Bestselling teen and adult fiction author Holly Bourne on how she wrote her first book while commuting to work, overcoming imposter syndrome, and the importance of diving into our darker thoughts to create good fiction.
There is something about Holly. If you look through the online reviews you’ll see comments like _‘there were times I felt Holly had climbed into my head’ and ‘I cried so much reading this_’. Her writing has the gift to connect to the reader – we explore this in the interview from her first book written on a 45 min commute, to overcoming imposter syndrome, why she thinks a writer should spend only 33% of their time writing and how writing fiction is the act of destroying the perfect idea you have in your head. Holly also talks us through her ideation process, how she uses psychology to get into her characters’ heads and her approach to marketing her work.
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Holly Bourne has written 12 books over 7 years. She started her writing career as a news journalist, but after working with young people, was inspired to write teen fiction and won awards for her best-selling, award-winning ‘Spinster Club’ series. When she turned thirty, Holly wrote her first adult novel, How Do You Like Me Now about the intensified pressures on women once they hit that landmark. Her latest book Pretending has garnered praise from book reviewers, bloggers and authors Marian Keyes, and Dolly Alderton. Four of her books have now been optioned for film and TV.
Alongside her writing, Holly has a keen interest in women’s rights and is an advocate for reducing the stigma of mental health problems. She is an ambassador for Women's Aid and their Love Respect campaign, educating young people about healthy relationships.
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SHOW NOTES
[02:18] Holly talks about her writing process and her coping mechanisms during lockdown
[04:23] How to be kind to yourself while writing in lockdown
[06:20] Having a hobby and doing other things apart from writing
[09:49] Holly’s journey from having a full-time job to becoming an author, and how she wrote her first book while commuting to work.
[13:18] How to overcome your imposter syndrome
[17:08] Why you should only spend 33% of your time writing
[18:37] Why the first draft is just like digging up a fossil
[20:02] How psychology helps in Holly’s writing
[22:36] How writing fiction is the act of destroying a perfect idea in your head
[24:43] Holly’s writing process, the need to have the first line, and doing extensive research before the actual writing
[29:56] On being authentic with yourself and asking the hard questions
[34:55] Holly talks about marketing her writing and doing promotions
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QUOTES BY HOLLY
“Writing fiction is the act of destroying a perfect idea in your head…lots of people in this room have had that moment where they have this idea for a story or a character or a poem, screenplay, and they're so excited, and the temptation is to just leave it at that as this perfect unformed... once you start writing, it will never live up to the hype in your head. And then you might get a different idea or you might get bored of it, or you start having plot problems or characters...So it’s accepting the fact that you're going to completely ruin the best idea you ever had. But if you were that excited to begin with—if you were just buzzing when that idea land is, you've got to know that in the translation from head to work, there'll be enough of that. There will. You won't ever be able to get a hundred per cent, there'll be enough, and you cannot mend the blank page.”
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SELECTED LINKS FROM THE EPISODE
Connect with Holly Bourne
Twitter: @holly_bourneYA
Instagram: @hollybourneya
Facebook: Holly.BourneYA
The Science of Storytelling by Will Storr
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CREDITS
Production by Victoria Spooner. Artwork by Emma Winterschladen
Matt: Hello, and welcome to season one of the London writers salon podcast. I'm Matt.
Parul: And I'm Parul. And each week we sit down with a writer that we admire to talk about the craft of writing and the arts of building a successful and sustainable writing career.
Matt: These interviews are recorded live with our global writing community. If you would like to join us for the next recording or write with us at our daily Writers' Hour writing sessions, head to londonwriterssalon.com for more information.
Parul: In this episode, we interview writer, Holly Bourne. Holly has written 12 books over seven years. Some of her popular books include The Spinster Club, a series for teens and for adults. Her recent books include How Do You Like Me Now? and Pretending. Both of which explore themes of love, friendship, and confidence. There's something about Holly. If you look through the online reviews, you'll see comments like, "There were times I felt Holly had climbed into my head and I cried so much reading." Her writing has the gift to connect to the reader and that's something we explore in our interview.
Matt: In this conversation, we also learned from Holly how she wrote her first book while commuting to work, how she overcomes imposter syndrome by working hard and why a writer should spend only 33% of their time writing. We'll have to find out what the other 67% is.
