💋 ASK ME ANYTHING: writing edition
the floor is open and it is not made of lava
Good evening, everyone!
It was the Melbourne Writers’ Festival last weekend. I was invited, alongside Jemma Sbeg, to speak on Saturday evening at the State Library of Victoria!
The session promised to “tackle everything from impostor syndrome and single stigma to self-image and career crises”. All this from the perspective of two 20-somethings. So as you can imagine, I was already battling a case of the aforementioned syndrome as a thirty-and-2-month-year-old.
Alas, it was a fun crowd with lots of energy. Some giggles transpired, which is always lovely to hear.
After 45 minutes of 1v1 conversation, it was time for the Q&A.
To me, the question portion of these things is the most gooch-tingling section. I yearn to converse. I long to hear from my fellow townsfolk in the county square. The chaos and unpredictability of a question section is the drama I lack in real life.
We could only get through four or five questions, including a request for a ‘fit check’ where I was forced to explain why I wasn’t wearing the 2011 Eve Nightclub style fit that I had promised to wear.
I just wasn’t feeling it, so I followed my instinct – more on that later miluv. The perfect occasion for the auspicious look will come. Perhaps when we least expect it?
Tonight, I will be answering the questions we didn’t get to, as well as some other questions I received on Instagram.
I wrote a similar newsletter last year, about the publishing and writing process specifically, here.
Solving the riddle of writing commercially (and/or being published) can be akin to a never-ending expedition to White Castle. What is the fastest route? Where will we get stuck? And what even goes into the books, or better yet, the burgers?
Core childhood content. The burgers always looked dreadful. Why is the meat square? Where is the sauce? Also, Kumar cutting his pubes with the kitchen scissors </3
I digress.
Tonight I’ll answer some questions! Sorry if they’re obvious answers lol. I kinda just have this urge to be creative but I’m not in a funny mood so this is what I’m doing. If anyone else has been sick for two weeks straight, marinating, you may feel me.
Shall we?
1. Would you rather: A, a botched lip forever, or B, book never released?
Oh my days! Now this one is really wringing the brain dry and so early on. Hmm. I don’t think I could handle the below forever. But my book is a core tenet of my personality now.
I’ll say, no book. Leave the busted arse to the primates at Taronga Zoo!
2. Writing can be so isolating! When did you know to embrace the bubble or go out?
It’s funny, when I’m on a roll and in the zone, it doesn’t matter where I am. I could be on the bus frantically tapping into the notes app, or in my study with the door closed and the sunlight streaming in just so.
I am someone who needs a lot of external validation, creatively. Up until recently, every single thing I ever posted on Instagram had to be vetoed by at least one friend, sometimes two. How exhausting for them. So I would count going to them for guidance as ‘going outside’, if that makes sense.
A lot of writers and creators say that being ‘in life’ and going out and experiencing things is integral to being a better communicator or creative. This plagued me when I was in a more depressed era because I didn’t want to go outside… I think if you’re going outside with the sole purpose of trying to experience demonic things to access creativity, you’re putting yourself under undue stress. Some of the most exciting writing is about really mundane things that can happen in your house.
A book I would recommend for this is The Story: Love, Loss, and the Lives of Women by Victoria Hislop. It’s a compendium of 100 of the best short stories ever written. It’s a great way to discover writers you may never have otherwise found. It’s also a good introduction to all the different ways fiction can be written. Also great if you have a short attention span. Think of it as a tasting menu.
I bought it about ten years ago and I go and pick it up from a random page when I’m feeling uninspired.
3. Did you use AI?
No! I only downloaded ChatGPT about six months ago. For ages I just thought it was something high schoolers used to write their essays. I’m happy I didn’t open up that Pandora’s box until recently, cos it’s pretty tempting to use for everything.
It’s morally ambiguous, but I do think that it can serve a purpose. Especially if you’re a lone ranger. For instance, I’m writing a television script at the moment, and when the program I’m using (Final Draft) doesn’t make sense, I ask Chat to explain it to me. I don’t have anyone else to help me right now. So it helps with accessibility and I think that’s important. It’s sorta not that different to Grammarly or the red squiggly line that comes up when you use British English on Word.
