Not Too Busy To Write

It's Carers Week in the UK so I have recorded a bonus episode of teh podcast with two fellow writer carers. Marina Benjamin is the author of many books, the latest of which is A little Give: the unsung, unseen, undone work of women. She also cares for her elderly mother. Caro Giles is the author of Twelve Moons; A year under a share sky and is a single parent to four daughters, two of whom have complex needs.

This is a slightly different format to usual, with the three of us discussing our caring roles, the challenges of writing about the topic and the time we 'steal' away from our caring responsibilities to write.

This was such a wonderful and honest conversation and I'm so grateful for Marina and Caro for taking the time and being so open about the challenges.

Links

A Little Give - Marina Benjamin

Twelve Moons - Caro Giles

Tender - Penny Wincer

Daisy Buchanan is an award winning journalist, author and broadcaster who has had a varied writing career beginning in teen magazines, and now as a novelist. She's also the host of the chart topping podcast You're Booked - one of my favourite podcasts of all time.

We talk about Daisy's move from journalist and non-fiction author to fiction, and how terrifying that was, the joys and challenges of writing about sex and the importance of reading for pleasure when you're a writer. Daisy is also very open about the highs and lows of her publishing career and how not everything has been smooth sailing.

Links

Careering - Daisy Buchanan

Insatiable - Daisy Buchanan

Limelight - Daisy Buchanan (pre-order)

You're Booked Podcast

Peter Hujar's Day - Linda Rosenkrantz

Kick The Latch - Kathryn Scanlan

Daisy Buchanan on Instagram @thedaisybee

Penny Wincer on Instagram @pennywincer

Are you tearing your hair out about social media? Do you want to use it to grow your profile as a writer or shout about your book but it makes you uncomfortable? Nicola Washington is a social media marketer and she is passionate about helping writers get their work out into the world. As she says in this episode, after the immense hard work of writing a book, what a huge waste if nobody hears about it!

This is a hugely practical episode looking at strategy, building genuine relationships and creating community to help you spread your ideas, share your work and create meaningful change through the power of social media.

Links

Nicola on instagram @toomuch_social

Nicola's personal account on instagram @toomuchmotheringinformation

Instagram with Impact Workshop

Work with Nicola

Instagram accounts mentioned

@joanna_wolfarth

@emilyhenrywrites

Penny on Instagram @pennywincer

Penny's weekly writing newsletter pennywincerwrites.com

Non-fiction Retreat with Penny Wincer - easeretreats.com

Suzy Reading is a chartered psychologist, yoga teacher and coach whose work all centres around giving people the skills to nourish themselves. Her latest book is Rest to Reset: The busy persons guide to pausing with purpose. As well as talking about Suzy's journey from expert to author of 8 books, we talk about what rest actually looks like, the problem with the current conversations around burnout and moving towards the idea of rest as rebalancing, and that is going to look different for everyone. We also talk about relationship building in publishing, saying yes to opportunities and growing your authority as an expert in your field.

Links:

Rest To Reset - Suzy Reading

Self-care Revolution - Suzy Reading

This Book Will (Help) Make You Happy - Suzy Reading

You can find Suzy on Instagram @suzyreading

You can find Penny on Instagram @pennywincer

Sign up to penny's newsletter here - pennywincerwrites.com

Joanna Wolfarth is a cultural historian with a PhD in Southeast Asian art history. Her first book Milk: An intimate history of breastfeeding is a fascinating look at the social, historical and cultural contexts for this very personal of experiences, through art, philosophy, folk wisdom and interviews.

Joanna talks about how needing to make sense of the experience of new motherhood, led to a furious dive into the research between feeds and in tiny snatches of time when her baby slept, how motherhood made her fearless when it came to writing and non-fiction that seeks to ask questions, rather than provide all of the answers.

Links

Milk: An intimate history of breastfeeding

Joanna Wolfarth on Instagram @joanna_wolfarth

Penny on Instagram @pennywincer

Sign up for Penny's weekly writing newsletter here pennywincerwrites.com

Lucy Werner is a PR expert and founder of The Wern, an agency specialising in PR and branding for creative small businesses. Lucy is not only an expert at book PR but also a published author herself and in this episode Lucy shares what she has learned about book PR and marketing from both sides.

From building your authority and your brand before you publish, to promoting a book that already exists in the world, Lucy is a goldmine of information on how best to spread the word and get people buying your books.

Her infectious enthusiasm and fun approach to an area that many writers find daunting, will have you dipping your toes in the PR waters.

Links

Hype Yourself: A no-nonsense PR toolkit for small businesses - Lucy Werner

Brand Yourself - A non-nonsense brand toolkit for small businesses - Lucy Werner and Hadrian Chatelet

The Wern Agency

Lucy Werner on Instagram @lucywernerpr

Penny on instagram @pennywincer

Penny's weekly writing newsletter - pennywincerwrites.com

Catherine Newman is a writer with a varied career including two parenting memoirs and a middle grade novel. She had written for the New York Times, O Magazine, The Boston Globe and was a columnist for Real Simple Magazine. Her debut novel We All Want Impossible Things is the story of Ash, whose best friend Edi is dying of cancer. Set over a few weeks in a hospice, this book is filled with laughter and heartbreak. Catherine and I talk about the relief of laughing in the face of death, learning to embrace your natural writing voice and the how years of having to make a living from writing has had a positive impact on Catherine's daily writing habit. We All Want Impossible Things is out now.

Ease Retreat - Non-fiction with Penny Wincer, Wales, April 20-23 2023

We All Want Impossible Things - Catherine Newman

#AmWriting Podcast

Love, Nina - Nina Stibbe

Catherine Newman on instagram - @catherinenewman

Catherine's website - catherinenewmanwriter.com

Penny on instagram - @pennywincer

Penny's newsletter

Caro Giles is a writer based in the north east of England, whose first book Twelve Moons tells the story, across a year, of raising her 4 daughters alone in a wild and isolated part of the country. It's an incredible memoir about caring, isolation, and joy found in tiny pockets of time. We talk about how the pandemic totally changed how she the structure of the book, the challenges of writing and caring and this beautiful idea of writing as a way to put yourself in the foreground, when you have been in the background for so long.

Links

Twelve Moons - Caro Giles

An Evening with Caro Giles - Waterstones Newcastle 26th January

Alnwick Story Festival 25th February

Little Fires Everywhere - Celeste Ng

Empireland - Sathnam Sanghera

This Time Tomorrow - Emma Straub

Caro Giles on instagram @carogileswrites

Penny on instagram @pennywincer

You can sign up to Penny's weekly newsletter about writing and making time for creativity here pennywincerwrites.com

After a varied writing career including speech writing, journalism and screen writing, Janice Hallett turned to crime fiction and became a best-selling author that completely turned the genre on its head. Using transcripts, messages, emails, letters and articles, Janice's novels weave intricate, humourous and clever tales of murder and mystery. It was such a delight to take a deep dive with her into her writing process and how her varied experience as a writer informs how she approaches novels.