We talk about why the first draft is like digging up a fossil and how writing fiction is the act of destroying the perfect idea you have in your head. Holly also talks us through her ideation process, how she uses psychology to get into her characters' heads and her approach to marketing her writing
Parul: And, you know, for all her success, Holly is humble and open about the journey that led her to where she is today. Without further ado, we hope you enjoy our conversation with Holly Bourne.
First question, which is a very real topic, which is where we are right now in this strange Corona lockdown time. I'd love to hear a little bit about how you are coping at the moment? How are you writing? How are you motivating yourself and staying sane in these uncertain times?
Holly: I feel like there’s huge pressure to inspire everybody in the room, but then I've made my career on telling the truth and the truth is I have not done very well out of this lockdown. Creatively, it has caused some blockages for sure. And which is odd because I used to be a news journalist and I've always put my kind of high levels of productivity down to VAT training. You can't wait for them. You just show up. If you've got a daily deadline, which is having to write and write and then—so that's the way it's prepared me.
But yeah, the lockdown has slowed me and I'm trying to be kind to myself about that. And then just trying to be like cognitive load wise. There's a lot going on here. I'm living through history. We all are. We're sitting here digitally because none of us can leave our houses. The news is terrible. Our prime minister is in intensive care.
And so I'm just trying to be kind to myself about the fact that creativity is not coming naturally. However, I've tried to do at least one thing a day. That is helping even if it's just half a page. I've set myself like a bare minimum, which is like the barest…where I'm like, okay, if I achieve that, that's something considering the world outside is terrifying.
And so I've scraped through my bare minimum and some days it goes up and some days I am just going, “Okay. Off the page. That will do.” Be kind to ourselves, I think. People who want to use this time to write and have all that—is amazing. But if you're already struggling too, and feeling really annoyed because you're going, “I'll never have this time again. I don't have to commute. I don't have to do this, I don’t have to do that. I don’t have to socialize. I should be writing the great American novel, the great British novel.” Don't beat yourself up. I wrote almost all my books on a commute train [while] working full-time, you know. You can forgive yourself if you do not use the world ending to its full potential creatively.
Matt: So you mentioned being kind to yourself in addition to giving yourself a low bar to hit every day. What else are you doing to be kind to yourself?
Holly: In this kind of lockdown time?
Matt: Yeah.
Holly: I was telling you just before we logged in, I've actually had corona for the past two weeks, so I've been fighting that. And so that just requires a lot of sleep. In my case, I've been lucky to have it mildly. Like, wash your hands. You don't want this, guys. It's not—I really thought I was going to be one of the smug people who jog and is vegan and it'd be fine. And then the virus is like, I don’t give a shit that you're a vegan. I'm going to make you sick.
So I've just been sleeping a lot, reading books I really love. Just really plot-driven books, which just aren't too challenging in that kind of content. So I've been reading Marian Keyes’s new book, Grown Ups, and that's just been like vanishing into a hug that just ups my reading.
And one of the things I always get in terms of writing advice is if you want to be a writer, you should be reading as much as you're writing. And if you're actually struggling to write at the moment, just up your reading because that is going to help your writing so much. And so I've just been kind of going, okay, you're struggling with writing. So just read books of people that you love, who you admire because, through osmosis, you'll be absorbing their craft into you a little bit like that evil person in the Heroes TV show. I truly believe that you know, you absorb the best bits of the writers that you like by reading. So yeah. I've just been kind of reminding myself of my own advice, which is reading is just as good for your writing as writing is. Ah, that's beautiful.
Matt: Thanks, Holly. So you're an accomplished author. Even if you are having a hard time putting words on the page right now, I was listening to a podcast with you and you mentioned that you were taking evening counselling courses to be a trained counsellor. Is that still something you're doing or that you were doing?
And if so, I guess I was curious—that choice because you’re an accomplished author, but you're training to be a counsellor. I was just curious, where does that fit within your journey as an author?
Holly: I spent five years alongside doing my YA fiction. It's just what I started writing, working for a youth charity and helping people which required going into some training courses, understanding a lot about psychology and mental health problems. Stuff which informs my writing without meaning to it.
It wasn't like I was just helping a charity to like drain or use it for content. I wanted to help people and writing was always my hobby. And I took five years of working full-time and writing full-time before I can make the jump to become a full-time author. I found that I missed having a hobby. It's odd when your passion and your hobby, which is writing, becomes your job.
