Speaker 1: It's really hard to stop writing, isn't it? In some way,
Speaker 1: it's really hard to stop. It can be hard to
Speaker 1: do it when you need to do it as well,
Speaker 1: but it's hard to stop doing it when you love it.
Speaker 1: So I think once you hold on to that, you
Speaker 1: never really know what's going to happen.
Speaker 2: Welcome to Rights for Women, a podcast all about celebrating
Speaker 2: women's voices and supporting women writers.
Speaker 2: I'm Pamela Cook, women's fiction author, writing teacher, mentor and podcaster.
Speaker 2: Before beginning today's chat, I would like to acknowledge and
Speaker 2: pay my respects to the Durra Wal People, the traditional
Speaker 2: custodians of the land on which this podcast is being recorded,
Speaker 2: along with the traditional owners of the land throughout Australia
Speaker 2: and a quick reminder that there could be strong language
Speaker 2: and adult concepts discussed in this podcast. So please be
Speaker 2: aware of this. If you have Children around,
Speaker 2: let's relax on the convo couch and chat to this
Speaker 2: week's guest.
Speaker 2: Hi, everyone, Pam here, welcome to another episode of rights
Speaker 2: for women. It is April 30 as I record this,
Speaker 2: and today we have a great chat with Be Carroll
Speaker 2: all about her new book,
Speaker 2: One of us is missing. It's a fantastic book that
Speaker 2: I really enjoyed and had such a great time talking
Speaker 2: to be about. It's a crime thriller, but kind of
Speaker 2: on the softer end of the thriller genre and really
Speaker 2: includes a lot of family drama. There's a lot of secrets.
Speaker 2: There's so much tension. It's a real page turner. So
Speaker 2: it was fantastic to talk to be about her new release.
Speaker 2: But also there's a lot of talk in here about
Speaker 2: her experiences over 20 years as a published author
Speaker 2: and but kind of downsides of that, too, in terms
Speaker 2: of what happens when you are out of contract and
Speaker 2: the publisher doesn't pick you up for another book. How
Speaker 2: Burr has actually managed to navigate that in over 20
Speaker 2: years of publishing and really just kind of reinventing herself
Speaker 2: at different points, staying the distance, continuing to write, which
Speaker 2: is just the important thing that really comes out of
Speaker 2: this conversation, I think is just
Speaker 2: the importance of writing for the love of it and
Speaker 2: writing the next book and just being optimistic and thinking, OK,
Speaker 2: what can I do next? Where can I go? Who
Speaker 2: might be interested in publishing this book. Will I publish
Speaker 2: it myself? There's a whole lot of options now, as
Speaker 2: we know in terms of publishing.
Speaker 2: So it was really great to chat to be and
Speaker 2: to hear her experiences in this kind of area, And, uh,
Speaker 2: it was really optimistic. I thought, uh, lots of chat
Speaker 2: in there about how to stay published, but also lots
Speaker 2: of chat in there about the new book one of
Speaker 2: us is missing.
Speaker 2: I'm not gonna go on too long in this introduction.
Speaker 2: This is quite a long episode. We did have a
Speaker 2: few Internet glitches, so there's in places, some very minor
Speaker 2: little glitches with the video and with the audio, but
Speaker 2: they're super minor. So do keep listening, because there is
Speaker 2: so much gold for both readers and writers in this episode,
Speaker 2: I also wanted to flag that I'll be taking a
Speaker 2: break for the next two weeks after this episode, there
Speaker 2: won't be any new rights for women episodes, so that
Speaker 2: means you'll be able to catch up on any of
Speaker 2: the fabulous episodes from this year or from the previous years,
Speaker 2: and the backlist that you may have missed uh, I'm
Speaker 2: taking a break because apart from being extraordinarily busy with
Speaker 2: writing
Speaker 2: and everything else, I'm just taking the two weeks off
Speaker 2: because next week I'm going to the stock horse Nationals
Speaker 2: in Tamworth to do a little bit of hanging out
Speaker 2: with my daughter and son in law as they ride there.
Speaker 2: And also mind the grand boys. So I'll be, uh,
Speaker 2: doing some family things, but also writing while I'm up
Speaker 2: there and getting the workshops all ready for the next
Speaker 2: chapter retreat, which is happening in
Speaker 2: two weeks time from today. I can't believe it. I've
Speaker 2: got 12 fabulous writers coming on the retreat, and, uh,
Speaker 2: I really have a lot of work to do to
Speaker 2: get ready for that. So won't be in your ears.
Speaker 2: Won't be seeing you on YouTube for the next couple
Speaker 2: of weeks, but stay tuned for what's coming up next.
Speaker 2: After that, we have a great interview with Mary Lou
Speaker 2: Stevens interviewing Julie Bennett about her new book, The Lost
Speaker 2: Letters of Rose Carey. And also Mayor Linnell will be
Speaker 2: coming up in June, talking to Katherine Centre
Speaker 2: about her new book, The ROM Comma. Hope that you're
Speaker 2: really enjoying the podcast. If you are as always, it
Speaker 2: would be fantastic. If you can leave some reviews, it
Speaker 2: just means that more people will get to hear about
Speaker 2: the podcast. It pushes the S in the rankings and, uh,
Speaker 2: shout out again to all the people following along on
Speaker 2: the diary of a procrastinator for patreon
Speaker 2: that is, uh, rolling along behind the scenes. And I'm
Speaker 2: putting out about three very short videos a week to
Speaker 2: the Patreon family supporters talking about my writing process, the
Speaker 2: obstacles that I'm finding and how I'm overcoming them, and
Speaker 2: any of the things I'm doing to push the new
Speaker 2: novel forward. So Diary of a Procrastinator You can sign
Speaker 2: up for that $5 a week at rights for Women.com/patreon.
Speaker 2: So now on to the chat with be See You
Speaker 2: in a couple of weeks,
Speaker 2: be Carroll. Welcome to the rights for women convo Couch.
Speaker 1: Thank you, pal. It's really lovely to be here. I
Speaker 1: don't think it has been on your convo couch before.
Speaker 1: I
Speaker 2: know it's amazing, and of course it's a virtual couch,
Speaker 2: but we actually caught up a little while ago. I
Speaker 2: think it was at Maxine Fawcett's launch for everything is perfect.
Speaker 2: I think that was when I last saw you.
Speaker 2: Yes, it was a
Speaker 1: really memorable
Speaker 2: evening. Yeah, it was fabulous. And of course, we're so
Speaker 2: lucky that we get to go to all these brilliant launches.
Speaker 2: And very soon it is going to be your launch
Speaker 2: for this fantastic book that I can't wait to tell
Speaker 2: everyone about. One of us is missing
Speaker 2: so much in here be that I want to talk
Speaker 2: to you about and also just about your whole publishing
Speaker 2: career in general because I feel like you are such
Speaker 2: an inspiration and there's writers out there who are going
Speaker 2: to be tuning in and I think are going to
Speaker 2: learn so much from this conversation because you've been around
Speaker 2: for a while now in the publishing industry, as have I.
Speaker 2: And there's so many things I want to chat to
Speaker 2: you about.
Speaker 1: I hope I can answer those questions when I look
Speaker 1: back on. I think it's 20 years of being published
Speaker 1: and just as confused as ever. But I think I'll
Speaker 1: be able to provide some insight.
Speaker 2: Let's go back in time be Let's start, First of all,
Speaker 2: with
Speaker 2: when was the time that you thought I really want
Speaker 2: to write a book or I want to be a writer.
Speaker 2: Are you someone who has written all your life, as
Speaker 2: many authors are, or did it come to you later
Speaker 2: in life?
Speaker 1: I wouldn't say that I was somebody who wrote all
Speaker 1: my life, but I really I've read all my life.
Speaker 1: I've been an absolutely compulsive reader. Have to always have
Speaker 1: a book with me,
Speaker 1: can eat a meal without reading At the same time.
Speaker 1: When I was a kid, I was always missing whenever
Speaker 1: anything needed to be done. I was in a far
Speaker 1: corner of the house reading a book, so I was
Speaker 1: a real bookworm, and I think in the back of
Speaker 1: my head I always wanted to write a book. And
Speaker 1: as soon as I finished
Speaker 1: university and I guess had a proper job, that's when
Speaker 1: I started writing and I. I didn't think it would
Speaker 1: end up here, but in my head I thought I'd
Speaker 1: like to write one book. I'll get it out of
Speaker 1: my system and then I'll move on with my life.
Speaker 1: And as you and I know well,
Speaker 1: writing isn't that simple. It's very addictive, and it's very
Speaker 1: hard to stop at just one.
Speaker 2: Definitely. So that book that you first wrote was that
Speaker 2: an idea that you'd had brewing in your head for
Speaker 2: some time and you thought, Yeah, I really want to
Speaker 2: get this story out. Or was it like you made
Speaker 2: the decision to write a book and then started thinking
Speaker 2: about What is it that I want to write?
Speaker 1: I had made that decision. I wanted to write a
Speaker 1: book and I had recently arrived in in Sydney, and
Speaker 1: I guess that was a big life change for me.
Speaker 1: Going from a very rural part of Ireland. I grew
Speaker 1: up in Blarney, as in Blarney Castle.
Speaker 1: It's a tiny village outside of Cork City, which is
Speaker 1: a small city in Ireland, which is not a big
Speaker 1: place to arrive into Sydney in the in the mid
Speaker 1: 19 nineties. It was a fairly drastic change, and it
Speaker 1: was a really exciting time here, and I got a
Speaker 1: job in a multinational IT company with some very interesting people.
