[SPEAKER_01]: and welcome to our show.
[SPEAKER_01]: The shit no one tells you about writing.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm best selling author Bianca Marie, and I'm joined by CC Lira of Wendy Sherman Associates and Carly Waters of PS Literary.
[SPEAKER_01]: Hi everyone, welcome back to another author-interview segment.
[SPEAKER_01]: Today's guest is a writer from London with Ganei and Heritage.
[SPEAKER_01]: She received a distinction for her master's in creative writing from Bernal University, where she studied under authors including Benjamin, Zephanaya, and Will Sulf, a book seller rising star in 2021.
[SPEAKER_01]: She is also an editor and has published a range of best-selling fiction.
[SPEAKER_01]: The exes is her debut novel.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's my pleasure to welcome Lia Dora Darlington.
[SPEAKER_01]: Lia Dora, welcome to the show.
[SPEAKER_01]: Hello, thank you so much for having me.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's wonderful having you.
[SPEAKER_01]: And for those of you who are watching on YouTube, I am holding up the book that we're discussing today, the exes, and I'm going to reach you the flap copy so that we can give you some context before we dive straight in.
[SPEAKER_01]: So, who hasn't wanted to murder and ex figuratively at least?
[SPEAKER_01]: In this explosive debut novel, a woman seemingly perfect romantic life is on the verge of collapse as she covers a hidden history revealing dark secrets that have deadly consequences.
[SPEAKER_01]: Natalie has only ever wanted to find the one, the perfect man.
[SPEAKER_01]: The happy family she never had, but each time she thinks she's finally getting somewhere, she's literally disappointed.
[SPEAKER_01]: Another red line through a list of exes, and that was before the night of the big fallout that left her even more alone.
[SPEAKER_01]: Then along comes James, wonderful handsome James, and Natalie thinks her luck has finally turned.
[SPEAKER_01]: Maybe he's the one for her.
[SPEAKER_01]: Maybe he's the one she's been waiting for all along.
[SPEAKER_01]: Maybe he won't wind up dead.
[SPEAKER_01]: But the harder Natalie tries to be a normal wife, the more world upending crews are brought to her door, leaving her unsure of who she really is, much less what she'll do, leaving her to question whether there is a monster within or a villain toying with her from the outside.
[SPEAKER_01]: What's the secret story behind Natalie's dead exes?
[SPEAKER_01]: Will she and James survive their marriage and do either of them deserve to?
[SPEAKER_01]: So near Dora, we love hearing debut authors journey to publication because there are so many different journeys to publication so I'd love to hear their first and then we're going to dive into the novel itself.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's a great question and I think my journey was perhaps unique to most because I work in publishing.
[SPEAKER_00]: So going out on submission was weird because I knew I was submitting first and foremost agent to I knew so I went out under a fake name and I also went out accidentally.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'd scheduled a bunch of emails to go out to agents in a few months time to get me to finish writing the book, because I was a popular director, a big day job, I needed some motivation, and then I got the Angela Feezer and a bunch of other things.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I forgot about it.
[SPEAKER_00]: I was very sick for a few months, until a few hours after the email said, oh god.
[SPEAKER_00]: but luckily words of the best.
[SPEAKER_00]: I wouldn't recommend this.
[SPEAKER_01]: I have never heard anyone go out on submission by accident.
[SPEAKER_01]: So this is like gold.
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay, so then what happened was the book done.
[SPEAKER_01]: It wasn't done and you'd gone out on submission.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was not done, but.
[SPEAKER_00]: Fortunately, I'm unfortunately the next day, the next morning I already had a few emails from agents saying, oh wait, I loved you know, because I had a few pages in an inquiry letter.
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, we loved it, can we see the whole thing?
[SPEAKER_00]: By the end of the Friday, I'd had 12 agents who'd asked for full.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I said, I'm so sorry.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't have that!
[SPEAKER_00]: I can send you all I have.
