Latest / The Book Deal / SUMMER SERIES Kylie Orr on competitions, writing craft, social media and letting go

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SUMMER SERIES Kylie Orr on competitions, writing craft, social media and letting go · The Book Deal

• 0:09
  Tina Strachan: This is the Book Deal podcast where you will discover the inspiring stories behind your favorite books.
• 0:15
  Natasha Rai: We interview seasoned and debut authors, as well as publishing industry professionals to bring you the best tips and advice on
• 0:22
  Madeleine Cleary: how to get that elusive book deal.
• 0:25
  Madeleine Cleary: So no matter what's.
• 0:26
  Madeleine Cleary: Stage of writing your at.
• 0:28
  Madeleine Cleary: We've got you covered.
• 0:29
  Madeleine Cleary: I'm Tina Strachan I'm Madeleine Cleary.
• 0:32
  Madeleine Cleary: And I'm Natasha Rai And join us as we pull back the curtain of published authors one deal at a time.
• 0:43
  Madeleine Cleary: The book Deal podcast acknowledges the traditional owners, the land and waters, which it's recorded on and pays respect to their elders past, present, and emerging.
• 0:56
  Tina Strachan: Hello, wonderful podcast friends.
• 0:58
  Tina Strachan: I'm Tina Strachan and welcome to the summer season of the Book Deal podcast for the 25 26 years.
• 1:05
  Tina Strachan: We have had a huge year made possible by your incredible support, but it's time for Madeleine, Natasha, and I to have a little break.
• 1:14
  Tina Strachan: We have lots of writing to do, lot.
• 1:16
  Tina Strachan: Gardening, lots of family time and a fair bit of rest due to help us reset and prepare for another huge year in 2026.
• 1:25
  Tina Strachan: So over the next five weeks, we will be bringing you some of our most played eps of all time.
• 1:31
  Tina Strachan: Maybe they're ones you've not had a chance to listen to yet, or maybe you're listening for a second time and hearing new details you missed the first time.
• 1:40
  Tina Strachan: Either way, we hope you enjoy the EPS and have a magical summer break or winter break for all of our Northern Hemisphere listeners.
• 1:48
  Tina Strachan: See you soon with new episodes of the Book Deal Podcast.
• 1:52
  Madeleine Cleary: Hey, Tina.
• 1:53
  Madeleine Cleary: Hi Madeleine.
• 1:54
  Madeleine Cleary: How are you?
• 1:55
  Madeleine Cleary: Oh, great.
• 1:56
  Madeleine Cleary: Well, just talking about how good the weather is.
• 1:59
  Madeleine Cleary: The weather is amazing.
• 2:00
  Madeleine Cleary: Yes.
• 2:01
  Madeleine Cleary: In both Melbourne and Gold Coast.
• 2:03
  Madeleine Cleary: Like that's, that's.
• 2:04
  Madeleine Cleary: That's great.
• 2:06
  Madeleine Cleary: We're both looking at sunny skies.
• 2:08
  Madeleine Cleary: It is great.
• 2:08
  Madeleine Cleary: Especially after a week of rain that we had up here, it's must be very, very tough living in Queensland.
• 2:13
  Madeleine Cleary: Yeah.
• 2:13
  Madeleine Cleary: It's hard.
• 2:16
  Madeleine Cleary: I wanted to ask you, cause I saw this week on your Instagram, uh, some amazing photos of you.
• 2:23
  Madeleine Cleary: You did a shoot and you looked gorgeous.
• 2:26
  Madeleine Cleary: And you also had some little friends join you as part of your shoot as well.
• 2:29
  Madeleine Cleary: Can you tell us about that?
• 2:31
  Madeleine Cleary: I did.
• 2:31
  Madeleine Cleary: Okay.
• 2:32
  Madeleine Cleary: I did.
• 2:32
  Madeleine Cleary: Yeah, well, um, that was super fun and something that I've been looking forward to for a couple of weeks.
• 2:38
  Madeleine Cleary: So that's part, that was for a, um, like an author video, it's just called, um, that, uh, the, my publisher, uh, requested.
• 2:48
  Madeleine Cleary: So I, cause I'm about six months out now from release date of my first book in my series.
• 2:56
  Madeleine Cleary: So I feel like that's when everything sort of starts happening and you kind of.
• 3:00
  Madeleine Cleary: Um, the publicists contact you, et cetera.
• 3:02
  Madeleine Cleary: So, um, one of the things they've asked for is an author video and they use that to send to, um, booksellers, um, mostly to, uh, when they're going around trying to sell you.
• 3:16
  Madeleine Cleary: sell your book into, into the, into the stores.
• 3:19
  Madeleine Cleary: And um, yeah, so that was really fun because I've got lots of animals in my book, uh, because it's based in a zoo.
• 3:27
  Madeleine Cleary: Um, I just thought it'd be very appropriate to have some animals in my author video.
• 3:32
  Madeleine Cleary: Absolutely.
• 3:32
  Madeleine Cleary: I think it's so special.
• 3:34
  Madeleine Cleary: No one else is going to be able to pull that out.
• 3:36
  Madeleine Cleary: I don't think there are videos.
• 3:38
  Madeleine Cleary: It's very memorable.
• 3:40
  Madeleine Cleary: Yeah.
• 3:40
  Madeleine Cleary: Yeah.
• 3:41
  Madeleine Cleary: Hopefully.
• 3:41
  Madeleine Cleary: Yeah.
• 3:42
  Madeleine Cleary: Well, I actually wasn't too sure.
• 3:43
  Madeleine Cleary: I did ask them first because I thought, Oh, well maybe it would be too distracting, you know, take away from, you know, You?
• 3:50
  Madeleine Cleary: Me.
• 3:50
  Madeleine Cleary: Yeah, talking about.
• 3:51
  Madeleine Cleary: So it's just like introduce yourself, introduce your book.
• 3:54
  Madeleine Cleary: What's the, um, you know, what was the motivation to write the book, um, and why, who, who would enjoy reading it and why you wanted to write it, et cetera.
• 4:06
  Madeleine Cleary: Um, so I wasn't sure if that was going to detract from it.
• 4:08
  Madeleine Cleary: Um, but it was a very good excuse to play with some animals again and get my little fuzzy fix.
• 4:14
  Madeleine Cleary: But I also had, um, quite a few animals.
• 4:16
  Madeleine Cleary: There was a snake and a, and a black cockatoo, and I even had a pet.
• 4:21
  Madeleine Cleary: And, um, so beautiful ringtail possum.
• 4:25
  Madeleine Cleary: So I just kept saying my spiel over and over and over while I had the animals.
• 4:28
  Madeleine Cleary: Cause you know, when you work with animals, anything can happen.
• 4:31
  Madeleine Cleary: Uh, so I just kept saying it over and over and just like, we'll just keep going.
• 4:35
  Madeleine Cleary: We'll let the animals do their thing.
• 4:37
  Madeleine Cleary: And hopefully we have.
• 4:38
  Madeleine Cleary: something at the end so that we can use.
• 4:41
  Madeleine Cleary: So yes, little pom pom, um, the ringtail possum was the one that we went with because she was beautiful and there's a beautiful ringtail possum in my book and there's like a, because it's middle grade and it has lots of illustrations, there's a beautiful illustration of a ringtail in there as well that looked just like her.
• 4:59
  Madeleine Cleary: Um, so yeah, that was with um, Wild Call um, wildlife.
• 5:04
  Madeleine Cleary: They were very amazing and helped me out for the day.
• 5:07
  Madeleine Cleary: So that was, that was so fun.
• 5:08
  Madeleine Cleary: So hopefully I get to work with them a little bit more, but so that's all the video.
• 5:12
  Madeleine Cleary: Do you have, will you be doing one too, probably?
• 5:15
  Madeleine Cleary: You just, um, I'm not, I'm not too sure at the moment, but I just wanted to say one thing though on that, Tina, if you can see Stand and pitch your book with a snake right next to your face.
• 5:27
  Madeleine Cleary: I feel like you can pitch it anywhere, like that is next level.
• 5:32
  Madeleine Cleary: Oh, it was a beautiful snake too.
• 5:34
  Madeleine Cleary: Yeah, so, but it was cool because now I've got like a, um, yeah, a whole heap of video and some photos and stuff with them all, so it was beautiful, yeah.
• 5:42
  Madeleine Cleary: Yeah, that's exciting.
• 5:44
  Madeleine Cleary: So I've had a few, um, things come through from listeners, actually, some feedback.
• 5:49
  Madeleine Cleary: Um, and so one of the questions, and these are actually people who are not not necessarily writers, but they're readers and they're really keen to, you know, what is middle grade, Tina?
• 6:01
  Madeleine Cleary: Oh, okay.
• 6:02
  Madeleine Cleary: Middle grade.
• 6:03
  Madeleine Cleary: So is a, I guess, a category for children.
• 6:08
  Madeleine Cleary: Um, That is usually classified between like, you could call it 8 so that often, so because kids, they like to read up, so they, as in, the character, the main characters, they like them to be a few years older than them, they don't like to read down or even their same, they like to read up a couple of years, so, so, It's like eight plus is this category.
• 6:35
  Madeleine Cleary: And so, you know, my books, the characters are 11 and they can probably go up to 12, but once they become teenagers, it's often moving into young adult.
• 6:50
  Madeleine Cleary: Then, um, yeah, so, you know, there's a bit of a, yeah, if they're 13, it's kind of really bordering.
• 6:57
  Madeleine Cleary: And sometimes they, you can see them in middle grade, but then they're sort of pushing that boundary to, to young adults.
• 7:03
  Madeleine Cleary: New things emerging when you're turning 12 and 13 that might not necessarily be dealt with in middle grade, but of course they might as well.
• 7:10
  Madeleine Cleary: Yeah.
• 7:10
  Madeleine Cleary: And when you're 13, you're in high school.
• 7:12
  Madeleine Cleary: So that is, you know, high school kids, it's a whole different thing.
• 7:17
  Madeleine Cleary: And eight year olds, you know, reading about high school life is probably not ideal.
• 7:22
  Madeleine Cleary: So that's when it just sort of shifts that category.
• 7:24
  Madeleine Cleary: Um, but you know, there's always exceptions to the rule, but that is what middle grade is.
• 7:29
  Madeleine Cleary: Interesting.
• 7:29
  Madeleine Cleary: And I've also had other people say to me, Tina's amazing.
• 7:32
  Madeleine Cleary: She's got three books coming out next year.
• 7:34
  Madeleine Cleary: How many words are in each book?
• 7:36
  Madeleine Cleary: Yes.
• 7:37
  Madeleine Cleary: So middle grade, normally like the sweet spots about, um, about 40, 000.
• 7:42
  Madeleine Cleary: Words?
• 7:43
  Madeleine Cleary: Um.
• 7:43
  Madeleine Cleary: That's still, that's a lot.
• 7:45
  Madeleine Cleary: Yeah, so it's two hundred and forty Pages.
• 7:49
  Madeleine Cleary: Yes.
• 7:49
  Madeleine Cleary: And.
• 7:50
  Madeleine Cleary: Including illustrations as well in that too.
• 7:53
  Madeleine Cleary: Including illustrations.
• 7:54
  Madeleine Cleary: You've got the cover there.
• 7:55
  Madeleine Cleary: Can you show us the cover?
• 7:56
  Madeleine Cleary: Yes, I can.
• 7:56
  Madeleine Cleary: I mean, sorry for everyone who's listening on, like, without video, but, um.
• 8:00
  Madeleine Cleary: We'll try and describe it.
• 8:02
  Madeleine Cleary: And when are you going to reveal it on, you have to put it up on social media soon.
• 8:05
  Madeleine Cleary: Yes, I will.
• 8:06
  Madeleine Cleary: Very soon.
• 8:07
  Madeleine Cleary: I'm just gonna, cause I, you know, I have gone through it because you know when you It doesn't matter how many times you read some your work, you'll always find something you want to change.
• 8:17
  Madeleine Cleary: And I've been trying not to do that because you know, this is, so I have got my arc.
• 8:21
  Madeleine Cleary: That was the other very exciting thing.
• 8:23
  Madeleine Cleary: That's happened recently.
• 8:23
  Madeleine Cleary: The arc everyone is the uncorrected proof.
• 8:25
  Madeleine Cleary: Oh my goodness.
• 8:26
  Madeleine Cleary: All right.
• 8:28
  Madeleine Cleary: So shall I describe it?
• 8:30
  Madeleine Cleary: Yeah, you can describe it.
• 8:32
  Madeleine Cleary: Okay.
• 8:32
  Madeleine Cleary: So, um, there's this beautiful sort of sign archway saying wild zoo, and then underneath it says Nika and the missing key.
• 8:40
  Madeleine Cleary: And there's a gorgeous girl and she's got brown hair and brown eyes and she's holding, is that like a little Joey in there?
• 8:47
  Madeleine Cleary: Yep.
• 8:47
  Madeleine Cleary: It's a joey kangaroo.
• 8:49
  Madeleine Cleary: It's a little joey kangaroo in her knapsack.
• 8:51
  Madeleine Cleary: Because she lives in a zoo.
• 8:53
  Madeleine Cleary: Oh my gosh.
• 8:54
  Madeleine Cleary: That is so beautiful.
• 8:55
  Madeleine Cleary: And it's this gorgeous, glossy, beautiful.
• 8:58
  Madeleine Cleary: The illustrations are stunning.
• 9:00
  Madeleine Cleary: Amazing.
• 9:01
  Madeleine Cleary: She's done such a good job.
• 9:02
  Madeleine Cleary: It's a little wraparound cover as well.
• 9:04
  Madeleine Cleary: So yes, it's very exciting.
• 9:06
  Madeleine Cleary: It's amazing just to hold it like in my hands.
• 9:09
  Madeleine Cleary: And it's, uh.
• 9:10
  Madeleine Cleary: It's a real thing.