Speaker 1: There were some really interesting people I was working with,
Speaker 1: and I thought to myself,
Speaker 1: Oh my God, this is what I'll write. A book
Speaker 1: about an Irish girl coming to Sydney and getting a
Speaker 1: job in an IT company, I. I threw in a
Speaker 1: little bit of fraud, and but when I look back,
Speaker 1: I think half the people who purchased that book purchased
Speaker 1: it to see if they were actually in it. My
Speaker 1: Exco and I completely denied it was way about me,
Speaker 1: but of course it was
Speaker 1: completely. But I can assure everyone now, being 20 years along,
Speaker 1: I no longer write books. I do write them a
Speaker 1: little bit about sometimes things that happen to me, but
Speaker 1: they're no longer quite as blatantly based in my own
Speaker 1: life as one point. I think a lot of books
Speaker 1: are like that. I think that's how they start.
Speaker 2: Definitely. So. The first book was that executive affair.
Speaker 2: Yes, that was
Speaker 1: executive pair. Even the title makes me cringe.
Speaker 1: It was so much a product of its time. Like
Speaker 1: on the front cover, the girl is wearing a white
Speaker 1: suit pants that is such a product, it's not.
Speaker 2: But that was the thing. And that is the thing
Speaker 2: with publishing, isn't it? There's trends. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and at the time Everyone was really proud of that cover.
Speaker 1: They loved it. They loved it. Initially in Ireland they
Speaker 1: saw the Australian cover and like, drawn or cover because
Speaker 1: we need to have that cover. That cover is amazing.
Speaker 1: And now I'm looking at the cover and I'm like, Oh,
Speaker 1: my God, it's so dated looking at them.
Speaker 2: So that was 12 books ago, wasn't it? Be because
Speaker 2: I think one of us is missing is your 12th book. Yeah.
Speaker 2: So when was the executive affair published?
Speaker 1: That was published in 2004. So exactly 20 years ago.
Speaker 2: So yeah, you've definitely been doing this longer than me.
Speaker 2: My first book was published 2012.
Speaker 2: Wow. OK, OK, so what genre would you say? Executive
Speaker 2: affair is. At
Speaker 1: the time, it was labelled women's fiction and a lot
Speaker 1: of us had issues with that label. I think at
Speaker 1: the time, because there was no such thing as men fiction.
Speaker 1: Today we would just say contemporary fiction. But in in truth,
Speaker 1: there was elements in executive affair that were quite crime.
Speaker 1: There was a corporate fraud essentially in the book, and
Speaker 1: in my second book, there was also a crime and
Speaker 1: in my third book was probably
Speaker 1: more women's fiction and my fourth. But there were crimes. Actually,
Speaker 1: there was somebody stabbed to death in my fourth book.
Speaker 1: But there was always probably. And I do remember an
Speaker 1: early editor saying to me, because at the time women's
Speaker 1: fiction was extremely popular, it was selling really well. And
Speaker 1: I remember an early editor saying to me, What's with
Speaker 1: it with you and the intrigue? Why are you keeping
Speaker 1: things back from the reader?
Speaker 1: That's not part of this genre? Can you lay off
Speaker 1: on that? So it's funny how if I had received
Speaker 1: different advice back then, maybe I would have found myself
Speaker 1: in this genre a little bit sooner. Yeah, so it
Speaker 1: was interesting.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, interesting. I guess what comes and goes In
Speaker 1: terms of popularity at the time, books like Marian Keyes
Speaker 1: and Cathy Kelly were selling truckloads. They still do, but
Speaker 1: But they were the number one type of book that
Speaker 1: was selling. And a lot of us that were signed
Speaker 1: back then were signed to deliver to that particular genre.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so you continued writing for publication. Who was your publisher?
Speaker 2: Back in at that time. I think
Speaker 1: I've got surely got out the Guinness Book of Records
Speaker 1: for the most publishers in Australia.
Speaker 2: I really want to hear about this because I think
Speaker 2: this is brilliant and you and I were talking about
Speaker 2: this when we spoke at Maxine's.
Speaker 2: I think it's really good for authors out there to
Speaker 2: know even if, uh, aiming for publication or if you've
Speaker 2: had one or two books published is that the publisher
Speaker 2: you're with now might not be the publisher you're with
Speaker 2: in two or three years time or five years or
Speaker 2: 10 years like it's It can be a bit of
Speaker 2: a kind of merry around, can't it, where you're off
Speaker 2: on a different horse each time. So really interested to
Speaker 2: hear about how that has evolved for you be
Speaker 1: it's I mean it Fundamentally. It's a very tough industry,
Speaker 1: and at the end of the day, I'd love to
Speaker 1: say it was me publisher hopping, but it really wasn't
Speaker 1: for somebody who has a background in business as I do.
Speaker 1: The publishing industry is extremely and a lot more hardcore
Speaker 1: and brutal than anything I've ever come through in business.
Speaker 1: When they aren't done with you. They are done with
Speaker 1: you and it can be quite brutal and sometimes not
Speaker 1: anything you've done wrong. It's just time. Timing can work
Speaker 1: in your favour, and it can hold the work against you.
Speaker 1: So that very first book was published here by Hachette,
Speaker 1: and at the same time it was picked up by
Speaker 1: an Irish publisher on a three book deal. But, uh,
Speaker 1: I didn't last for Hachette very long. They didn't take
Speaker 1: up their option for the second book. For a while,
Speaker 1: I was published in Ireland, and I wasn't published here.
Speaker 1: So that was the case for my second novel and
Speaker 1: my third novel and then my fourth. My third novel
Speaker 1: did really well, and when it got to number four
Speaker 1: and then suddenly, publishers were once again interest here in
Speaker 1: picking me up.
Speaker 1: And then I signed a deal with Pa MacMillan and
Speaker 1: I published my fourth book with Pa MacMillan and I
Speaker 1: back published my first three books with Pa
Speaker 2: MacMillan. OK, even that first one that had been out
Speaker 2: here with a different
Speaker 1: publisher, it had a It got a new cover, a
Speaker 1: much nicer cover that a bit more contemporary and and
Speaker 1: so in all, I had five books with Pa MA Me,
Speaker 1: But they were some of my earlier books. And in retrospect,
Speaker 1: I don't know if it was the right thing to
Speaker 1: resign those books, and at the time there was a
Speaker 1: lot of money involved because somebody else was bidding for
Speaker 1: that book. And so there was a lot of money
Speaker 1: on the line, and I guess that's not always a
Speaker 1: good thing, either, because it was in advance that I
Speaker 1: could never really earn back then. So my fifth book
Speaker 1: came out with Pat Mill, and but I already knew
Speaker 1: that I was quite shaky ground because the print run
Speaker 1: wasn't great and it was a much more reduced publication,
Speaker 1: and I could see I was on very shaky ground.
Speaker 1: And then
Speaker 1: they rejected my sixth book, which was ready to go,
Speaker 1: and at that point I reached it. It was probably
Speaker 1: my first really big crisis point where I was like going,
Speaker 1: What am I doing? I don't have a publisher. Nobody's
Speaker 1: interested because I guess I'm not a writer virgin anymore.
Speaker 1: When you're a new debut author gets excited, but when
Speaker 1: you're when you've been around for a while. It's hard
Speaker 1: to get people excited and
Speaker 1: I'd have just because the book was written and I
Speaker 1: knew it was a good book. I said, Oh, well,
Speaker 1: selfish it. I didn't really want to self publish it.
Speaker 1: I've got to say And I do remember my agent
Speaker 1: at the time saying to me that self publishing was
Speaker 1: a K of death, which was not very helpful at all,
Speaker 1: because I said to him, That's not going to do
Speaker 1: with it. Nobody wants to publish it. And so I
Speaker 1: self published it, and
Speaker 1: it did. Yeah, OK, and all the libraries picked it
Speaker 1: up because they had all my back lists. So I
Speaker 1: guess it. And it also picked a proper distributor. So
Speaker 1: it was even though it was self published. It had
Speaker 1: a lot more backing, perhaps, than a normal self published
Speaker 1: book because it had a distributor and it was on.
Speaker 1: It was as professional as what you could get. Got
Speaker 1: the same designer to do the cover. I got it
Speaker 1: professionally typeset. It looked good, and so when it went
Speaker 1: into libraries, it looked like just like any other book
Speaker 1: turns apart.
Speaker 1: Book six. Yeah, with the next. I guess I had
Speaker 1: a bit more interest, but and there was a few
Speaker 1: points where we almost got publishers over the line and
Speaker 1: we didn't quite manage it. And again I was there
Speaker 1: and I had a finished book. And so I self
Speaker 1: published that as well, because nobody in the end of
Speaker 1: the day, nobody signed a contract despite trying very hard
Speaker 1: to to achieve that. And then
Speaker 1: I guess the kind of miracle happened, then a traditional publisher.
Speaker 1: This time it was Penguin, UK said. Oh, actually, we
Speaker 1: really these books we really like. And I had written
Speaker 1: another book, and it seems to me that when I'm
Speaker 1: at my bleakest doing sports, I seem to write more.
Speaker 1: It's almost like
Speaker 1: who care. It's all lost anyway. I might as well
Speaker 1: just write a book. Shit.