The Mysterious Case of the Alperton Angels is out January 19th

Links

The Mysterious Case of the Alperton Angels - Janice Hallett

The Twyford Code - Janice Hallett

The Appeal - Janice Hallett

You can find Janice Hallett on Twitter @JaniceHallett

You can find Penny on Instagram @pennywincer

You can sign up to Penny's weekly writing newsletter here - pennywincerwrites.com

Not Too Busy To Write will be back for a new series on January 18th. Guests for series 6 include memoirists, debut novelists, non-fiction authors and much more. The series kicks off with best selling crime author Janice Hallett and oh my goodness is it a great episode about writing outside of the box. See you in two weeks for series 6!

Want to write a non-fiction book proposal this year? Penny's first online workshop of the year is on January 11th at 7.30pm. Tickets are just £39

Write Your Book Proposal - eventbrite

www.pennywincerwrites.com/workshops

Penny on Instagram - @pennywincer

Lindsey Kelk is a Sunday Times bestselling author of over 20 novels. Her latest The Christmas Wish is a hilarious and delightful time loop story set during a family Christmas. Lindsey and I chat about subverting Hallmark movie tropes, being a full time novelist in a much maligned genre and the realities of being working class in the publishing industry.

The Christmas Wish is a joy and is out now in hardback.

Links

The Christmas Wish - Lindsey Kelk

The Change - Kirsten Miller

Her Majesty's Royal Coven - Juno Dawson

Book Lovers - Emily Henry

This Time Tomorrow - Emma Straub

Book Proposal Group January 2023 - pennywincerwrites.com/bookproposalgroup

Penny's weekly newsletter

You can find Lindsey on instagram - @lindseykelk and on Twitter @LindseyKelk

Lindsey on Facebook

Penny on Instagram - @pennywincer

Chibundu Onuzo is a novelist whose first book was published when she was just 21 years old. Her third and latest novel Sankofa was short listed for the Women's Prize for Fiction Futures Prize, an Amazon book of the year and a Reese Witherspoon Book Club pick in 2021.

We talk about the inspiration behind Sankofa, how Chibundu's writing process has changed over the past 10 years and her role as a judge of the Women's Prize Trust Discoveries 2023.

Links

Sankofa - Chibundu Onuzo

Women's Prize Discoveries Prize 2023

The Spider King's Daughter - Chibundu Onuzo

You can sign up for Penny's newsletter here

Penny on Instagram - @pennywincer

Emily Henson is an art director and stylist and the author of five books. Her latest is Create: Inspiring homes that value creativity over consumption. In this episode Emily talks about her journey from stylist and blogger to author and the close collaborative, relationship she has with her publisher. It's a really fun and informative episode for all those who would love to know exactly what goes in to producing and writing gorgeous and thoughtful illustrated books.

Links

Create - Emily Henson

Life Unstyled - Emily Henson

Life Unstyled Blog

Life Unstyled on Instagram

Emily Henson's Styling portfolio

Penny Wincer's Newsletter - pennywincerwrites.com

Penny of Instagram - @pennywincer

Ali and Penny are back together talking about the experience of publication. It has been three months since Ali's book The Last Days came out and it seemed like a great time to have a debrief and discuss the highs and lows, the hard work and the realities of publishing. We talk about reviews, proofs, blurbs, news events that drown out book publicity and the things outside of our control when publishing. We also take a little look ahead to our next publications.

Links

Strandings - Peter Riley

Lipstick Traces - Greil Marcus

An Angel at My Table - Janet Frame

Foster - Claire Keegan

The Hours - Michael Cunningham

Sign up to Penny's newsletter here - pennywincerwrites.com

Ali Millar on Instagram @ali_millar_writes

Penny Wincer on Instagram @pennywincer

Winnie M Li is a Taiwanese-American author and activist originally from New Jersey. Her second novel Complicit is about a film lecturer in an obscure American college who once was on the cusp of a major film career. When she is approached by an investigative journalist about an alleged incident that occurred 10 years earlier, memories of youthful ambition and guilt arise.

Winnie talks in this episode about how the lure of writing about film was what compelled her to write a second (very different) novel about sexual assault. About how using the framework of the protagonist telling her story to someone else from the distance of 10 years, gave her an interesting perspective to play with. We also talk about the arts grants that have allowed her to pursue her writing.

Links

Complicit - Winnie M Li

Dark Chapter - Winnie M Li

Arts Council England Grants

https://www.artscouncil.org.uk/ProjectGrants

https://www.artscouncil.org.uk/dycp

Winnie M Li website

Instagram - @winniemli

You can sign up to Penny's newsletter here

Penny on Instagram @pennywincer

Shakaila Forbes-Bell is a fashion psychologist and the author of Big Dress Energy: How fashion psychology can transform your wardrobe and your confidence. It's a book that is a pleasure to read, filled with insights and backed up by rigorous research.

In this episode Shakaila talks dressing our different identities, the challenges of switching from academic writing to creative non-fiction, making academic research more widely available to the everyday reader and some of the difficult decisions she made around creating time to write this book, including being honest about her chronic pain condition and her role raising her sisters children.

Big Dress Energy is out now.

Links

Big Dress Energy - Shakaila Forbes-Bell

Big Dress Energy Podcast

Margaux Vialleron is a French born, London based writer. Her debut novel The Yellow Kitchen centres around the friendship of three very different women over the course of a year, with a kitchen and the food prepared within it at its heart.

Margaux speaks about why she is drawn to writing about friendship and food, how she uses her sense to dive into the English language and why she has chosen to write in her second language. We also talk a bit about her day job as a translation rights literary agent.

Links

The Yellow Kitchen - Margaux Vialleron

The Salmon Pink Kitchen Podcast

The Salmon Pink Kitchen Newsletter

Penny's instagram @pennywincer

Contact Penny

Beth Kempton is a Japanologist, a best selling author and a writing mentor whose books have been translated into 24 languages. Her Latest book The Way of the Fearless Writer challenges the assumption that writing must be a struggle and filled with suffering. We talk about why it's important to know why we write, learning to let go in our writing, when to share our work (and when not to) and learning to trust in writing as a practice.

Links

The Way of the Fearless Writer - Beth Kempton

Freedom Seeker - Beth Kempton

Wabi Sabi - Beth Kempton

Do What You Love For Life - Writing classes with Beth Kempton

The Fearless Writer Podcast

You can sign up to Penny's weekly newsletter about all things writing and finding time to write here

Huma Qureshi is a former Guardian and Observer journalist and is the author of the memoir How We Met and her latest book Things We Do Not Tell The People We Love, is a short story collection about the distance between people - between mothers and daughters and between lovers. It includes the "The Jam Maker" which won the Harper's Bazaar Short Story Prize 2020. We talk about what drove Huma to set herself the challenge of writing 10 short stories in a fairly short period of time, the importance of short story prizes as a way of setting yourself deadlines and challenges, and how motherhood both affected her confidence as a writer but also gave her an urgency to get the words on to the page.