• 9:11
  Madeleine Cleary: It's a real thing.
• 9:11
  Madeleine Cleary: All that work and effort over years and years.
• 9:14
  Madeleine Cleary: Yes.
• 9:15
  Madeleine Cleary: Very, very exciting.
• 9:16
  Madeleine Cleary: Very, very cool.
• 9:17
  Madeleine Cleary: So yeah, so that's the ARC, which we spoke about in the last, um, in our last episode.
• 9:21
  Madeleine Cleary: So advanced reading copy that also gets sent out to booksellers and reviewers.
• 9:25
  Madeleine Cleary: And also it does give you that opportunity to see it in print, um, and if yeah, there is any inaccuracies that, that you need to correct.
• 9:33
  Madeleine Cleary: So yes.
• 9:35
  Madeleine Cleary: So exciting.
• 9:36
  Madeleine Cleary: So yeah, so it is quite thick.
• 9:38
  Madeleine Cleary: So 240 pages.
• 9:39
  Madeleine Cleary: Um, and so you've, you've got to do three of those this next year.
• 9:44
  Madeleine Cleary: Yes.
• 9:45
  Madeleine Cleary: Um, yes.
• 9:46
  Madeleine Cleary: So, you know, three of them, three together is quite, quite a lot of words, really.
• 9:51
  Madeleine Cleary: Isn't it?
• 9:51
  Madeleine Cleary: It is.
• 9:52
  Madeleine Cleary: It's significant.
• 9:53
  Madeleine Cleary: It's massive.
• 9:54
  Madeleine Cleary: Well, I, I think it's amazing.
• 9:56
  Madeleine Cleary: Like you work so hard and everyone Telling me that like, oh, Tina's sounds great.
• 9:59
  Madeleine Cleary: And she just must be working so hard.
• 10:01
  Madeleine Cleary: I'm like, yes, she is.
• 10:03
  Madeleine Cleary: Yes, but so are you Madeleine, as are all authors, especially, you know, in the lead up to debut books coming out.
• 10:11
  Madeleine Cleary: Absolutely.
• 10:12
  Madeleine Cleary: Which we both are.
• 10:13
  Madeleine Cleary: Absolutely.
• 10:14
  Madeleine Cleary: That's kind of my, um, that's basically what I've, my updates for the last couple of weeks.
• 10:20
  Madeleine Cleary: What about you, Madeleine?
• 10:21
  Madeleine Cleary: We need an update from you.
• 10:22
  Madeleine Cleary: Um, yeah, so very exciting.
• 10:25
  Madeleine Cleary: Um, so my publicist contacted me last week and said, um, we're going to announce the, the deal in books and publishing, which is, I think the industry rag, um, that all sort of everyone reads and, uh, whether you're a bookseller or an agent or a publisher, um, it's, yeah, something that we all like to look at.
• 10:46
  Madeleine Cleary: Um, even though I signed the deal over a year ago, I think they prefer to.
• 10:51
  Madeleine Cleary: So I'm going to announce it close to the publication date.
• 10:53
  Madeleine Cleary: So mine will be in another eight months, um, just to sort of keep the hype and, and generate a bit more interest.
• 11:00
  Madeleine Cleary: Otherwise people are going to forget if they, if we released it a year ago.
• 11:03
  Madeleine Cleary: So that was really exciting.
• 11:05
  Madeleine Cleary: I didn't know when it was going to be released.
• 11:07
  Madeleine Cleary: So did you open your emails and see it in there or did someone send it to you?
• 11:12
  Madeleine Cleary: Well, I think one of, uh, so Nadia from the Daybrew crew, she was the first one that found it.
• 11:17
  Madeleine Cleary: She found it two minutes after the email was sent.
• 11:19
  Madeleine Cleary: She was, she was, I didn't actually see that comment.
• 11:24
  Madeleine Cleary: So I was just like looking through my emails at lunchtime and then I just checked it and saw my face.
• 11:30
  Madeleine Cleary: I was like, Oh, Oh, this is exciting.
• 11:32
  Madeleine Cleary: So yeah, I don't know.
• 11:34
  Madeleine Cleary: It's just like, it's, it's, it feels quite exciting.
• 11:36
  Madeleine Cleary: So I had so many people reach out and it was really lovely.
• 11:38
  Madeleine Cleary: So yeah, that was, that was fun.
• 11:40
  Madeleine Cleary: It's nice.
• 11:40
  Madeleine Cleary: Um, but yeah, other than that, um, I've, I've been just relaxing the last week cause I handed in my edits.
• 11:47
  Madeleine Cleary: I'm not sure if I told you that, did I?
• 11:49
  Madeleine Cleary: Is that a yes.
• 11:50
  Madeleine Cleary: Yeah.
• 11:50
  Madeleine Cleary: So I handed that in about a week ago, a week and a half ago and felt very, very relieved doing that.
• 11:56
  Madeleine Cleary: Um, after doing that big sort of read through, um, and so recovery time, I think, don't you?
• 12:03
  Madeleine Cleary: Because your brain's just been working over time and you absolutely like it.
• 12:08
  Madeleine Cleary: So yeah, having a full recovery.
• 12:10
  Madeleine Cleary: Afterwards to, yeah, just kind of get back, get back on track with everything else that you've put off during that time and also give your brain a little bit of a break.
• 12:19
  Madeleine Cleary: Yeah, the garden, pulling out lots of weeds.
• 12:22
  Madeleine Cleary: That's what I've been doing and it's been really lovely.
• 12:24
  Madeleine Cleary: But, um, I, I don't know, Tina, and you're probably very similar.
• 12:27
  Madeleine Cleary: I think, um, I find like I'm turning my brain off, but I'm also thinking of new ideas and that's getting me really excited.
• 12:35
  Madeleine Cleary: So I've come up with a new idea for a new book that I really want to start.
• 12:40
  Madeleine Cleary: It's a really fun project, but I just can't, I'm just trying to keep that on the back burner, because I'm worried if I embark upon that, I'm just gonna get a little bit distracted.
• 12:53
  Madeleine Cleary: So do you, when you get those ideas in your mind though, are you writing them down or are you just keeping them in?
• 13:00
  Madeleine Cleary: Oh, absolutely.
• 13:01
  Madeleine Cleary: So you're writing it all down.
• 13:02
  Madeleine Cleary: So it's there for when you're ready.
• 13:04
  Madeleine Cleary: So it popped into my brain, uh, on a train in Romania, going through Transylvania.
• 13:12
  Madeleine Cleary: Perfect.
• 13:12
  Madeleine Cleary: And I just decided I'll just spend the two hour train journey, just sitting and looking out at the beautiful Transylvanian mountains instead of like listening to music or listening to a podcast and just to let my brain set.
• 13:24
  Madeleine Cleary: So I had about two and a half hour train ride.
• 13:26
  Madeleine Cleary: And I reckon on hour two.
• 13:29
  Madeleine Cleary: My brain just became super creative.
• 13:31
  Madeleine Cleary: It took a while, um, and then, yeah, it just switched.
• 13:35
  Madeleine Cleary: And so then I just had the whole concept of how the novel would begin.
• 13:39
  Madeleine Cleary: And yeah, so I'm excited.
• 13:41
  Madeleine Cleary: Were you sitting there with a pen and paper?
• 13:43
  Madeleine Cleary: Can I ask?
• 13:44
  Madeleine Cleary: Just because I feel like when I sit there with a pen and paper, it's almost like it's this connection from my brain to my hand, to the paper.
• 13:51
  Madeleine Cleary: And if I, and that's when it starts.
• 13:54
  Madeleine Cleary: coming, like flowing a little bit.
• 13:55
  Madeleine Cleary: Oh, that's interesting.
• 13:57
  Madeleine Cleary: Is that how you get your, oh, no, I just stare.
• 14:00
  Madeleine Cleary: And then I quickly jot down a few weird words in my phone.
• 14:04
  Madeleine Cleary: Okay.
• 14:04
  Madeleine Cleary: Yeah.
• 14:04
  Madeleine Cleary: Yeah.
• 14:05
  Madeleine Cleary: Well, whatever, if you don't have pen and paper, definitely you need to just get anywhere in your phone.
• 14:08
  Madeleine Cleary: I'm the same.
• 14:09
  Madeleine Cleary: I have a Thousand notes that make probably no sense, but one day I'll go back to them.
• 14:14
  Madeleine Cleary: It would be good one, one day you should publish those random notes and everyone I'll be like, look at the brilliance of the God, maybe, but I think that's really important what you said.
• 14:25
  Madeleine Cleary: And, um, you know, unfortunately we can't all be on a two and a half, you know, hour train ride through Romania.
• 14:32
  Madeleine Cleary: But, um, do you find that even just going for a walk around the block?
• 14:37
  Madeleine Cleary: Or a couple of blocks.
• 14:38
  Madeleine Cleary: Or, um, going for a drive?
• 14:41
  Madeleine Cleary: I actually Um, like going for a drive and do voicemail messages into my phone, um, you know, cause safety first while driving and, um, yeah, or just finding that bit of space and sitting where you're not distracted by other things to get those ideas flowing.
• 14:58
  Madeleine Cleary: Agreed.
• 14:58
  Madeleine Cleary: Agreed.
• 14:59
  Madeleine Cleary: And if I'm ever stuck in a scene where I don't have a solution.
• 15:04
  Madeleine Cleary: Even, I don't even have to go for a walk around the block.
• 15:06
  Madeleine Cleary: I just need to get up and make myself a cup of tea or something while I'm waiting for the kettle.
• 15:11
  Madeleine Cleary: I just pace a little bit and then I'm like, Oh, found it.
• 15:16
  Madeleine Cleary: And often it's like, do you find in the shower as well?
• 15:18
  Madeleine Cleary: Cause you're doing something repetitive and you can't have your phone with you or anything else.
• 15:22
  Madeleine Cleary: And then suddenly your brain just finds all these solutions.
• 15:25
  Madeleine Cleary: The problem is you, you're in the shower.
• 15:27
  Madeleine Cleary: You can't like get out and start getting on your phone and writing things down.
• 15:31
  Madeleine Cleary: We need like a, like a recorder in the shower, I think, so you can start.
• 15:35
  Madeleine Cleary: Or a whiteboard.
• 15:37
  Madeleine Cleary: Or, my kids have these, um, crayons, bath crayons.
• 15:42
  Madeleine Cleary: They just roll all over the wall with it.
• 15:44
  Madeleine Cleary: So really, Um, maybe you need to get yourself some of them and just draw on the wall.
• 15:49
  Madeleine Cleary: It would look like the visionary of a madman or something, like all these like red scrolls riding in the bath, shower.
• 15:57
  Madeleine Cleary: Yes, there's a, there's an awesome children's author called Nat Amor who also talks about getting her ideas.
• 16:04
  Madeleine Cleary: I think it's quite common.
• 16:07
  Madeleine Cleary: I think it's, I reckon it's a common thing, but also I think writers are always good walkers because that's a nice way for your mind to switch off.
• 16:15
  Madeleine Cleary: Yeah.
• 16:15
  Madeleine Cleary: It sounds like that's where, what you do.
• 16:18
  Madeleine Cleary: Yeah.
• 16:19
  Madeleine Cleary: If it's not flowing or, you know, sometimes just staring at the wall, you know, often with the computer open because you're hoping that the ideas will somehow flow onto the, into the computer.
• 16:29
  Madeleine Cleary: But yeah, it is just about.
• 16:32
  Madeleine Cleary: Even when you don't think anything is there and you have no ideas and no suggestions.
• 16:38
  Madeleine Cleary: It is just about even going for that walk and something triggering you, a dog or a bird or, you know, a kid or something triggers you and it just, you just have to sit with it, doesn't it?
• 16:49
  Madeleine Cleary: And there's always, I think the, the, the brilliant thing about it and you have to keep telling yourself is I've always been able to find just solution.
• 16:56
  Kylie Orr: So
• 16:57
  Madeleine Cleary: even if you've come across a problem, you're like, I'm never going to get over this.
• 17:00
  Madeleine Cleary: That's not going to be helpful.
• 17:01
  Madeleine Cleary: You just have to go.
• 17:01
  Madeleine Cleary: No, it'll come.
• 17:02
  Madeleine Cleary: You just have to sit with it.
• 17:04
  Madeleine Cleary: It's so true.
• 17:05
  Madeleine Cleary: But in that moment, Hey, when you, you were like, this is, I can't fix this.
• 17:09
  Madeleine Cleary: This is terrible.
• 17:12
  Madeleine Cleary: And, but it does.
• 17:14
  Madeleine Cleary: And I think you do have to do it.
• 17:16
  Madeleine Cleary: a few times to realize, no, you can, you do always find your way out of it and you do always find a way to fix the, you know, the plot issue or whatever it was that was getting you stumped.
• 17:26
  Madeleine Cleary: But it's so true that you say that because that even happened with my third book, the last book that I handed into my publisher.
• 17:33
  Madeleine Cleary: I literally pulled it all apart the week before it was due on
• 17:36
  Kylie Orr: my
• 17:37
  Madeleine Cleary: Fijian holiday.
• 17:38
  Madeleine Cleary: Getting up at 3am.
• 17:40
  Madeleine Cleary: Great time to do it.
• 17:41
  Madeleine Cleary: Um, but yeah, You know, and I was just like, this is an absolute mess, I'm never going to get to the end of it.
• 17:47
  Madeleine Cleary: And I was trying to say to myself, no, but you, you know, you know, this has happened before and you know, you can get through to the end.
• 17:53
  Madeleine Cleary: Um, and when you get there, you'll be like, oh, that's right.
• 17:56
  Madeleine Cleary: I knew that all along.
• 17:59
  Madeleine Cleary: It's such a mind game, isn't it?
• 18:00
  Madeleine Cleary: It is.
• 18:01
  Madeleine Cleary: It is.
