Today we’d like to introduce you to Liz Logan (Derr)
Hi Liz, it’s an honor to have you on the platform. Thanks for taking the time to share your story with us – to start maybe you can share some of your backstory with our readers?
It’s a winding path of where I started and where I am now. I would say it started when I was nineteen, I decided I wanted to try comedy. The decision came over a stoop beer while I was cracking a friend up who said I should try and perform. I wrote a cute four minute set and hopped on stage. It was not great. In fact, it was pretty horrible. I came to learn that it isn’t something you can just succeed at, you must work for it. I was a full time student, working full time, and trying to have a social life, so even though I wanted to do comedy, I wasn’t able to work as hard as I needed to. I eventually quit without the inkling to return. After moving to Atlanta in 2019, diving into and recovering from a severe drug addiction, I finally decided to try my hand at comedy again. To no one’s surprise, I was awful. Yet, I didn’t give up. I was out at open mics nearly every night, finally getting funny enough to be booked. I was hitting my stride in the Atlanta Comedy Scene when I got sick. I won’t go into the gory details but it left me bedridden for about a year, effectively slashing my comedy dreams. I had chronic pain, was on a ridiculous amount of medications, and my immune system was shot. I became a shut-in essentially overnight. I needed a break from my body and brain. I turned to reading, diving into stories aided my escapism. I was never much of a reader but I found myself building a library very quickly. I’ve read some really amazing books and some truly awful ones. After one particularly poorly written book, I thought to myself, I can do this, and I can do it better. So I wrote a book. I’m still neck deep in revisions but I wrote the damn thing. I found it to be insanely cathartic and therapeutic. I already am working on another story. Right now, I am about to begin querying agents and I hope to publish my book and possibly more after that, I may go back to comedy, I truly was in love with it, but I need to finish healing physically and mentally from when I endured before I can. So for the time being, I am chasing a different dream, to become an author.
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
Life is not a smooth road and one that is in a creative vain is always bumpy. Even breaking through the societal mentality of ‘success’ is insanely difficult. I have a software degree, you can’t get father from the arts than that. I never believed that a career in performing or writing was viable, until I tried it. I never thought success came from the arts, until I started to feel it. So, no, it was not a smooth road. Overcoming myself was the largest obstacle. Once I realized I could do whatever I wanted, however I wanted, I gained a sense of freedom and that freedom lead me to creativity.
Thanks – so what else should our readers know about your work and what you’re currently focused on?
I suppose I can share what my first novel, Flip side, is about. The novel combines the intimate and raw writing style of Coco Mellor’s Blue Sisters and the shifting emotional states of Stephen Chbosky’s Perks of Being a Wallflower with the witty and humorous dialogue of Adam Silvera’s They Both Die at The End. Flip side is a multi-POV coming of age story opening and ending with Kit, a non-binary teenager who is a witty drug addict with a difficult and confusing home life. Their addiction leads them to be institutionalized with other teens who have their own internal demons to slay. Kit makes unlikely and intense friendships with the other tormented teens while they’re locked away together. When the group is finally released from their medical prison they’re faced with the same issues that put them in there in the first place. My novel is a snapshot of these kids’ lives and what they do together to attempt to grow as budding adults while their environments remain stagnant and traumatic.
As for what qualifies me to write such aa book: I am a stand up comedian and if you know anything about the art form, you know that comics typically come from traumatic life experiences, I am no exception to this. Through my comedy and connections I was able to bring performances to the drama stage, as well as minor film roles. Outside of my various stage activities, I’ve been enrolled in The Book Incubator with published authors Mary Adkins and Rufi Thorpe to better equip myself with the tools to transform my previously punchy comedy to a long form novel.
What would you say have been one of the most important lessons you’ve learned?
Pivot. If you physically or mentally can’t continue, pivot. Stand-up comedy, from the outside looks very different than being a writer. However, there is quite a lot in common. Writing is the cornerstone for both, delivery is essential, and being able to speak about anything is what sets a comic or writer apart. I was lucky that both of these passions have similar building blocks because when I did get sick, I was able to pivot and still work out my creative muscle and find enjoyment in the same way, even though I was doing something very different.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://lizderrcomedy.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lloganlibrary/ and https://www.instagram.com/lizderbator
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/l-logan/
Image Credits
Robert Wolfgang