You feel like the luckiest person in the world, but it can sort of, you know, take the edge off the joy and also your writing. And I'm sure lots of people in the room would feel this too. Writing has always been my identity. I write, I'm a writer, but then when that's linked to how you make your rent, you get book sales doing well, or not doing well. And there was just a lot of noise. And I was like—realized I needed something else. Like I needed more identity. And so I've kind of swapped from helping people as a job to writing. I love my job. I love writing, but there's something missing. And so I've started to train to be a counsellor, which takes a very long time. And it's very hard, but oh my, if you want to be a writer, reading any book about psychotherapy, psychology is just—in terms of character and understanding why anyone that you are writing about—why they behave the way they do, what their flaws are.
I didn't mean it to help my writing. I was doing it because it interests me and I want to help people, but it's just been the best training. I'd like to tell anyone. So do like a level two evening class in psychology if they want to help their writing because it'll just make your characterization just on another level.
Parul: And that really makes sense because I was saying to Matt earlier that one of the things about your writing—because I read a lot and there are characters that I like in other books, but with your characters, there's a nuance. You get insight that I haven't seen elsewhere. And I find—I'm like, how does…how did she do it?
And now it's pretty interesting to hear that actually, you really are delving quite deep into people's psychology and that's how you're bringing it out.
Holly: There’s a really good book that I can recommend. I'm sure lots of you have read it already, but it's called The Science of Storytelling by Will Storr. Have you guys read it?
Matt: I've read it and I've recommended it to anyone. It's beautiful. Yeah. It's amazing.
Holly: He basically comes at how to write a novel from the perspective of the science of neurochemistry and psychology. It's just brilliant. And when I read that book, which I only read a year ago because it's quite new, I understood my own craft more.
I was like, oh okay this is what I've been doing. I didn't realize that was what I was doing because I love to lose time…scrappy writer. That's what I feel like. I'm always like, “Just tell stories and hope for the best.” And haven't been classically trained in how to be a novelist, but it's understanding people, and being really interested in what makes a person tick, what’s the difference between their inner self [and] outer self, the ideal self, the perceived self. All that mess that goes in that boils under all of our skin. That's where the story is coming from.
Matt: For a moment, you touched on that you were working full time for five years while you were writing. And it was only after those five years that you transitioned to an author full-time and I guess because a lot of writers might be in that place that you were, where you were working full time and writing on the side, I was curious, what did that look like for you? What was your writing schedule, your work schedule? You mentioned writing on the tube or on the commute. Is that when you wrote, or can you tell us a little bit about that time for you?
Holly: My first five YA books…around a full-time job when I was commuting in London because charity work doesn't pay well. So I couldn't afford to live in London. So I had to get on this miserable train, but like lots of commuters, I worked out where to stand, where the doors open, where I might get to see all like all that kind of, you know, elbows out and have my teeny tiny little laptop. And this was before smartphones so you didn't have the internet to distract you on your phone, but I would say now, if anyone has a commute that—where they can sit with…writing, like put it on airplane mode, because I did just a 42 minutes [travel] from where I lived to London Bridge and then 42 minutes on the way home. And I just went—just do it. This is the only time you have all day. You'll be knackered by the time you get home from work. Just do it now. Don't worry about it being rubbish. Don’t worry about how dreadful it is. Just get it done. Like you can't mend a blank page and so I would just keep going. It's amazing what you can achieve in a commute. Like I write five books on the commute, 42 minutes each way, every day. If I was being—treating myself, I wouldn't write on the way home. I'll say, oh, I'm just going to stare out the window.
It's a treat. I think anyone who wants to be a writer for a living, which I'm sure is a lot of people in this room. And it's amazing and I highly recommend it. [I] really believe that anyone in this room can get there, but it's a slow journey. And one of the things my agent always said when I got my first deal, she was like, “You will not even be able to think about giving up your job until at least books four or five. People, I think, are waiting for this luxury ticket. But for most offers like myself, like my first advance, I couldn't have lived off that. It wasn't life-changing money. It wasn't even a yearly salary. It was nice, But I was so excited, you know. I had to financially keep going, but you build a readership and you build and build and build. And that's what you want anyway. You don't want to just write one book that [sold]. You want to build a readership.
Parul: You've done that. You've built a brand like—almost like a brand. If someone says Holly Bourne to one of your fans, say a latest book is coming out, they'll want to buy it. And I want to buy everything you write now because I'm addicted to them and that's what you've managed to achieve.