• 18:01
  Madeleine Cleary: Do you find now, after having written three plus books, that when you're, oh, I should actually ask you, are you a plotter or a painter?
• 18:11
  Madeleine Cleary: Um, I think I change all the time.
• 18:13
  Madeleine Cleary: Um, and I was a, I started as a pants up.
• 18:19
  Madeleine Cleary: Should we explain what that is to anyone?
• 18:21
  Madeleine Cleary: It doesn't.
• 18:21
  Madeleine Cleary: Yes.
• 18:22
  Madeleine Cleary: Yeah.
• 18:22
  Madeleine Cleary: So pants up.
• 18:24
  Madeleine Cleary: You see, you're right on the seat of your pants.
• 18:25
  Madeleine Cleary: You have no idea what's around the corner or you might only know what's just around the corner.
• 18:32
  Madeleine Cleary: Yeah.
• 18:33
  Madeleine Cleary: You, you plot it out.
• 18:34
  Madeleine Cleary: You're plotting.
• 18:36
  Madeleine Cleary: And I think there's differing levels of all of that.
• 18:38
  Madeleine Cleary: of those two things.
• 18:40
  Madeleine Cleary: Um, and then there's Plantsa, which is when you're in the middle.
• 18:43
  Madeleine Cleary: Oh, I've heard of this.
• 18:43
  Madeleine Cleary: But I think they're different.
• 18:44
  Madeleine Cleary: I think they're different.
• 18:45
  Madeleine Cleary: Um, like there's different levels and, and for people, but I used to pants and I just, I wrote a whole, a whole book pantsing it, but there is a point, you know, where you do go back and you, and you editing and that's all part of plotting.
• 19:03
  Madeleine Cleary: And, and I think if you don't plot first, you just have to edit.
• 19:07
  Madeleine Cleary: And you end up sort of doing, kind of doing it anyway.
• 19:10
  Madeleine Cleary: And then I, I mean, my brain is, um, loves, um, a good, you know, spreadsheet and it loves the math.
• 19:18
  Madeleine Cleary: It loves the math of writing.
• 19:19
  Madeleine Cleary: So I love story grid and, um, save the cat.
• 19:24
  Madeleine Cleary: And I don't know any of these.
• 19:26
  Madeleine Cleary: Oh, we're going to have to do an episode on tools, I think.
• 19:30
  Madeleine Cleary: I have actually created a mush of the two.
• 19:32
  Madeleine Cleary: Really?
• 19:33
  Madeleine Cleary: So it's because I, it is so satisfying.
• 19:37
  Madeleine Cleary: So there's a manuscript that I'm working on at the moment, which I'm really plotting.
• 19:42
  Madeleine Cleary: But I think it's all, some people would also call it, You have zero draft of pantsing, but like, I'm literally plotting in Scrivener every single chapter and then making, and then I keep checking back to make sure that I'm hitting like the mathematical equations of where things technically are supposed to happen in Storygrid and Save the Cat.
• 20:05
  Madeleine Cleary: And I have to say, when, when you plot something out and then you go and check it to these math, you know, kind of the maths behind what makes.
• 20:14
  Madeleine Cleary: a good story, or in a good plot, and it actually hits it because you've just done it innately anyway.
• 20:21
  Madeleine Cleary: That is, that is glorious for me.
• 20:23
  Madeleine Cleary: I love that.
• 20:23
  Madeleine Cleary: Oh my gosh.
• 20:25
  Madeleine Cleary: Let's do a whole other episode on the math of writing.
• 20:29
  Madeleine Cleary: Um, because yeah, some people hate that sort of thing, but I, I love it.
• 20:32
  Madeleine Cleary: I've okay.
• 20:33
  Madeleine Cleary: I've never heard of it.
• 20:34
  Madeleine Cleary: Save the cat or what was the other one?
• 20:36
  Madeleine Cleary: Story grid.
• 20:37
  Madeleine Cleary: Story grid.
• 20:38
  Madeleine Cleary: Never heard of it.
• 20:38
  Madeleine Cleary: Heard of, I've heard of Scrivener, but never used it, but I've heard that you can't go back when you start with going down Scrivener.
• 20:46
  Madeleine Cleary: Um, I am old fashioned.
• 20:47
  Madeleine Cleary: I use Word.
• 20:49
  Madeleine Cleary: Do you?
• 20:49
  Madeleine Cleary: Yep.
• 20:50
  Madeleine Cleary: And then my, um, editor, she gave me a spreadsheet where she kind of tracks the plot things that happened on the plot.
• 20:56
  Madeleine Cleary: Aha, see.
• 20:57
  Madeleine Cleary: She gave me that.
• 20:58
  Madeleine Cleary: I was like, Oh, this is really how it's the math.
• 21:01
  Madeleine Cleary: Yep.
• 21:02
  Madeleine Cleary: It was just in my head.
• 21:03
  Madeleine Cleary: Otherwise, cause I'm a full panther.
• 21:04
  Madeleine Cleary: I was going to say you're clearly a panther then if, if, yeah, no idea about structure.
• 21:09
  Madeleine Cleary: I just was like, yeah, throw it all in and see what happens.
• 21:12
  Madeleine Cleary: And now I'm, well, this is why I'm on my third structural edit.
• 21:15
  Madeleine Cleary: So yeah.
• 21:17
  Madeleine Cleary: Oh, I don't know.
• 21:19
  Madeleine Cleary: Yeah.
• 21:19
  Madeleine Cleary: Perhaps.
• 21:20
  Madeleine Cleary: Well, let's, let's chat about story grid another time.
• 21:23
  Madeleine Cleary: I think that's.
• 21:24
  Madeleine Cleary: That's good.
• 21:24
  Madeleine Cleary: And listeners as well.
• 21:26
  Madeleine Cleary: If you do want to hear about this, let us know as well on our Instagram, if this is not something you want us to talk about.
• 21:32
  Madeleine Cleary: I mean, I'm very, very interested, but I'm curious to see if other writers are interested as well.
• 21:36
  Madeleine Cleary: Would you like an episode where Tina tries to convince Madeleine that the math in the writing is the best?
• 21:42
  Madeleine Cleary: Awesome.
• 21:42
  Madeleine Cleary: Fun.
• 21:44
  Madeleine Cleary: My maths teacher would be so happy about this.
• 21:46
  Madeleine Cleary: She was always trying to convince me why maths was important, even though I was a very English kind of minded person.
• 21:52
  Madeleine Cleary: So, all right, we'll leave that for another episode.
• 21:54
  Madeleine Cleary: Kylie Orr is an author of dark and twisty contemporary fiction.
• 22:00
  Madeleine Cleary: Her debut novel, Someone Else's Child, was long listed in the Rochelle Prize and published by HarperCollins in 2022.
• 22:07
  Madeleine Cleary: Her second novel, The Eleventh Floor, hit shelves in February this year, was chosen as an Apple Books Must Read and Book of the Week in the Age and Affiliate newspapers nationally.
• 22:17
  Madeleine Cleary: Last year, when I was a wide eyed and freshly signed author, I met Kylie and found her to be wonderfully warm, kind, and generous.
• 22:24
  Madeleine Cleary: I think you'll find the same when you listen to our discussion, as we talk competitions, agents, wins and woes, and much, much more.
• 22:30
  Madeleine Cleary: Kylie Orr, welcome to the Book Deal Podcast.
• 22:34
  Madeleine Cleary: Thank you for having me.
• 22:35
  Madeleine Cleary: I'm excited.
• 22:36
  Madeleine Cleary: Yay! And congratulations too on your amazing two novels, which I have with me here, um, which I have to say I absolutely loved and absolutely consumed them.
• 22:46
  Madeleine Cleary: So thank
• 22:47
  Kylie Orr: you.
• 22:47
  Kylie Orr: You do have to say that because you can't sit in front of me and say they're terrible, but you can say that off camera.
• 22:53
  Madeleine Cleary: Genuinely love them everyone.
• 22:55
  Madeleine Cleary: So please, please do pick them up.
• 22:57
  Madeleine Cleary: I'm also personally so excited to have you on board because I've attended some of your events in person and I know you have some absolutely wonderful insights to share with us.
• 23:06
  Madeleine Cleary: Um, but before we jump into all of the things.
• 23:10
  Madeleine Cleary: I just want to find out a little bit more about your writing process before you were published, because I know you were writing feature articles for 20 years for many different media outlets before you published your first novel.
• 23:22
  Madeleine Cleary: So for you, do you think writing a novel was the next logical step?
• 23:26
  Kylie Orr: Um, gee, when you say 20 years, it makes me sound really old, doesn't it?
• 23:30
  Kylie Orr: Uh, no, it was not the next logical step.
• 23:32
  Kylie Orr: I had never intended to write a novel.
• 23:35
  Kylie Orr: I wanted to write children's books.
• 23:37
  Kylie Orr: And so I was part of a children's book, um, writers group at the library.
• 23:43
  Kylie Orr: And so that's where my energy was concentrated.
• 23:45
  Kylie Orr: And I also had young children at the time.
• 23:47
  Kylie Orr: So I was reading lots of children's books, wondering how the hell did this rubbish get published?
• 23:51
  Kylie Orr: And of course I can do it better than they can, uh, found out I can't do it better than they can.
• 23:57
  Kylie Orr: Um, but I was writing, yeah, 800 word features for the age and daily life and essential baby.
• 24:04
  Kylie Orr: And I actually had.
• 24:07
  Kylie Orr: An editor from pan Macmillan checked me on LinkedIn.
• 24:11
  Kylie Orr: How does that happen, Kylie?
• 24:13
  Kylie Orr: That's amazing.
• 24:14
  Kylie Orr: It's like, I liken it to being a waitress in New York, who's like desperate to break into Hollywood.
• 24:19
  Kylie Orr: And I mean, not New York, I don't know, anyway, in LA and then I don't know, they get approached and say, you'd be great as the lead actor in this amazing blockbuster anyway, happened like that.
• 24:31
  Kylie Orr: Wow.
• 24:32
  Kylie Orr: She emailed and said she'd read some of my articles and she thought I had a good voice for women's fiction.
• 24:39
  Kylie Orr: And did I have any gems lying in my bottom drawer?
• 24:42
  Kylie Orr: And I was kind of like, gosh, that's a weird email to get.
• 24:47
  Kylie Orr: Hold my writers group and just kind of shrugged it off.
• 24:50
  Kylie Orr: Like, well, I'm not going to write a novel.
• 24:52
  Kylie Orr: So I'm just probably going to say no.
• 24:54
  Kylie Orr: And they were like, are you crazy?
• 24:56
  Kylie Orr: Nobody ever emails you to ask, have you got a book?
• 24:59
  Kylie Orr: Just say yes.
• 25:00
  Kylie Orr: And I was like, but I don't, they're like, make something up.
• 25:04
  Kylie Orr: So I made up two synopses.
• 25:05
  Kylie Orr: One was funny and one was someone else's child.
• 25:09
  Kylie Orr: And she said, I like the sound of the funny one, but nobody buys funny books.
• 25:13
  Kylie Orr: I don't believe that.
• 25:14
  Kylie Orr: I'm well, that was back way, way when before COVID and now everybody buys funny books because life is heavy.
• 25:21
  Kylie Orr: Uh, anyway, so she said, give me the first 20, 000 words of someone else's child.
• 25:26
  Kylie Orr: And I had no idea how to write a novel.
• 25:29
  Kylie Orr: So I.
• 25:30
  Kylie Orr: Sat down and tried to start this novel that I did not plan and my husband who works in IT that you just met because we had some sound difficulties at the start of this, uh, he said to me, just start at the start.
• 25:43
  Kylie Orr: I'm like, wow, that is super unhelpful.
• 25:45
  Kylie Orr: Start at the start.
• 25:46
  Kylie Orr: I don't know where the start is.
• 25:48
  Kylie Orr: Anyway, I managed to cobble together 20, 000 words, sent it to her.
• 25:52
  Kylie Orr: It went to an acquisitions meeting, which I'm sure you will explain to your listeners at some point, if they don't already know, and it fell down.
• 25:59
  Kylie Orr: It fell down at acquisitions, and then I did not hear from her again, ever.
• 26:03
  Kylie Orr: Wow.
• 26:04
  Kylie Orr: Uh, so yeah, that was a bit of a shock to the system, but then I was determined that I was going to write this novel to the end just to prove to myself that I could.
• 26:13
  Madeleine Cleary: Amazing.
• 26:14
  Madeleine Cleary: 20, 000 words though, how do you go from zero to 20, 000?
• 26:19
  Madeleine Cleary: With great difficulty.
• 26:20
  Kylie Orr: Let me tell you, I banged my head on the keyboard.
• 26:22
  Kylie Orr: I started at different points and I'm like, no, that doesn't work.
• 26:25
  Kylie Orr: That doesn't work.
• 26:26
  Kylie Orr: And because I'd never written a novel, I just sort of approached it like, you know, each I'd written some short stories.
• 26:33
  Kylie Orr: So I was like, maybe each chapter can just be like a short story.
• 26:36
  Kylie Orr: And then I just connect the short stories.
• 26:38
  Kylie Orr: Doesn't work like that either.
• 26:39
  Kylie Orr: So yes, I, I go back and look at what I sent her and it was terrible.
• 26:44
  Kylie Orr: Any wonder it fell down acquisitions, but I didn't know what I was doing.
• 26:47
  Kylie Orr: So,
• 26:48
  Madeleine Cleary: but also incredible that she took 20, 000 words to acquisitions, because I don't think I've ever heard that before.
• 26:54
  Madeleine Cleary: That's, that's quite significant.
• 26:56
  Madeleine Cleary: So obviously you, you have that talent, the, the, the writing talent, you, you understand women's voice.
• 27:01
  Madeleine Cleary: What do you think that means in practice?
• 27:03
  Madeleine Cleary: What, what does women's voice mean?
• 27:05
  Kylie Orr: I don't know.
• 27:06
  Kylie Orr: It's not a conscious thing.