[SPEAKER_00]: So yeah, it was a little bit chaotic and unconventional, but I think because I knew how to pitch a book for my day job.
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, publishing crime killers was my jam.
[SPEAKER_00]: I love reading crime killers.
[SPEAKER_00]: I know sort of what makes me excited about a book and it's character and story.
[SPEAKER_00]: They're really interesting, emotional details.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I think that helped.
[SPEAKER_00]: Of course by the time I went out, I'm submission publishers.
[SPEAKER_00]: I had to give up the jig and say, this is who I am.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was a fun experience, if unusual.
[SPEAKER_01]: That is.
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, there's so much to impact this.
[SPEAKER_01]: So most people are dying for contacts in the industry.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, most debut authors are like, I just need to meet a writer who can perhaps mentor me or make friends with so and so so that I get an end so that I'm not going into the slush file.
[SPEAKER_01]: You had an end, but you used a fake name.
[SPEAKER_01]: Was that because of imposter syndrome because you wanted to know that it was good enough and that it wasn't just your position in publishing,
[SPEAKER_00]: That, you know what, great question.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think it was a little bit of both.
[SPEAKER_00]: There was definitely an element of, I don't want you to just say you want to represent me because you know, I'm someone in publishing and I know, and you know that I've got contacts.
[SPEAKER_00]: The retailers are XYZ, but I also had never shown this book to anyone, like no one had read it.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, and although I have a history of writing a little bit simple to myself, I haven't actually written any thrillers, so I don't know if it's any good.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was a little bit of a bit of a monster syndrome.
[SPEAKER_00]: which I think is creative.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's very easy to sit in and sometimes you're in a voice couldn't say you're not good enough.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is rubbish.
[SPEAKER_00]: Why bother with it?
[SPEAKER_00]: I think ways bother.
[SPEAKER_00]: Always boss.
[SPEAKER_00]: Easier said than done.
[SPEAKER_00]: So yeah, a little bit of both, but ultimately I'm glad that I did it this way because I could feel confident that people were responding to it responded because they genuinely liked the material.
[SPEAKER_00]: And it's a wild ride.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I think that helped.
[SPEAKER_00]: Wow.
[SPEAKER_01]: And okay, so then have any offers of representation did you get after all of these sort of requests for fools and you were like, okay, I don't really have it, this is what I have.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was 11 or 12.
[SPEAKER_00]: So all pretty much everyone except one.
[SPEAKER_01]: to actually yeah okay so all right so this is a great teachable moment because I think so many emerging authors are just so desperate for one person to say yes I mean I say in the podcast it just takes one yes but I don't mean go with your only yes you know it's like one yes can change your life but like if there's other yes or if that isn't the right yes doesn't mean you should take it so what did you said about going okay this is the person that I want to
[SPEAKER_00]: So it's interesting.
[SPEAKER_00]: Every agent is so different.
[SPEAKER_00]: I knew that I wanted someone who would be editorially hands on.
[SPEAKER_00]: There was some agents who said, this could benefit from just go out as it is tomorrow.
[SPEAKER_00]: And some agents who had much more control feedback and I'm someone who really loves
[SPEAKER_00]: need back.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's not always easy, but I know that it's helping me improve.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think particularly you know, I'd be going out to publishers with my own name.
[SPEAKER_00]: I really wanted to feel confident that I'd done all of that like hurt.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, someone who's editorial hands-on was very important and someone who I knew and this is my own business perspective here knew was good at getting people to prioritise their submissions because here's a little tidbit.
[SPEAKER_00]: As an editor, there are some agents who, if they send me submission, then a box of my inbox, I will drop everything and
[SPEAKER_00]: that doesn't happen with.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I think that was definitely also a factor, but I agree with you.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think sometimes when people get an author, it feels like, yes, absolutely, I'm just take this no questions asked.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I actually do think that having a bad agent or bad publisher is worse than having none at all, very privileged positions for me to be saying that right now.
