P.A. Lapham’s road to publishing The Glass Coast began long before the novel had a title. It started with a childhood mystery, continued through handwritten fantasy manuscripts, and resurfaced decades later during a conversation with her husband.
By then, she had built a career in science and technical writing. Fiction remained an ambition she had never quite put aside. Returning to it meant making time for something she had loved since childhood—and eventually deciding how she wanted to share it with readers.
Her debut novel took a route that included literary representation, editorial revisions, and submissions to publishers before she chose independent publication. Each stage helped bring The Glass Coast closer to the book readers would encounter.
An Early Manuscript and a Very Optimistic Cover Letter
In junior high, P.A. Lapham and her best friend co-wrote a Nancy Drew-style mystery called The Secret of the Old Lighthouse. Finishing the story was only part of their plan. They mailed it to Grosset & Dunlap with a note asking the publisher to send them the bill for printing.
It was an ambitious introduction to publishing, supported by the enviable confidence of young writers who had not yet discovered how complicated the process could be.
The response was gracious. As Lapham recalls, the publisher suggested contacting a subsidiary that worked with young authors. The book remained unpublished, but the experience became an enduring part of her writing story.
In high school, she kept going. A visiting playwright selected her murder mystery play for performance by the school’s drama department. She also devoted herself to a lengthy science fiction and fantasy novel inspired by Star Wars, planning to finish it during the summer after graduation.
Then a paying summer job arrived. College followed, bringing creative writing electives but little time to complete a full-length novel. Writing continued to matter, even as practical demands reshaped the hours available for it.
Stories Waiting Between Other Responsibilities
During the 1980s, Lapham worked on another ambitious project: Sirkle, a fantasy set in the Triad Kingdoms. Its world featured a floating continent, an approaching catastrophe, and dragons whose disappearance threatened the people’s survival.
The scale of that manuscript reflected how readily her imagination could build an entire world. She recalls that it still exists somewhere among her papers, partly handwritten and partly typewritten.
Meanwhile, her professional life increasingly involved medical and technical documents. Writing became a central part of her career, though the work called for a different kind of attention than fiction.
Over time, she wondered whether years of analytical writing had diminished her creative voice. Looking back, she also recognized how much those early stories had contributed to her command of language and sentence structure. The writing she loved as a young person had helped establish skills she used throughout her working life.
The desire to write fiction remained. It was waiting for an opening.
The Conversation That Brought Her Back
That opening came in early 2024. Her husband, a fellow independent author, was preparing to publish a reprint of his first book. He asked why she had never considered writing a novel herself.
Having known her since childhood, he knew about her early creative projects. His question brought a familiar ambition back into focus.
By this point, her daughters were young adults. She was still working full-time, but evenings and weekends offered more room to write. Encouragement and available time arrived together, giving her a reason to begin again.
The first pages were written outdoors in an old-fashioned spiral notebook. It was a return to a method she remembered from her youth, complete with the pleasure of putting pen to paper. It also came with a practical limitation: hand cramps. After roughly two chapters, she moved to Microsoft Word.
The tools changed. The story kept developing.
From Disappeared to The Glass Coast
An early spark for the novel came from music. Lapham had discovered indie musician Cary Brothers through Smallville years earlier. When she later encountered his song “Disappear,” it prompted a story idea that became a draft titled Disappeared.
That version shared a premise with The Glass Coast, and many of its characters carried into the later manuscript, although their names changed.
As she wrote and researched key concepts, the story evolved. What began in a notebook developed into the coastal mystery surrounding Elara Ellis, her fractured memories, and the unsettling world of Ellis Reach.
Some of the research behind that evolution cannot be discussed without revealing important plot points. For readers, those discoveries belong within the novel. What Lapham can share is that the book took shape through exploration and revision, rather than arriving fully formed with its final title and direction.
A Valuable Chapter in Traditional Publishing
In early 2026, Lapham signed with a literary agent. She spent the next couple of months completing editorial revisions and reworking the story before the manuscript went on submission to publishing-house editors.
That process gave her an opportunity to develop the book with professional editorial guidance. It also introduced her to the realities of a publishing timeline that could extend well beyond completion of the manuscript.
Her agent was transparent about the potential wait for an offer and the additional time that could pass before publication. Lapham appreciated that openness and the experience itself.
She describes her time pursuing traditional publication as educational and deeply positive. Her eventual decision to leave that route did not erase the value of the work already completed. Those revisions remained part of the novel’s development.
Choosing Her Own Timeline
The deciding factor was time.
Lapham had more stories she wanted to write and share. At this stage of her life, the possibility of spending years bringing each book to readers felt difficult to reconcile with those ambitions.
Independent publishing offered a way forward that better suited her priorities. She chose to withdraw from the traditional route and move toward releasing The Glass Coast herself.
Her explanation also carries the humor that runs through her account of the journey: “Besides, patience has never been one of my virtues… so why start changing now?”
The decision brought a long-held ambition into a new phase. The childhood manuscripts, unfinished projects, professional writing, and editorial work had all contributed to the author making that choice.
A New Chapter for a Lifelong Writer
The Glass Coast is P.A. Lapham’s first independently published work of fiction, with a writing history that reaches back decades. Its publication marks the point when a story that once lived in notebooks and drafts becomes an invitation to readers.
Discover the coastal mystery at the heart of that journey—and meet the characters who brought her back to fiction.