Links

Miniature Worlds: Writing short stories with Huma Qureshi

Things We Do Not Tell The People We Love - Huma Qureshi

How We Met - Huma Qureshi

Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen

A Ghost in the Throat - Doireann Ni Ghriofa

You can find Huma Qureshi on instagram @humaqureshiwriter

Sign up for Penny's newsletter here

You can check out all the book recommendations from the podcast at our bookshop on bookshop.org which helps support independent booksellers

Cathy Rentzenbrink is a Sunday Times best selling author of The Last Act of Love, A Manual for Heartache, Dear Reader and Everyone is Still Alive. Her latest book, Write It All Down, is all about writing from life.

Cathy talks about how her first memoir started because she need to write it out of her, how she's learned to trust the process of writing, even though she's still filled with self doubt and learning that external validation of our writing doesn't magically fix that doubt.

Links

Write It All Down - Cathy Rentzenbrink

The Last Act of Love - Cathy Rentzenbrink

Everyone Is Still Alive - Cathy Rentzenbrink

The Virgin Suicides - Jeffery Eugenides

Without Warning And Only Sometimes - Kit De Waal

You can follow Cathy on Instagram @catrentzenbrink and twitter @catrentzenbrink

You can follow Penny on Instagram @pennywincer and sign up for her newsletter here.

Julia Silk is a an agent with Greyhound Literary. Julia spent many years as an editor before becoming an agent who represents a wide range of fiction and non-fiction authors. We talk about what exactly an agent does, how agents find and nurture authors as well as how agents deal with rejection (yes they get rejected too!). She also talks about the common problems that she sees in manuscripts, including really figuring out what the point of your book is and the importance story and how to write a captivating cover letter. It is a packed epsiode full of gold for submitting writers.

Julia Silk is currently open for submissions

You can find Julia on twitter @juliasreading

Book Proposal Group Program with Penny Wincer

Links

Sisters - Daisy Johnson

Nine Perfect Strangers - Liane Moriaty

If This Is a Man - Primo Levi

Eat Up - Ruby Tandoh

You can find all the books recommended on the podcast at our Bookshop.org shop - Not Too Busy To Write Recommends - buying through our bookshop supports independent booksellers as well as supporting the podcast

REPLAY: This episode was originally released in April 2022

Sophie Howarth has a varied and unique career spanning art, entrepreneurship, teaching, activism and writing. She has been Curator of Public Programs at Tate Modern, co-founded The School Of Life and Department Store for The Mind, has written several books on photography. Her latest book The Mindful Photographer is about slowing down and paying attention to what we see. Sophie is a big believer in the joy of being an amateur and the book is for anyone, regardless of equipment or expertise, to find a fresh way of paying attention in the world.

We talk about 'beginning in the middle' - how in middle age, with our awareness of impermanence, we are somehow freed from constraints by being more aware of death. We also talk about the process of writing a photography book, of approaching the artists she wanted to use to illustrate the ideas in the book and the range of work including diversity of gender, race and genre.

Our conversation spans so many areas - inspiration (and too much inspiration/input), work freedom, following joy and the idea of practise as a way of living.

Links

Book Proposal Group Program with Penny Wincer

The Mindful Photographer - Sophie Howarth

Street Photography Now - Sophie Howarth

Family Photography Now - Sophie Howarth

sophiehowarth.com

You can find Penny on Instagram @pennywincer and you can sign up for her newsletter here

Lulah Ellender is an author, creative non-fiction writing teacher and writing coach based in Sussex. Her latest book Grounding: Finding home in a garden is about a single growing year in her garden after her mother died and her family was in danger of losing the home that they had lived in for 10 years. We talk about how Lulah weaves together the stories of many other gardens and the artists who created them into her own personal narrative alongside non-fiction elements of plant and garden history. She sees her role as taking the reader by the hand and leading them through, rather than memoir being particularly about her.

Lulah also tells me about her flexible online courses in Life Writing, her favourite books about writing, the importance of close reading your favourite books and reading widely around your topics of interest.

Links

Grounding - Lulah Ellender

Elizabeth's Lists - Lulah Ellender

Lulah's writing courses

Maggie Nelson - Bluets

EveryBody - Olivia Laing

The Artists Way - Julia Cameron

The Art of Memoir - Mary Karr

Bird By Bird - Anne Lamott

Angela Hui is an award winning food and lifestyle journalist whose first book Takeway: Stories from a childhood behind the counter is about growing up in a Chinese takeaway in rural Wales. We talk about how the memoir began life as an article she wrote for VICE on how Chinese takeaways are disappearing and the dual identities of her childhood - going from yearning to fit in to coming to love and appreciate both her Chinese and Welsh heritage. We also talk about just how important food is in Chinese culture, what it was like to put her formidable mother down on the page and how food has followed her from a childhood behind the counter, to her career as the food writer for Time Out London.

Links

Takeaway - Angela Hui

Michelle Gallen is an Irish author raised in a border town in the north and now based in Dublin. Her first novel Big Girl, Small Town was short listed for the Costa First Novel Award, The Comedy Women in Print Award and An Irish Book Award. Her second novel Factory Girls, set in the summer of 1994 in a small town in Northern Ireland, as a group of friends await their A level results, wondering if they'll ever escape the deprived community they were born into. It's dark and incredibly funny.

We talk about how growing up in a divided community where violence was normal and was dealt with by turning to dark humour and the differences between writing her first and second novel. We also talk about her recovery from a brain injury, the bursaries that allowed her to quit her day job in order to write and the importance of having people to champion and encourage your work.

Links

Factory Girls - Michell Gallen

Big Girl, Small Town - Michelle Gallen

Irish Arts Council Literature Project Award

Arts Council England - Develop Your Practice Fund

Society of Authors Grants

Our very own Ali Millar is on the podcast today talking about her debut book The Last Days. We talk about how writing this memoir was a necessity in truth telling, obsessing over structure, talking books into life and redrafting - lots of redrafting. We also talk about some of the challenges of writing a memoir both emotionally and legally and vulnerability of exposure. The Last Days is out now.

Links

The Last Days - Ali Millar

Original Sins - Matt Rowland Hill

Idol - Louise O'Neill

The Year of Miracles - Ella Risbridger

You can find Ali on instagram @ali_millar_writes and Penny @pennywincer

Chloe Times is an author, podcaster and former teacher based in Kent. Her debut novel The Seawomen, a dystopian tale about a closed community and one young woman who gets a small taste of freedom, is out now. Chloe and I talk about how her disability naturally leads her to write about marginalised characters, building worlds and complex female friendships on the page. Chloe is a graduate of the Faber Academy and talks about how that experience changed her life as a writer. We also chat about the joys of writing podcasts and her wonderful podcast Confessions of a Debut Novelist.