[SPEAKER_00]: But you're not all agents, publishers are created equal.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think something that writers probably also don't know is that if you do get
[SPEAKER_00]: an offer of representation through, email all the other people you have your manuscript and say, by the way, even much before the stage of offer, if someone requests your full manuscript, say, hey, by the way, I've had one full request in, so when I was getting this activity going, I think I don't only had two requests for the full manuscript by the Friday morning, because I sent it out Thursday.
[SPEAKER_00]: end of day.
[SPEAKER_00]: I might be getting my timings to slide next up.
[SPEAKER_00]: But then I emailed everyone else and was like, hey, it's been a couple of hours.
[SPEAKER_00]: I've got two full requests in.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then when I had six, I would email and say, hey, it's now six.
[SPEAKER_00]: Hey, now it's 10.
[SPEAKER_00]: So that also helps build a bit of momentum.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't think that's only people know that you can do that, but it's a nice trick if you are getting bites to get people to prioritize and read.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because again, agents are inundated.
[SPEAKER_00]: They have so many more submissions coming through.
[SPEAKER_00]: And that's an answer.
[SPEAKER_00]: I feel like we have so many.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, it's in saying the level of submissions that agents get.
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay, so then once you went out on submission, did that happen quickly again because you picked an agent who editors were going to prioritize what did that process look like for you?
[SPEAKER_00]: So I still had to write the second half of the book and I need that I want to do that it's possible to go out and submission with a partial.
[SPEAKER_00]: It does make your life much more difficult because a lot of publishers are like, well we don't know how it's going to land a bit of tea strategically sometimes an agent might know the second bit of the book because this is very rare and it's very naughty but there was a case of an agent setting something out as upon a partial
[SPEAKER_01]: at any style of ballad goal.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: I probably should have spiced all of that.
[SPEAKER_01]: Listen, I'm going to style ballad goal, but it's like really smart of that agent because agents are wanting to get the author, the most amount of money, the most amount of whatever.
[SPEAKER_01]: And also, and it is a can work with an author to fix up the second part of the book.
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, maybe it's more work than what they were signing up.
[SPEAKER_01]: For, but it is fixable.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's true.
[SPEAKER_00]: So it can happen.
[SPEAKER_00]: It can happen that you can go on a passion and get a great deal.
[SPEAKER_00]: But for me, I know that most editors and my publishers are like, we want to see the full thing.
[SPEAKER_00]: So you're immediately narrowing the number of people who are going to offer, you know, you're immediately taking people out for counts.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yes, that was a couple of weeks away for Christmas was most of the right, which again I wouldn't necessarily recommend, but it was really fun giving myself some intensive time to read, just focus on the story and what I want to do with these characters I had my outline already.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think probably also why I finished this book, I have a lot of half-inish manuscripts that I'd never plot it one out before.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, if you're struggling.
[SPEAKER_00]: It might help.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's not for everyone.
[SPEAKER_00]: I know some fantastic real writers who are pantsers and they've got so many twists in their book that feels so cleverly free-meditated, but their brain is just magic at doing them.
[SPEAKER_00]: Anyway, I'm going off on a tangent.
[SPEAKER_00]: I have a tangent.
[SPEAKER_00]: I love a tangent, God bless me.
[SPEAKER_00]: To answer your question.
[SPEAKER_00]: After I finished writing it, it had been a few months.
[SPEAKER_00]: I wanted to wait and send it out around London book that.
[SPEAKER_00]: So in the UK, that's our biggest corporate professional publishing event.
[SPEAKER_00]: So a lot of books I get sent out around that time.
[SPEAKER_00]: guess a great international rights deal.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's lots of buzz.
[SPEAKER_00]: You get lots of wonderful stories, sky everyone from across the world.
[SPEAKER_00]: You've come in from foreign publishers and I'm going to forget all the different things that people do in public shake.
[SPEAKER_00]: But it's a great moment if you think it's going to be buzzy.