• 27:07
  Kylie Orr: I mean, I, I am a woman and I have a voice and I have opinions and I guess maybe it comes through in my writing.
• 27:14
  Kylie Orr: I don't know.
• 27:14
  Kylie Orr: I think when I wrote for Essential Baby, um, you know, I was having children at the time and ended up with four of them.
• 27:22
  Kylie Orr: I mean, I didn't end up with them.
• 27:23
  Kylie Orr: I did choose to have them.
• 27:25
  Kylie Orr: I just appeared on my doorstep, but, um, I think I just was trying to take a more honest, lighthearted approach to parenting, because I just felt like everything was telling you how you should be doing it, and I actually just wanted to tell the reality of it.
• 27:39
  Kylie Orr: And so perhaps that authenticity was attractive at the time, and maybe it just kind of filled a gap that wasn't quite there.
• 27:48
  Kylie Orr: Unfortunately, I was not able to translate that to a novel at that stage.
• 27:53
  Kylie Orr: So yeah, it is, and I think taking a part manuscript.
• 27:58
  Kylie Orr: Acquisitions, particularly for someone who's never written a novel or a debut is.
• 28:02
  Kylie Orr: highly unlikely to get up.
• 28:04
  Kylie Orr: But it was nice because she actually planted the seed in my head.
• 28:09
  Kylie Orr: Maybe I do want to write a novel.
• 28:10
  Kylie Orr: Maybe I do have something to say.
• 28:12
  Kylie Orr: And in novels, particularly domestic suspense, you can talk about much broader themes than you can in a children's book.
• 28:18
  Madeleine Cleary: Do you still have that synopsis, the funny novel, sitting in your drawer?
• 28:21
  Madeleine Cleary: I
• 28:21
  Kylie Orr: do.
• 28:22
  Kylie Orr: And I did because I have, at my events, I have a lot of people actually, every single event I've done, somebody in the audience has said, Would you ever write a funny book?
• 28:30
  Kylie Orr: Cause you're pretty funny.
• 28:32
  Kylie Orr: And when I say that, I hate it.
• 28:34
  Kylie Orr: Cause then people are like, well, where's, where's all the funny?
• 28:37
  Kylie Orr: How come she's not that funny?
• 28:38
  Kylie Orr: Um, my family don't think I'm funny.
• 28:40
  Kylie Orr: They don't laugh at anything, but I have teenagers, so they're never going to laugh.
• 28:45
  Kylie Orr: Unless they're laughing at me rather than with me.
• 28:49
  Kylie Orr: So yeah, I did pull it out and try, tried, but I don't know, my head just is, it just diverts to dark themes.
• 28:58
  Madeleine Cleary: Okay.
• 28:58
  Madeleine Cleary: So, so you've, you've got this rejection from Pagan Macmillan, um, but it's a great step first step, I think, in, in knowing that you, you can go and do this.
• 29:07
  Madeleine Cleary: So what, what do you do then?
• 29:08
  Madeleine Cleary: What are you, what did you then sit down and go, I want to, we want to finish the novel, but then what's the next step?
• 29:15
  Kylie Orr: Just googled.
• 29:16
  Kylie Orr: How do you write a novel?
• 29:17
  Kylie Orr: And then I was like reading everything doing little mini courses.
• 29:22
  Kylie Orr: I enrolled in short courses.
• 29:24
  Kylie Orr: I just tried to practice writing, writing.
• 29:28
  Kylie Orr: And then I I can't remember which order it was in.
• 29:34
  Kylie Orr: I won a scholarship to Fiona McIntosh's Um, commercial fiction masterclass, which is amazing.
• 29:40
  Kylie Orr: Like I cried when I got the phone call, must've thought I was unhinged because my dad was actually very sick at the time he was dying of cancer and it was very hard to invest emotional energy into writing, but I was trying to sort of do it, you know, I was at four little kids.
• 29:57
  Kylie Orr: My youngest had just started school.
• 29:59
  Kylie Orr: So I was trying to use that year as a year to really sink my teeth into this idea.
• 30:04
  Kylie Orr: And, um, so when I got the scholarship, it kind of confirmed to me that there was something in this story that was worth pursuing.
• 30:13
  Kylie Orr: And then I, luckily, cause I won the scholarship, I didn't have to pay to go.
• 30:18
  Kylie Orr: But then when I got back, I wanted to make sure I could write the book to the end.
• 30:21
  Kylie Orr: So I paid for a mentorship with Catherine Heyman, who's an Australian author.
• 30:27
  Kylie Orr: And that was a six month mentorship where I had to give her 10, 000 words every month.
• 30:31
  Kylie Orr: And then we'd have an hour Zoom at the end of the month.
• 30:34
  Kylie Orr: So incredible.
• 30:35
  Kylie Orr: Yeah, I sort of had this tutorage that she didn't teach me how to write, but she gave me deadlines.
• 30:41
  Kylie Orr: And then we spoke about what needed to happen in that chapter.
• 30:44
  Kylie Orr: What all that 10, 000 words, what I needed to fix and just exploring character and stuff.
• 30:50
  Kylie Orr: So it sort of helped me learn how to write a book to the end.
• 30:54
  Kylie Orr: And the rest was just many, many years of editing and trial and error.
• 30:58
  Kylie Orr: Uh, and yeah, it took from the, the seed of an idea that I sent to that Pam McMillan editor.
• 31:06
  Kylie Orr: To the time my book hit a shelf was seven years,
• 31:09
  Madeleine Cleary: seven years, and a lot of investment financially in that as well,
• 31:13
  Kylie Orr: which is also very hard to justify when you're not earning a massive income.
• 31:17
  Kylie Orr: I was trying to do freelance writing around it and you know, that was not bringing in a lot of cash.
• 31:22
  Kylie Orr: And thankfully my husband was very supportive because he runs his own business that I 20 years.
• 31:29
  Kylie Orr: And I've been the main carer and, you know, Put a lot of free energy and hours into supporting his work and he is like, well, now it's your turn.
• 31:41
  Kylie Orr: So that's nice.
• 31:42
  Kylie Orr: But, you feel a bit
• 31:43
  Madeleine Cleary: of pressure in that then as well?
• 31:44
  Madeleine Cleary: So you've obviously supported him and then he's now supporting you through that seven year journey.
• 31:48
  Madeleine Cleary: Did you feel the pressure to, to, to really get the contract?
• 31:52
  Kylie Orr: Uh, not from him at all, but pressure from myself.
• 31:55
  Kylie Orr: Like I, you know, I've, I've quite stressed and frustrated about not being.
• 32:01
  Kylie Orr: Making much money and then having to invest money to learn this new skill.
• 32:05
  Kylie Orr: Um, which I guess is like an apprenticeship, you know, it's like any new job, you've got to train yourself to do it.
• 32:12
  Kylie Orr: Um, but there's no guarantee at the end of this one, that's the difference.
• 32:15
  Kylie Orr: I mean, train for a new job and then apply for jobs and hopefully get a job.
• 32:19
  Kylie Orr: But in publishing, it doesn't work like that.
• 32:21
  Kylie Orr: So no, it
• 32:22
  Madeleine Cleary: doesn't.
• 32:22
  Madeleine Cleary: And thankfully it did work out for you.
• 32:25
  Madeleine Cleary: So when you did type the end though, of someone else's child, your debut novel.
• 32:30
  Madeleine Cleary: So what, what do you do then?
• 32:32
  Madeleine Cleary: How do you approach, when do you know when it's ready?
• 32:34
  Madeleine Cleary: And when do you go out into the world with it?
• 32:36
  Kylie Orr: Well, I don't think you know, I know for sure.
• 32:39
  Kylie Orr: Now looking back, it's never ready after one draft.
• 32:43
  Kylie Orr: Please don't ever, ever send your manuscript out after one draft.
• 32:46
  Kylie Orr: It is not ready.
• 32:47
  Kylie Orr: Um, so I redrafted it many times.
• 32:50
  Kylie Orr: I had some people close to me read it.
• 32:53
  Kylie Orr: So, I have a sister in law who's a GP, so she's great.
• 32:57
  Kylie Orr: She's an avid reader, but also she gives me medical stuff.
• 33:01
  Madeleine Cleary: And there's a reason for that, everybody, that it's why it would be important to have a GP in this, but we won't give out spoilers.
• 33:07
  Madeleine Cleary: Correct.
• 33:07
  Kylie Orr: In both my books, actually.
• 33:09
  Kylie Orr: And I have a friend who's a police officer.
• 33:12
  Kylie Orr: So she reads it for, you know, police, it's not a police procedural, but, you know, just to make sure I'm using the right titles and whatever, she's very
• 33:21
  Madeleine Cleary: helpful.
• 33:22
  Kylie Orr: And then I have a cousin who is.
• 33:25
  Kylie Orr: Um, a social worker, um, and an avid reader.
• 33:29
  Kylie Orr: And so I got a few people to read it and give me feedback and then I decided I didn't know what to do next.
• 33:37
  Kylie Orr: I'd tried to, I'd sent it out to a few and just got radio silence.
• 33:42
  Kylie Orr: And then, um.
• 33:43
  Kylie Orr: To publishers or to agents
• 33:44
  Madeleine Cleary: initially?
• 33:45
  Madeleine Cleary: To publishers initially.
• 33:46
  Madeleine Cleary: Mm hmm.
• 33:47
  Kylie Orr: And Fiona McIntosh helped me with one of the submissions, and I got a pretty brutal rejection that way, and I remember crying on my keyboard.
• 33:57
  Kylie Orr: I got it on like a Friday night.
• 33:59
  Kylie Orr: My husband was away for work, and I had to take my sons to their football training.
• 34:04
  Kylie Orr: And I read the email and just was sobbing onto my keyboard and my eldest son, who was like, I don't know, he might've been 10 at the time.
• 34:14
  Kylie Orr: He came and just kind of patted me on the back and said, it's all right, mum.
• 34:19
  Kylie Orr: And he's like, what's wrong?
• 34:20
  Kylie Orr: I said, they don't like my story.
• 34:23
  Kylie Orr: And he was like, it's okay, somebody will like it.
• 34:26
  Madeleine Cleary: Oh, isn't it so nice to have children who can go and comfort you in that moment?
• 34:30
  Madeleine Cleary: I know! That's very beautiful.
• 34:32
  Madeleine Cleary: Um,
• 34:32
  Kylie Orr: yeah, so I had so many rejections and then I entered the ritual prize.
• 34:39
  Kylie Orr: And it is called the Ritual Prize.
• 34:41
  Kylie Orr: I have double checked this.
• 34:42
  Kylie Orr: Not the Rochelle.
• 34:42
  Kylie Orr: It's Ritual.
• 34:43
  Kylie Orr: Lots of people say Rochelle, but it's named after Matt Ritual.
• 34:46
  Kylie Orr: Yes.
• 34:47
  Kylie Orr: Yes.
• 34:47
  Kylie Orr: Hannah was married to Matt.
• 34:48
  Kylie Orr: And so I actually checked directly with her in a tweet.
• 34:52
  Kylie Orr: Does it rhyme with Michelle or Mitchell?
• 34:55
  Kylie Orr: Um, anyway, I had entered the Ritual Prize the year before and got nothing with a different manuscript.
• 35:02
  Kylie Orr: Um, and then I thought, oh, well, this one's just sitting here.
• 35:05
  Kylie Orr: Let's just send it and see what happens.
• 35:07
  Kylie Orr: Nothing happened last time.
• 35:08
  Kylie Orr: What have I got to lose?
• 35:09
  Madeleine Cleary: And the ritual prize, correct me if I'm wrong, it's just the first three chapters, isn't it?
• 35:13
  Madeleine Cleary: And then you've got the synopsis for the rest of the novel.
• 35:15
  Madeleine Cleary: Is that right?
• 35:16
  Kylie Orr: Correct.
• 35:17
  Kylie Orr: And it's for emerging, uh, unpublished authors.
• 35:21
  Kylie Orr: Perfect.
• 35:21
  Kylie Orr: Um, so yes, I thought, oh, well, it gives me a deadline.
• 35:25
  Kylie Orr: I like deadlines and I, I tried to enter different competitions just to keep my writing muscle going and sometimes it would just be like a short story competition.
• 35:33
  Kylie Orr: So I just, if this manuscript was driving me nuts, I would go and try to just write a short story and then enter a short story competition and you know, it didn't get recognition in many, many of them got shortlisted in some and uh, anyway, so I sent this off to the Sorry, before that, I had paid an external editor.
• 35:53
  Kylie Orr: So after I got my brutal rejection, um, it was originally written from three points of view and I think it just wasn't working and the brutal rejection really cut deep, but I didn't want to give up on it.
• 36:06
  Kylie Orr: And so I decided to pay an editor.
• 36:09
  Kylie Orr: I think it was 1, 500 at the time.
• 36:11
  Kylie Orr: Again, I Well, there's a lot of money that you don't have, that you're not earning
• 36:16
  Madeleine Cleary: with no guarantee at the end.
• 36:17
  Kylie Orr: Correct.
• 36:18
  Kylie Orr: But I just didn't know what to do after that.
• 36:20
  Kylie Orr: I didn't know how to make it better.
• 36:22
  Kylie Orr: I knew it wasn't working, but I didn't know how to fix it.
• 36:24
  Kylie Orr: And so I paid this editor who was fantastic.
• 36:28
  Kylie Orr: She gave me an 11 page report.
• 36:30
  Madeleine Cleary: Wow.
• 36:30
  Kylie Orr: How did you find the editor as well?
• 36:33
  Kylie Orr: I asked around for some referrals and this particular editor, she said, well, you know, I think she used to work for one of the big publishers, but now she's like freelance and contracts back.
• 36:42
  Kylie Orr: And she like had edited Liane Moriarty and Wow.
• 36:45
  Kylie Orr: Oh yeah.
• 36:46
  Kylie Orr: What an opportunity.