Links

The Seawomen - Chloe Timms

The Faber Academy - Scholarships

Confessions of a Debut Novelist Podcast with Chloe Timms

You can find Chloe on twitter @clotimms and instagram @clotimms

You can find Penny on Instagram @pennywincer

Chloe Ashby is an arts journalist and author based in London. Her debut novel Wet Paint is about a young woman struggling to move forward after the traumatic death of her best friend, who finds solace in a painting and a life of routine, until a sudden change of circumstances has her undressing for strangers as a life model. We talk about ways of finding your way in to a story as a writer, writing about visual art and exploring ideas of control in characters. We also talk about having an 'affair' with novel writing on the side of other paid writing work and Chloe's life as a freelance arts writer working on non-fiction art books and reviewing exhibitions.

links

Wet Paint - Chloe Ashby

Look at this if you love great art - Chloe Ashby

Colours of Art: The story of art in 80 palletes - Chloe Ashby

chloeashby.com

Instagram - @chloeashby

Twitter - @chloeashby

You can find us on instagram @pennywincer and @ali_millar_writes

Ilona Bannister's second novel Little Prisons, is set in one building, from four perspectives, each one a woman experiencing a kind of imprisonment. Emotional, mental and literal. Ilona is our first return guest on the podcast and we discuss the difference between the experience of writing book one and book two, the complex literary devices she uses in the novel to examine issues around human trafficking and how she challenges the reader and our expectations by writing characters that stretch our compassion and have us question how we see those who are the most invisible in our society.

Links

Little Prisons - Ilona Bannister

When I Ran Away - Ilona Bannister

Sophie Howarth has a varied and unique career spanning art, entrepreneurship, teaching, activism and writing. She has been Curator of Public Programs at Tate Modern, co-founded The School Of Life and Department Store for The Mind, has written several books on photography. Her latest book The Mindful Photographer is about slowing down and paying attention to what we see. Sophie is a big believer in the joy of being an amateur and the book is for anyone, regardless of equipment or expertise, to find a fresh way of paying attention in the world.

We talk about 'beginning in the middle' - how in middle age, with our awareness of impermanence, we are somehow freed from constraints by being more aware of death. We also talk about the process of writing a photography book, of approaching the artists she wanted to use to illustrate the ideas in the book and the range of work including diversity of gender, race and genre.

Our conversation spans so many areas - inspiration (and too much inspiration/input), work freedom, following joy and the idea of practise as a way of living.

Links

The Mindful Photographer - Sophie Howarth

Street Photography Now - Sophie Howarth

Family Photography Now - Sophie Howarth

sophiehowarth.com

Sian Meades-Williams is the brains (and muscle) behind the hugely popular Freelance Writing Jobs newsletter and co-founder of the award winning lifestyle newsletter Tigers Are Better Looking (formerly Domestic Sluttery). In today's episode we discuss Sian's new book The Pyjama Myth: The Freelance Writer's Survival Guide - an indispensable guide for writers from pitching to getting paid. Sian is full of fantastic advice for earning a living from the craft of writing, including pitching. We also do a deep dive into newsletters and the freedom and joy they bring to her work. A must listen for anyone experiencing the highs and lows of freelance writing life.

Links

The Pyjama Myth - Sian Meades-Williams

Freelance Writing Jobs Newsletter Sign up

Tigers Are better looking Newsletter Sign Up

The Feminist Quiz Book - Sian Meades-Williams and Laura Brown

You can find Sian on Twitter @SianySianySiany and sianmeadeswilliams.com

In this episode Maggie Gee reads extracts from her stunning new novel, The Red Children (Saqi Books). Set in the near future against a backdrop of increased migration pressure, climate change and increasing isolation, The Red Children explores themes of far right extremism and the aftermath of virus.

Ali talks to Maggie about the enduring power of fable. How characters with radically different personalities to ours can foster a deeper empathy, and how to write the non-human successfully.

Lizzie Damilola Blackburn's debut novel Yinka, Where is Your Huzband? tells the story of 31 yr old British-Nigerian Yinka, who is feeling the pressure to settle down. When she finds out her ex-boyfriend is bringing his new fiance to her cousins wedding, she decides to go on a mission to find herself a plus one for the big day. Lizzie and Penny chat about how Yinka started life in a short story and how Lizzie felt characters like Yinka were missing from mainstream women's fiction. After the story won a prize, Lizzie decided to write her into a novel. Lizzie is passionate about representation in fiction and about writing religion in a way that feels true to her. She also discusses the importance of writing about colourism and body image for dark skinned black women and creating nuance and humour these complex issues.

Links

Yinka, Where is Your Huzband? - Lizzie Damilola Blackburn

Hope and Glory - Jendella Benson

The Christie Affair - Nina De Gramont

You can find Lizzie on twitter @DamilolaLizzie

Clover Stroud is a Sunday Times best selling author of a number of books including The Wild Other and My Wild and Sleepless Nights. Her latest book, The Red of My Blood, is the story of her sister Nell's death and the immediate aftermath. Clover talks about how her writing benefits from the immediacy of writing in real time and how it felt natural for her to write about the extremities of grief when she was deep in its throws. We also talk about taking yourself to the edge creatively and how it makes life more vivid and putting a magnifying glass up to human experience as well as some of the positive aspects of social media. Clover also has some excellent reading advice for writers.

Links

The Red of My Blood - Clover Stroud

My Wild and Sleepless Nights - Clover Stroud

The Stone Mason - Andrew Zeminski

Devil in a Coma - Mark Lanegan

Atlas of the Heart - Brene Brown

You can find Clover on instagram @clover.stroud

Doreen Cunningham began her a career as a climate science researcher and has spent the last 20 years as a journalist. Her memoir, Soundings: Journeys in the company of whales, is the story of her experiences follow the grey whale migration from Mexico to Alaska as a newly single parent with her very young son in tow. Woven into the book is the story of her time spent with an Inupiaq family in Northern Alaska, where she joined a traditional whale hunt and learnt about how climate change was already affecting artic communities. It's a memoir about love, wrestlessness, colonialism, motherhood and climate change. Doreen talks about the challenges and responsibility of writing about her experiences as a white person within an indigenous community, the urgent drive to write about climate change in a way that would resonate with readers and writing about science in an accessible, story driven way.

Links

Soundings: Journeys in the company of whales

Literary Kitchen

Society of Authors - Grants for work in progress

Big Magic - Elizabeth Gilbert

We Need New Names - Noviolet Bulawayo

Devotion - Hannah Kent

In this week's episode Ali talks to Lily Dunn, the author of Sins of my Father (W&N, 17th March) about the craft of memoir. Together they discuss how narrative techniques can be used to move the form past expected norms, taking the personal into the realms of the universal, how the 'I' on the page differs from the 'I' in every day life, and how at the heart of memoir lies a love of storytelling. They also consider where the writer sits - does the writer operate as observer or partaker, are they inside or outside, and how does the act of writing alter this position.