[SPEAKER_00]: So yeah, we ended up waiting until then.
[SPEAKER_00]: I can't remember what the equivalent is in the US.
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, I think the US equivalent is the London book fair.
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, yeah, thanks for the London.
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, I know that they get all buzzed about that as well.
[SPEAKER_01]: So, so were they more than, like, was they more than one publisher interested?
[SPEAKER_01]: How did that end up looking eventually?
[SPEAKER_00]: So, in the UK, my editor preempted it overnight.
[SPEAKER_00]: And thank God, because I don't think my desk could have taken it.
[SPEAKER_00]: So that meant,
[SPEAKER_00]: My agent sent out, you know, late on the Thursday and then on Friday morning, he'd said, here's a figure.
[SPEAKER_00]: Great.
[SPEAKER_00]: You've got a plummet day to take it or it's off the table.
[SPEAKER_00]: So there's a little bit of negotiating, but we ended up accepting it that same day.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm always an or if people who couldn't do that.
[SPEAKER_00]: I very rarely preempted things when I was, well, okay, well, I'm not so much that's a lie.
[SPEAKER_00]: I did sometimes video everything's actually Geneva Rose when I acquired
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, if somebody sees something and they know they wanted and you know, then amazing.
[SPEAKER_01]: And it is because I've had books up before for like six or seven months on submission.
[SPEAKER_01]: And in that time, you maybe get like two rejections.
[SPEAKER_01]: And it's gone out to 20 editors and you're like, oh my God, for six months, you're vomiting blood.
[SPEAKER_01]: And then you finally get the, you know, the thing that you need.
[SPEAKER_01]: But yeah, it is.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's very, very stressful.
[SPEAKER_00]: it's very stressful.
[SPEAKER_00]: What I do quite enjoy, which was we've been seeing a little bit more than something that had been out on submission phrases.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then suddenly there's like a four-way auction for it, which is quite fun.
[SPEAKER_00]: I know it doesn't happen all the time.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's great.
[SPEAKER_00]: In the US, it said it was slightly different.
[SPEAKER_00]: My US agent went out to add just some select editors and then there was an auction for it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you to all of these teachers who read for it.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was very exciting, the sort of dizzying, a dizzying experience for me, but it was great because I got to then talk to different teams, and then they're about people's different visions of the book.
[SPEAKER_00]: And again, the editorial wasn't important to me.
[SPEAKER_00]: I wanted someone who was willing to get in the weeds for the edits in my art that is fantastic.
[SPEAKER_00]: And she works very well with Joel, who's my UK editor, I say.
[SPEAKER_01]: amazing.
[SPEAKER_01]: And again, like a teaching moment for our listeners is that, you know, a lot of writers just want the book to sell as it is.
[SPEAKER_01]: And they're going to go with the agent who goes this doesn't actually need any work.
[SPEAKER_01]: Because by then you've probably been working on it for years and you're just like to the love of all that is there.
[SPEAKER_01]: Somebody take it.
[SPEAKER_01]: Just leave it.
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't want to work on it anymore.
[SPEAKER_01]: But honestly, I am always suspicious of that kind of an offer where it's just perfect
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't know about you, Leodoro.
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, you, I guess, are going to start doing readings in public, but I still edit my books.
[SPEAKER_01]: Years after the fact, when I'm doing a reading in public, I'm like, why did I use that country phrasing?
[SPEAKER_01]: That's terrible.
[SPEAKER_01]: This could have been better.
[SPEAKER_01]: Why did I get the character to say this?
[SPEAKER_01]: And so, even the best box can still be elevated to a certain degree, whether it's 10, 20 percent.
[SPEAKER_01]: So, you know, trying not to fall into the trap of, okay, I don't need to do any more work on this, and rather be like, what else can I do to really, really make this stick up?
[SPEAKER_00]: It's really a good advice.
[SPEAKER_00]: I actually also have to say, I think most of the books that I've published have been the most successful, other ones that we've done, the most editorial work on.