Holly: Okay. But that's an—how old am I now? That is 10 years in the making, like getting to that point. You saying something that wonderful to me just makes my belly just like, oh. It was a decade and for half of that, I was sitting in my office loving my day job, but, you know, thinking this isn't what I want to do. I want this, I want this. But it's patience. Patience and just getting the words on the page. Yeah, write them, write them now.
Matt: Five years to overnight success.
Holly: Five years is just to like, be able to manage living full time. I didn't have a five-year—yeah, you still worry if you're a Creative for a living like, “Are people going to let me do this forever?” That’s a big ask. To be constantly terrified as well….I don't think the fear ever goes away and that imposter syndrome. I have that all the time. I'm always like, “Why are these people turned up listening to me? I didn't know what I'm doing.” This is just all, I believe that every writer that I admire has that. To me, the real work is overcoming that. And still going, shut up. I'm going to write anyway.
Parul: I have a question for you. I think that that's wonderful advice. I think it's really inspiring. I'm curious about your work as a journalist as well. We have a lot of people who come to our events who maybe dabble in both. What do you see as the difference? Have you chosen to only be a novelist? Would you ever go back to journalism? What do you see as the advantage or disadvantage?
Holly: I hated being a journalist, especially in news journals. I was at a newspaper for two years and I just didn't have the temperament to deal with that much misery every day. It's quite a cutthroat.
Well, you're kind of trying to race other people to stories against your rivals, all of this. I’m just not like that. I'm just very kind of an empath [and] want everyone to like me. And that just does not go down well, and I’m just crying in the box most of the time. I really believe in a free press, you know, telling the truth and getting to facts, especially in the world of fake news. Like I really believe that, but it just didn't fit my temperament. And to me, I love fiction because, to me—and this is an opinion—it’s not a truth. But to me, fiction is the most powerful way to change somebody's mind and the most powerful way to seed positive social change because it's an irreplicable act of immersive empathy—reading a piece of fiction. Because even if you're reading a news article about something terrible happening, or watching a TV show, there's that barrier still.
If you're in fiction, and especially I wrote a lot of first-person fiction, I always say when I go to talk to kids, I'm like reading is magical. Like you're looking at a dead bit of tree and vividly hallucinating like, it’s crazy. And you're actually in the head of somebody who doesn't exist and you're feeling their feelings as they feel them, and you're experiencing those experiences. The power of that—it's basically tripping your brains off. And then you can learn so much about the human experience and feel emotions that you never felt. And just to me, that's just where my heart is. Like, look how excited I am. Like, I love it so much.
So like that is the medium for me. That won't be the medium for everyone. People feel that way about poetry, screenplays. It's like, what makes your hearts sore where you just feel like I am on the earth to tell this type of story in this way. And it's finding your own creative, sweet spot for you, and knowing that you're the only person to tell this story in this way because you're you. And if you're getting all that zing, that means you should be telling that story. And it's finding it for you cause it's different for everyone.
Parul: That really speaks to me. I mean, I've looked through a lot of your feedback because I found it really interesting because the passion that came across from the reviews were so much more than I've seen elsewhere.
And this is one quote from someone who read your book and it's called Pretending: “I honestly wish every young woman could read this book before she enters a relationship. So she would know what healthy and unhealthy looks like before giving away her heart. This is the best book I've read in a very long time.” And I know you touched upon the psychology, you know, you really like to understand what makes people tick, but I wonder if there's anything else you can tell us about how you create these, the process behind creating the characters and the dialogue. Is it based on real life? Are you stealing conversations from your friends?
Holly: You know how a perfect victoria sponge recipes that we get like 33% butter, 33% flour, 33%—I feel like if you want to be an author, it's 33% writing, 33% reading and 33% living, getting out there, taking an evening class and counselling and speaking to somebody on the bus, putting yourself out of your comfort zone. And that's hard if you're a writer because my natural inclination is to just sit like Gollum in my room. I'd say, you know, I'm an introvert, most writers are, but it's like forcing myself out of that because you just need to osmosis life to get ideas and to meet people to maybe understand them [and] where characters can come from.
When I write characters that seem to really connect with people, I think hopefully it's because I just go out and [...] it myself as much as possible. But it's also, I think having to be honest with yourself. Obviously, you're drawn to tell particular stories based on the life that you've had, the things that have happened to you.