• 36:47
  Kylie Orr: She's, she's it.
• 36:49
  Kylie Orr: Um, and she was fabulous and told me the three points of view are not working.
• 36:53
  Kylie Orr: You either need to, I mean, very delicately, she didn't say it as directors are, but she just said, you either need to develop two of the The three characters more, or you need to rewrite it from this one character whose voice is strong.
• 37:05
  Kylie Orr: So I rewrote the whole thing from one point of view.
• 37:10
  Kylie Orr: It was a nightmare.
• 37:10
  Kylie Orr: I didn't even know, I didn't even understand how, like, you know, if there's a scene and that particular character was not in that scene.
• 37:18
  Kylie Orr: How was I supposed to rewrite that scene if she's not even in the room?
• 37:22
  Kylie Orr: So yeah, it was a bit of a mind boggle.
• 37:24
  Kylie Orr: Huge.
• 37:25
  Kylie Orr: Massive,
• 37:25
  Madeleine Cleary: massive
• 37:25
  Kylie Orr: structural
• 37:26
  Madeleine Cleary: change.
• 37:27
  Kylie Orr: But a better book for it.
• 37:29
  Kylie Orr: And that's what I entered into the Ritual Prize and I was long listed.
• 37:34
  Kylie Orr: Didn't know.
• 37:35
  Kylie Orr: Like when I entered the Ritual Prize the first time, I was like manifesting, I put it in my diary the day it was announced, I was visualizing my name on a long list.
• 37:46
  Kylie Orr: Never happened.
• 37:47
  Kylie Orr: None of it happened.
• 37:48
  Kylie Orr: And then the second time, I entered and forgot about it.
• 37:52
  Kylie Orr: And then started getting all these phone calls on this day, had all these missed calls and I was like, what's going on?
• 37:57
  Kylie Orr: And yeah, one of my friends rang and he said, you're on the long list for the ritual prize.
• 38:01
  Kylie Orr: And so I pulled over to the side of the road and had a cry because I knew this would be where it all changes.
• 38:08
  Kylie Orr: So yeah, that got me an agent.
• 38:10
  Kylie Orr: And that agent started pitching my work in March, 2020.
• 38:15
  Madeleine Cleary: An amazing time for the publishing industry.
• 38:17
  Madeleine Cleary: Honestly.
• 38:18
  Madeleine Cleary: Well timed, Kylie.
• 38:19
  Kylie Orr: Shocking, shocking timing.
• 38:22
  Kylie Orr: Anyway, so yes, then went on to get many more rejections and finally secured a two book deal with HQ Fiction HarperCollins in October 2020.
• 38:33
  Madeleine Cleary: Amazing.
• 38:33
  Madeleine Cleary: What an incredible story.
• 38:34
  Madeleine Cleary: And so this was what, about eight, seven, eight years worth of work.
• 38:39
  Kylie Orr: I think it was like five years by that time, and then it didn't hit shelves until June 2022.
• 38:45
  Kylie Orr: So like another 18 months later.
• 38:48
  Kylie Orr: Yeah.
• 38:48
  Madeleine Cleary: Before I even saw the book on the shelf.
• 38:50
  Madeleine Cleary: After going through all of those different structural edits and editing, going through the process.
• 38:54
  Madeleine Cleary: But.
• 38:54
  Madeleine Cleary: Here it is.
• 38:55
  Madeleine Cleary: Here it is.
• 38:56
  Madeleine Cleary: So exciting.
• 38:57
  Madeleine Cleary: It was originally
• 38:57
  Kylie Orr: called The Fundraiser, so clearly I'm not good at titles.
• 39:00
  Kylie Orr: Oh, I can
• 39:00
  Madeleine Cleary: see that.
• 39:01
  Madeleine Cleary: Yeah, someone else's child.
• 39:02
  Madeleine Cleary: And I know that you've always said as well that you never expected to have a pink, a pink spine.
• 39:07
  Madeleine Cleary: But I think it's a beautiful cover.
• 39:09
  Madeleine Cleary: It is a gorgeous cover.
• 39:10
  Madeleine Cleary: Yeah.
• 39:11
  Madeleine Cleary: Amazing.
• 39:12
  Madeleine Cleary: So, um, I thought, given The Eleventh Floor, which is your latest novel, um, which was released in January this year.
• 39:20
  Madeleine Cleary: Yep.
• 39:20
  Madeleine Cleary: Yep.
• 39:21
  Madeleine Cleary: This is something that, um, all authors absolutely love to do, uh, is pitch their novel.
• 39:27
  Madeleine Cleary: Do they?
• 39:27
  Madeleine Cleary: They absolutely love it.
• 39:29
  Madeleine Cleary: It's their favourite part of every, every interview.
• 39:32
  Madeleine Cleary: Um, now it's been about, uh, six or seven months since it's been released, so I'm not sure how many times you've been pitching it since then.
• 39:39
  Madeleine Cleary: But would you, Kylie Orr, please pitch your book, The Eleventh Law, to us?
• 39:44
  Kylie Orr: Sure, I can.
• 39:45
  Kylie Orr: Uh, it's about Gracie, who's a tired mum of a young baby, and she is not coping.
• 39:51
  Kylie Orr: Her husband encourages her to have one night in a hotel, just where she can rest and rejuvenate, just by herself.
• 39:58
  Kylie Orr: So he stays home with the baby, she goes to the hotel with the intention of Ordering room service and, you know, sleeping in instead, she goes to a rooftop bar and has a cocktail and meets a man and she ends up in his room and she can't remember how she got there.
• 40:13
  Kylie Orr: And then when she wakes and she's shocked, she decides to sneak out.
• 40:19
  Kylie Orr: But as she sneaks out, she witnesses a crime.
• 40:22
  Kylie Orr: And so.
• 40:23
  Kylie Orr: Reporting what she saw will jeopardize her marriage, but staying silent might cost somebody else their life.
• 40:31
  Madeleine Cleary: So
• 40:31
  Kylie Orr: she's in this dilemma.
• 40:32
  Madeleine Cleary: Amazing.
• 40:34
  Madeleine Cleary: Well done.
• 40:34
  Madeleine Cleary: Great pitch.
• 40:35
  Madeleine Cleary: Um, highly recommend everyone read this book, um, get a copy.
• 40:39
  Madeleine Cleary: It's fantastic.
• 40:40
  Madeleine Cleary: And so interesting.
• 40:41
  Madeleine Cleary: Did you find the writing process of writing the sec, your second book different to someone else's child?
• 40:46
  Madeleine Cleary: Did you feel more confident?
• 40:47
  Kylie Orr: Look, when my first book was getting rejected, the advice I got was to move on to another book, start writing something else, which I was super offended by at the time, because I felt like I was giving up on this first book.
• 40:59
  Kylie Orr: Um, but it was good advice because it got my headspace out of that constant rumination about why I was getting rejected and whatever.
• 41:07
  Kylie Orr: Um, and so I had started writing the second one and tried really hard to do a better job of planning because obviously the first book was my apprenticeship book.
• 41:16
  Kylie Orr: I had no idea what I was doing.
• 41:18
  Kylie Orr: It was so messy and chaotic and it took me ages to just figure it out.
• 41:23
  Kylie Orr: The editing process was awful.
• 41:26
  Kylie Orr: So the second book, I thought I'm going to approach this differently.
• 41:28
  Kylie Orr: I'm going to try and plan.
• 41:29
  Kylie Orr: And I did.
• 41:31
  Kylie Orr: Do a very, very vague plan, but ultimately it's just not how I write.
• 41:36
  Kylie Orr: And so I'd liken it to sort of tossing all the parts of an IKEA cabinet on the floor and trying to piece it together without instructions.
• 41:43
  Kylie Orr: And sometimes you're missing screws and it's a bit wonky.
• 41:47
  Kylie Orr: Um, I think with the second book, and now that I've written the third, I just trust my intuition more.
• 41:54
  Kylie Orr: So if something's not working, I don't, it doesn't stop me.
• 41:58
  Kylie Orr: I just go, yeah, well, that's not working and we're just going to have to fix that later.
• 42:01
  Kylie Orr: And I know that editing is actually where the magic happens.
• 42:04
  Kylie Orr: So we, we will fix it later.
• 42:07
  Kylie Orr: Um, but, and I, I am confident enough in myself that I can rework something now because I have written a whole book to start messiest way possible and managed to get it to a polished book at the end.
• 42:20
  Madeleine Cleary: And so, um, with your third book, have you given it out to your, do you still give it out to your family and friends?
• 42:26
  Madeleine Cleary: The, so you've got your friend who's the GP and friend who's a police officer, or do you now, is it now something between you and, and your publisher or now with your agent?
• 42:36
  Kylie Orr: Uh, I still give it to the GP.
• 42:38
  Kylie Orr: I'm not sure if I've given this one to the police officer.
• 42:41
  Kylie Orr: I can't remember probably less.
• 42:43
  Kylie Orr: So, and I do have a couple of, um, midwife scenes and I also have a sister in law who's a midwife.
• 42:49
  Kylie Orr: You know,
• 42:49
  Madeleine Cleary: everybody.
• 42:50
  Madeleine Cleary: I have
• 42:52
  Kylie Orr: sent her just those chapters to double check that that's all, you know, kosher.
• 42:57
  Kylie Orr: Um, I do have some good contacts.
• 43:00
  Kylie Orr: I've got a lawyer, a friend who's a lawyer.
• 43:02
  Kylie Orr: So she has helped me with a few things as well.
• 43:04
  Kylie Orr: So it is currently with, uh, my agent.
• 43:09
  Madeleine Cleary: So let's talk about your agent actually.
• 43:11
  Madeleine Cleary: So this is very recent and exciting news.
• 43:13
  Madeleine Cleary: Um, so do you want to tell us about what you announced last week?
• 43:17
  Kylie Orr: Sure.
• 43:17
  Kylie Orr: I have signed with Zeitgeist Agency with Samuel Bernard.
• 43:21
  Kylie Orr: Very excited.
• 43:22
  Kylie Orr: So I did have different agents for the first two books, but we went in different directions.
• 43:27
  Kylie Orr: And then I was un agented, un agented, that's hard to say, for a while and was in two minds about whether I, because I already have an established relationship with my publisher.
• 43:39
  Kylie Orr: Um, and, um, And also I had nothing to offer a new agent because I got a two book deal under one agent and then, um, we parted ways and then I really needed to write a new book to have a new agent be interested.
• 43:53
  Kylie Orr: So yes, Samuel is very enthusiastic and driven and very insightful with his edits.
• 44:00
  Kylie Orr: So it's, I'm actually just in love with him.
• 44:03
  Kylie Orr: Oh, it's not, it's not in front of me.
• 44:05
  Kylie Orr: I, um, I'm in final sort of editing stage before I give it to him, but this is kind of how I print, like I literally print out.
• 44:13
  Madeleine Cleary: So for those just listening online, um, listening, Kylie's just held up a massive printed out manuscript that's been nicely bound as well.
• 44:22
  Madeleine Cleary: Yeah.
• 44:23
  Madeleine Cleary: Look at all, and it's covered in lots of markings.
• 44:25
  Madeleine Cleary: So I go, I do manual edits because
• 44:28
  Kylie Orr: when I'm trying to keep the whole book in my head, I find it really hard to do that online, like in Word or whatever.
• 44:35
  Kylie Orr: So if I can read the whole thing as one, that means I remember that I already mentioned that in chapter two, now I've mentioned it again in chapter 11, I need to get rid of that.
• 44:44
  Kylie Orr: Whereas when you're just editing in little bits and pieces, sometimes you can't hold it all in your head.
• 44:49
  Kylie Orr: So I do have the final printed out copy that I'm.
• 44:52
  Kylie Orr: Doing manual edits and then I will fix it in Word and send it to Samuel next week.
• 44:57
  Kylie Orr: And then hopefully we'll start.
• 45:00
  Kylie Orr: Yeah.
• 45:01
  Madeleine Cleary: I'm interested to know, where did you, so obviously you landed on the side of, yep, you wanted to be an agent and author.
• 45:08
  Madeleine Cleary: How did you come to that decision?
• 45:09
  Madeleine Cleary: Because it's, it's always a tricky one, a balance, I think, particularly for those starting out in the industry, the question is, do you apply for.
• 45:16
  Madeleine Cleary: to agents first, or do you go directly to Australian, to publishers?
• 45:20
  Madeleine Cleary: Cause I know in the Australian industry, you don't have to have an agent to approach publishers.
• 45:25
  Madeleine Cleary: So what, what, what do you think, what's your advice, Kylie?
• 45:28
  Kylie Orr: Look, I think for me, I had tried.
• 45:31
  Kylie Orr: Prior to getting my first agent, I'd tried, I'd approached publishers and was getting nowhere.
• 45:35
  Kylie Orr: So then, but also it's a tricky balance because if you, our industry is quite small here.
• 45:41
  Kylie Orr: So if I approach all the big publishers and some of the little ones and they all say no, and then I go to an agent, you've left the agent not very many options to pitch your work.
• 45:53
  Madeleine Cleary: That's good insight.
• 45:54
  Kylie Orr: People change, people move on from jobs and, you know, ultimately it's the person reading it who has to fall in love with it.
• 46:01
  Kylie Orr: And those people do move on and switch between publishers and go into other jobs.
• 46:05
  Kylie Orr: So it's not that it's forever, like you've done your dash.
• 46:09
  Kylie Orr: But, um, I think to me, an agent just has insights, established relationships.
• 46:17
  Kylie Orr: I mean, you can do all this yourself.
• 46:19
  Kylie Orr: That's hardly.
• 46:21
  Kylie Orr: You know, an option, but you have to wait for a publisher to open their submissions.
• 46:26
  Kylie Orr: Then you have to kind of research what they're looking for.
• 46:28
  Kylie Orr: You've really got to cater your pitch.
• 46:30
  Kylie Orr: Like you're writing a resume for a job.