[SPEAKER_00]: So it can sometimes feel daunting, because ultimately your manuscript is a kind of baby.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so someone's suggesting that your baby changes, I think it can feel like, oh my god, how help you.
[SPEAKER_00]: Please, my baby's perfect.
[SPEAKER_00]: And in many ways, you know, it is for you.
[SPEAKER_00]: But there are always going to be ways to make a story, strengthen a story, and to help it sort of the message carry to readers in a more clear, compelling.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, gripping away, so.
[SPEAKER_01]: Great, I mean, even like big bucks, like I remember speaking to Hailey Reed for such a fun age and Sally Kim, who was a editor and apparently like they went over those opening chapters over and over again.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so people go, oh, Hailey Reed, they're updated so well and so they think the book was just perfect.
[SPEAKER_01]: But like, you know, they had to go over those opening chapters quite a bit to get it to the point where it was so amazing.
[SPEAKER_01]: So, okay, this is a hugely ambitious debut.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, it was someone who wasn't an editor would be like, wow, you have got multiple POVs.
[SPEAKER_01]: You've got a then and now structure, which means like multiple timelines, which is a lot of juggling.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's difficult to pull off as a debut.
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, was it a case of you just had all this experience with it?
[SPEAKER_01]: So it was like, I know exactly what I'm doing or was it like, I'm just going to dive in and see how the hell this goes.
[SPEAKER_00]: good question.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think interestingly when it came to writing, I almost had to switch off my edit to brain.
[SPEAKER_00]: As soon as you were thinking about the reception, the book is going to get a kill.
[SPEAKER_00]: It kills you.
[SPEAKER_00]: You're a bit of teacher writing anything.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I had to kind of just pretend that no one was going to read it.
[SPEAKER_00]: and let it flow.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think I definitely end up doing things that I've probably was just probably would have usually said, hey, let's maybe avoid doing this.
[SPEAKER_00]: As an editor, which is quite funny because quite a few of my authors have now read it and they've opened so phenomenally kind of, but they like you told me not to do this and now you're doing it.
[SPEAKER_00]: I thought they might, I pre-warned them.
[SPEAKER_00]: I said, hey, those things I might have warned again, I definitely don't in place, so that you can come beyond.
[SPEAKER_01]: But again, like, in one book, it's not going to work.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, for example, we often say on the podcast,
[SPEAKER_01]: Don't introduce a POV character far into the book like this, but it's going to be a POV character.
[SPEAKER_01]: I have it like, only on the read it gets used to it, and some stories you can do that.
[SPEAKER_01]: Others stories you can't, there is a point at which their character becomes POV in the story, and that's in a particular book where it needs to be.
[SPEAKER_01]: So again, the book teaches you what it needs.
[SPEAKER_00]: it's very true.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I always say this to, well, all of my authors, whenever it comes to edits or the rules of writing or the rules of what makes a good story, sure, like listen to it, but you don't take on 100% and you need to have the authenticity of your own voice.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, yes, listen, yes, collaborate, but ultimately make a decision about what's right for you.
[SPEAKER_00]: Don't take in 100% of edits.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think otherwise, it's not your own story.
[SPEAKER_00]: That makes any sense.
[SPEAKER_01]: No, it is.
[SPEAKER_01]: I was trying to please everyone all the time means it becomes, you know, just generic as opposed to whatever vision you had for it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Very, very true, very true.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, okay.
[SPEAKER_01]: So, I mean, yeah, so for our listeners who are writing multi peer voice stories, multi timeline stories, this is, you know, an excellent examination of the pacing with that when to go back into the past, because a lot of the time,
[SPEAKER_01]: Jewel, I have to go dual, Leodoro, because Americans always think I'm going dual with the J, J, E, W, E, L, and I've got the emails saying, what is the dual timeline narrative?
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm like, well, it's diamonds and rubies.
[SPEAKER_01]: So, deal, yeah, dual.