I think in order to write good fiction, you have to have a good grasp of yourself and not be scared to dive in there, to dive into the darker thoughts that you might have, the darker experiences you might have lived through. The hard conversations that you've had with your friends and family. And it's not like, “Write a hidden autobiography”, which you get—thrown at you a lot if you're a writer, especially if you're a female writer. It's if I have a thought that makes me uncomfortable, I don't push it away. I'm like, oh, where's that coming from? And I kind of spend some time trying to work out why I'm feeling jealous, why I'm feeling insecure, why I'm feeling angry and then, and dig in that, and then you start finding the fossils of the stories and which is what Stephen King says. [It’s] just like finding a fossil.
I said it's about being brave enough to kind of jump into the darker parts of the human experience even if you're writing a comedy because all of us have very complicated, quite dark lives. All of us have dysfunctional families. All of us have really had dysfunctional relationships. All of us feel hugely alone probably about 80% of our time. The human experience is hard. You have to not be scared to go in there, I believe, in order to be creative in a way that's going to really connect people. People want that to be seen, but it's hard. If I'm not terrified, then I think I'm writing crap. I know the good stuff is coming when I'm just going, “This is awful. What are people going to think of me if I write this?” When people get it—if I just feel sick, then I know it's a good page.
Parul: That makes sense. Yeah. You've written things that I didn't think I've had the courage to admit, even to myself.
Holly: Well, I don’t know. I've read a lot of psychology books and I had to have a lot of therapy when I was working for the charity. So I do think personal discovery really helps your creativity as well. And it's a really beneficial thing to do anyway, regardless if you want to write. Just like understanding yourself better is good for you anyway.
Matt: When you write, and obviously you've written a lot, that's resonated with so many people. Do you think about the reader when you're writing? Like who might be reading this? Is that something that goes through your head while you're writing? Or is it more in the editing phase or—
Holly: I'm sure again that most people in this room have read Stephen King's On Writing. And that to me is like my bible. I reread it at least once a year. He sort of said [that] initially the first draft is like you're telling the story to yourself. It is like a fossil you're just trying to dig up. And so I think when I'm in first draft land, to me, that's all about overcoming the fear that I think it's rubbish. Overcoming the boredom after the first 15,000 words where I'm like, “Oh, this is the best idea in the world. This is amazing.”
And after 15,000 words going, “No, this isn't actually very good and I'm sort of screwing up and I've got this. I have a great idea.” I actually think I used to be excited by this power on—it’s overcoming all those hurdles and trying to get that fossil out of your mind. And to me, that's telling the story to yourself and anyone, I read back the first draft and I'm like, why [did] this fossil arrived?
What is this story? What is it trying to say? What's it trying to—why did it come out of me? What's going on here? Who's it for? And that's in the editing process, but initially, I don't have a clue what I'm doing. Sorry. I wish I could, seriously. I just know that you don't know what you're doing until you finished writing if you write like me.
Matt: What you said, it just reminded me. There's another quote I wrote down that you said that sometimes you'll share with writers, [which] is to accept that writing a novel is all about ruining the perfect idea you had in your head. Is that kind of what you mean by that? Or can you tell us a little more?
Holly: I remember seeing it, I think it was like a meme on Twitter and it was like, what I think my book will be like and it's a picture of like The Last Supper. She was like, I want my book to turn out like it, and it's just a stick drawing—drawing a light Microsoft paint in like these stick figures there like, oh, that is true.
And I do believe that writing fiction is the act of destroying a perfect idea in your head. And I'm sure, as I said, lots of people in this room have had that moment where they have this idea for a story or a character or a poem, screenplay, and they're so excited, and the temptation is to just leave it at that as this perfect unformed—well when I get the time to write it, it's going to be amazing. It's going to be great because once you start writing, it will never live up to the hype in your head. And then you might get a different idea or you might get bored of it, or you start having plot problems or characters. You're like, “Oh, I don't know how I'm going to get this to work.”
So it’s accepting the fact that you're going to completely ruin the best idea you ever had. But if you were that excited to begin with—if you were just buzzing when that idea land is, you've got to know that in the translation from head to work, there'll be enough of that. There will. You won't ever be able to get a hundred per cent, there'll be enough, and you cannot mend the blank page.
I should say that over and over again when I go into schools. Just get it written, make it terrible, ruin it, but there will be enough of that initial joy and energy, and you can start finding it, but you can actually find it in this real place, the words on the paper that you made, the download that you created. But you cannot do that unless you screwed it up completely, to begin with.