• 46:33
  Kylie Orr: You can't just send a blanket, you know, you, you want to cater it.
• 46:36
  Kylie Orr: And each publisher will ask for something different.
• 46:38
  Kylie Orr: They might ask for the first 10, 000 words.
• 46:40
  Kylie Orr: They might ask for the first three chapters.
• 46:42
  Kylie Orr: They might, you know, you have to do a query letter, all those things that we spend hours and hours on, if you actually are serious about getting your work published and I had.
• 46:51
  Kylie Orr: Done all of that, but it wasn't working.
• 46:54
  Kylie Orr: And so an agent to me just has an inroads and obviously they also know which editor likes this kind of genre, this style.
• 47:06
  Kylie Orr: I think this will be a great fit for so and so.
• 47:08
  Kylie Orr: We don't know that as writers, especially as aspiring writers.
• 47:11
  Kylie Orr: Yes.
• 47:11
  Kylie Orr: Um, so to me, and also.
• 47:15
  Kylie Orr: You, you know, pay a fee, like they take 15%, but they also do a lot of free work at the start.
• 47:20
  Kylie Orr: They're reading a lot of manuscripts there.
• 47:23
  Kylie Orr: Um, and to me, 15 percent of something is better than no percent of nothing.
• 47:27
  Kylie Orr: So I, and also I think, I mean, an agent is like a publisher.
• 47:32
  Kylie Orr: You've got to find the right fit.
• 47:34
  Kylie Orr: And I think Samuel is a good fit for me because he understands the way I work.
• 47:38
  Kylie Orr: I like clear communication.
• 47:40
  Kylie Orr: I don't, I'm not great with, um, Lack of transparency, like I would much rather have the information, even if it's bad, and then just work with that, then try and have someone sort of, you know, keep me a little bit in the dark because they don't want to upset me.
• 47:57
  Kylie Orr: I just want to know, just tell me, like if something's not working or whatever.
• 48:01
  Kylie Orr: Um, so in the end, and also he has worked very hard to, you know, Do you, do you want me to pitch you for this festival?
• 48:18
  Kylie Orr: Do I, and I wasn't even represented by him at the time.
• 48:21
  Kylie Orr: So it was already showing me that he was champion.
• 48:27
  Kylie Orr: So that to me was enough to say, yeah, and also he's fairly new to the agency, which means he's, he's hungry, like he wants to build his list.
• 48:34
  Kylie Orr: He's passionate and he knows he's got the guidance of experienced agents and yeah, it seemed like a no brainer, but it took me six months to decide that.
• 48:44
  Madeleine Cleary: Well, I think it's really exciting, Kylie, and I can't wait to find out.
• 48:48
  Madeleine Cleary: Are you allowed to tell us a little bit about your third book or is that under wraps at the moment?
• 48:51
  Madeleine Cleary: Yeah, I can tell you.
• 48:52
  Madeleine Cleary: I mean, I
• 48:52
  Kylie Orr: haven't sorted out the elevator pitch.
• 48:55
  Kylie Orr: Um, I'll tell you what inspired it.
• 48:57
  Kylie Orr: It's about coercive control, which I know is a pretty hefty topic, but all of my books have fairly hefty topics in them.
• 49:04
  Kylie Orr: Um, I saw that there was A domestic violence service in Ringwood, which is the southeastern suburbs of Melbourne.
• 49:14
  Kylie Orr: And I know there's many of these spotted around, but they were doing a training program for hairdressers and beauticians in spotting the signs of coercive control and domestic violence.
• 49:25
  Kylie Orr: Not as a way to tell hairdressers and beauticians how to intervene, but as a source to refer Um, resources, and I just thought that was such good thinking outside the box.
• 49:37
  Kylie Orr: I mean, domestic violence is such a massive issue.
• 49:41
  Kylie Orr: Women's safety, you know, and what we're learning, especially from Jess Hill, see what you made me do, um, is it all starts back at coercive control.
• 49:51
  Kylie Orr: So I was just so intrigued by the idea of, you know, You know, an intelligent, you know, educated woman falling for a charming man, and then getting stuck in this situation that is just sort of, you know, quietly undermining her and then feeling in a way like she couldn't get out.
• 50:14
  Kylie Orr: And I, I think that if you write it in fiction, to me, the hope is that somebody will read it and recognize themselves in it because there's a lot of data out there.
• 50:25
  Kylie Orr: There's a lot of research on coercive control, but it's very heavy stuff to read through.
• 50:30
  Kylie Orr: I feel like if you put it in a fictional story, sometimes you can get a different message through to people and it might connect in a different way.
• 50:37
  Kylie Orr: So I have Val who's a hairdresser and then I have Isla who's a British backpacker who's come to Australia for an adventure.
• 50:45
  Kylie Orr: Doesn't plan to fall in love with someone, but does.
• 50:47
  Kylie Orr: And he moves her to the island where Val is a hairdresser and Val starts to spot some things and intervenes probably in a way that she shouldn't.
• 50:58
  Madeleine Cleary: Oh, Kylie, that sounds like an incredible book.
• 51:00
  Madeleine Cleary: And it's a story I think that has to be told.
• 51:02
  Madeleine Cleary: I mean, I think this is more common in our society than we know and realize.
• 51:07
  Kylie Orr: Absolutely.
• 51:08
  Madeleine Cleary: And often it's as well, it's, it's hard to identify those red flags for women who are in those situations too, in those relationships.
• 51:16
  Kylie Orr: Yeah.
• 51:16
  Kylie Orr: And I've interviewed a lot of women, um, because I'm really interested in that, um, That initial sort of slide, like nobody starts a relationship with someone, you know, insulting them or physically hurting them and stays in it.
• 51:29
  Kylie Orr: Like, you know, they really love bomb them and woo them in.
• 51:33
  Kylie Orr: And so that's the part that really intrigued me.
• 51:36
  Kylie Orr: I mean, it does go to pretty dark places, but I always leave my reader with hope.
• 51:41
  Kylie Orr: I want them to finish the book and feel like everybody who needs to be okay is okay.
• 51:46
  Madeleine Cleary: And I would say that is very similar to your first two books.
• 51:49
  Madeleine Cleary: The themes, when you read the blurb, they seem heavy, but there is always that beautiful moment of hope, which I think is really lovely and important.
• 51:56
  Madeleine Cleary: Oh, thank you.
• 51:56
  Kylie Orr: Yeah.
• 51:56
  Kylie Orr: So I'm looking
• 51:57
  Madeleine Cleary: forward to reading your third book.
• 51:58
  Madeleine Cleary: It sounds fantastic.
• 51:59
  Madeleine Cleary: Um, just on something different, because I know you have an amazing Profile online and you connect with so many people.
• 52:06
  Madeleine Cleary: And obviously you've got lots of friends and people who do different things, but you also connect online with a whole community there.
• 52:13
  Madeleine Cleary: Do you want to talk a little bit about your, cause you use Instagram primarily, I know as a, you're also also a social media profile, but how did you build your following and do you think it's important for authors to have it?
• 52:24
  Kylie Orr: Look, I think I know plenty of authors who are highly successful without social media.
• 52:30
  Kylie Orr: I think if you write a good book, that's probably the most important thing.
• 52:34
  Kylie Orr: I guess if you have hundreds of thousands of followers and you write a book that might be very appealing to a publisher, but most of us don't have that many followers.
• 52:42
  Kylie Orr: Um, I started on Instagram when my children's books came out.
• 52:47
  Kylie Orr: So I did end up having four children's books published, um, and was quite uncomfortable about it.
• 52:53
  Kylie Orr: And I didn't.
• 52:54
  Kylie Orr: My husband, as I mentioned before, is in IT and absolutely hates social media.
• 52:58
  Kylie Orr: He doesn't like Mark Zuckerberg.
• 53:00
  Kylie Orr: He's he, he just, and if I ever complained to him about social media, he just looks at me like, yeah.
• 53:06
  Kylie Orr: Cause it's crap, like don't be on it, but I feel like it's hard not to be on it.
• 53:11
  Kylie Orr: And I feel like Instagram has been amazing for me in connecting me to the book community.
• 53:17
  Kylie Orr: So who knows if it helps with sales, but that's kind of not really why I'm on there.
• 53:22
  Kylie Orr: I feel like it's, I've met beautiful books to grammars.
• 53:27
  Kylie Orr: I've met other authors.
• 53:28
  Kylie Orr: I've met.
• 53:30
  Kylie Orr: librarians, booksellers, like bookish people.
• 53:33
  Kylie Orr: And it's so nice, particularly when you're a new author and you turn up to an event and you're a bit nervous and there's somebody in that audience that you recognize from, or whatever, that is really nice.
• 53:45
  Kylie Orr: Excuse me.
• 53:46
  Kylie Orr: I'm not getting emotional.
• 53:47
  Kylie Orr: I just lost my voice.
• 53:48
  Madeleine Cleary: You can get emotional about that.
• 53:50
  Madeleine Cleary: That's fine.
• 53:51
  Kylie Orr: So, yeah, it's been a slow build.
• 53:53
  Kylie Orr: I mean, I've been on there for a few years and, you know, I'm not breaking any records and you know, it's tricky to find the balance because I try not to.
• 54:01
  Kylie Orr: Like, I want it to be all round, and I want it to be authentic and honest, which is who I am, but also has got me into trouble.
• 54:08
  Kylie Orr: Um, so, and also I'm trying to respect my kids privacy, and you know, they're teenagers, so they don't really want to be, like, they don't even post on there.
• 54:18
  Kylie Orr: Do they follow you, though?
• 54:20
  Kylie Orr: I think so.
• 54:21
  Kylie Orr: I mean, I did, I put up a, you probably saw it.
• 54:24
  Kylie Orr: I put up a, like a dance video.
• 54:26
  Kylie Orr: Oh yes, I saw that.
• 54:27
  Madeleine Cleary: That was fantastic.
• 54:28
  Madeleine Cleary: Your humor definitely shines through on your Instagram for everyone listening.
• 54:31
  Madeleine Cleary: That's good.
• 54:31
  Madeleine Cleary: Go check it out.
• 54:32
  Madeleine Cleary: Thank you.
• 54:33
  Madeleine Cleary: I
• 54:34
  Kylie Orr: mean, I
• 54:34
  Madeleine Cleary: think it's You've got great
• 54:35
  Kylie Orr: dance moves, Chloe.
• 54:35
  Kylie Orr: I'm jealous.
• 54:39
  Kylie Orr: But my 13 year old daughter said to me, Oh my God, don't post that mom.
• 54:43
  Kylie Orr: My friends follow you.
• 54:45
  Kylie Orr: And that's going to be so embarrassing.
• 54:46
  Kylie Orr: And for a moment I was like, Oh, like, I don't want this to come off badly for her.
• 54:52
  Kylie Orr: Like, I don't want to post that and then have her friends go, Oh my God, your mom's so embarrassing.
• 54:57
  Kylie Orr: But in the end I was like, you know what, 13 year olds.
• 55:00
  Kylie Orr: I'm not my bloody audience and they can just unfollow me if they don't like it and I said to her, you know, only you think your own parent is embarrassing.
• 55:10
  Kylie Orr: Like growing up, I had friends who I thought their dads were hilarious, but they were horrified by their dads, you know, but I didn't think that I could see their dad might be embarrassing to them, but they weren't embarrassing to me as the friend.
• 55:22
  Kylie Orr: And so in the end, I was like, Screw this.
• 55:25
  Kylie Orr: I would actually rather show her, this is who I am unapologetically.
• 55:31
  Kylie Orr: I'm just putting a bit of fun out there.
• 55:33
  Kylie Orr: I'm not claiming to be some kind of dance star.
• 55:37
  Kylie Orr: I'm just showing them a little bit of insight into my life, which is sometimes at breakfast I dance and my kids roll their eyes and go, here she goes again.
• 55:47
  Kylie Orr: And.
• 55:47
  Kylie Orr: Okay.
• 55:47
  Kylie Orr: Thank you.
• 55:47
  Kylie Orr: Whatever.
• 55:48
  Kylie Orr: Like, I think we, we overanalyze it too much and people worry about the algorithms and all that.
• 55:54
  Kylie Orr: I know nothing about that.
• 55:55
  Kylie Orr: I don't care.
• 55:56
  Kylie Orr: I tried TikTok.
• 55:58
  Kylie Orr: I was terrible.
• 55:59
  Kylie Orr: I didn't do any dancing over there.
• 56:00
  Kylie Orr: I haven't
• 56:01
  Madeleine Cleary: ventured into TikTok either.
• 56:02
  Madeleine Cleary: I think that's a whole new world.
• 56:04
  Kylie Orr: I use it to actually, I almost use it like Google now, like, which is probably bad, but you know, I search different things on there, but I've stopped posting.
• 56:12
  Kylie Orr: And my publisher actually said to me in the nicest possible way.
• 56:17
  Kylie Orr: You don't need to be on TikTok.
• 56:18
  Kylie Orr: We've got young people for that.
• 56:21
  Kylie Orr: I was like, are you telling me I'm too old?
• 56:23
  Kylie Orr: No, no, no.
• 56:23
  Kylie Orr: But if you're not enjoying it, don't be on it.
• 56:26
  Kylie Orr: Like, and I was like, yeah, I'm not enjoying it.
• 56:27
  Kylie Orr: I'm getting off.
• 56:28
  Kylie Orr: And so that's what they were trying to say.
• 56:30
  Kylie Orr: And I think good advice I've heard is to just pick one, pick one that you like.
• 56:34
  Kylie Orr: I don't love Facebook.
• 56:36
  Kylie Orr: I don't really understand Facebook.
• 56:38
  Kylie Orr: I don't do the cross posting because You know, what I've learned is that each platform has a very different kind of feel.
• 56:46
  Kylie Orr: And so sometimes I will take content from Instagram and adjust it for Facebook, but I, I don't, I see people who cross promote and think, I think you're missing something there.