Speaker 2: Have you found that when you're doing that, it's like
Speaker 2: you're writing the book that you really want to write
Speaker 2: because you're not writing the contract? So you're just writing genuinely.
Speaker 2: You know what's coming out from your heart sort of thing?
Speaker 1: Yeah, So that book that I completely wrote from my
Speaker 1: heart was the missing pieces of Sophie McCarthy because at
Speaker 1: the time I had already self published two books. I
Speaker 1: had no intentions of self publishing any of the books,
Speaker 1: and I just thought, I'm just going to write this.
Speaker 1: I sort of want to dabble with having a character
Speaker 1: who's not as likeable as my previous characters. I want
Speaker 1: to dabble with something darker, and that
Speaker 1: was the book that really got me back in the game.
Speaker 1: I guess it was picked up by Penguin UK, and
Speaker 1: then it was published, distributed here by Penguin Australia, and
Speaker 1: I was S in mainstream publishing. But I don't think
Speaker 1: I would have ever written that book.
Speaker 1: Hannah not been out of contract and had my back
Speaker 1: wall as such. Isn't
Speaker 2: that interesting? How did that come under the radar of
Speaker 2: Penguin UK
Speaker 1: you my agent, because I'm still really struggling here to
Speaker 1: get over get past my reputation really does, even though
Speaker 1: that sounds terrible, right? When you're no longer published and
Speaker 1: if you're not selling very high numbers, it's really hard
Speaker 1: to get a publisher to pick you up here.
Speaker 2: I'm hearing you, you
Speaker 1: know that, right? And sometimes thing to do with the
Speaker 1: book and in the end, with the missing pieces of
Speaker 1: Sophie McCarthy. There was quite a lot of interest from
Speaker 1: a number of overseas publishers, and I know now it
Speaker 1: was a good book at the time. I was like, No,
Speaker 1: I wrote what I wanted to write, but it was
Speaker 1: It didn't matter what I wrote here. There was no
Speaker 1: convincing a publisher at the time to publish me here.
Speaker 2: How did you cope with that kind of mentally and
Speaker 2: emotionally that you mentioned Book six, I think, is your
Speaker 2: first crisis or whatever. But now how did you find
Speaker 2: that kind of having been traditionally published and all that
Speaker 2: sort of thing? And then suddenly you can't get a
Speaker 2: publisher here interested in your books? How did you cope
Speaker 2: with that? Mentally and emotionally? Look,
Speaker 1: there was days when I was very stoic and just
Speaker 1: got on with the job and
Speaker 1: kept driving and did the best I could do. And
Speaker 1: then there were days when I was sobbing
Speaker 1: and get a complete mess. And I guess you see,
Speaker 1: the thing is, you do feel like a failure. It's
Speaker 1: you're you're so invested in it, and it's funny because
Speaker 1: now I can look back over, I guess the last
Speaker 1: 20 years and laugh at myself a little bit. And
Speaker 1: though I think it's Kate Milden
Speaker 1: Hall has said, it's not a matter of life and
Speaker 1: death these books, So we're not like paramedics trying to
Speaker 1: save lives. It feels to us, and we have a
Speaker 1: lot invested. But a bit of perspective is is really useful.
Speaker 1: But it is, I guess when you love what you're
Speaker 1: doing and you want to keep doing it and realising
Speaker 1: that
Speaker 1: you might not be able to keep doing it, that
Speaker 1: is is a bit devastating, too, and you can't pretend
Speaker 1: that it's not devastating. And I think you know how
Speaker 1: that feels. And a lot of authors know how that feels.
Speaker 1: And I guess the truth of it is that every
Speaker 1: new debut book publisher signs they're probably dropping a mid
Speaker 1: list author to make room for that debut book. And
Speaker 1: that's the industry. But you don't know that when you
Speaker 1: are being signed or being dropped.
Speaker 2: No,
Speaker 1: you don't have a perspective and it took me many
Speaker 1: years
Speaker 1: to learn that perspective and sometimes you hear that perspective
Speaker 1: from other authors who listen to a lot of podcasts
Speaker 1: and really study what's happening. I learn a lot from
Speaker 1: being around other authors, and I'm still learning every day,
Speaker 1: every
Speaker 2: day and things change change. Don't they changed so drastically
Speaker 2: over the years? And I think, But I'm the same.
Speaker 2: Even looking back, I don't think I realised at the
Speaker 2: time how much not getting another deal with Hachette after
Speaker 2: four books with them?
Speaker 2: No, not that we've got anything against a shirt personally, but, um,
Speaker 2: you know, I had a great relationship with my publisher there,
Speaker 2: like really, And I know that she was devastated that
Speaker 2: she they weren't going to publish another book. But I
Speaker 2: think what I didn't grasp at the time and it
Speaker 2: took me a long time to grasp is it's a
Speaker 2: numbers game. It's a business. They're in the business of
Speaker 2: making money. And when the books aren't making the money, yeah,
Speaker 2: they're not meeting the financial expectations that the publisher had.
Speaker 2: It's not really anything to do with whether that book
Speaker 2: is well written or not, or whether the readers who
Speaker 2: did read it loved it or whatever. It's just purely
Speaker 2: we're not making enough money out of you. So see you.
Speaker 2: We're gonna find somebody else. That's really the reality, isn't it?
Speaker 2: It
Speaker 1: is the reality, and publishers aren't necessarily honest with us.
Speaker 1: I don't know if it's good to be honest or bad,
Speaker 1: to be honest, though, because I think if they were,
Speaker 1: if they really told us
Speaker 1: the how they make decisions we might not write
Speaker 2: book through. But I think we're getting up to book
Speaker 2: number eight in a minute. Sophie McCarthy, I think. Right.
Speaker 2: But how did you mentioned you had you put two
Speaker 2: books out, Self published two books. You didn't really want
Speaker 2: to do it again. How did you find the whole
Speaker 2: experience of self publishing? Were there kind of things that
Speaker 2: you did love about it and other things you didn't love?
Speaker 2: What was that like for you?
Speaker 2: I didn't in the
Speaker 1: end, even though I didn't want to do it because
Speaker 1: my published my agent made me feel like it was
Speaker 1: the wrong step. I learned an awful lot about the
Speaker 1: industry and the process. I never really knew that type setting.
Speaker 1: I never knew much about cover designs. All the platforms
Speaker 1: were just starting to come into play all the different
Speaker 1: online platforms and alerts.
Speaker 1: I learned a lot and I ended up enjoying it,
Speaker 1: and I think it ended up saving my career. In
Speaker 1: actual fact, it saved my career because it kept my
Speaker 1: out there and in particular over that period. The librarians
Speaker 1: were very supportive of me and book books got selected
Speaker 1: for a together G programme based librarian
Speaker 1: and that felt extra special because they were books that
Speaker 1: had been entirely produced by me down to even using
Speaker 1: the cover with lots of help, mind you, because I
Speaker 1: did hire all the right help I knew, and at
Speaker 1: that time there was a lot of self published books
Speaker 1: that you pick it up and you knew immediately that
Speaker 1: it was self published. I wanted somebody picking up my
Speaker 1: book
Speaker 1: not to know that it was self published. I wanted
Speaker 1: it to look exactly like my other books, and they
Speaker 1: did so it. It's self publishing. It really did save
Speaker 1: my career. I guess it kept my name relevant and
Speaker 1: out there. Otherwise I would have had I think the
Speaker 1: missing piece of Sophie McCarthy finally was released in 2018
Speaker 1: and less than perfect. My traditional novel was released in 2011,
Speaker 1: I think, or 12. So I had a period of
Speaker 1: about six years to seven years there where
Speaker 1: I wouldn't have been heard of if I hadn't self
Speaker 1: published those books. And I would you know, any kind
Speaker 1: of readership that I had built up would have gone
Speaker 1: and dissipated. In that time, I
Speaker 2: was exactly the same. I had crossed my heart out
Speaker 2: and I was the same as you be. I just
Speaker 2: wanted it to look exactly the same as every other
Speaker 2: book on a shelf. And I think that's so important
Speaker 2: is to do it really professionally, have it professionally edited,
Speaker 2: great cover, all that sort of thing.
Speaker 2: And like you, I learned so much in that process,
Speaker 2: and I'm certainly not sorry that I've done it, and
Speaker 2: I would do it again. Yeah, I and
Speaker 1: I said I wouldn't do it again because it was
Speaker 1: all a positive experience. It saved
Speaker 2: a lot of work. It
Speaker 1: is a lot of work, and maybe it's harder now
Speaker 1: as well to I think we might have hit a
Speaker 1: sweet point where you could successfully publish a book and
Speaker 1: sell a few 1000 copies. I'm not sure if that's
Speaker 1: as easy anymore,
Speaker 1: but it's also, ironically, when I self published, I got
Speaker 1: invited to so many more things because people wanted to
Speaker 1: know how to do it. So I got invited to
Speaker 1: all these festivals and book events that I had never
Speaker 1: been invited to. While I was traditionally published. It was,
Speaker 1: That's
Speaker 2: great. Like you say, It kept your name out there.
Speaker 2: You had books circulating. Your readers were still finding your work.
Speaker 2: So was that first book that you self published. Was
Speaker 2: that Sophie McCarthy?
Speaker 1: No. And that was one apart. And then there was
Speaker 1: once lost and and then then was the missing pieces
Speaker 1: of Sophie McCarthy, which was picked up by Penguin UK
Speaker 1: and sold in here, distributed by Penguin Australia. And then
Speaker 1: I hit another hiccup because I was no sooner feeling,
Speaker 1: Oh my God, this has been really good. I'm back.