Abigail Bergstrom is a literary agent and consultant, former editor, and now debut novelist. What A Shame is a darkly funny novel about grief, friendship and dabbling in the occult. Abigail talks about the challenges of having a lot of knowledge of the industry whilst writing and having to take her agent hat off in order to write, removing the constraints that made writing feel like 'work' and being conscious of the exchange that happens when we give up other things in order to write on the side of a demanding full time job.

Bergstrom Studio is a 360 degree literary consultancy, offering editorial consultancy and representation. As an agent Abigail represents multiple best selling authors and has some excellent advice for those who are going out on submission.

Links

Bergstrom Studio

What A Shame - Abigail Bergstrom

Wet Paint - Chloe Ashby

Beautiful Country - Xian Julie Wang

You can find Abigail on Instagram @abigailbergstrom and @bergstrom.studio

And Penny on instagram @pennywincer

Our writing lives don't always look the same. Depending on which phase you're in, drafting, editing, submitting, publishing or promoting - our rhythms and routines change according to what phase we are in. Ali and Penny are currently in different phases to each other and to where they each were a year ago. Today's episode is about where they are at and how that changes how they sit down and get the work done. They are both now juggling multiple projects at different stages and how that has necessarily changed their writing routines, in ways that are both good and a challenge.

Caribbean-American writer Charmaine Wilkerson's incredible fiction debut, Black Cake is a sweeping family tale about inheritance, memories and secrets. Charmaine discusses the layering of multiple timelines, much like the layering of a cake or the layering of conversation. She also talks about channeling the characters, allowing herself to follow them and see where they take her and having a quarter of the book written in various files before she was certain it was a story.

Black Cake is out in the UK on 3rd February 2022 and in the US on 1st February

Links

Black Cake - Charmaine Wilkerson

Another Life - Jodie Chapman

Beautiful Country - Qian Julie Wang

Olga Dies Dreaming - Xochitl Gonzalez

The Final Revival of Opal and Neve - Dawnie Walton

Who They Was - Gabriel Krauze

Cathy Rentzenbrink is a Sunday Times best selling author of The Last Act of Love, A Manual for Heartache, Dear Reader and Everyone is Still Alive. Her latest book, Write It All Down, is all about writing from life.

Cathy talks about how her first memoir started because she need to write it out of her, how she's learned to trust the process of writing, even though she's still filled with self doubt and learning that external validation of our writing doesn't magically fix that doubt.

A wonderful episode filled with advice from the most generous of writers.

Links

Write It All Down - Cathy Rentzenbrink

The Last Act of Love - Cathy Rentzenbrink

Everyone Is Still Alive - Cathy Rentzenbrink

The Virgin Suicides - Jeffery Eugenides

Without Warning And Only Sometimes - Kit De Waal

You can follow Cathy on Instagram @catrentzenbrink and twitter @catrentzenbrink

You can follow Penny on Instagram @pennywincer and twitter @pennywincer

It's that time of the year and Ali and Penny have a chat about where they are at with their writing projects and if they are where they hoped they would be. They talk about some big successes and failures, places where the path diverged and where writing projects went off in a new direction. They talk about letting go of projects as well as taking on new projects you didn't imagine you would do. They also look ahead to some 2022 writing goals.

Links

Life Writing Group Coaching with Penny Wincer

Still Life - Sarah Winman

Ghost Stories - M R James

A bit of a tongue in cheek question this week... Where do ideas come from? Ali and Penny talk all about ideas, sniffing them out like a blood hound, scratching away at them to see if they are interesting and following our curiosity. For us both, it's all about interacting with the external world and creating a habit of looking for and developing ideas. We also talk about having fallow times and abundant times and how they are both important in a writers life. And of course, we talk an awful lot about reading......

Links

My Body - Emily Ratajkowski

Ali and Penny come together to discuss life writing this week. They have both used different approaches to life writing and they discuss why they made the choices they did and how they might do it differently in the future. It's also an episode in which Ali reveals she doesn't really like memoirs (even though she just wrote one) and Penny that she hopes her life is going to be boring enough in the future that she never feels compelled to write one (although she's very partial to the essay).

Links

Swimming In Hampstead ladies pond - Daunt Books

Upon This Rock - Essay by John Jeramiah Sullivan

Constellations - Sinead Gleeson

I am I am I am - Maggie O'Farrell

The English Heretic Collection: Ritual Histories, Magickal Geography - Andy Sharp

My Year of Rest and Relaxation - Ottessa Moshfegh

You can find all the books mentioned on the podcast at Bookshop.org

Julia Silk is a an agent with Charlie Campbell Literary Agents. Julia spent many years as an editor before becoming an agent who represents a wide range of fiction and non-fiction authors. We talk about what exactly an agent does, how agents find and nurture authors as well as how agents deal with rejection (yes they get rejected too!). She also talks about the common problems that she sees in manuscripts, including really figuring out what the point of your book is and the importance story and how to write a captivating cover letter. It is a packed epsiode full of gold for submitting writers.

Julia Silk is currently open for submissions

You can find Julia on twitter @juliasreading

Links

Sisters - Daisy Johnson

Nine Perfect Strangers - Liane Moriaty

If This Is a Man - Primo Levi

Eat Up - Ruby Tandoh

You can find all the books recommended on the podcast at our Bookshop.org shop - Not Too Busy To Write Recommends - buying through our bookshop supports independent booksellers as well as supporting the podcast

Huma Qureshi is a former Guardian and Observer journalist and is the author of the memoir How We Met and her latest book Things We Do Not Tell The People We Love, is a short story collection about the distance between people - between mothers and daughters and between lovers. It includes the "The Jam Maker" which won the Harper's Bazaar Short Story Prize 2020. We talk about what drove Huma to set herself the challenge of writing 10 short stories in a fairly short period of time, the importance of short story prizes as a way of setting yourself deadlines and challenges, and how motherhood both affected her confidence as a writer but also gave her an urgency to get the words on to the page.

Links

Things We Do Not Tell The People We Love - Huma Qureshi

How We Met - Huma Qureshi

Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen

A Ghost in the Throat - Doireann Ni Ghriofa

You can find Huma Qureshi on instagram @humaqureshiwriter

You can check out all the book recommendations from the podcast at our bookshop on bookshop.org which helps support independent booksellers

Claire Lynch is an author and academic whose first book Small: On Motherhoods is a memoir about her experience of becoming a parent and the tiny things that are really the biggest things in life. We talk about finding a structure that reflect what the book is about, perspectives in both life and the page and the joy of capturing those early childhood in writing. Claire also discusses the winding publishing process and the previous iterations that the memoir had before it took on this final form.