• 56:56
  Kylie Orr: You're not actually catering this to your audience, which obviously takes time.
• 57:00
  Kylie Orr: And maybe specialists in social media say that's stupid.
• 57:03
  Kylie Orr: Don't do that.
• 57:04
  Kylie Orr: But I just, to me, it's almost like, again, catering your pitch.
• 57:09
  Kylie Orr: Yeah.
• 57:10
  Kylie Orr: Yeah.
• 57:10
  Kylie Orr: Talk to your audience and don't, and also you don't want to just be selling stuff all the time.
• 57:15
  Kylie Orr: Hey, I wrote a book.
• 57:15
  Kylie Orr: Did you hear I wrote a book?
• 57:17
  Kylie Orr: Look at the book.
• 57:17
  Kylie Orr: Here's the book.
• 57:18
  Kylie Orr: See?
• 57:18
  Kylie Orr: And when it's coming out, it feels very much like that.
• 57:21
  Kylie Orr: You just have to ride the buzz and hope that people will stay with you.
• 57:25
  Kylie Orr: But I try to sort of diversify it a little bit.
• 57:28
  Madeleine Cleary: What do you think is the time period you're allowed when your book comes out to, to say, Hey, I've written a book a couple of weeks, maybe.
• 57:35
  Madeleine Cleary: I reckon a couple of weeks too.
• 57:37
  Kylie Orr: I just, I mean, you know, I was doing, I had a very intensive event schedule that I had.
• 57:42
  Madeleine Cleary: Yes.
• 57:42
  Madeleine Cleary: I want to talk about that too, actually.
• 57:44
  Madeleine Cleary: Yes.
• 57:44
  Madeleine Cleary: Your event schedule, but yes, good.
• 57:47
  Kylie Orr: And so I was, you know, I had a lot of content I could post and I was like, God, people getting sick of this.
• 57:52
  Kylie Orr: And I was wearing yellow to match with my book cover.
• 57:54
  Kylie Orr: So sometimes I used that as a.
• 57:56
  Kylie Orr: An edge or I tried to maybe profile someone who came to one of my events because that's kind of the interesting connection part that I like.
• 58:06
  Kylie Orr: Um, but I, you know, even myself who now understands that your book probably gets a month of attention and then the next round of books come through.
• 58:15
  Kylie Orr: So you do have a very small window to promote your book.
• 58:18
  Kylie Orr: I mean, obviously you can still Peter often promote it, but people, I get sick of seeing other people's stuff After about a week or two, I'm like, yeah, yeah, you wrote a book.
• 58:28
  Kylie Orr: Got it.
• 58:29
  Kylie Orr: like, great.
• 58:30
  Kylie Orr: It's an amazing achievement.
• 58:32
  Kylie Orr: Congratulations and get excited and soak in all those moments where it's on the shelf and stuff.
• 58:36
  Kylie Orr: But if you keep hammering people over the head with it,
• 58:39
  Madeleine Cleary: and in the end the people who are following you, they've probably already bought.
• 58:42
  Madeleine Cleary: The book or they've read it or they've engaged with you.
• 58:45
  Madeleine Cleary: It, I think I've, I had some really good advice not to use social media as an author to sell your books.
• 58:50
  Madeleine Cleary: It's there for, as a connect, a way for you to connect with the industry and be part of the industry.
• 58:54
  Madeleine Cleary: And I think, yeah, absolutely.
• 58:55
  Madeleine Cleary: If you approach it as a, a, a way for you to sell your, your books, it's, it's probably not going to work out the way you want.
• 59:02
  Madeleine Cleary: Um, unless of course you've got a massive profile, like that's different.
• 59:06
  Madeleine Cleary: Exactly.
• 59:07
  Madeleine Cleary: And I'm sure
• 59:07
  Kylie Orr: there are people who, you know, have strategies about converting, you know, these things to sales, but that is not me.
• 59:14
  Kylie Orr: And also it's not my job.
• 59:16
  Kylie Orr: Like it's not, my job is to write a good book.
• 59:19
  Kylie Orr: That's right.
• 59:19
  Kylie Orr: Connect with my readers.
• 59:20
  Kylie Orr: And
• 59:21
  Madeleine Cleary: not be consumed by Instagram because it can be at all consuming as well.
• 59:25
  Kylie Orr: Absolutely.
• 59:25
  Kylie Orr: And I do think it changes the way you think.
• 59:27
  Kylie Orr: Like when I first got on it, You know, I'd be walking somewhere and I'd think, Oh, that might be a good photo for Instagram.
• 59:33
  Kylie Orr: And I'm like, who am I turned into now?
• 59:35
  Kylie Orr: Like, is this who I am?
• 59:37
  Kylie Orr: You start drafting the captions in your head.
• 59:38
  Kylie Orr: Yeah.
• 59:39
  Kylie Orr: So I, I do think it does mess with your brain a little bit.
• 59:42
  Kylie Orr: I try to balance it out, but yeah.
• 59:44
  Madeleine Cleary: Yes.
• 59:45
  Madeleine Cleary: No, it's a good, good thing.
• 59:46
  Madeleine Cleary: So actually on your events, cause I did notice you had an amazing schedule following the publication of the 11th floor.
• 59:52
  Madeleine Cleary: How did that.
• 59:54
  Madeleine Cleary: Come to, to head, did you go and organize some of those events yourself and tell us about some of the reception, I suppose, that you received in those events too.
• 1:00:02
  Kylie Orr: Yeah.
• 1:00:02
  Kylie Orr: Okay.
• 1:00:03
  Kylie Orr: Um, I love events.
• 1:00:05
  Kylie Orr: I love meeting readers.
• 1:00:07
  Kylie Orr: Are you an extrovert?
• 1:00:08
  Kylie Orr: I think so.
• 1:00:09
  Kylie Orr: I think you are.
• 1:00:10
  Kylie Orr: I, I, I used to be, I think COVID changed things for me.
• 1:00:14
  Kylie Orr: Like I used to be someone who would go through our calendar like and go, Oh, we've got a spare weekend.
• 1:00:20
  Kylie Orr: Who can we have over?
• 1:00:21
  Kylie Orr: And my husband is quite introverted, but loves cooking.
• 1:00:24
  Kylie Orr: So it was a great way to, he would cook and it gave him something to talk about.
• 1:00:29
  Kylie Orr: And then I would do all the, you know.
• 1:00:31
  Kylie Orr: Entertaining.
• 1:00:32
  Kylie Orr: Um, but through COVID, I think I just got really lazy.
• 1:00:37
  Kylie Orr: And now I look at my calendar and hope for a free weekend and I don't fill it with social things, but I think, um, the events, I love them, but they're exhausting.
• 1:00:49
  Kylie Orr: And also you have to be on, like you can't go to an event and be feeling a bit flat or a bit tired because it's like you're one, you You know, opportunity to connect with that group of readers and not that I, you know, I'm not a professional speaker.
• 1:01:03
  Kylie Orr: I don't, but I feel confident speaking about my books, but I've built that over time, of course.
• 1:01:08
  Kylie Orr: So it was very nerve wracking at the start.
• 1:01:10
  Kylie Orr: I'm happy to chat to someone Q and A, but then a couple of the libraries were like, Oh, we don't have anyone who can do a Q and A.
• 1:01:16
  Kylie Orr: Can you just do a presentation?
• 1:01:17
  Kylie Orr: I was like, what?
• 1:01:19
  Kylie Orr: Um, so yeah, it has, I've had to build my confidence over time, but in terms of organizing it, that is a very individual.
• 1:01:27
  Kylie Orr: Her author thing that whatever situation they've got going on with their publisher.
• 1:01:32
  Kylie Orr: What I learned from the first book is you really have to capitalize on that first kind of two weeks to a month when the book comes out.
• 1:01:40
  Kylie Orr: And I didn't realize that.
• 1:01:42
  Kylie Orr: And there was a few things organized, but I didn't really understand whose job it was to organize them.
• 1:01:47
  Kylie Orr: I, and I was so scared of stepping on toes, like, am I allowed to ask the publisher that do I ask my agent that?
• 1:01:53
  Kylie Orr: And, you know, the vibe I kind of got was.
• 1:01:57
  Kylie Orr: We don't have a lot of time to do this.
• 1:01:59
  Kylie Orr: Like if you want to do it, you're welcome to contact whoever.
• 1:02:02
  Kylie Orr: But then I was like, how do I do that?
• 1:02:04
  Kylie Orr: Do I just send an email to a librarian?
• 1:02:06
  Kylie Orr: Do I just I think that's what
• 1:02:07
  Madeleine Cleary: we're all asking in our current debut crew.
• 1:02:09
  Kylie Orr: How do we do this?
• 1:02:10
  Kylie Orr: Yeah, I think you can.
• 1:02:11
  Kylie Orr: I think you just introduce yourself.
• 1:02:13
  Kylie Orr: But If you can do it before the book comes out, like, so for the second book, I like, usually you get assigned a publicist, but they're so run off their feet.
• 1:02:23
  Kylie Orr: You're not their only author.
• 1:02:24
  Kylie Orr: So, you know, they, they might reach out to a few different places that they have established relationships with.
• 1:02:30
  Kylie Orr: And, you know, I was, for my second book, I think I pushed a little bit harder, felt a bit more confident about asking for things.
• 1:02:37
  Kylie Orr: And so I did, um, They were great at organizing quite a few more events than the first time around, but I also knew from the first time, about six months out from when my book, I started contacting, but I'd built relationships from the first book.
• 1:02:53
  Kylie Orr: The problem with the first book was when it came out and then I realized, Oh, hang on.
• 1:02:57
  Kylie Orr: How do people get these events?
• 1:02:59
  Kylie Orr: What am I supposed to do?
• 1:02:59
  Kylie Orr: It was already three, four, five months after the book had come out.
• 1:03:03
  Kylie Orr: And sometimes booksellers are not that interested because it's too far from release date and then they've got all these other books coming out or librarians might say, yeah, we're happy for you to come, but we can't get a bookseller to come or, you know, those, so you might have to bring your own stock.
• 1:03:19
  Kylie Orr: So I just had to sort of feel my way.
• 1:03:22
  Kylie Orr: And, but I established enough relationships with like local libraries and that I was able to contact them again and say, Hey, remember me, my second book's coming out.
• 1:03:32
  Kylie Orr: How would you feel about me doing?
• 1:03:34
  Kylie Orr: And so I did really hack them in at the start.
• 1:03:38
  Kylie Orr: And I like nearly lost my voice by the end because I was talking so much.
• 1:03:41
  Kylie Orr: So I think it's a balance.
• 1:03:43
  Kylie Orr: But.
• 1:03:44
  Kylie Orr: I, I think most debut authors will find that they have to arrange their own events.
• 1:03:49
  Kylie Orr: That's good advice.
• 1:03:50
  Kylie Orr: So don't be frightened to contact, you know, librarians love authors generally, if you're nice and polite and you help them fill their calendar.
• 1:04:00
  Kylie Orr: Um, yeah, I probably do more libraries than any kind of, you know, author.
• 1:04:05
  Kylie Orr: Bookseller events, um, and also I love libraries and I love the idea that books are accessible to people in whatever form because books are expensive and not everybody can afford them.
• 1:04:14
  Kylie Orr: And so I would much rather reach a reader who gets to borrow my book than not reach them at all.
• 1:04:19
  Kylie Orr: And I have done events in tiny regional towns where five people have turned up and I've thought, gosh, was this like worth it?
• 1:04:27
  Kylie Orr: I've paid petrol, I'm paying my accommodation.
• 1:04:30
  Kylie Orr: Like, mostly the publisher doesn't have the budget to do all that, so you are investing again.
• 1:04:38
  Kylie Orr: You know, I went to one, it was in Kerrang in Victoria, and you know, it was lovely.
• 1:04:44
  Kylie Orr: I love meeting people.
• 1:04:45
  Kylie Orr: They even asked me to go to the aged care facility.
• 1:04:48
  Kylie Orr: Really?
• 1:04:49
  Kylie Orr: Say hello to the people there.
• 1:04:50
  Kylie Orr: So I did.
• 1:04:51
  Kylie Orr: Um, anyway, but you kind of get home and think, God, I've actually invested all this money.
• 1:04:56
  Kylie Orr: I wonder, I would like, there's sort of no way to make the, you know, a data link between how many fails spurred from that event.
• 1:05:04
  Kylie Orr: And that's kind of not why you do it.
• 1:05:06
  Kylie Orr: You're building your brand or just hoping to have a repeat reader, I guess.
• 1:05:11
  Kylie Orr: Anyway, when my second book came out, I had a woman contact me who'd come to the Kerrang event and said, I'm not sure if you remember me, but I came to Kerrang and as soon as I saw that your second book was out, I bought it, loved it, just wanted to let you know.
• 1:05:24
  Kylie Orr: I mean, gosh,
• 1:05:26
  Madeleine Cleary: how amazing.
• 1:05:27
  Madeleine Cleary: That's why you do it.
• 1:05:28
  Madeleine Cleary: That is.
• 1:05:28
  Madeleine Cleary: So if you hadn't have gone to that event with those five people, you would never have received that.
• 1:05:33
  Madeleine Cleary: And that's a really heartwarming email to receive.
• 1:05:35
  Madeleine Cleary: Of
• 1:05:36
  Kylie Orr: course.
• 1:05:36
  Kylie Orr: I mean, God, it's so nice to hear from readers when they're not Correcting your grammar or whatever.
• 1:05:41
  Kylie Orr: Um, but stuff like that is, I mean, that, that's enough for me to go, yeah, it's worthwhile.
• 1:05:46
  Kylie Orr: And then I, I did one, um, in Mornington and one of the women who attended, enjoyed it so much that she ended up contacting me when the second book came out and said, would you come and run a workshop for our writers group?
• 1:05:59
  Kylie Orr: And I'd never run a workshop before.