Speaker 1: And then my publisher left
Speaker 1: Penguin UK. And then also, when your publisher leaves, that's
Speaker 1: a big thing. You've lost your champion within that particular
Speaker 1: publishing house, and it wasn't even that bad, or it
Speaker 1: became worse because the person who replaced her then left
Speaker 1: and the person who replaced her then left had an
Speaker 1: option for a second book with them. And they said,
Speaker 1: We don't have anyone who can even look at a
Speaker 1: second book at the moment, and we need to hire
Speaker 1: and you can either wait for six to
Speaker 1: 12 months to two years or and I guess I
Speaker 1: didn't want to wait because I thought, Oh, I don't
Speaker 1: even know who you're going to get or if you're
Speaker 1: going to get someone or if you're that's another thing
Speaker 1: that happens to a lot of authors their publisher moves on.
Speaker 1: And sometimes they they've lost their biggest supporter when the
Speaker 1: publisher moves on.
Speaker 1: So then I was
Speaker 1: had to go back to market again. But this time
Speaker 1: I did pick up another publisher, and this time it
Speaker 1: was profile UK and pro profile. UK published two of
Speaker 1: my books, and then they distributed those books here through
Speaker 1: Alan and Unwin. I'll summarise all the Australian publishers when
Speaker 1: I'm done, because I yeah,
Speaker 2: it's really interesting,
Speaker 1: you know, to Alan and UN. But both of those
Speaker 1: books came out during Covid
Speaker 1: and and I think the second of those books, you
Speaker 1: had it coming, didn't even in the UK didn't even
Speaker 1: make it out of the warehouses. Even Amazon was closed down.
Speaker 1: It was an entire shutdown. Yeah, So at the end
Speaker 1: of those two books, I was once again without a publisher.
Speaker 1: But I then signed with a firm here in Australia,
Speaker 1: and I was
Speaker 1: back with a mainstream publisher in where I live, which
Speaker 1: felt really important. Yeah.
Speaker 1: In the meantime, I lost my UK publisher. So
Speaker 1: yeah, that's quite a story, isn't it? She McMillan two
Speaker 1: sub published books that were distributed by Dennis Jones at
Speaker 1: the time
Speaker 1: and then a Penguin UK book distributed by pens Profile
Speaker 1: books distributed by Allen and Unwin and then affirm. That's
Speaker 1: how many different people my books have been brought.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but like I was saying, I think this is
Speaker 2: a great lesson for everyone out there. Look, if you
Speaker 2: get in with a publisher and everything's going well and
Speaker 2: there isn't any rocky patch like fantastic. But
Speaker 2: you know, as we both know, we know so many
Speaker 2: people that have been with one publisher and then maybe
Speaker 2: have not been published for a while and find another
Speaker 2: publisher like it is actually quite a normal thing, isn't it?
Speaker 2: Like at the time when it happens to you, you
Speaker 2: feel like Oh, God, I'm the only failure that this
Speaker 2: has happened to. But when you talk to a lot
Speaker 2: of people in the industry, this is actually quite a
Speaker 2: normal thing, isn't it?
Speaker 2: Look, I think all of that is so true. So
Speaker 2: with a firm, you know, you mentioned that some of
Speaker 2: your earlier books while they were women's fiction, had this
Speaker 2: kind of mystery in element of intrigue. And it seems
Speaker 2: that in your most all your most recent books have
Speaker 2: been going that way and more and more into that
Speaker 2: crime
Speaker 2: genre. So when you got the contract with a firm,
Speaker 2: was your agent still just shopping your books around here?
Speaker 2: Or even though you had the books out in the
Speaker 2: UK and and all that sort of thing
Speaker 1: was shopping my books around here and again, I was
Speaker 1: at a crisis point because I could see with the
Speaker 1: UK that things weren't going particularly well, and I didn't
Speaker 1: know if I could sell
Speaker 1: the book here. So it was a real save by
Speaker 1: the Bell one again to get the books in with
Speaker 1: the firm. But the books had got steadily, I guess
Speaker 1: darker and You Had a Coming, which was my second
Speaker 1: book with Profile, Got shortlisted for the DAS and the
Speaker 1: Ned Kelly's, which made me really think I thought, Oh
Speaker 1: my God, I
Speaker 1: really crime now because up until that point, I wouldn't
Speaker 1: have entirely classified myself as crime. I'm still not really
Speaker 1: hardcore crime, as I'm sure you'd agree. It's how much
Speaker 1: softer offering.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so did that kind of then change your perspective
Speaker 2: on when you're going in to write a book? When
Speaker 2: you started thinking of yourself, even though it may be
Speaker 2: on the lighter end of the spectrum or whatever of crime,
Speaker 2: did it change the way you approached the writing or
Speaker 2: thought about what you were writing?
Speaker 1: It did because my publisher had a firm Martin Hughes was.
Speaker 1: He's very honest. He's a very honest view of it,
Speaker 1: and he and look, he said, you need in my
Speaker 1: particular niche of crime fiction
Speaker 1: you're after maximum tension. Minimum bodies, right? We're not talking
Speaker 1: about lots of dead bodies. We're talking about maximum tension.
Speaker 1: But by the same token a few times, and particularly
Speaker 1: with my recent book, one of us is missing, he went, Oh, burry,
Speaker 1: You've written a contemporary drama this this two family drama.
Speaker 1: This needs way more attention. I was waiting for ages
Speaker 1: for this to happen, and you need to turn this
Speaker 1: book completely back to front because there's not enough tension.
Speaker 1: And so I guess
Speaker 1: I was still doing my same old thing.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's definitely got that family drama element, but I
Speaker 2: have to say we'll get on to actually talking about
Speaker 2: the book in a minute, but it is loaded with tension.
Speaker 2: So whatever you did when you went back, you did
Speaker 2: brilliantly because there is so much tension in it. The
Speaker 2: funny thing
Speaker 1: was, I didn't change the story at all. It was
Speaker 1: one of those weird things where I didn't change the
Speaker 1: story at all, but I completely changed the structure.
Speaker 2: OK, hold that. We're gonna come back to that. Yeah,
Speaker 2: So it
Speaker 1: has changed how I write. And now I'm working on
Speaker 1: a draught book and I can hear his voice in
Speaker 1: my head saying and an eye roll I can see
Speaker 1: the eye roll going. This is very nice and everything
Speaker 1: reading about this family. But
Speaker 1: is the tension Burt? And so I immediately went, OK,
Speaker 1: I won't start there. I'll put in a dead body here.
Speaker 1: And so I've changed what I'm doing. I suppose I
Speaker 1: have changed what I'm doing. But at the end of
Speaker 1: the day, I guess my thing that I won't ever
Speaker 1: change is that I want to write about people
Speaker 1: that I like and that I'm interested in and that
Speaker 1: I want them
Speaker 1: to be everyday people. And sometimes I pick up a
Speaker 1: crime book. And particularly in this genre, there's a lot
Speaker 1: of unlikable people and I, I think so, unlikable. They're
Speaker 1: not real. So I. I still want them to be real,
Speaker 1: and I want them to be somebody that you can
Speaker 1: relate to. But I have tried to up the attention
Speaker 1: to deliver to this genre.
Speaker 2: Oh, you've done it magnificently. So now that we are here,
Speaker 2: let's talk about one of us is missing. Amazing, like
Speaker 2: I absolutely loved it could not put it down. Uh,
Speaker 2: I have obviously an advanced reader copy here, but the
Speaker 2: real thing will be out very soon. So can you
Speaker 2: tell listeners, What is this book about? Who is the
Speaker 2: family that we meet and what's the kind of setup?
Speaker 1: OK, so the book is. It's about a family of
Speaker 1: four who go to a stadium concert, and parents Rachel
Speaker 1: and Rory Sullivan bring their Children, their teenage Children to
Speaker 1: a fictional Coldplay concert. And it's a one we've all
Speaker 1: been to. Many of us have been to those concerts
Speaker 1: this year. It's the the 60 odd 1000 people at
Speaker 1: this concert, and while they're at the concert, one of
Speaker 1: the family goes missing thing. And that's the premise of
Speaker 1: the book. And each of the four family members
Speaker 1: has a reason to go missing. They've each been going
Speaker 1: through different thing, and as the top ticks down, we
Speaker 1: we find out the secrets that they've been keeping from
Speaker 1: each other. And also we find they find out that
Speaker 1: they have enemies, that they didn't even realise that they had,
Speaker 1: and they realised that life is never going to be
Speaker 1: the same again after this particular night. But do you
Speaker 1: want to hear? I came up with the premise I
Speaker 2: started reading this not long after I'd been to the
Speaker 2: Taylor Swift concert. And I've been to quite a few
Speaker 2: big concerts in that Allianz Stadium. Adele Ed Sheeran and
Speaker 2: one of the things that freaks me out is that
Speaker 2: kind of when, especially when you're coming out because everyone
Speaker 2: arrives at different times, but
Speaker 2: everyone leaves at the same time. So one of the
Speaker 2: things that always freaks me out is walking out, particularly
Speaker 2: if you're getting public transport. Is that walking out in
Speaker 2: this mass Absolute mass of people and just that
Speaker 2: sensation of having so many people around you And I
Speaker 2: don't know, I guess in the back of my mind,
Speaker 2: occasionally I have thought, What if something happened here? What
Speaker 2: if you know, someone went crazy or whatever, and this
Speaker 2: isn't to give any spoilers away to the book because
Speaker 2: we're not talking about that, But
Speaker 2: it really struck a chord with me. That was where
Speaker 2: it was set because I could picture it. And I
Speaker 2: knew that feeling of that mass number of people and
Speaker 2: what it would be like to try and find someone
Speaker 2: in that crowd. But yeah, please tell me what the
Speaker 2: inspiration was for it OK,
Speaker 1: so the inspiration happened quite a number of years ago.
