Applications are currently open for the 2025 McCoy Grant for Bookseller Writers. This unique grant is offered because of the generous support of Sarah McCoy, the New York Times bestselling author of Mustique Island. Read more about the grant here.

Sarah McCoy sat down with 2024 grant recipient Ally Kirkpatrick of Old Town Books to talk about her writing and what receiving the grant has meant to her.

SM: First off, congrats again on being the 2024 McCoy Grant recipients. It may be a new year, but we’ll be celebrating you until the 2025 recipients are announced in July! So we thought it the perfect time to sit down and chat about what you’ve been up to. How has the McCoy Grant made an impact on your writing?

AK: I think the biggest impact has been all the amazing, magical, TIME this grant has afforded me. I’ve been able to hire my babysitter for extra hours just to write. It felt strange at first, but then wildly productive. That should be obvious - not having children crawl all over you = more productive writing time. But I had grown so used to writing amidst the joyful chaos of life with young kids that I forgot what a few stolen hours here and there can do for a manuscript. The other biggest impact, I have to admit, is comfort. I got myself a decent desk chair with part of the grant money, and honestly it has been life changing. How did I ever write sitting in a wooden dining chair? My new cushy mint green, wheeled, adjustable office chair makes me - and my back! -  so happy. 

SM: Would you like to tell us a little about your work in progress?

AK: My work in progress is a book about my mind bending experience postpartum when I had a perinatal mood disorder (PMAD). It was a really scary time and writing about it initially was a therapeutic, personal thing to do. As I carried on - 40,000 words now! - I realized I was making something I might want to share with others. Others who have experienced PMADs, but folks who might have had other mental health crises of all sorts, too.  In my recovery I came across a lot of first person narratives about the acute mental health crisis experience itself, but less so about the long recovery. I was looking for something different than the harrowing first person account, something not to “bright side” a mental break but a story that spent more time on the after effects of one… So the engine of my project really became, “How to survive this? How to live with the shame of the experience?”  It has, surprisingly, been a real pleasure to write. I’ve allowed myself the freedom to be weird, to be gentle, to be honest. I really hope to share it someday with the world. 

SM: How has the McCoy Grant made an impact on your personal life?

AK: The grant helped me feel less alone! Through an online writers class I met a group of writers and we meet monthly now, exchanging pages and giving feedback and encouragement to one another. 

SM: With the submission season now open, what would you tell other bookseller writers who are thinking of applying?

AK: I would encourage them to really go for it, to apply apply apply. It has made a huge difference in my writing year and I am so grateful. This grant can be their motivator, their vote of confidence, too. 

SM: It’s such a pleasure hearing from you. I know your fellow booksellers are cheering you on, as am I!

The McCoy Grant for Bookseller-Writers was created by New York Times bestselling author Sarah McCoy, (Mustique Island) in partnership with the Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance (SIBA) for any unpublished southern women or nonbinary booksellers who harbor ambitions to be published writers.