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You never can tell where life will take you. When I met Beth Uznis Johnson at an MFA alumni event for Queens University of Charlotte, she lived in Michigan, and I lived in Chicago. Who’d have guessed that a decade later, she’d live a few blocks from me, and we’d meet for Monday writing dates? Not all of life’s twists are so happy though. Dealing with unexpected change and loss is the focus of Johnson’s debut novel, Coming Clean, just released by Regal House Publishing.
Coming Clean centers around Dawn, a young woman who’s become a cleaning lady after losing her fiancé in an accident. While Dawn’s life was spared, she bears scars, outside and inside. Over one week, she visits five clients’ homes, where, after cleaning, she poses for photographs taken by her friend Matthew for an art grant competition. As the week goes on, the stakes grow beyond getting caught to risking Dawn’s carefully constructed post-accident identity. Coming Clean’s release is timely. It’s a winter kind of novel, for long nights when time expands and you want to dwell in an immersive story with flawed characters who are fumbling through their own dark night toward a more hopeful spring.
Claudine Guertin-Ceric
Dawn is such an intriguing character who’s easy to identify with. She engages in some behaviors that she knows don’t serve her well, but she can’t quite make the shift. When you started writing, did you know the nature of her struggles and whether she would figure things out?
Beth Uznis Johnson
I often begin by observing an unusual behavior and then invent a story to explain it. When I started writing Dawn, I knew she was a grumpy cleaning lady who messed with her customers’ belongings. As I asked myself why, her backstory began to form. It became clear that she was angry that her life had taken such an unfair turn. After the motorcycle crash that killed her fiancé, some people blamed her even though she herself had barely survived. She lacks a good support system and resources to start over. She lives in a mobile home she bought with the insurance money.
When the novel opens, Dawn is doing her best to overcome what happened. But her best might mean rearranging Barb Turner’s decor every week, even though Barb always moves it all back. Dawn seeks the tiniest sense of control.
Claudine Guertin-Ceric
That brings me to the hot-button topic of writing difficult women and also reading them. Is there an expectation that female characters aren’t allowed to make the same mistakes as male characters without sacrificing likeability?
Beth Uznis Johnson
Flawed female protagonists are the most interesting kind. Remember in Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout when Olive stole just one shoe from the closet of her son’s new wife? We all have unkind urges in response to difficult emotions. Fiction is a chance to explore what might happen if we actually act on those urges.
I’m reading a great novel right now called Big Swiss by Jen Beagin, about a woman who transcribes counseling sessions for the local sex therapist. She knows all kinds of personal information about people. Does she keep it to herself and behave professionally? No, of course not. She makes a big mess of things and has to find a way out of it. That’s why it’s a good story.
In our society, women are judged far more harshly than men for far less. We’ll elect a president who brags about grabbing women by the pussy and pays off porn stars, but god forbid a female candidate gets irritated or briefly loses her cool during a debate. I grew up reading my grandma’s Danielle Steele romance novels. Those women were all gorgeous, perfectly dressed, and deeply in love. My own taste gravitates toward grittier stories.
I think readers of literary fiction appreciate complex characters, including those who make mistakes and might not be sorry about it. Understanding what motivates characters and how they grow makes fiction compelling. By the time I finished Coming Clean, I felt like Dawn’s protective aunt and was proud of how far she’d come.
Claudine Guertin-Ceric
Dawn’s clients are very diverse, yet they all point her toward the same reckoning with her past. I’m wondering how you pulled that off.
Beth Uznis Johnson
A big part of the project was imagining the five homes Dawn would clean and inventing the lives of their occupants. A lot of the details needed to get conveyed through their objects. Matthew’s photography project gives them the excuse to explore each house and find flaws within. Life can go wrong in so many ways: spouses lie and cheat, people repress trauma, children create chaos, people relocate to places where they don’t want to live.
Drafting Coming Clean felt like going to five estate sales where you wander through and envision who lived there and what their socioeconomic status is. Dawn views all of her customers as wealthy since they can afford a maid. Beyond money, her customers all have one thing Dawn doesn’t: a married life. She can’t help but compare herself and imagine the life she might have had if her fiancé Terry hadn’t died. At first she’s our window into her customers’ lives, but they become the window into Dawn.
Claudine Guertin-Ceric
Coming Clean unfolds over seven days, and you worked on this novel for ten years. How did the story evolve? Did you find it helpful or challenging to be growing while you worked on the manuscript?
Beth Uznis Johnson
It was definitely a long process, and I’m not the same person or the same writer. I had an agent back in 2016, but she couldn’t place the novel. I put it aside and drafted two other novels. For a while, I thought maybe I’d moved on.
However, Dawn kept permeating my thoughts, like an old friend I’d lost touch with and wondered about. I eventually returned to the project and to the editorial feedback it had received on submission. Early versions focused on Dawn’s clients, their homes, and the photography project. But in later versions, those elements gained focus with Dawn’s backstory of the accident and her relationship with her fiancé and his mom. Dawn struggles to forgive herself for surviving. She can’t give herself permission to move forward because she’s tethered to her past. These aspects all gave the book more depth.
I revised the manuscript extensively and submitted to small presses. When Regal House accepted it, it felt so satisfying that I hadn’t given up. Those revisions were all worth it.
Claudine Guertin-Ceric
One key theme in this novel, aside from accepting loss, is the guilt that can arise from surviving something traumatic. What are your thoughts on that?
Beth Uznis Johnson
The losses I’ve experienced are unlike Dawn’s, but I’ve known people who died young like Terry. When someone is suddenly gone, it’s hard to reconcile certain things. For example, who wants to admit the dead person could be a jerk? Worse, who wants to admit they were a jerk to someone who died? Part of Dawn’s growth is becoming honest with herself about her relationship with Terry. They both made serious mistakes they couldn’t take back.
She’s young and can’t help but care what people think. There’s a point in the novel where she thinks:
Forgiveness—of course it mattered. Anyone who said otherwise was full of shit. The most innocent person could feel guilty by the mere suggestion someone believed they were.
For a while, I couldn’t decide whether Dawn was guilty or not guilty for the accident. It’s universal and human to feel guilt even if we’re not all that guilty. Or, sometimes we feel guilty about not feeling more guilty.
Claudine Guertin-Ceric
Matthew’s camera sees a version of Dawn that she’s unable to see. Coming Clean seems to make art the window into a person’s true nature. Do you agree with that?
Beth Uznis Johnson
Matthew isn’t afraid to see the painful truth. He’s not hiding from anyone or anything. He’s curious about the world, asks questions, and seeks beauty through his camera lens. Any artistic commentary in the novel comes from Matthew’s character. He’s drawn to anything that makes him feel. Writing him made me think so much more about the artistic process and how art can help people heal.
Claudine Guertin-Ceric
You lived in Chicago twenty years ago and just moved back with your family from Michigan. How does it feel to be back? What’s been your experience of the literary scene here?
Beth Uznis Johnson
In Michigan, I felt a bit isolated from other writers. Chicago, though, wow. It’s amazing to be in a place where there are always writers around, writers I’ve met at various places throughout my education. I’ve also met up with other Regal House Publishing authors who live around Chicago. There are so many bookstores, there are readings, there are literary events, there are festivals, there’s everything! There is StoryStudio. So, even if you just want to take a class and improve your writing, it’s here. I’m so happy to be here. My husband and I are also eating our way through all the neighborhoods around us. It’s been a blast.
FICTION
Coming Clean
By Beth Uznis Johnson
Regal House Publishing
Published January 9, 2024
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