Speaker 1: It was in 2019, and it was a U two
Speaker 1: concert and my Children were a bit younger then. My
Speaker 1: oldest was 17, my youngest was 14
Speaker 1: and while I was trying to get tickets to this concert,
Speaker 1: first of all, they were really keen to go because
Speaker 1: I guess music is a very intergenerational thing. We grew
Speaker 1: up liking the music that our parents listened to. Our
Speaker 1: Children grew up liking some of the music. We listen
Speaker 1: to some of their music
Speaker 1: because you're in the car with each other all the time.
Speaker 1: You're at home with each other all the time. Concerts
Speaker 1: are intergenerational, I think, and they're a great way for
Speaker 1: families to bond. So anyway, the kids did want to
Speaker 1: come to this UT concert. They were really keen,
Speaker 1: and I was trying to get four seats to the
Speaker 1: concert and I couldn't. There was only two seats slept.
Speaker 1: I had a clock ticking down and my son was like,
Speaker 1: We'll go on, we'll go on the field, we'll go
Speaker 1: on the field And there was still a few seats
Speaker 1: left on the field and I was like going, But
Speaker 1: you're only 17 or 14 and that's not the whole
Speaker 1: purpose of this, but literally. I had 30 seconds left
Speaker 1: to make this to do this transaction
Speaker 1: and and even it ended up. You know, it was
Speaker 1: either that or nothing, really. And I ended up getting
Speaker 1: two stand tickets and two field tickets, and I thought
Speaker 1: to myself, Oh, God, I don't know if that's a
Speaker 1: good idea. And look, I know that probably sounds very helicopter,
Speaker 1: and I'm a very I'm a self confessed helicopter parent.
Speaker 1: I'll say that straight up. But when you're in a
Speaker 1: crowd like that, you're talking about relatively inexperienced
Speaker 1: teenagers. They doesn't. They're not familiar with a stadium familiar
Speaker 1: with that side of the city. Yeah, if it was
Speaker 1: in our local suburbs, they would be fine. But they're
Speaker 1: not familiar with the city or navigating their way around
Speaker 1: the And I guess I had a 17 year old
Speaker 1: who was extremely overconfident. I know everything about everything. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and then a 14 year old who literally is just
Speaker 1: the worst sense of direction you've ever seen in your life.
Speaker 1: And so
Speaker 1: I knew it was probably a bad idea. And of course,
Speaker 1: when it came to the night and we were walking
Speaker 1: there and there's thousands and thousands of people walking there,
Speaker 1: all I could think was like, What have I done?
Speaker 1: Oh my God. And I was trying to convince them
Speaker 1: I was like, OK, Ash, you come in the stands
Speaker 1: with me. Connor, you go to be with your dad.
Speaker 1: I was trying to reorganise, and they weren't having any
Speaker 1: of it ever. Anyway, we as we got there and
Speaker 1: then there's also that thing when you come out of
Speaker 1: the stadium and I think you particularly notice this when
Speaker 1: you're out at home. Bush,
Speaker 1: they're huge, right? And when you come out, you don't
Speaker 1: know where you're going to come out, and
Speaker 2: it's that kind of circular thing and let's come out
Speaker 2: this side or do you go like, Where did you enter?
Speaker 2: Where are you leaving at the point?
Speaker 1: That and you particularly don't know that when you're 14
Speaker 1: and 17, right, that you don't know the area. So anyway,
Speaker 1: during this whole concert, I was up in the stands
Speaker 1: worrying myself sick, particularly about my 14 year old down
Speaker 1: in that wash pit worrying myself. Absolutely sick,
Speaker 1: and that's where the idea of the novel came from.
Speaker 1: And of course, it's great to have an idea for
Speaker 1: a novel. That's a really good premise. But then you've
Speaker 1: got to figure out, OK, someone is missing
Speaker 1: what's happened and and really not easy to figure
Speaker 2: out what's happened. But how do you go from there?
Speaker 2: Be like you. You've been this crime genre. You've got
Speaker 2: this idea. Can you remember where you went with that idea? Like,
Speaker 2: how do you sit down and then nut out? What's
Speaker 2: your process in Nutting out the plot?
Speaker 1: I never really not at the plot, Pa. Make life
Speaker 1: really hard for myself by not planning anything but I
Speaker 1: with this story I just started Initially. I started the
Speaker 1: book four months before, and I guess I got to
Speaker 1: know each character
Speaker 1: just through each character and figuring out what was going
Speaker 1: on in their lives that could have led them to
Speaker 1: the point of one of them not turning up at
Speaker 1: the meeting place after the concert. And so I explore
Speaker 1: that by writing it in that form, and when I
Speaker 1: got to the night of the concert. I guess I
Speaker 1: knew which one of them
Speaker 1: wasn't going to turn. And then I was immediately had
Speaker 1: written myself into another problem as to what had happened
Speaker 1: to them. And I don't know, I'm the kind of writer,
Speaker 1: I there's some areas of crime writer I didn't wanna go.
Speaker 1: So I kept thinking, I don't want to go into this,
Speaker 1: and I don't want to go into that. And that's
Speaker 1: just far too gruesome. And no, I can't do this
Speaker 1: and I can't do that. And I was everything I
Speaker 1: thought of. I was like, Oh, no, that's too dark.
Speaker 1: So it took me a long time to figure out
Speaker 1: what it was
Speaker 1: that had happened. And I guess I I just fighting
Speaker 1: until I figured it out.
Speaker 2: So you very much, uh, learn things as you go writer.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, As soon as I tried to plan the books,
Speaker 1: they're just boring. I'm just so bored. I'm like going Oh,
Speaker 1: this is just boring. And I keep telling myself my
Speaker 1: life would be so much easier if I planned. And
Speaker 1: I think all of us pans say that our life
Speaker 1: would be so much easier if we planned, but there's
Speaker 1: something about for me. How I come up with ideas
Speaker 1: is when my fingers are on the keys. That's what
Speaker 1: generates ideas in my head. It doesn't matter if sitting
Speaker 1: there with a whiteboard I could look at it all
Speaker 1: day long. I wouldn't be able to think of a
Speaker 1: single idea. I have to be type to come up
Speaker 1: with
Speaker 2: ideas. I'm exactly the same I find, and I should
Speaker 2: have realised this years ago. But I said to my
Speaker 2: husband the other day, actually about horse riding, I said,
Speaker 2: I'm just thinking I'm a really slow learner he said,
Speaker 2: which he probably nailed it. He said, No, you just
Speaker 2: don't have enough confidence in your own ability. But anyway,
Speaker 2: that's a whole other story. But I find with
Speaker 2: writing and what I'm working out with, this one I'm
Speaker 2: working on now is that part of the whole thing,
Speaker 2: for with the pants thing for me is being in
Speaker 2: that character's skin in that moment, or at the end
Speaker 2: of that scene that you've just written and thinking,
Speaker 2: What am I going to do now or what would
Speaker 2: she do next? Or what could happen that would really
Speaker 2: throw her world into turmoil. But I've got to be
Speaker 2: in that moment to work it out. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm the same, and I think that's why I do it.
Speaker 1: It's And then, at the end of the day, I
Speaker 1: Oh my God, who knew who knew that would happen?
Speaker 1: I certainly didn't, and and I'm addicted to that feeling.
Speaker 2: And I guess if you're creating that feeling for yourself,
Speaker 2: then you're also creating it for your readers, aren't you?
Speaker 1: Yes, but then I went and I had to turn
Speaker 1: this book back to front because my publisher said It's
Speaker 1: too much of a contemporary. So
Speaker 2: tell us about that. How did you go about doing that?
Speaker 1: He wanted a plan, Pam. Oh, no. And I was
Speaker 1: like a plan.
Speaker 1: And so I do. I have pulled out the spreadsheet
Speaker 1: in the past during editing,
Speaker 1: when I'd been asked to do trick tricky things in
Speaker 1: editing because when I'm writing, I have a very firm
Speaker 1: hold on what's happening, where and what's happening when, and
Speaker 1: I have a really good hold in it. But as
Speaker 1: soon as you start shifting things around, you lose that
Speaker 1: hold you, you become confused really quickly about and crime
Speaker 1: is different. It's You can ruin the book, really. But
Speaker 1: if you move things around in the wrong way, you
Speaker 1: can completely ruin the book. So he insisted
Speaker 1: on a plan. So I had to do a chapter.
Speaker 1: I did a spreadsheet just with chapter summaries for him,
Speaker 1: and it was really reorganising my chapters. But it was
Speaker 1: like I was like, I can't believe I'm doing this.
Speaker 1: I cannot believe it doing a plan for this edit
Speaker 1: where normally I would just dive in, I would normally
Speaker 1: dive in. But in retrospect, it was very good advice,
Speaker 1: because what I was trying to do was a lot
Speaker 1: more complicated than what I thought it was. I said
Speaker 1: to myself when he said, Oh, I think you need
Speaker 1: to start at the concert. We need to start at
Speaker 1: the concert and then flash back in time and I
Speaker 1: was like,
Speaker 1: That's easy. I've done that before. I've done flashbacks before.