[SPEAKER_01]: the new timeline narrative because often when you go back into the past, it can slow down the pacing because you feel like you can drag back to the past.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: Because the writers gain weight rate rate before you understand this, you need to know this.
[SPEAKER_01]: But this book showed perfectly how a past timeline narrative
[SPEAKER_01]: can actually up the tension of the present day narrative.
[SPEAKER_01]: So were you figuring that out when you were outlining, when you were plotting, when you're going, okay, at this point, this has to go back in the past, this has got to be in the present, et cetera, or was it again sort of feeling your way intuitively through the story?
[SPEAKER_00]: A little bit of both, which I guess is a
[SPEAKER_00]: To an extent, I wanted to make sure that there was a good rhythm there.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I originally had quite a rigid structure, but by the time I got quite way into the writing, so I need to pause the end and certainly in the edits, things took on a bit of a life of their own.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think when it came to the past chapters and when we're zipping back, it's always about the stakes both literal and emotional to me.
[SPEAKER_00]: And
[SPEAKER_00]: It was really important to me that those scenes, even though they've already happened and you kind of already know where they're going, that there was still a sense of something emotionally or physically at stake, which I guess is why they're interesting.
[SPEAKER_00]: We're also learning so much more about our protagonist through them.
[SPEAKER_00]: So even though we're looking back into windows at the past, it's telling us more about our present.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think there was, I tried to keep myself reasonably limited with my character count on those chapters too, because ultimately they are a bit more emotional than I don't know if this person is going to survive for the week.
[SPEAKER_00]: Which is offered what's happening in a more, in a different, in a different, in a different kind of threat I guess.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, so long-winded answer, but ultimately I found my way, I found my way with
[SPEAKER_01]: No, I love that.
[SPEAKER_01]: And as well, I think this kind of structure serves a story where there are multiple inciting incidents.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think what a lot of right to struggle with is that the inciting incident.
[SPEAKER_01]: If you think of the characters' misbeliefs, the first wound is in their past.
[SPEAKER_01]: But then they're starting the story in the prison day and so you need to inciting incidents.
[SPEAKER_01]: like why is the story opening now where it is on this particular day and then you go back into the past what was the inciting incident that you begin there in the past so it's like you know it's got to hit all of those beats.
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean you said it perfectly.
[SPEAKER_00]: I suppose when I was thinking about the present day story a lot of what I wanted to do was it's figuring out you know how they
[SPEAKER_00]: it.
[SPEAKER_00]: I guess it was kind of James finding the letters, although you don't necessarily see that on the page, whereas in the past it's this first death that happens and what it makes a feel about herself and what it makes us feel like she's capable of.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was really fun exploring those in two different two different places that were asked.
[SPEAKER_00]: They were crossing the streams.
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, and it also shows like the braiding of past and present because who a character is in the present is so much dependent on what they've been through in the past in terms of what they believe about themselves, the things that they were told in their childhood or even like.
[SPEAKER_01]: teenagers or as, you know, they were growing up.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so, those two are constantly in conversation with each other.
[SPEAKER_00]: It must be so.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think when it came to writing this story, you know, a massive question to me is, you know, what would drive all women to feel this level of rage or this much violence?
[SPEAKER_00]: So it was absolutely about then looking at
[SPEAKER_00]: what someone's charting might look like, what someone's previous relationships might look like.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think relationships full-stop always really interesting to me, I think you read it in the copy, everyone knows what it's like to matter a partner.
[SPEAKER_00]: So that's something that makes people have a familiarity with, but ultimately relationships massively different in terms of dynamic depending on the identities of people in the relationship, differences in class, well, race, massively shift.
[SPEAKER_00]: didn't have power and then what happens when the power suddenly goes tangibly unequal, what does that do to a person when they realise that they don't have quite the same setting, what dangers that create, what conflict does that create?
[SPEAKER_00]: I loved it.
