Fiction
Previous titles: The Seven Stages of Anger and Other Stories (2014, Press 53); The Pull of It (2016, Underground Voices), If the Ice Had Held (SFWP, 2019); What If We Were Somewhere Else (SFWP, 2021)
Elevator pitch: The Last Supper follows three months in the chaotic life of Amanda, a stay-at-home mom who is desperate for something more than the isolated world of her suburban home. Consumed by parenting anxieties, Amanda’s illusory stability collapses when the cracks in her marriage finally split open so wide she sees a way out and finds a pathway to reclaim her own creative and economic agency.
What prompted you to write this book?
I’m very interested in the intersection of women’s lives with both paid and unpaid labor—and how those intersections can impact or enable the ability to participate in creative work.
For example: I was employed in the information technology sector for a decade and a half, including at the executive level. This radically limited my ability to participate in writing residencies and conferences, and it often meant that in order to eke out writing time, I said “no” to nearly everything else. No to hangouts with friends. No to watching a movie with my partner. No to anything other than the bare minimum with family.
At the same time, that work track meant when it was time for book tour, I could afford more stops than my publisher could reasonably fund. I was able to cobble together a writing life and a corporate life.
I do not have children, and that was a choice for me. I did not see how I could work, parent, and write. The Last Supper was an imagining of different choices—I worked big jobs, but no job is as big or all-consuming as being a mother. The plot focuses on a mom who has just turned 40 and has two young boys. She refuses to return to her position as a sales associate after the second son is born, because it feels like doing two different kinds of work is untenable. I was asking a question, in fiction, about how to create meaning in life while weighted down by the very present and persistent demands of the everyday.
This is certainly not a new question, in fiction or otherwise. Still, it’s something I felt in a very real way when I was working full-time and trying to keep my head above water with those demands while attempting to fully engage with my creative life.
I wanted to take the time in a novel to let the question unfold: Truly, how can we manage to weave the disparate threads of economics, care, and creative imperative into something that is more than a crazy quilt?
How long did it take to go from idea to publication? And did the idea change during the process?
From the time I began focusing on this project to get the WIP in shape for submission through the publication date, it will be right around five years.
Two and a half years were focused on the writing. Even though the character sketching had started much earlier, when I put more attention on the MS—when I realized it could be a book, and started to be intentional about writing it as one—it took 18 months to draft and then a full year of revisions.
In writing I feel like I start with a kernel, and then at some point it pops and there are new contours in the same material.
Then, there was another roughly two and a half years for the publication process. Santa Fe Writers Project (SFWP) accepted the pitch in late 2023. In March 2024, I got the green light and a contract. However, that still meant dev edits, copy edits, proofreading. The book’s publication date is April 7, 2026.
Were there any surprises or learning moments in the publishing process for this title?
This is my fifth book, so frankly I’m not surprised by much anymore. What I think surprises other people is how long it can take to go from contract to print, but I often say “two years is tomorrow in publishing years,” because it takes a lot of time to prepare for a book launch, and it takes time to go through editing. I do see other writers frustrated with how long it takes for a traditionally published book to reach shelves, but I don’t see the point of rushing to market. I get the feeling of wanting the project out in the world, but that said, The Last Supper had the longest lead time of any of my books. As I approach release date, it feels as though those preparation months elapsed very quickly.
Still, there are always learning moments. Regarding The Last Supper, my publisher wrote during the most recent government shutdown that the spring titles could be impacted, as the Library of Congress was also closed, so that meant a delay in processing the CIP data. And without the CIP data, it is much harder for libraries to include a title in their stacks. I hadn’t considered how political posturing would impact even forthcoming books.
Were there any surprises in the writing process for this book?
The surprise in writing The Last Supper was the form. It is told in short, chronological chapters, which is different stylistically for me.
However, the form fit the narrative, and I was surprised at how much the structure helped me push the plot forward. As novelists we’re often thinking about how things fit together in narrative—how to build the story—but writing within the parameters of the compressed chapters gave the book a different texture than it would otherwise have.
What do you hope readers will get out of your book?
Anyone who sits down to read a book is already thinking about how they spend their time. For readers of The Last Supper, I hope folks specifically take away an understanding of how their commitment to conventional structures may be getting in the way of their own happiness.
However, that said, readers make their own meaning from any work of fiction.
If you could share one piece of advice with other writers, what would it be?
My advice is to accept the pace. That goes for your own pace as a writer, and the pace of the industry.
Allow yourself to be comfortable with the slow paces of writing, of querying, of getting to contract, of going through the editing process. While I can understand how exasperating—and frankly, demoralizing—querying can be, time usually benefits a manuscript. Finding the right home for your words is always worth it.