Speaker 1: That's easy, but actually wasn't easy
Speaker 1: at all, and in fact, it turned out to probably
Speaker 1: be one of the most difficult rewrites I've ever
Speaker 2: done. Wow. So you'd already written the draught were you
Speaker 2: shuffling scenes that you already had? Did you then have
Speaker 2: to add new bits and new perspectives and heaps?
Speaker 1: Loads of new bits, No new perspectives but loads of
Speaker 1: And the story in itself didn't change except for the
Speaker 1: who did it. The who did it did change, but
Speaker 1: the story in itself
Speaker 1: didn't change. But the changing the timing of the story
Speaker 1: meant that there was a lot of back and forth.
Speaker 1: So even if you look at how the book starts
Speaker 1: that very first chapter, I had to say who all
Speaker 1: the people were that were involved, even though there's a
Speaker 1: lot of names early on because I can't pretend they
Speaker 1: don't exist. Whereas with the previous version, I was able
Speaker 1: to introduce the characters in a much more gradual way.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that type of thing where I can't deny there's
Speaker 1: a big thing. There's a few big things happening here.
Speaker 1: I can't just show them getting ready for the concert
Speaker 1: without showing their concern about these big things that are happening.
Speaker 1: And so it was extremely tricky to was extremely tricky
Speaker 1: not to trick the reader, really.
Speaker 1: I had to be honest with the reader about what
Speaker 1: was going through their head at the time while they
Speaker 1: were getting ready for the concert. And then also there
Speaker 1: was necessary repetition. There was necessary repetition because I had
Speaker 1: to help the reader navigate back and forth
Speaker 2: with the time frame with the
Speaker 1: time frame and and I think to the rewrite I must.
Speaker 1: I think I added at least 20,000 words that then
Speaker 1: later axed in different places. But
Speaker 1: it was much more complicated than it was initially. That's
Speaker 1: not a problem. No problem. I can do this and
Speaker 1: then ive
Speaker 2: written 11. I can do this.
Speaker 1: Yes, I was definitely overconfident and underestimated what was involved
Speaker 1: in it. I very quickly I realised, Oh, I'm going
Speaker 1: to start with a new file and the file is
Speaker 1: going to be blank.
Speaker 1: And I will copy and paste, but I'll only copy
Speaker 1: and paste
Speaker 1: once I know that is that's belongs in there. So
Speaker 1: I did build it up from
Speaker 2: Wow, that was gonna be my next question. Actually. How
Speaker 2: did you practically manage that? Like I was at my
Speaker 2: writing group today at the in, the lovely Joan Mill
Speaker 2: was there, So she has seen cards where she writes
Speaker 2: a summary of what's happening and because now she's on
Speaker 2: book number six or whatever. So she knows
Speaker 2: roughly the kind of structure that she's using. So you'll
Speaker 2: have index cards, and I have used index cards a
Speaker 2: lot in the past myself. But yeah, so you started
Speaker 2: with a black document. You had your draught And was
Speaker 2: it then a matter of just pulling things out and
Speaker 2: moving them around
Speaker 1: Page one? And I said, OK, it's the day of
Speaker 1: the concert.
Speaker 1: What can I use? And then I massaged it, and
Speaker 1: once I was happy with what I had massaged, I
Speaker 1: then went OK, Now they're walking to the concert. What
Speaker 1: can I keep? And then I brought in that, and
Speaker 1: then I massaged it to change it and and I
Speaker 1: built it up like that. And then it became very obvious. OK,
Speaker 1: I need this extra scene here, and I need this
Speaker 1: extra scene there, and I put those in as I went.
Speaker 1: I didn't allow myself go forward or go back
Speaker 1: without OK putting in what I needed. And even if
Speaker 1: it meant new writing, yeah, because
Speaker 2: it does move around in time like we go back.
Speaker 2: But then it comes back to the concept like there's
Speaker 2: a lot of time shuffling. I'm terrible with timeline. It's
Speaker 2: my worst nightmare. But how did you work out how
Speaker 2: far back to go and when to put in a
Speaker 2: scene from three weeks ago,
Speaker 2: as opposed to a scene from three hours before they
Speaker 2: went to the concert? That was the
Speaker 1: easier part. The going back was the easy part because
Speaker 1: I had written that kind of in a more intact,
Speaker 1: I guess in. That's how the novel had originally started.
Speaker 1: It originally started four months before the concert, so when
Speaker 1: you're flashing back to four months,
Speaker 1: that was needed, massaging and needed fixing and a few
Speaker 1: extra things put in and but it was largely written.
Speaker 1: But it was the current time that caused me the
Speaker 1: biggest trouble, because I had to elongate
Speaker 1: what was happening at the concert,
Speaker 1: and I had to do that in a way that
Speaker 1: didn't give away what was going to happen in the
Speaker 1: next novel. A lot of what's happening at the concert
Speaker 1: is new, and a lot of what you flash back
Speaker 1: to was, Pre-existing
Speaker 2: did you have to kill a lot of darlings. Were
Speaker 2: a lot of darlings left out?
Speaker 1: No, actually, I had to. No, I didn't have to
Speaker 1: kill any darlings. And I know I'm the worst person
Speaker 1: ever for having too many characters. Honestly,
Speaker 1: Every time I write a book, I'm like going, Oh
Speaker 1: my God, can you just cut out the the number
Speaker 1: of characters? It's I drive myself mad, but I just
Speaker 1: don't know how to make it real.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it didn't confuse me. The number of characters
Speaker 1: I didn't have to kill A and Dave Darlings, but
Speaker 1: I did struggle with, I guess, the introduction of those
Speaker 1: darlings because of the structure they came, all came at once,
Speaker 1: and they needed to all come at once because we
Speaker 1: are at the climax of the book at the start,
Speaker 1: and so you can't pretend that they don't exist.
Speaker 2: You have to. You had to change the structure in
Speaker 2: order to up the tension.
Speaker 2: What were some of the other things that you did
Speaker 2: at a page or chapter level in terms of really
Speaker 2: making sure that there was plenty of tension in there?
Speaker 2: I had a lot of
Speaker 1: this in there, But it was in It was delivered
Speaker 1: in a more gentle way. And I do remember my
Speaker 1: publisher saying to me, he said, You've gone there anyway, Burr.
Speaker 1: By the end of the novel, you have gone fairly dark.
Speaker 1: So you're I don't know what you're trying to avoid.
Speaker 1: And so I guess that was really interesting. One thing
Speaker 1: I would say I did have to do was I
Speaker 1: had to miss those red herrings
Speaker 1: of which there was quite a number. Actually, I think
Speaker 1: I'm learning how to write crime as I go. I
Speaker 1: don't know all the rules. Do you know what I mean?
Speaker 1: Which
Speaker 2: might be the thing that you don't know. The rules,
Speaker 1: the rules, I don't know. And so apparently I had.
Speaker 1: And this is from an old friend, Govern, who
Speaker 1: is really a bit like your inky She's like my
Speaker 1: inky Her opinion means a lot. And she's very you
Speaker 1: won't kill off any of these red herrings. I should point.
Speaker 1: And I was like, Ok, yeah, I guess because you
Speaker 1: really write crime and you really know what you're doing.
Speaker 1: I didn't really know what to do. I am a
Speaker 1: bit of a novice. I think when it comes to
Speaker 1: writing this genre, it didn't
Speaker 2: read like you're a novice, but and one of the
Speaker 2: things that I loved were the kind of, particularly
Speaker 2: at the beginning. There is different lengths of chapters, but
Speaker 2: those really short, snappy chapters I found
Speaker 2: were really compelling and just really helped add that tension
Speaker 2: and that sense that Oh, I want to read the
Speaker 2: next chapter to find out what happens for the next character.
Speaker 1: OK, Oh, that's good. That's good. Actually, that was one
Speaker 1: other thing that was very challenging. These two teen voices.
Speaker 1: I haven't done that before. I don't know if I
Speaker 1: will do that again,
Speaker 1: and that's not easy. Lucky I had some experts in
Speaker 1: the house. Yeah,
Speaker 2: that's right. Yeah, I'd say you've got four point of
Speaker 2: view characters. Did you see any one of those characters
Speaker 2: as your kind of main character? Or do you feel
Speaker 2: that they were all pretty much equal in terms of
Speaker 2: the level of importance
Speaker 1: to them When I started off, I think Rachel was
Speaker 1: my main character. She's the mom and al always, because
Speaker 1: you can identify with the mom more because you are
Speaker 1: a mom and she's closer in age to you.
Speaker 1: But I guess as the book went on, the other
Speaker 1: characters got stronger. They got stronger and and by the end,
Speaker 1: certainly Bridie has come to the fore a lot more.
Speaker 1: And the dad has come to the poor a lot more,
Speaker 1: and they've all garnered sympathy. And in some ways, Rachel,
Speaker 1: I guess because of some of her decisions,
Speaker 1: some people judge her quite harshly. I didn't judge her harshly,
Speaker 1: but I think some readers do judge her harshly. So
Speaker 1: the different voices in this book were a challenge as well.
Speaker 1: And through every rewrite I was constantly trying to improve them.