[SPEAKER_01]: How are the dynamics are amazing in a story and yeah there was just there was so much to to love here something that I want to chat about as well is writing the so-called unreliable narrator and I wonder if there is a reliable narrator like I don't know I feel like any first personal or anything it was a third or first like someone will think they really self-aware but there will be areas of their life that they're not self-aware but
[SPEAKER_01]: We, and I don't want to give anything away.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's difficult to say.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I've got to discuss with that giving things away, but like, what a character believes about themselves and about their past, even if it's not true.
[SPEAKER_01]: Can we speak a bit about that in terms of, because you are, you as the writer are keeping secrets.
[SPEAKER_01]: you're keeping secrets from the reader and you are keeping secrets from your main characters well, like you know things Natalie doesn't know.
[SPEAKER_01]: So how do you sort of balance that out as you're writing that the calibration of the two?
[SPEAKER_00]: It's difficult.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think I'm so hyper-aware again because of my job of just how much people who love this kind of fiction, sort of suspense, psychological fiction, thrillers, how much they read.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's really difficult to press readers in this area of the market.
[SPEAKER_00]: So when it came to the reveals, I knew that there was a challenge there.
[SPEAKER_00]: How do I do something that feels fresh and new?
[SPEAKER_00]: But just taking out the pure, hey, this is the prize of it.
[SPEAKER_00]: It came even more important to me to think
[SPEAKER_00]: The emotional residents of something that was going to be revealed as it were.
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, we kind of have to care about the characters in order for people to care about whatever is whatever which ever twist or whatever reveal comes to the floor.
[SPEAKER_00]: So that's why I ended up spending a lot of my time with Natalie with James with the various characters in the novel who might do things that we don't necessarily agree with.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's how can we still get to understand them so that when something happens to them that size make or when they learn
[SPEAKER_00]: It's just, we don't agree with that.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's difficult because you're making them relatable and you're giving them something vulnerable that the reader can connect with, even if you maybe think they're not a good person or diabolical, but you're still invested somehow in the story.
[SPEAKER_01]: And something that I loved about this as well is how I, as a reader, was actually
[SPEAKER_01]: to be participating in the story because I had constant theories and I feel like you've got the readers soon as they're coming up with theories and there was like one plot point that I was like oh I definitely know how this is going to end and then that happens and I'm feeling very smart and I was like yeah I figured that out and then boom you hit with something that you would not at all expect it.
[SPEAKER_01]: So again it's that calibration of getting the reader interested getting them to guess but still surprising them.
[SPEAKER_00]: Hmm, that, I think I know exactly the twist that you're talking about, as well, it's sort of the midpoint twist.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I didn't really, I didn't really intend it for it to feel like a massive twist.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was almost a way of roughing, as you say, the reader.
[SPEAKER_00]: Who knows what happens if in these stories and get people into a comfort zone before the seven other things I just like it I mean Right is like magicians right we're going look over here.
[SPEAKER_01]: Look over here and we're waving something shiny off to the side while we're doing this, you know, it's light of hand
[SPEAKER_01]: that we hoping the reader doesn't notice.
[SPEAKER_00]: But ultimately, I just wanted to make sure it's still whatever was revealed.
[SPEAKER_00]: If someone goes back and reads it, it didn't feel like it was a trick.
[SPEAKER_00]: I don't know about you, I hate reading something.
[SPEAKER_00]: And they're like, this is the massive reveal.
[SPEAKER_00]: You're like, well, you've kind of lied to me.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_00]: You've not just mist-directed, you're actively set this up in a way that I couldn't guess that.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's one out of it, because it's fun trying to guess.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, and then suddenly like, oh, there's no way I could have guessed that.
[SPEAKER_00]: Then, yeah, I, I certainly feel cheated as a reader.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I want to avoid that.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think hopefully, with all the reveals here, when you go back and read, if anyone wants to, I don't, I don't reread things very often.