Matt: I love that.
Parul: Yeah. So get it done. And that makes me think of—it makes me question the process you go through. So when you have an idea, you have a concept in your head and you're determined to write it. What time? How long do you allow yourself to write that? What does that process look like? Are you still doing two hours a day?
Holly: And again, this is so different depending on everyone. Yeah. It's like what works for me is definitely—will not work for everybody. I know some people who plan every chapter before they write, I'm always in awe of them and quite jealous of them. I'm like, “Oh, you’re a better writer than me. You’re so organized.”
To me, I have to have the first line, and I could tell you the first line of any of my books. Like you can test me. I'll be like, I know that. The first line is what always arrives. So if pretending the first line was “I hate men”, which is one of my favourites and it is technically hate speech, but it is the buildup to a joke. So I have to have the first line and then usually once I put the first line, the concept and what I want to write kind of rushes in, and I've got a very vague idea of what I want to explore and what I want to happen. I never know the ending. Then I research it. I research all the stuff. And I think having a journalistic background is very useful.
So I can kind of interview people, so if you’re pretending it's about somebody who survived a rape from previous a boyfriend that hasn't quite dealt with the trauma and now they're trying to find love kind of five years later, and they feel they have to hide this trauma in order to be romantically acceptable. So I had to, you know, research like, you know, read books about trauma, interview psychotherapists, then a lot of time interviewing survivors. Like all this stuff to just feed the idea and make sure that when it comes to actually getting to the first draft, I'm not losing the rhythm because I'm like, “Hang on. I don't know anything about PTSD. I should probably go and research that for three weeks and then get back to it.”
Because I feel like once I land in a first draft, I don't want to do anything apart from write. So I feed myself like a kind of glutton with much research also because I'm delaying starting. Cause it's terrifying starting a book. I'm like, “Oh, I don't want to ruin it. I'm going to ruin it the moment I start it.” So I'll just delay it with all this research and then like a helicopter, finally, I land like kind of fat with research and a very vague idea. And then I just go for it. And I have a daily word count. I do not let myself not meet that word count unless I'm very ill. So corona has been very useful. I'm like, “Yes, I have the killer virus. I don't have to write today.” But normally I do not let myself go to bed until I've hit the word count and I just keep going and going and going until I hit the end. And I do not read anything back.
Cause I know if I read it back, it’ll be dreadful and I'll hate it and I'll lose all of my confidence. And I just like, you know, it's dreadful. First drafts always are. Just don't look back. Keep going. And so then I just kind of get out and that's how I write. It's not very scientific.
Parul: Matt and I spoke to lots of different writers about their style, and we've definitely seen a lot of that. Everyone has a different style, but it is really interesting to see how you work. I mean, 12 books in seven years. It's interesting to see what sits behind that. There's definitely a work ethic that you have that I find very interesting.
Matt: I had a question around how you choose the next idea. I'm sure you have loads of ideas of what you could work on.
Holly: I wish, no. I don't know if you guys are the same, but like, my fear always is like, what if I never have another idea for anything ever again. But that is a fault that will flow into my brain at like 11:30, 2:00 PM when I was trying to sleep. And then I'm like, oh right now, I'm just going to be paralyzed with fear. And I don't know how you get ideas for books…
Parul: So you ask someone who has written one book for someone who's written 12 books. We talk about trading up problems, maybe the problem you have as a first-time writer versus when you're trying to think of your 13th, 14th, 15th, but maybe that's the problem that you trade up.
Holly: Yeah, I think it is, especially if you have like a brand author, like, you know—I like my readers to some degree to know what they’re getting. Because I know I get really pissy when artists that I love suddenly go off-piste and I'm like, “No, Taylor, go back to country.”
Parul: Have you heard of James Altucher? He talks about ideas like how to exercise the idea muscle. He talks about this concept of every day you just write down 10 ideas about any sort of concept, whether it's the ways in which a woman falls off a cliff or different ways a mobile phone cover could look. And then you—he just says the idea start mating with each other and generate more ideas. You should look it up. We can share the link. It’s his theory of how he never runs out of ideas.