• 1:06:00
  Kylie Orr: So I had to kind of teach myself how to do that.
• 1:06:03
  Kylie Orr: And that, Went amazingly well, and now I've got a workshop that I've written that hopefully I can, you know, offer to other organizations.
• 1:06:10
  Kylie Orr: So I
• 1:06:11
  Madeleine Cleary: think you
• 1:06:12
  Kylie Orr: need to not look at it as only five people turned up.
• 1:06:15
  Kylie Orr: You need to look at it and not also look at it as well, look at the opportunities that might come out of it, but just connecting with people.
• 1:06:20
  Kylie Orr: That's the key.
• 1:06:21
  Kylie Orr: The nice bit.
• 1:06:22
  Madeleine Cleary: That's wonderful.
• 1:06:22
  Madeleine Cleary: And you went down to Tassie as well, didn't
• 1:06:24
  Kylie Orr: you?
• 1:06:25
  Kylie Orr: I did.
• 1:06:25
  Kylie Orr: I did a few events with Jo Dixon, who's from the same publisher as me.
• 1:06:30
  Kylie Orr: And I love Jo and we had fun and we did a road trip and yes, and then she came to Melbourne and I organized a few events for us together there.
• 1:06:36
  Kylie Orr: And that's also great for libraries because they get two for one.
• 1:06:39
  Madeleine Cleary: Exactly.
• 1:06:40
  Madeleine Cleary: And they would just be so, I would imagine being really grateful that you guys have come out to some of those regional areas.
• 1:06:45
  Madeleine Cleary: They probably don't see that many authors coming to see.
• 1:06:47
  Madeleine Cleary: Absolutely.
• 1:06:49
  Kylie Orr: And also when there's two of you, it's great because you can just bounce off each other.
• 1:06:52
  Kylie Orr: So you can do a Q& A, no librarian has to necessarily do extra work to be involved, you know, so it's kind of.
• 1:06:58
  Kylie Orr: A traveling roadshow.
• 1:06:59
  Kylie Orr: That's here's something we prepared earlier.
• 1:07:02
  Madeleine Cleary: Amazing.
• 1:07:03
  Kylie Orr: Yeah.
• 1:07:04
  Madeleine Cleary: Well, I'm just going to ask you one last question, if that's okay, Kylie.
• 1:07:08
  Madeleine Cleary: Um, and normally on the podcast, we ask our guest authors for their top tip for emerging writers, but in the spirit of your Wednesday segment on your Instagram, which is the wins and woes, which everyone loves.
• 1:07:21
  Madeleine Cleary: So do check it out.
• 1:07:22
  Madeleine Cleary: If you haven't already, I thought I'd ask you, what's been your biggest win so far and your.
• 1:07:27
  Madeleine Cleary: Gracious woe?
• 1:07:28
  Madeleine Cleary: Is that the way to describe it?
• 1:07:30
  Kylie Orr: I guess so.
• 1:07:31
  Kylie Orr: Firstly, I have to credit author Eliza Henry Jones with the wins and woes idea because we have a group chat in our writers group that I'm in one with her and she used to just pop in there if she hadn't heard from us for a while.
• 1:07:43
  Kylie Orr: Okay, everyone wins and woes.
• 1:07:46
  Kylie Orr: So I said to her, I just love this idea.
• 1:07:48
  Kylie Orr: Can I steal it for Instagram and just call it Wins and Woes Wednesday?
• 1:07:51
  Kylie Orr: And she's like, uh, yeah, I don't own it.
• 1:07:53
  Kylie Orr: Um, yeah, it's, I like it because it helps you focus on like, if you're having a bad week, it also helps you focus on something that was a win.
• 1:08:02
  Kylie Orr: So, uh, do you want me to start with my woe, I guess, and then we'll end on a win.
• 1:08:08
  Kylie Orr: Let's end on a win.
• 1:08:09
  Kylie Orr: So the woe is the woe about for emerging writers.
• 1:08:14
  Kylie Orr: I would say.
• 1:08:17
  Kylie Orr: The biggest woe for me was probably the learning curve and the reality versus the expectation.
• 1:08:23
  Kylie Orr: I think it's incredibly hard to be seen in a sea of books that are being released each month, and you have no control over when your book comes out and who it's up against when it does.
• 1:08:35
  Kylie Orr: You just have to hope that your readership builds over time.
• 1:08:38
  Kylie Orr: And even though I'd been told that, and I've been told to play the long game and all of those things, I just I don't know.
• 1:08:45
  Kylie Orr: I just assumed it was going to be an instant bestseller and get a movie deal.
• 1:08:49
  Madeleine Cleary: Of course.
• 1:08:50
  Madeleine Cleary: That is the expectation because that's what you read about in the media, isn't it?
• 1:08:54
  Kylie Orr: Exactly.
• 1:08:55
  Kylie Orr: I think.
• 1:08:56
  Kylie Orr: Yeah.
• 1:08:56
  Kylie Orr: I think we just, I mean, that was always my hope.
• 1:08:58
  Kylie Orr: I was just joking about it, but you know, some part of me is like, well, it would be great if it did happen.
• 1:09:04
  Madeleine Cleary: And you have to have that hope always.
• 1:09:06
  Kylie Orr: Yeah.
• 1:09:07
  Kylie Orr: I think the, what, I don't know if it's a woe, but learning to let go of the control.
• 1:09:13
  Kylie Orr: Like I wanted to know every step of the way how I, I work better with information and I work Better if I know how things operate and so much of publishing feels like it's behind a big heavy drape and we have no idea what's going on behind it.
• 1:09:26
  Kylie Orr: And it almost feels like we're not allowed to peek through, you know, like, hi, can I have a look at how, like, I wanted to go to like, can I come and meet the sales team and, you know, tell them, so they actually have a personal, you know, connection.
• 1:09:39
  Kylie Orr: And, you know, they get you to film little videos about your book and stuff, but you're not meeting.
• 1:09:43
  Kylie Orr: The team and all like, but obviously you also don't want to be that really annoying author who's highly demanding and, and you're new to this.
• 1:09:51
  Kylie Orr: So you want to make sure everyone likes you and everybody's happy with the way, you know, but I am ambitious and I'm also older.
• 1:09:58
  Kylie Orr: Like, I don't have time to just stuff around.
• 1:10:01
  Kylie Orr: I've spent years waiting to get this book published.
• 1:10:03
  Kylie Orr: And then I, I don't want to see it just fall off the shelf after three months.
• 1:10:08
  Kylie Orr: But also I didn't really understand what I could do to impact that to make it better.
• 1:10:12
  Kylie Orr: I think my mistake was that I mistook passion and ambition for impatience.
• 1:10:20
  Kylie Orr: And I think that it's very hard to be patient when you feel everything's riding on this one moment.
• 1:10:27
  Kylie Orr: Like when my book comes out, what, what do I do?
• 1:10:29
  Kylie Orr: What if it doesn't do as well as they'd hoped or, you know, so I think that woe probably continues, but I'm learning to just let go a little bit and say, well, I don't, I can't control that.
• 1:10:40
  Kylie Orr: I'll just control what I can.
• 1:10:42
  Kylie Orr: I'll write the best book I can and, you know, ask for some stuff and maybe I'll get it and maybe I won't and do the events cause I like it, not because I'm expecting anything out of it.
• 1:10:53
  Kylie Orr: And do some Instagram reels because.
• 1:10:57
  Kylie Orr: It's a bit of fun and that's pretty much all I can do.
• 1:11:00
  Kylie Orr: And you hope that one day, you know, you can make this your career and make a living out of it.
• 1:11:05
  Madeleine Cleary: And I would imagine letting, coming to that realization and letting that go, it's a relief, isn't it?
• 1:11:10
  Madeleine Cleary: When you know, when you look at what it is that you can control, which is writing a good book, doing the events that you really enjoy, but all the other things that go on in the background.
• 1:11:18
  Madeleine Cleary: And I think because the publishers, you Uh, incredibly busy in the sales teams and all sorts of things.
• 1:11:23
  Madeleine Cleary: Like they're operating on very, very tight timeframes themselves.
• 1:11:27
  Madeleine Cleary: They've got so much going on.
• 1:11:28
  Madeleine Cleary: It's, it's quite difficult to be that person to knock on the door and ask questions if you can't.
• 1:11:33
  Kylie Orr: Yeah, absolutely.
• 1:11:34
  Kylie Orr: And I've never been made to feel like I can't ask the question.
• 1:11:37
  Kylie Orr: It's just that we have, you know, particularly as debuts, we just have this thing, like we're so lucky that we got a book deal, so many people want it.
• 1:11:45
  Kylie Orr: I don't want to ruin it by being that person.
• 1:11:47
  Kylie Orr: And.
• 1:11:48
  Kylie Orr: Yeah.
• 1:11:49
  Madeleine Cleary: Yes.
• 1:11:49
  Madeleine Cleary: I was talking with Catherine Collette yesterday and I said we need a procedural instruction on how to be a debut.
• 1:11:54
  Madeleine Cleary: We need to, because I come from government where everything, all the processes are documented in very orderly ways.
• 1:12:00
  Madeleine Cleary: That would be really handy.
• 1:12:01
  Madeleine Cleary: It would be nice,
• 1:12:02
  Kylie Orr: but it's probably different for every single book.
• 1:12:04
  Kylie Orr: That's the problem.
• 1:12:05
  Kylie Orr: They need it.
• 1:12:05
  Kylie Orr: Yeah.
• 1:12:06
  Kylie Orr: I mean, I did once.
• 1:12:08
  Kylie Orr: Like when I was kind of frustrated at the start, like, I don't understand how any of this works.
• 1:12:11
  Kylie Orr: I did like this little document for myself that was like, this is all the questions I need answered as a new author.
• 1:12:18
  Kylie Orr: And stuff like, what's the print run going to be?
• 1:12:21
  Kylie Orr: And you know, like, Um, where is it selling into?
• 1:12:24
  Kylie Orr: Is it going to Target?
• 1:12:25
  Kylie Orr: Is it going to Kmart?
• 1:12:26
  Kylie Orr: Like you don't, unless you ask, you don't necessarily get given that information.
• 1:12:31
  Kylie Orr: And I guess the publisher is also trying to walk that tightrope of not wanting to upset you or disappoint you like they hold hope for your book too.
• 1:12:39
  Kylie Orr: So, and not every single book can have, you know, massive exposure, they don't have budgets for this.
• 1:12:46
  Kylie Orr: So, or time or whatever.
• 1:12:48
  Kylie Orr: So I think, yeah, just learning to let go.
• 1:12:51
  Kylie Orr: So I, I think.
• 1:12:52
  Kylie Orr: I was worried that letting go of control meant I would care less, like I'd linked these two ideas that I, I only want to know how it all works because I care.
• 1:13:01
  Kylie Orr: I care about the outcome of the book and I've kind of learned I can still care about the outcome and know that it's just getting me so wound up all these different parts of cogs in the wheel that I don't understand.
• 1:13:13
  Kylie Orr: So I either will learn what I can and then the rest.
• 1:13:17
  Kylie Orr: Whatever.
• 1:13:18
  Madeleine Cleary: That's, I think, a fantastic tip to hold for emerging writers as a way of sort of managing their own expectations about the process, but also for us debuts for next year as well.
• 1:13:30
  Madeleine Cleary: I think it's a great tip.
• 1:13:31
  Madeleine Cleary: And
• 1:13:32
  Kylie Orr: then the
• 1:13:32
  Madeleine Cleary: win,
• 1:13:33
  Kylie Orr: we should end on the win.
• 1:13:34
  Kylie Orr: It's hard to narrow it down, but I would say that seeing your book on a shelf is a pretty big win.
• 1:13:41
  Kylie Orr: Amazing.
• 1:13:41
  Kylie Orr: And for me, I have no idea why, but walking through the airport and spotting my book was like, Oh my God.
• 1:13:48
  Kylie Orr: This is amazing.
• 1:13:49
  Kylie Orr: This might never, ever happen to me again.
• 1:13:51
  Kylie Orr: I am in an airport and my book is on the shelf.
• 1:13:54
  Kylie Orr: And that's quite hard to get into the airport as well.
• 1:13:56
  Kylie Orr: Like not every book can fit in an airport bookshop.
• 1:14:01
  Kylie Orr: So not everyone will get their book in an airport bookshop.
• 1:14:03
  Kylie Orr: And they're all different.
• 1:14:05
  Kylie Orr: Suppliers anyway.
• 1:14:06
  Kylie Orr: So, um, so that was a pretty huge win for me.
• 1:14:10
  Kylie Orr: I would say readers contacting me is also a huge win and the beautiful writing community.
• 1:14:15
  Kylie Orr: I mean, I don't, I don't know much of the writing community outside of Melbourne, Victoria.
• 1:14:21
  Kylie Orr: I know some in New South Wales and they're lovely.
• 1:14:23
  Kylie Orr: I haven't met.
• 1:14:25
  Kylie Orr: A writer I didn't like, they're all very, to me, just welcoming and you know, they commiserate and they understand how it works and they celebrate each other's wins and it's just not like anything I've known.
• 1:14:39
  Kylie Orr: I don't know.
• 1:14:40
  Kylie Orr: We're just, it's, it's a very supportive community, not just writers, but the bookstagrammers, librarians and yeah.
• 1:14:46
  Madeleine Cleary: We are so lucky, I think, to have this community and we are lucky to have you as part of it.
• 1:14:50
  Madeleine Cleary: Kylie.
• 1:14:52
  Madeleine Cleary: Oh, thank you.
• 1:14:52
  Madeleine Cleary: So thank you so much for joining us on the book deal and I wish all of those debuts the best of luck.
• 1:14:58
  Madeleine Cleary: Thank you.
• 1:14:59
  Tina: Thank you for listening to the book Deal podcast.
• 1:15:02
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• 1:15:07
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• 1:15:15
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• 1:15:19
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