Links

Small: On Motherhoods - Claire Lynch

Beautiful World, Where Are You? - Sally Rooney

Lost Cat - Mary Gaitskill

Monument Maker - David Keenan

You can follow Claire Lynch on twitter @DrClaireLynch

Don't forget to check out our Bookshop.org page where you can purchase any of the books mentioned on the podcast. Buying through bookshop.org helps support independent bookshops and the podcast

Evie Wyld is an award winning author of three novels, the latest of which, The Bass Rock, won the Stella Prize 2021. We discuss writing a novel about male violence against a backdrop of #MeToo, and speaking about the subjects in the book in a year of highly publicised violence against women. We also talk about how motherhood, and the nature of writing with young children, led to some of the structural elements of The Bass Rock and how an award like the Stella Prize can create change in a writing career.

Links

The Bass Rock - Evie Wyld

Review Book Shop Peckham

Devotion - Hannah Kent

The Interestings - Meg Wolitzer

You can find all the books recommended on Not Too Busy To Write at our bookshop.org shop - making it a great way to support both the podcast and independent bookshops

Ali and Penny discuss the pros and cons (yes there are sometimes cons!) of being in a writers group. What are they best for? How do you find one? Or better yet, how do you put one together. A packed episode and we suspect, a topic we will come back to again.

Links

Sweet Home - Wendy Erskine

Intimacies - Lucy Caldwell

Penny Batchelor is a thriller writer whose first novel My Perfect Sister was nominated for the Guardian "Not The Booker Prize" 2020. We discuss her latest novel Her New Best Friend, about an isolated mother of two young children whose new friend may not be all she seems. We talk about including disabled people in fiction, taking the plunge to write that first novel after turning 40, exploring female friendships on the page and jumping around genres. Penny is also the co-founder of Thriller Women with EC Scullion, where they share interviews with female thriller writers.

Links

Thriller Women

Her New Best Fried - Penny Batchelor

My Perfect Sister - Penny Batchelor

Her Perfect Twin - Sarah Bonner

The Thing Around Your Neck - Chimamanda Ngozi Adichi

You can find Penny Batchelor via her website https://www.pennybatchelor.co.uk/

And on Twitter @penny_author

Ali and Penny are back together for a final episode before their summer break. This week they discuss why there are many positives of professional writing being a second or third career for most people. This week is all about mining your previous work for skills that really come in handy for both writing and publishing. From being able to treat your book as a product, to being able to work ahead in "seasons" - whatever your background, there are skills that you will be bringing to the table.

Links

We Need To Talk About Money - Otegha Uwagba

How Much Of These Hills Is Gold? - C. Pam Zhang

Things Are Against Us - Lucy Ellmann

Don't forget you can check out Not Too Busy To Write on Bookshop.Org to see a full list (and purchase!) all books mentioned in the current series.

We'll be back in the Autumn but in the mean time you can find Ali on Instagram @ali_millar_writes and Penny @pennywincer

Claire Fuller is the author of four novels, the latest of which Unsettled Ground is shortlisted for the Women's Prize. Claire started her career as a sculptor with a day job in marketing and we talk about her decision to start writing fiction, which began with short stories, how she uses music to short cut her way into writing mode, leaving the day job behind and novels as an object of creation.

Unsettled Ground is the story of 51 yr old twins Jeanie and Julius living in poverty in rural Wiltshire. When their mother suddenly dies, the outside world starts to force it's way in to their isolated existence. It's a stunning portrait of love, resilience and survival.

Links

Polly Vaughn performed by Tia Blake

Unsettled Ground - Claire Fuller

Bitter Orange - Claire Fuller

Fugitive Pieces - Anne Michaels

Malibu Rising - Taylor Jenkins Reid

You can find Claire Fuller on Instagram - @writerclairefuller

For a list of Claire's events and workshops visit www.clairefuller.co.uk

Clemmie Telford is a former creative director, a content creator and podcast host of "But Why?" and her first book also called But Why? is about the big tricky questions and having honest conversations with yourself. We dive into structuring a book with a lot of big topics, writing honestly and vulnerably and embracing dyslexia. Clemmie started a blog many years ago called the "Mother of All Lists" which has grown into a platform for others to share their stories in list form - a way of writing which is accessible to so many, even those who never thought of themselves as 'able to write'.

*Apologies we had some technical issues while recording and there are a few dodgy sound moments - but please stick with it - it's such a great episode!*

Links

But Why? - Clemmie Telford

Mother of All Lists

Conversations on Love - Natasha Lunn

The Joy Luck Club - Amy Tan

You can find Clemmie on Instagram @clemmie_telford

All the book spoken about on Not Too Busy To Write can be found at our bookshop.org shop - https://uk.bookshop.org/lists/not-too-busy-to-write-recommends

Kate Mosse is the international bestselling historical fiction author and the co-founder and chair of the Women's Prize for Fiction. Kate's latest book, An Extra Pair of Hands, is about her experience as an unpaid carer to both of her parents and now her mother in law. We talk about Kate's decision to write about such a personal topic, respecting other peoples stories and contributing to a conversation to shed light on a hidden group. Kate talks about her writing routine and how caring has influence it in recent years.

We also take a dive into the Women's Prize, why it was set up and the incredible work it has done to put wonderful books into the hands of readers. From it's inception the prize was designed to look outwards, to include the reader and to support, invest in and value the work of women writers. We also talk about the snobbery around women's fiction and certain genres of fiction. Kate tells us about her standout winners from the past 25 years.

Women's Prize Shortlist 2021

Links

An Extra Pair of Hands - Kate Mosse

The City of Tears - Kate Mosse

Fugitive Pieces - Anne Michaels

Small Island - Andrea Levy

We Need To Talk About Kevin - Lionel Shriver

The Book About Getting Older - Dr Lucy Pollock

To The Ends of The Earth - William Golding

A Line To Kill - Anthony Horowitz

Outline - Rachel Cusk

You can find Kate Mosse on Twitter and Instagram

https://www.katemosse.co.uk/

Ali talks to Tanya Shadrick about her forthcoming book, The Cure for Sleep: A Late Waking Life. Described as an electrifying voice, The Cure for Sleep details Tanya's transformative near death encounter after the birth of her first child, and how this became the catalyst to transforming her life.

In this intriguing conversation Ali and Tanya talk about the need to be selfish as mothers, how class has impacted on their writing and the importance of not always reading to see their own reflections but instead to broaden the world, while simultaneously understanding that as writers with unusual backgrounds, they have stories that deserve to be told.

Read more about Tanya's work and the book here:

www.thecureforsleep.com

You can follow Tanya here:

Twitter: @tanyashadrick

Instagram: @tanyashadrickwriter

Rebecca Schiller is the author of four non-fiction books, a freelance journalist and the co-founder of the human rights charity Birth Rights. We take a dive into Rebecca's latest book Earthed - a memoir about returning to the land and how it refuses to follow the usual "good life" tropes and instead documents an unravelling of a woman whose problems follow her.