Holly: I think—I always know I've got one because I suddenly just kind of get a bit excited and I've got to write it down. And then it's usually when I'm on a long walk or on a long car drive the day or two after I've got really upset about something. Basically, I think if you've had an emotional response to being alive when that—you kind of don't just shake off. You just really have a motive. Usually, there's something there. All of my books have come from some sort of, probably negative emotion. And then I've kind of erupted and got upset and not quite understood why. And then I've left myself chill out and ruminate on it.
And again, being brave enough to be like, “What was going on there, Holly? What was going on?”
Parul: The authentic feeling. You talk about this authenticity, being authentic with yourself and asking yourself the hard questions.
Holly: Yeah. And so with Pretending, I'd had a really horrible altercation with some man at Victoria train station. I'd had a really good night out and I was trying to get the last train home and I was a bit jolly because I'd had a few drinks and I was wearing a nice dress. And it was like floating around London, feeling a little bit like Carrie Bradshaw. Like in your head you're like, “Oh, I could totally be in a film.”
I was in that sort of jolly mood, trying to work out the last train home. And then some guy came up to me when I was looking at the train and he was like—came up to me and I thought he needed like information about the trains. And he was like. I just want to tell you how beautiful you are. And for some reason, I just wasn’t in the mood for that. And wasn't, didn't have my senses up…and I just turned around and I just went, “I don't need to know that you find me attractive. Like I’m just trying to get home.” And I did—I said it in a kind way. But it was just a bit like, no, I’m just…leave me alone. And he, of course, erupted and started swearing at me and calling me a bitch and a ho and then followed me into WH Smith to continue telling me why I'm such, you know, and it's almost like a compliment from a place of hate rather than appreciation.
And it was just awful to the point where I was like crying and begging him to leave me alone. And I was like, “I'm on top of WH Smith, this is my safe space. Let me out.” And then I was just like fear. It's like furious, furious and furious and then got on the train, shaking. And I was just venting to a friend about what just happened. And then I suddenly just got out my laptop in my bag and write “I hate men.” and then that chapter came. And I just wrote a massive rant. That was only a couple of days later that I thought of the punchline to the chapter which is, “Oh, he's messaged back. Nevermind.”And this idea that you can just be like this raging feminist and then suddenly the moment a guy that you do like, who you would like to tell you, it's beautiful suddenly messages back and you're like, “Oh, I don't care.” Like I can look out the window. And that's where it came from. So I’m always like… mine the complicated emotion.
Matt: Wow. Thanks for sharing that. That's the behind the scenes story of Pretending
Holly: I owe that dude a drink.
Matt: Yeah, maybe he's on here. Probably not. I guess, yeah. And I have a question because you write about such real things, and maybe some traumatic things and raw things. You have a partner. I was curious, does your partner read your books? And if so, what's that dialogue like of either characters or situations, whatever you want to share with us.
Holly: We're both a very literary couple. We're new-ish. We've been together for three years, but we're very happy. We are. It's just like, it can exist. I was so sceptical my whole life, and then I'm like when you meet someone, you're really happy [and] you're like, “Oh, it's real.” Like, this is what I'm holding out for. But one of my biggest anxieties about our relationship was him reading my work and him maybe thinking it's about him or that I'm like that—to me was a huge anxiety, particularly. I really go there. And I think he's a keeper because he just doesn't think it's about him at all.
I think I could even call him by his name and he wouldn't, he’s just like—but he's very supportive. And even with that first chapter in Pretending that “I hate men” chapter, which of course it could be hard to read if you're a man, man.
Matt: And that’s dating you.
Holly: Yeah, he read it and he was laughing and he's like, “Oh, you need to put this in there. You need to put that in there.” And I was like, “Oh my God, I'm just not going to let you leave me because you're amazing.” And that, you know, to feel free, to be creative. I remember seeing there was like a Twitter storm, like a couple of weeks ago about whether or not your partner should read your work or respect your work and what that means about your relationship.
I don't think it matters if your partner reads things or not, but I think they need to take it seriously. It would be bad to be—if you're creative and somebody’s like, oh, you’re doing your little thing? you doing your little writing or doing your poetry, like to kind of diminish that in any way.
That's the only thing where I have a strong opinion. Wanting to tell your story in whatever form that takes is the most powerful human urge. And it takes so much bravery. And so anyone that you're close to, that you love should be saying, “Tell your story.” Like, that's amazing. Like I love that you want to be creative. I think that's incredible. That's the only thing I have to say about that.
Matt: It sounds like a keeper.
Holly: Well, we'll see. We’re in lockdown together so God knows what happens.