Speaker 1: There was one discussion here one night where we had
Speaker 1: a big family debate about what you would call drug
Speaker 1: goes and druggies and what different age groups call them.
Speaker 1: And so even between my now 21 year old and
Speaker 1: 19 year old, there's different lingo. There's different. They use
Speaker 1: different words. It was that was an ongoing challenge throughout
Speaker 1: the noble, trying to
Speaker 1: channel as teen voices and also in a way that
Speaker 1: mature adults want to read because we don't always want
Speaker 1: to read from the point of view of much younger people.
Speaker 1: But I think
Speaker 2: one thing that having those multiple point of view characters does,
Speaker 2: and you did distinguish their voices really beautifully. So we
Speaker 2: knew as each chapter moved on, we got to the
Speaker 2: next person. There was a really distinct sound to the voice,
Speaker 2: and Bridie's voice was different to her mother's and et cetera,
Speaker 2: et cetera, the other two as well. But I think
Speaker 2: one of the things that
Speaker 2: that that does swapping point of views is it really
Speaker 2: does help with that, upping the tension because we get
Speaker 2: into one character's skin and one character's head and perspective,
Speaker 2: and we're empathising with that character. Uh, but then that
Speaker 2: stops and we're into the next character. So you automatically
Speaker 2: wanna know. No, I wanna go back and see what
Speaker 2: what's happening with Rachel next. So it pulls you through
Speaker 2: the story because you are constantly shifting character, experience and I.
Speaker 2: I find that really compelling
Speaker 1: as crime writers. Different point of view is our friend.
Speaker 1: It's different than our friend. It gives us a chance
Speaker 1: to leave someone in a real predicament
Speaker 1: and then go on to something else. and then write
Speaker 1: that person into predicament and then go back. And it
Speaker 1: helps us hugely in terms of writing the
Speaker 2: novel when you finish that whole restructuring thing, Did you know,
Speaker 2: like immediately? Yes, that's it. I've got it. I
Speaker 1: didn't know. Yes, I got it. And I was actually
Speaker 1: really nervous. I was really nervous because I'd gotten from
Speaker 1: a novel. I thought that I really knew what the
Speaker 1: kind of flash points were to a novel where I
Speaker 1: didn't
Speaker 1: know any more of what the flashpoints were. And so
Speaker 1: before I handed it back to my publisher, I gave
Speaker 1: it to more readers than what I've ever done before. Oh, really? Yeah. I.
Speaker 1: I think I gave it to about six or seven
Speaker 1: people to read it to see. Did they know who
Speaker 1: did it?
Speaker 1: Did the bombing of who did it come at the
Speaker 1: right time? Did they believe it? And whilst their feedback
Speaker 1: reassured me, they all had very valuable things to say
Speaker 1: to say still, and I'm always extremely grateful for
Speaker 1: people who read your books and very kindly lend their
Speaker 1: intelligence to the plot and help you make you a
Speaker 1: better book and I. I think I had achieved the
Speaker 1: main things I said I had to do. But obviously
Speaker 1: when you've done a restructure to that level,
Speaker 1: there's always some small things that you haven't addressed and
Speaker 1: you need fresh eyes on the book. And and so be.
Speaker 1: Before I sent it back, I had given it to
Speaker 1: six other readers. And so by the time I'd taken
Speaker 1: their feedback on board, which wasn't
Speaker 1: drastic by any means, but it made me feel a
Speaker 1: lot more confident with what I was heading back. And
Speaker 2: was it a thumbs up from your editor? Then
Speaker 1: it was a thumbs up, but they were horrified by
Speaker 1: how long the book had
Speaker 2: become. Oh, really? Now it's too long. Go and cut
Speaker 1: some of it I had to delete. I think they
Speaker 1: wanted me to delete 15,000 words, but I deleted 10,000
Speaker 1: words in a line edit and then another 2000 during
Speaker 1: copy
Speaker 2: Edit. Wow,
Speaker 2: think the that tightening that you did just improved it
Speaker 2: even further because I think one of the things with
Speaker 2: that Pacey sort of high tension reading is that there's
Speaker 2: no extraneous words, and I think you've really nailed that.
Speaker 1: Oh, thank you. It's so hard to know when you've
Speaker 1: changed it that profoundly and again. As I said, I
Speaker 1: was trying to help the reader with the back and
Speaker 1: forth so that they wouldn't be confused about what was
Speaker 1: happening before and what was happening after.
Speaker 2: So you have chapter headings for that, don't you?
Speaker 1: I do have chapter headings, but the reader still needs
Speaker 1: reminding of the time and what's happening with time. You
Speaker 1: need to help them a little, and really honestly, Pam,
Speaker 1: probably it was the most, and I've done some hard
Speaker 1: rewrites in my day. I really have
Speaker 1: this book was it was very easy to write. That
Speaker 1: first draught was probably the most difficult restructuring I've ever
Speaker 1: done because normally when hard restructuring is deleting characters or
Speaker 1: combining chapters or doing all that sort of things can
Speaker 1: all be very tricky. But this
Speaker 1: was just next to trick.
Speaker 2: And were you working to a deadline? I imagine, too.
Speaker 2: But
Speaker 1: yeah, and I don't sit at my desk. If I
Speaker 1: change the camera, you would see where I write, which
Speaker 1: is literally an armchair. It's very bad for my posture.
Speaker 1: I sit in an armchair with my laptop on my
Speaker 1: lap and again it's a bit something. I need to
Speaker 1: be in that position before I can write right. And
Speaker 1: if I try and write at a table or a desk,
Speaker 1: I can't do
Speaker 2: it. Isn't that funny? We all have our little quirks.
Speaker 2: It's amazing.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's whatever releases that creativity in your head, it writes.
Speaker 1: But I sat in an armchair for so long, I
Speaker 1: got swollen ankles. Oh, no, I have never It was
Speaker 1: like being in a long haul flight. I was like,
Speaker 1: What has happened in my leg? So there's something. And
Speaker 1: then I realised it was because I've been sitting here
Speaker 1: for 12 hours a day. Moving. Yeah, yeah, that was
Speaker 1: a new That was a new thing. Thank you. One
Speaker 1: of us is missing for giving me swollen ankles.
Speaker 2: I'm picturing you pulling on the compression socks or something,
Speaker 2: and
Speaker 1: it was full on
Speaker 2: Oh, we haven't talked a lot about the characters and things.
Speaker 2: I don't want to go too much into the actual
Speaker 2: story because there it's very hard to avoid spoilers. You
Speaker 2: mentioned earlier the secrets thing. So all of the characters
Speaker 2: have secrets.
Speaker 2: They're really important in kind of. There's some things that
Speaker 2: the reader knows at some points that the other characters
Speaker 2: don't know. The reader knows things about happening in the
Speaker 2: background for some of the other characters. That Rachel, for instance,
Speaker 2: might not know. Was that Al already there in your
Speaker 2: initial story? Or did you deliberately plant some of those secrets?
Speaker 2: Are they some of the red herrings you were talking about?
Speaker 1: I think IR stakes for some of those things, but
Speaker 1: they were all there, and that's what made the rewrite
Speaker 1: so weird. And that's why I was saying, Why was
Speaker 1: it so hard when
Speaker 1: there was no characters deleted, There was no scenes deleted.
Speaker 1: It was all adding it was adding to be able
Speaker 1: to accommodate the new structure. But I did increase the
Speaker 1: stakes with those particular secrets and and all the while
Speaker 1: trying to it was very important to me that this
Speaker 1: family was a likeable family and that they loved each other.
Speaker 1: I was trying to make them a normal family that
Speaker 1: have just been struggling with various things
Speaker 1: rather than making them all toxic. So I was trying
Speaker 1: to try it all the time. Sometimes having that type
Speaker 1: of aim in crime fiction is all I
Speaker 2: can imagine. You mentioned that word steak spur, and it's
Speaker 2: something that every book I have to really think about,
Speaker 2: and usually that's what I have to go back and
Speaker 2: really increase, I think, is what's at stake for this character.
Speaker 2: Can you talk a little bit about the importance or
Speaker 2: in writing in general? And maybe in this book, in
Speaker 2: particular for how important increasing those stakes are in terms
Speaker 2: of creating that whole arc where you can pull the
Speaker 2: reader through to the end of the story? I
Speaker 1: think it's It's absolutely crucial, and the big thing we're
Speaker 1: struggling with is increasing the stakes in a believable way
Speaker 1: in a way. And also, if you manage to do
Speaker 1: that in a believable way,
Speaker 1: you will be, I guess they'll be hooked and they'll
Speaker 1: be invested in the character. They will like these characters
Speaker 1: and they will be seriously invested in them. And I
Speaker 1: think when I was trying to increase the stakes and
Speaker 1: I thought about this afterwards and even though while I
Speaker 1: was doing it, I probably couldn't coherently tell you what
Speaker 1: I was trying to do. But I, I think what
Speaker 1: I did was I tried to increase the fear, their
Speaker 1: fears and that on the night, as each of them
Speaker 1: went into that stadium,
Speaker 1: they each had different fears that they were grappling with.