Rebecca is also the founder of Mothers Who Write, which began life as in-person retreats for mothers who need to escape the everyday pressures of the domestic and get some clear headspace for writing. Rebecca talks a little about the future of Mothers Who Write which is now expanding into an online community that she hopes will not only support writers but help them earn an income too. We also go on quite important tangent on the difficulties writers face earning an income and how that can really impact on diversity in publishing.

links

Earthed - Rebecca Schiller

Mothers Who Write

You can sign up for Mothers Who Write Mailing List here

Born Between Crosses - Natasha Carthew

We Should All Be Millionaires - Rachel Rodgers

You can find Rebecca Schiller on Instagram @rebecca.schiller

Penny @pennywincer

Ali @ali_millar_writes

Jessica Hatcher-Moore is an award winning foreign correspondent specialising in women's health in conflict zones. After moving back from East Africa to North Wales with her husband to have their first child, she was shocked to find a deep problem within her home country around silence after birth and a lack of care and support for women in the post natal period. After Birth is a pregnancy book all about the period after giving birth and how to recover your body and mind. As an investigative journalist Jessica challenges the given wisdom and found many apposing views and presents a wider view that women are rarely given.

Jessica talks about the specific challenges of writing about pregnancy while being pregnant (she handed in her manuscript just before giving birth to her second child) and what she learned from her own research about seeking out help.

Links

After Birth - Jessica Hatcher-Moore

Young Adam - Alexander Trocchi

Earthed - Rebecca Schiller

Everyone is Still Alive - Cathy Rentzenbrink

You can find Jessica on Instagram @jessicajanehatcher

Olivia Sudjic is the author or two novels and a non-fiction long form essay. Her latest novel, Asylum Road, is a darkly unsettling story of a newly engaged couple unraveling.

In this episode Olivia talks about the lure of control that drove her to novel writing as well as the risks involved when shouldering creative responsibility largely alone. The advantages of choosing a young, up and coming agent who is also your ideal reader as well as the the challenges of writing versus publishing and making the reader do a bit of work. And what happens when the siren song of writing becomes a day job?

Links

Asylum Road - Olivia Sudjic

Sympathy - Olivia Sudjic

Exposure - Olivia Sudjic

Ill Feelings - Alice Hattrick

This is the Ritual - Rob Doyle

In The Garden: Essays on Nature and Growing - Daunt Books

The Adventures of Miss Barbara Pym - Paula Byrne

You can find Olivia Sudjic on instagram @olivia.sudjic

We usually talk about getting the work done and being productive. Today is a counter episode - rest.

Ali thinks she's bad at it, Penny feels she's pretty good at it. We talk about how it's easy to always measure your productivity but rest is needed is we are to keep going. When we're on deadlines or are afraid of losing momentum on a project, it can feel scary to slow down and take breaks. But taking a step back to rest can really pay off.

We talk about the importance of self awareness and doing what works best for you.

One way of really understanding where your time goes is time logging, an exercise which Ali and Penny both did for this episode. They talk about the interesting results of putting a magnifying glass to how they spend their time.

Sign up to Penny's newsletter for updates on her upcoming course on creating time

Links

My Phantoms - Gwendoline Riley

The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue - V E Schwab

Effortless - Greg McKeown

On the podcast today, Christina Sweeney-Baird, talks about her debut, The End of Men; a prescient debut about the effects of a virus that only kills males.

Not only did Sweeney-Baird write her debut before the pandemic hit, she also balances writing life with the demands of being a full time Corporate Litigation Lawyer. Christina tells us how she manages her time, and how an earlier manuscripts can act as training for subsequent drafts.

We also discuss the benefits of writing within a genre - how the specific rules of plot help as building blocks to a novel.

It's a jam-packed episode and The End of Men looks set to be the runaway hit of the summer - enjoy!

Due to wifi troubles, Christina's sound cuts out a couple of times, but it's so informative that it's 100% worth sticking with it.

Links

Letters To Camondo by Edmund De Waal

Nothing But Blue Sky - Kathleen MacMahon

The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue - V E Schwab

The Handmaids Tale - Margaret Atwood

You can find Christina Sweeney-Baird on Instagram @christinasweeneybaird

Not Too Busy To Write at Bookshop.org

Annie Ridout writes in multiple genres including non-fiction, poetry, journalism and now fiction. Her latest non-fiction book Shy: How being quiet can lead to success explores the positive aspects of shyness as well as how to manage some of the more challenging sides of it. We talk about embracing our natural personalities, expanding our comfort zones and dealing with rejection as a writer. We also dive in to the topic of platform building as a writer, Annie's slightly unusual route to publishing and juggling running a business with writing books and raising kids. It's a chock a block episode!

Links

Shy: How being quiet can lead to success - Annie Ridout

Freelance Mum - Annie Ridout

Redhead By The Side of The Road - Anne Tyler

Confusion - Elizabeth Jane Howard

You can find Annie Ridout on Instagram @annieridout

You can see all the podcast reading recommendations at Bookshop.org

Reading and writing go hand in hand. In their most conversational episode yet, Ali and Penny talk about what they read to inform their writing practice; and Ali discovers she owes Agatha Christie an apology.

Some books act as guide books, others as inspiration, others as companions to the writing process, all are vital ways to breathe life and depth into writing, Ali and Penny unpick just how they use their reading to do this. Be warned, they talk about a lot of books, but you'll leave the episode feeling inspired and ready to tackle your current or next project.

In Episode 9 Ali and Penny talk to Jodie Chapman about her debut novel, Another Life, out now on Penguin Michael Joseph.

Another Life tells the story of Nick and Anna, and the one seminal summer the pair spend together that marks each of them in its own way. Years later, tragedy brings the two back into each other's orbits, but is it too late? Jodie Chapman describes the book as a book about love in all its forms, and it's this idea that forms the backbone of her conversation with Ali and Penny.

Anna is trapped by the expectations of the religion she's raised in, one where there are no birthday celebrations, or Easter or Christmas, and the end of days hangs heavily over her. We talk about using life to inform your writing, and the risks and opportunities this presents.

Another Life is narrated by Nick, we talk about writing from the male perspective, about motherhood and the fear of toxic masculinity as well as the immense privilege and challenges of raising boys; and how life life is never black and white, only ever hues of something else.

It's a packed episode - enjoy!

Links

Another life - Jodie Chapman

Sorrow and Bliss - Meg Mason

Peel Me a Lotus - Charmian Clift

Many Different Kinds of Love - Michael Rosen

No One Is Talking About This - Patricia Lockwood

You can shop all the podcast book recommendations on the Not To Busy To Write Recommends at Bookshop.org

You can find Jodie Chapman in instragram @jodiechapman

When life is busy, we don't always get the long stretches of time we would ideally like to have to write. So how do you train yourself to write in tiny spaces of time?

