Even Bestselling Authors Can Suffer Imposter Syndrome

Many U.S. Americans have forgotten about the land-grab of 1848 when half of Mexico’s territory became part of the U.S. by an act of aggression and American expansionism. Reyna Grande’s timely new historical novel, A Ballad of Love and Glory, takes us back, giving us an epic tale of survival that follows a Mexican army nurse and an Irish solider willing to fight to the death for Mexico's freedom.

Writing the critically acclaimed book gave author Reyna Grande a new take on her own sense of belonging as an “immigrant” to California.

Her work gives voice to the hidden experiences of the vulnerable and asks us to consider: On stolen and occupied land, who is the outsider?

Source: Reyna Grande, used with permission

Ariel: Much of your writing explores characters’ experience of Mexican-U.S. immigration, something that's often written about from the gaze of the U.S. American media or by writers without direct experience.

Reyna: When I first started writing, I didn’t think of writing as an act of activism or a tool for social change. With my first novel, I was mostly writing it for me, to explore my own pain and history and make sense of my traumatic immigrant experiences. I wanted to write about child immigrants in particular because there were very few stories out there about that. I didn’t begin to really “own” my voice or actively get political with my writing until I published.

When my book came out, I started getting messages from readers, especially immigrant readers or children of immigrants, about how much my story had resonated with them. Then I heard from “non-immigrant” readers about how my book had opened their eyes. I began to be invited to speak at conferences about my experiences as a child immigrant, and in this way, I began to advocate for this vulnerable group. It wasn’t until this happened to me that I realized how I could use my words to build bridges and tear down walls and use my voice to advocate for my community.

Ariel: Your first novel, Across a Hundred Mountains, draws on some autobiographical experience. Your memoir, The Distance Between Us, was published a half-dozen years later. How did you make the decision to tell this story first as a novel with multiple points of view and later as autobiography?

Reyna: I started to write the memoir in 1997 when I was a junior at UC-Santa Cruz. By then, I had discovered that writing could be very healing. I wanted to exorcise the demons that haunted me. I wanted to unload the burden I carried—the memories that left me scarred. But I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t bear the thought of having to go back there and live through everything all over again. So, I turned my story into a novel, and that is how Across a Hundred Mountains was born. By fictionalizing my story, I was able to put some distance between myself and my emotions. But I never gave up the idea of someday writing my real story.

When I graduated, I taught ESL to immigrant children. Most of them had gone through a similar experience as I had. Before, I hadn’t given much thought to my experience with family separation in a larger context. (I thought it’d just happened to me!) Later I learned that 80% of immigrant children in U.S. schools have been separated from their parents in the process of migration. I realized that it was an experience that was all too common, yet it wasn’t part of the conversation about immigration. So, I began to write about my personal experience as a child left behind, as a border-crosser and undocumented youth. I wanted people to see the immigrant experience through a child’s eyes.

Ariel: You’ve won an American Book Award, been a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award, even been on Oprah. Do you ever get imposter syndrome?

Reyna: I actually wrote an essay on imposter syndrome that was published in The Lily. It was about an experience I had at an author event where I was mistaken for a waiter. I felt so out of place at that event (at the fancy Library of Congress, no less), and then when that happened, I felt even worse—that is, until dinner was served and it was tacos! I told myself that if tacos belong at the Library of Congress, so do I.

So yes, I do suffer from imposter syndrome a lot, and it gets exhausting having to give myself pep talks to help me believe that I do belong, that I am supposed to be there, that I have earned my right to have a seat at the table (or to be up on that stage, or for my books to be read.)

Ariel: How did A Ballad of Love and Glory stretch you as a writer?

Reyna: Oh, man, did it stretch me! I had never written historical fiction before, or outside of my culture or my gender. I was so intrigued about the Mexican-American War, especially because in the U.S. this war of conquest has been erased from our history and thus, from our collective consciousness. The-powers-that-be decided we should forget about the land-grab of 1848 when half of Mexico’s territory became part of the U.S. by an act of aggression and American expansionism.

There were many times during the writing this book when I thought I had taken on more than I was capable of. “I can’t do this,” was a constant thought in my head. But I persevered. And one day, there was a different thought in my head—“I am doing it!” and later, “I did it!”

I’m so proud of this book. It took my writing to a whole new level. It also empowered me because it helped me to reframe the way I see myself as a Mexican living in this country. For too many years, I’ve let others make me feel that I don’t belong here and I should “go back to where I come from.” But learning about this history, I realized that as a Mexican living in California, a state which was once a part of Mexico, I am not the foreigner or the outsider.