Speaker 1: Rachel had a serious illness, a life-threatening illness, and obviously
Speaker 1: she was afraid for her future. She was afraid of
Speaker 1: her Children being left motherless,
Speaker 1: and Rory was afraid that his marriage wasn't the same
Speaker 1: after that illness, and and he was afraid of speaking
Speaker 1: up and rocking the boat in the marriage. And Emmett
Speaker 1: is afraid of failure, as many teens are and Friday
Speaker 1: is afraid of. She's lonely, essentially, she's really lonely, and
Speaker 1: her family don't know the extent of her loneliness. And
Speaker 1: so they carried all those fears in there
Speaker 1: that night. And then when the worst thing happens, they realise. Actually,
Speaker 1: the big fear is the fear of the unknown and
Speaker 1: what has happened here and how. What have we done
Speaker 1: to cause this situation? And I guess once I grasped
Speaker 1: onto that fear that immediately I think raises the stakes
Speaker 2: that's so important, but and just what you were saying
Speaker 2: then I think that's about the believability and the fact
Speaker 2: they are such an ordinary family. And I think that's
Speaker 2: what you relate to as a reader. Certainly what I
Speaker 2: related to is, even though you might not have been
Speaker 2: in exactly that situation
Speaker 2: as any of the characters, you've been in a similar
Speaker 2: situation or people who have been in a similar situation.
Speaker 2: Dealing with a life threatening illness and or having a
Speaker 2: child who is having friendship issues at school and how
Speaker 2: much that can impact on them. And the other thing
Speaker 2: is also that sense of in a family of not
Speaker 2: saying anything about those fears because you don't want to
Speaker 2: upset others,
Speaker 2: or that you're afraid that you're revealing something about yourself
Speaker 2: that even your people closest to you don't know. You
Speaker 2: really captured all that thought so nicely. Thank you, thank you.
Speaker 2: There is a fair bit of police kind of procedure
Speaker 2: at different parts of the book. How much research did
Speaker 2: you have to do be into some of those kind
Speaker 2: of technical aspects of policing that appear in the book?
Speaker 1: I did
Speaker 1: have to do a fair bit of research and and
Speaker 1: I've found policing hard to search because a particular chief
Speaker 1: inspector who helps me and a detective who helps me,
Speaker 1: but they're really busy people said I have to choose
Speaker 1: my questions really carefully. I will ask one question and
Speaker 1: I will get a very quick response and then I
Speaker 1: have to say OK, that's not what I thought. I'd
Speaker 1: better alter this. I do have a criminal lawyer who
Speaker 1: helps me and who helped me, particularly towards the end
Speaker 1: of the novel. There's a scene towards the end of
Speaker 1: the novel
Speaker 1: that had I written it the way I had written,
Speaker 1: it would have been completely inaccurate and he helped me
Speaker 1: fashion that particular scene. And he's helped me now with
Speaker 1: a number of my books
Speaker 1: and he always says to me, You need to stop
Speaker 1: stressing because if you look at what's on TV, it's
Speaker 1: so inaccurate that this is actually way closer to the truth.
Speaker 1: Even in its inaccurate form, it's way closer to the
Speaker 1: truth than anything we watch on TV about crime
Speaker 1: that he has helped me with a number of my
Speaker 1: novels now, and I always imagine him in his kind
Speaker 1: of city office, laughing at the the questions. I sent
Speaker 1: them the very obscure questions at him, and and I
Speaker 1: did very luckily know somebody who works in security in
Speaker 1: a large stadium.
Speaker 1: And he and this was during Covid. Actually, he let
Speaker 1: me see what they can see through their CCTV and
Speaker 1: how and their CCTV is a It's absolutely amazing. But
Speaker 1: of course, it's useless when you've got 50,000 people there
Speaker 1: because you can't see anything, but it is amazing. And
Speaker 1: so he was also very helpful. I think the thing
Speaker 1: when it comes to research now, with every single novel,
Speaker 1: I have nothing to draw on myself. So I have
Speaker 1: to read practically everything because everything is new and I'm
Speaker 1: trying to write something that's fresh. Yeah, every time. But
Speaker 1: you learn
Speaker 2: something from every novel,
Speaker 1: don't you? Oh, God. One thing. And I often think
Speaker 1: like what you said earlier. Am I just a slow learner?
Speaker 1: How am I still learning this crap? He set up
Speaker 1: to 20 years
Speaker 2: in bubbles.
Speaker 2: Each time I do it, it feels like I'm doing
Speaker 2: it for the first time. And until I get to
Speaker 2: a point and I think I yeah, I do know
Speaker 2: what I'm doing. Yeah, sorry, but when is this book
Speaker 2: actually out
Speaker 1: on the 30th of April
Speaker 2: 30th of April. Ok, yeah. This will be out probably
Speaker 2: the week that week or the week after. Now, I
Speaker 2: do believe you are going to a Coldplay concert later
Speaker 2: in the year.
Speaker 2: Yes, I am going
Speaker 1: to a CO. So this is the funny thing about
Speaker 1: this book, right? It was written during Yeah, a lot
Speaker 1: of it was written during Covid. And we didn't even
Speaker 1: know if there was ever going to be musicals ever again, right?
Speaker 1: It looked pretty bleak
Speaker 1: there for a while. It really didn't. I think this
Speaker 1: is the first year they really come back and forth.
Speaker 1: And some Coldplay have been in Sydney for a number
Speaker 1: of years. And now suddenly they're coming in the same
Speaker 1: year that the book is coming out, which is quite ironic.
Speaker 1: And so when they announced the concert, I was like, Oh,
Speaker 1: my God, I've got to get tickets. But oh, my God.
Speaker 1: And of course, the whole family wants to go. The
Speaker 1: whole family wants to go. But this time I'm going
Speaker 1: down on the field. You get a
Speaker 2: hand on each hand.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I was saying, but everyone's laughing because I been
Speaker 1: rubbish jinxed us. You totally jinxed us. In fact, I
Speaker 1: know lots of people are going to that concert because
Speaker 1: I think they're doing or because they are you going, pa? No,
Speaker 2: I missed out on tickets. I can't believe
Speaker 1: that.
Speaker 1: I think they're doing four consecutive nights. I know lots
Speaker 1: of people going to that cool pay concert, and hopefully
Speaker 1: they won't be thinking about my book and they'll be
Speaker 1: enjoying the concert.
Speaker 2: There'll be some great promotional opportunities there. Be so make
Speaker 2: sure you take lots of photos. And I'm just seeing
Speaker 2: Chris Martin in the background and the yellow balls and
Speaker 2: your book in the world.
Speaker 2: Now bet this has been such a great chat and
Speaker 2: thank you for staying on so long. We've covered so
Speaker 2: much territory, but I'd like to finish up with a
Speaker 2: question which sometimes we've touched on. But what would you
Speaker 2: say is at the heart of your writing
Speaker 1: Everyday people is at the heart of my rising.
Speaker 1: I'm not interested if
Speaker 1: they're super rich or super successful, or
Speaker 1: I'm interested in everyday people finding themselves in really hard
Speaker 1: situations and what they'll do in those situations. And I
Speaker 1: think I want you to essentially like my characters and
Speaker 1: believe in my characters.
Speaker 2: You've definitely nailed that with this book and because we've
Speaker 2: been talking so much about the publishing industry and something
Speaker 2: that I did mean to say earlier, which I think
Speaker 2: might be a great kind of thing to finish on,
Speaker 2: is the thing that you have continued to do be
Speaker 2: all through all those 20 years and lots of disappointments
Speaker 2: and not really knowing who was gonna publish your next
Speaker 2: book or how it was gonna be published is you've
Speaker 2: kept writing
Speaker 2: and I think that's the key, isn't it?
Speaker 1: It is the key, and it in many ways it's
Speaker 1: very liberating because once you've figured that out, you'll be happy.
Speaker 1: You'll be happy. And you know, this is really hard
Speaker 1: to stop writing, isn't it? In some way, it's really
Speaker 1: hard to stop. It can be hard to do it
Speaker 1: when you need to do it as well,
Speaker 1: but it's hard to stop doing it when you love it.
Speaker 1: So I think once you hold on to that, you
Speaker 1: never really know what's going to happen. And once you
Speaker 1: don't expect a smooth ride, I think if you are
Speaker 1: prepared for a few bumps along the road, then you'd
Speaker 1: be well equipped for what's ahead.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think that's a perfect note to finish on.
Speaker 2: Thank you so much for all the best with one
Speaker 2: of us is missing. Great book, please everybody out there
Speaker 2: just as a great reading experience. But particularly also if
Speaker 2: you're a writer and wondering how to get tension into
Speaker 2: your writing through all those things we talked about on
Speaker 2: the page through the lines structure, the plot, everything fantastic
Speaker 2: read and I will see you be at war. A
Speaker 2: mole on the third of May I see you,
Speaker 2: Bye bye.
Speaker 2: Thanks for listening to rights for women. I hope you've
Speaker 2: enjoyed my chat with this week's guest.
Speaker 2: If you did, I'd love it if you could add
Speaker 2: a quick rating or review wherever you get your podcasts
Speaker 2: so others can more easily find the episodes. Don't forget
Speaker 2: to check out the backlist on the rights for women website.
Speaker 2: So much great writing advice in the library there, and
Speaker 2: you can also find the transcript of today's chat on
Speaker 2: the website, too.
Speaker 2: You can find details on the website on how to
Speaker 2: support the podcast through Patreon and you can connect with
Speaker 2: me through the website at Rights for Women.com on Instagram
Speaker 2: and Twitter at W for W podcast. The Facebook page
Speaker 2: writes for women or find me and my writing at
Speaker 2: Pamela cook.com dot a U.
Speaker 2: Thanks for listening. Have a great week. And remember every
Speaker 2: word you write you're one word closer to typing the end.