Ali and Penny discuss the techniques they have used over the past few years when time is short. From keeping up the frequency so your mind is never far from the project, to using mini rituals and music to short cut your way to writing mode, this is an episode which questions our default excuse to avoid writing because we only have tiny pockets available to us.

Links mentioned

Janet Murray Membership (virtual co-working)

London Writers Salon (writers hour)

Books

Medical Muses: Hysteria in 19th century Paris by Asti Hustvedt

Holy Anorexia by Rudolf M Bell

Summerwater by Sarah Moss

You can find all of our book recommendations at

Not Too Busy To Write - Bookshop.org

In Episode 7 Penny is absent due to self-isolation, so Ali takes the helm. She introduces their slightly ambitious plan to read the Women's Prize longlist before the announcement of a winner in July.

Ali talks to Tetyana Denford about the first in her new trilogy of books, Conversation with Grief. Conversation with Grief was born after the death of Tetyana's grandmother, when Tetyana was forced to sit with her grief in the vacuum of a pandemic. They talk about how grief changes shape, how it constantly surprises us and how sometimes, the only thing we can do is invite it in. They also talk about how motherhood is a form of grief and how the opposite of grief is love.

All of Tetyana's books are self published. In the second half of the episode she shares insights into the process, and talks about the challenges and rewards of wearing so many hats simultaneously. She also talks about how self publishing isn't a less than option, but one that requires just as much work and dedication as a more traditional publishing route.

Conversation with Grief is available to preorder.

Motherland by Tetyana Denford

Tetyana's youtube series is here.

Books mentioned in the episode are:

Patricia Lockwood: No One is Talking About This

Glennon Doyle: Untamed

Sarah Moss: Ghost Wall

A Little Life: Hanya Yanagihara.

All Books mentioned on the podcast are now all in one spot on our very own Bookshop.org list

https://uk.bookshop.org/lists/not-too-busy-to-write-recommends

The blank page can be terrifying, paralysing even. How do you overcome the fear of starting something new?

In Episode 6 Ali and Penny - both at the start of new projects - talk about the different tools they use to make a strong start on something new. They examine artistic considerations as well as more practical techniques including: goal setting, spreadsheets, progress checkers, and the all important writing community.

They also talk about ways of reframing the idea of 'dreams'. Is it a dream to write a book, or an ambition?

Links mentioned

Pacemaker - online wordcount app

Clare Seal's (My Frugal Year) progress grid

Story Genius - Lisa Cron

Heavy Light - Horatio Clare

Mrs Death Misses Death - Salena Godden

Women's Prize for fiction 2021 long list

How does perfectionism hold our writing back?

From not sharing our work, to not getting started at all, Ali and Penny dig into how to manage our perfectionism as writers. Asking can perfectionism ever be a positive thing for our work? We look at avoiding comparison, when to ignore your inner critic (and when to listen) and allowing yourself to be vulnerable.

Books mentioned:

White Feminism - Koa Beck

The See-Through House - Shelley Klein

A Slice of the Moon - Sandi Toksvig

The End of the Sky - Sandi Toksvig

Aside from sitting down to actually write, where else do we get our creative energy and ideas from?

From solo afternoon trips to the cinema, visits to modern art installations and long drives alone, this episode is all about how we feed our creativity, spark new ideas and solve creative problems. Becoming aware of how we feed our creativity is one thing - but how do we then protect that creative time? Penny and Ali talk about how they prioritise those activities by treating it as part of the process and why they think we should all take it seriously.

Links mentioned in the show

5x15 spoken word events

Hay Festival Player

Arvon at Home

Edinburgh Book Festival

Mr B's Emporium Book Subscription

Galley Beggar's Press subscription

Girl A - Abigail Dean

Pew - Catherine Lacey

The Silence - Don Delillo

The Divers' Game - Jesse Ball

This week Ali and Penny are joined by debut author, Ilona Bannister, whose novel, When I Ran Away, is released in the UK on 4th March by Two Roads books and on 30th March in the US with Doubleday Books.

When I Ran Away is a startling novel, funny and hard hitting, it tells the story of GiGi, an American mother of two living in London who just can't manage to do it all.

In this fascinating and wide reaching episode, Ilona talks about how, after having children, she felt it was hugely important to write honestly about the effects of motherhood, trauma and grief, and in doing so breaking the narrative that we can have it all.

Ilona tells Ali and Penny about her journey to publishing, how she set her own deadlines, treated the novel writing process like work before it was paid work, as well as what steps she took to maximise her changes of success.

Books discussed

When I Ran Away - Ilona Bannister

Wow, No Thank You - Samantha Irby

Mrs Death Misses Death - Salena Godden

Luster - Raven Leilani

H(A)PPY - Nicola Barker

Insatiable - Daisy Buchannon

You can find Ilona Bannister on Instagram @ilona.bannister

You can find Ali Millar of instagram @ali_millar_writes

And Penny Wincer on instagram @pennywincer

The myth of ideal conditions can discourage us from getting on with a project, it's tempting instead to wait until things get easier or better. Just how do we let go of this idea and get down to work?

Ali and Penny talk about how they've learnt to dismiss ideal conditions, instead accepting where they are, even if it's a bit shit. They examine the upsides of time constraints and how it can be important to dismiss what other (often male) writers say about routines, as well as why why neither of them believe in the muse.

Links mentioned in the episode:

Why I won't try to be super-mum - by Penny Wincer for The Telegraph

Mother for Dinner - Shalom Auslander

Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982 - Cho Nam-Joo

In the first episode of Not Too Busy To Write, Ali and Penny introduce themselves and how they came to writing and ask the big question - how the hell are they managing to write at the moment? This episode was recorded in London in January 2021 during lockdown (not, as Penny accidentally says, January 2001!!!) and between them Ali and Penny have a whole lot of kids and complications.

Books mentioned

Hamnet - Maggie O'Farrell

The Creative Habit - Twyla Tharp

The Rules Do Not Apply - Ariel Levy

Other links

Maggie O'Farrell interviewed by Stuart Kelly for EIBF

Ali can be found on Instagram @ali_millar_writes and via her website alimillar.com

Penny can be found on Instagram @pennywincer and via her website pennywincerwrites.com

Ali Millar and Penny Wincer are Not Too Busy To Write. Except sometimes they are too busy to write as much as they would like.

Join us as we discuss the highs and lows of sitting down to the work, feeding our creativity and navigating the world of publishing. We’ll be looking at giving ourselves permission to write before it’s paid work, finding our feet in new genres, dismissing ideal conditions, bringing skills from other careers into our writing life and the joys (and sometimes pain!) of book marketing.

You can find Ali Millar at www.alimillar.com and on Instagram

And Penny Wincer at www.pennywincerwrites.com and on instagram

www.nottoobusytowrite.com