[SPEAKER_00]: But there are some fun and easter eggs that I hope people are like, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh,
[SPEAKER_00]: it.
[SPEAKER_01]: And it feels like a pale, you know, when you alluded to something and we call it on the podcast curiosity seeds.
[SPEAKER_01]: And then like a little things, you know, Easter eggs, curiosity seeds that you plant and the reader starts joining the dots so that when something happens later, it feels
[SPEAKER_01]: inevitable and it feels like a payoff as opposed to a trick like you say because when that happens the reader's just annoyed and it's just like okay you've been messing with me and there was no way I could have figured this out anyway but it is rewarding to read it to go out of his paying attention and I picked up on this and this and then ooh this is the payoff for that.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yes that's exactly it.
[SPEAKER_00]: We're not supposed to satisfy.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's like solving a really great
[SPEAKER_01]: See you there, Keith.
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, God.
[SPEAKER_01]: And as well, like you can, the great thing with that is you can go back and put those clues in.
[SPEAKER_01]: As you figure out the story, you can go back, plant them even if that wasn't what you were intending.
[SPEAKER_01]: Because sometimes a twist will kind of happen organically and it's not something you plotted.
[SPEAKER_01]: And you're just like, oh my goodness, that's really good.
[SPEAKER_01]: But then you have to go back and sort of reverse engineer earlier stuff so that that does end up feeling like a pale.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think interestingly with the X in particular,
[SPEAKER_00]: Most of the twists didn't change.
[SPEAKER_00]: I might have taken out some.
[SPEAKER_00]: So at the point of starting to write it, I was already trying to see things in.
[SPEAKER_00]: The midpoint twist that I think we were talking about earlier is the only one that very seismically changed actually and I had to then go back and slightly rewrite and ask these chapters for reasons I won't.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's clear.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: It won't just show us how a work is an evolution, you know, even if you outline, even if you plot very tightly, it is an evolution and you're going to get to some point where it's like, okay, I need to go back and this needs to become more clear.
[SPEAKER_00]: I will say it's a bit of general advice to writers because sometimes writers say to me, you know, this thing is trending, I should just write that.
[SPEAKER_00]: And my first question is, well, do you enjoy that kind of thing?
[SPEAKER_00]: Because ultimately you are going to have to go back, like the dream scenario happens.
[SPEAKER_00]: You've got an amazing agent, amazing publishing deal.
[SPEAKER_00]: You're going to go back and back books, so many types.
[SPEAKER_00]: And if you don't genuinely love it,
[SPEAKER_00]: to let yourself wrenching your teeth out.
[SPEAKER_01]: So, and even if you do love it, even if you do love it, you end up hating it and you just take it away, but yeah, I agree with you.
[SPEAKER_01]: You really do have to love it to spend that much time with it.
[SPEAKER_01]: They're adorable.
[SPEAKER_01]: We at the end of our time are not quite sure how that happened.
[SPEAKER_01]: I still had tons of questions, but thank you was having.
[SPEAKER_01]: Thank you so much.
[SPEAKER_01]: Joining us for our supporters again, I'm holding up the book, The Exes.
[SPEAKER_01]: If you will link to it on our bookshop.org affiliate page.
[SPEAKER_01]: If you get it, you support an independent bookstore and the podcast at the same time.
[SPEAKER_01]: And Leadora, we wish you much success with that.
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you so much.
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you so much for having me.
[SPEAKER_00]: I was really excited to come on.
[SPEAKER_00]: I was listening to you guys.
[SPEAKER_00]: You've had so many fantastic people always that I hope I do.
[SPEAKER_00]: And it wasn't too much.
[SPEAKER_01]: So now we've had another fantastic guest on.
[SPEAKER_01]: So thank you.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was been a delight.
[SPEAKER_01]: And that's it for today's episode.
[SPEAKER_01]: I hope you'll join us for next week's show.
[SPEAKER_01]: In the meantime, keep at it.
[SPEAKER_01]: Remember, it just takes one yes.