It isn’t a reliable source, though. When I have plugged some of my writing into it and asked for ‘feedback’, it can flatten a lot of the tone and life that comes from idiosyncratic writing. Mistakes and weird grammar are nice and real. Is it ‘grammar are’ or ‘grammar is’? I don’t know and I don’t care. Language has evolved over eons, I’m here to set it back hehe.
I haven’t fully made up my mind on whether or not Chat is the end to civilisation and creativity as we know it. Standby.
my AI clocking those allegations…
4. During the talk, you touched on how it was important to be vulnerable (publishers want that), but that there were many things that you left out or found too embarrassing/hard to write about. How do you toe the line between vulnerability and oversharing/how do you decide what is worth revealing?
Ooh, I love this question.
I’m pretty jaded when it comes to power brokers in the writing space. I came up in the age of digital media, where young writers were expected to mine their personal experiences for clicks (lol that it was called ‘clicks’ instead of ‘taps’). American cultural critic Jia Tolentino wrote about this era in her essay ‘The Personal Essay Boom is Over’ in New Yorker years ago. Great explainer of this dynamic.
Reading messy stories where people overshare about dreadful things that have happened to them is fun, like eating fairy floss. A very quick way to feel something. I still go on the Daily Mail when I feel numb for that very reason – sometimes I want to feel anything, even if it’s pure, unadulterated rage.
But I think that a lot of creativity is lost when new writers are told that the only thing that is interesting about them is the worst thing that has ever happened to them.
There’s obviously nothing wrong with writing about bad things that have happened. It can be easier to access them and bring life to them because they make an imprint, they’re visceral. But I think the emphasis on this kind of writing takes away from the skill a lot of people possess in bringing to life the mundane. For instance, I’ve written about it before, but this piece in The New York Times titled ‘I Recommend Eating Chips’ just so captured my imagination, and stuck with me in a way a piece about something macabre could not.
All that said. An example of something that I wrestled with including in the book was my Mum’s story, and the story of her Mum’s post-natal depression and death. It felt very close to the bone, and also sort of not my story to tell. But ultimately, I decided to keep it in there as it helped illustrate a point I wanted to make about the dubious nature of ‘epigenetics’ and mother blame. Women are an easy target when it comes to impacting their children’s lives because more is expected of them in that parental role (in my opinion).
So the point being, anything I put in the book that felt close to the bone, I had to justify. A long and hard think was had. Some things did not pass that test, like tea about certain relationships. They got no airtime because they couldn’t illustrate a wider point that was integral to the book’s purpose. And it just didn’t feel right in ‘the gut’. I had to tell myself that what I have to say is interesting even if I’m not splaying myself open like a garlic-infused butterflied chicken.
I think getting really clear on the ‘point’ of the book helped too. It wasn’t until I landed on the title All I Ever Wanted Was To Be Hot that I could really use that as a filter. How did every chapter relate to that title? That helped.
I hope that makes sense hehe.
5. How do you broaden your vocabulary?
When I worked at Pedestrian as a writer, I kept a ‘Stickie’ on my desktop of weird words that I liked. I also always Google synonyms for words. I like words of yore that are also instantly recognisable, like how people name their babies old man names.
As I get older, I realise my parents have broad vocabularies. My Dad is really witty in a cunty way and the best way to really spar people is use out-of-the-box words, I’ve observed. That said, you can’t go past a well-timed “POO HEAD!”. My mum reads a lot and is perceptive. So that’s a helpful starting place.
Also, my mate Nat and I used to spend Year 11 writing in-depth, old-fashioned reviews of local McDonald’s restaurants on Facebook. A low-stakes, enjoyable way of learning to write humorously. For the fun of it.
I like collecting words, like little gems. Please don’t judge me if I haven’t used many in this newsletter 🥺
6. Hey boss, what’s the next story you want to tell?
Well hun, I want to make a television show!
A six-part comedy series about an influencer who is forced to work at her father’s car yard after a cataclysmic personal implosion. I love six-part series, particularly British ones. Amandaland, Pulling, Am I Being Unreasonable? core.
good bye
Let’s see how it goes. I feel comfortable saying that I want to do that because it’s notoriously extremely difficult to get anything up on-screen in Australia so I may as well tell everyone, and see if drumming up attention like an inflatable wacky waving tube man does the trick. It will happen!
Thanx for reading.
Should you wish to purchase my book, please do feel obliged.
Lots of regards,
Froooooooooomes