Parul: Just one quick question about [the] promotion of your work because for a lot of—some writers enjoy it more than others. How do you approach it? Do you find that you have to do a lot of work when your book does come out and you have to get it out there? Is this something you enjoy?
Holly: Yeah. When I have a book out, I am a mixture of happy and giddy, and also like the grumpiest cow. So going on tour, meeting readers is amazing. Getting to do something like this, writers get to talk about work and books with people who don’t get bored. Like the amount of dinner parties where I’m like, “Have you read the latest this and that…oh, wow it was done in first-person narrative. Isn't that interesting?” And they're just like, “I'm an accountant”. Like getting to geek out with my people is just a joy and then having readers who maybe made life changes because of my book like my first adult book, How Do You Like Me Now?. That has ended a lot of relationships, like in a good way. Like I've had people come up to me and be like, “I cancelled my wedding after reading your book.” Which was my hope when I wrote it and not in a, you know, loves stinks way, but just like people need to save their hearts to the people who respect them and love them in a healthy way.
I love all that. But as I said, I am a bit like a hermit Gollum, and so everything around tour, I hate it. I hate being away from home. I hate being in hotels. I hate being on a train. I'm quite happy in lockdown because as long as I've got a green space to walk in, like being in my house and just not having to go out there—and it's a big, bad world—is nice.
I find promotion amazing and also hugely difficult. And my publishers are very good at understanding that I'm quite a highly sensitive person., and so they do things like kind of, I’m away [for] more than three nights at a time. And then I have to come home and recharge like an iPhone, and then I can go back out again. But you hear people in America as well. Pretending is coming out in America in the fall. And they were like, “Well, you're a debut so we might not tour you until your second book…” and I’m like, “Thank God.” Cause you’ll hate it. You get flown into a different state every day. And oh, I would just be crying constantly. This is my worst nightmare. So I think most writers struggle with promotion because it goes against what makes you a writer, which is being quite into liking your home comfort. It doesn't tend to go with being very outlandish and spontaneous. And I don't know, in my experience, mostly awful.
Parul: Right, that makes sense.
Matt: Right, so I think we're out of time. We're going to wrap. Before you do, there are a couple of questions that might be rapid fire. The first is your first book. How many agents did you have to reach out to before you found the one you were happy to work with?
Holly: You're going to hate me and I'm going to say it was my first, but that was only because I researched and researched and researched and read every article online a million times about how to get an agent and you only get one shot to make a first impression.
It was like the best cover letter in the world to get the writers and artists for your book and make it your Bible. And then I promise you, you've got a really good shot at hearing back from your top agent.
Matt: Thanks. And then one more, do you work on one book at a time or are there a couple of things that you're working on at once?
Holly: I am only ever writing one book at a time. I could never—I find it…I get so grumpy anyway. Sometimes I'm having to edit a book that I've already written like I'm going to do line edits and I'm writing a new one, but that's—the act of creation has already happened and it's just refining it, but I could never. I'm, again, in awe of people who can. It's like, “Oh, I just did it. I woke up this morning and then I did some poetry in the evening”, and I'm like, you're amazing. I could never do that.
Matt: Excellent.
Holly: Oh, thank you [...] I feel very full talking to that for an hour.
Matt: Thank you so much, Holly. It's really been a pleasure
Parul: An incredible Tuesday evening.
Holly: Thank you and just get writing everybody just write, write, write.
Parul: We have a couple of final shout outs just before we go. So Holly supports women's aid charity. So if you go to womensaid.org.uk, is there anywhere, in particular, you think anything that you would like to push any campaign that is particularly supporting Woman’s Aid?
Holly: At the moment, domestic violence is, unfortunately, going through the roof in lockdown situations. So I know everyone's hurting somebody at the moment, but if you could just [give] tenner, anything you can spare towards women's aid, they really need it right now because it's a dangerous time in that regard. Yeah, the horrible side effects of lockdown. But yeah, the women's aid is amazing and they're a safe place to donate to.
Parul: Great. As Holly's book is out, it's out in the UK right now, the US it's coming out in the fall.
Holly: Yeah, fall which
Parul: In the fall. Autumn.
Holly: Yeah… I became an American then.
Matt: I know what that means. Excellent. Well, thank you. Thank you so much, Holly. It's really been a pleasure. Please continue to self-care and rest and sleep and keep writing for all of us.
Holly: I had a great time. Thank you.
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