The Storyteller: Interview with Beth O'Leary

Hi and welcome to the very first edition of The Storyteller! If you aren't yet subscribed to the newsletter, you can change that here.

Today, I've got with me the wonderful Beth O'Leary who wrote one of my favourite books of 2019 in The Flatshare.

Without giving too much away, The Flatshare is a contemporary romance novel where Tiffany "Tiffy" Moore and Leon Twomey have never met but share a bed. Tiffy, who works as an assistant editor at a boutique/specialist publisher, urgently needs cheap rent while Leon, as a palliative care nurse, works nights and needs the extra cash. 

It's a set-up that could have gone horribly wrong, both narratively and in reality, but Beth O'Leary pulls it off in this charming book that proves beyond doubt that romance novels can and should have depth, well-rounded characters, and organic plot development. You can read my review of it here.

Beth's second novel, The Switch will be out on April 30, 2020 (UK) and June 9, 2020 (US). Eileen and Leena Cotton are a grandmother-granddaughter duo who want to escape their current situations and decide to swap places for two months - Eileen moves into Leena's London flat while Leena goes to rural Yorkshire.

In her own words, she writes "uplifting stories - the sorts of books you reach for when you need a hug." Now, who doesn't love those?

Without further ado, here's Beth O'Leary!

AN: You wrote almost the entire draft of The Flatshare on your commute--that's inspiring! How did you keep yourself motivated and disciplined through it? What sort of environment do you find most conducive to creativity and focus?
 
BL: There were plenty of days when I did not keep myself at all motivated and disciplined, and just stared out of the window! But I think the most helpful thing I did was save up for some noise-cancelling headphones. They made such a difference. Typically I prefer quiet when I’m writing, so I had to adapt to work with train noise (and those annoying people who always have really loud phone conversations in the quiet carriage)… So the noise-cancelling headphones were a lifesaver. I would put them on and the working day ahead/behind me would disappear: I was in Tiffy and Leon’s world.

I actually started listening to music to block out noise, and ended up finding particular songs helpful for getting into the feel of the novel, so I created a playlist for the book. I never used to write to music but now I often do it – I think I retrained myself during those long commutes!
 
AN: I read that the idea was inspired by you moving in with your now-fiance in Winchester and the conflicting schedules you had with him being a doctor. How did you come up with the characters of Leon and Tiffy from that point? Did the characters come first before the rest of the story developed or was it the other way around?
 
BL: I actually came up with the concept – two strangers sharing a bed but not meeting – first, and the characters grew from that point. So far this seems to always be my method, and if a concept starts to spawn characters (sorry, that makes it sound like some sort of alien birth but it’s the best word I could think of right now!) then that’s a sign it might be a keeper.
 
AN: Did you always want to be a writer? I'd love to know what comprises your bookshelf and what your reading story is.
 
BL: I have always wanted to be a writer. It’s a boring answer to that question, really, but it’s true. I’ve been a big reader since I was a very young child, and now my tastes are pretty eclectic, from Terry Pratchett to Virginia Woolf to Tessa Dare. My bookshelves reflect that, and there’s no hierarchy there: my classics are in with the rom coms, my sci-fi epics are next to the YA tear-jerkers… Every one of those books is beautiful and deserves to be treated as such!
 
AN: How much did your work and experience in the industry help you when you were writing this book and The Switch?
 
BL: The area of publishing where I worked was quite unusual – I worked on books that were spin-offs from kids’ TV shows, and the books I edited were often activity books and puzzle books. So it was a very different world from the one I’m now in as an adult fiction author. But I still learnt a huge amount from working at a publisher and seeing how the business of books works behind the scenes. It taught me that an editor needs a neat pitch to give the sales team when they’re talking about a new book; it taught me that often authors don’t actually know best when it comes to their own work; and it showed me that it can happen. I think that was the most important part. Being an author was such a dream to me, but working for a publisher showed me that there really are people whose dreams of getting published come true. That was so inspiring and motivating.
 
AN: As a writer myself, I'm equally interested in the craft and process of the writing. I read your Instagram post about whether you were a plotter or a pantser and got thinking about what I do (conclusion is, a bit of both, depending on the story I'm writing). Do you find that your approach to writing and the process changes for every new work you write? Or are you very much a creature of habit? As cliche as it sounds, where do you draw your inspiration from?
 
BL: So far, my process seems to be relatively similar for each book, though every story feels very different to work on. I start with a concept, a question, something I hope will intrigue the reader: what if two people shared a bed but didn’t meet, or what if a grandmother and granddaughter stepped into one another shoes... I have a whole bunch of these sorts of ideas floating around in my head when I’m in new-idea mode, and it’s hard to say where they come from – I pick them up around the place all the time, piecing them together from experiences and things I read and people I meet. But eventually one of these concepts will jump out – perhaps because I can immediately see one of the characters, or because some element of it catches my attention and is something I’m keen to write about at that moment. This is quite trial-and-error for me – between every book, I’ve always started a project that hasn’t been right and has ended up getting abandoned. So it’s not very neat, as processes go! But once I get going on a first draft and I can tell it’s RIGHT, then it tends to fly. And then I spend many months rewriting, editing and crafting to turn the first draft magical messiness into an actual story.
 
AN: The thing that struck me immediately about The Flatshare (and one of the big reasons I was immediately drawn in) was how real it felt, how well-rounded in its approach to its characters, how organically it all unfolded. Do you have a writer's manifesto about the kind of stories you want to tell and what you want them to achieve?
 
BL: What an interesting question! I think I want to tell stories that are true to life, but hopeful. I want people to feel happier because they’ve read my books, and I want to remind people to be kind.
 
AN: How did the idea of The Switch come about?
 
BL: The idea for The Switch first grew in our precious last weeks with my maternal grandmother. I stayed with her for a few days in her small village, and imagined for a moment what it would be like for a young woman to step in to a community like that and try to fill her grandmother’s shoes. At first I wanted to write about that young woman stepping up when her grandmother was unwell, but then I reflected on how often we read about older people who are dying or sick, and I thought… couldn’t I write a woman in her late seventies who was at the start of an adventure, rather than the end of one? So that’s how the story became a full-on swap.
 
AN: Did you notice any difference in yourself or the process of drafting, writing, and developing the story idea between your first and second books? I've heard that the sophomore slump can be quite the trial.
 
BL: God, yes, writing the second book was so much harder. It was the self-doubt, really. With the first book I had no expectations of myself and nobody had any expectations of me. I wrote in the quiet, don’t-say-it-out-loud hope that someone might want to publish me one day, but I never felt that would really happen. Whereas for the second book, I knew it would be published, and there were suddenly all these people I could let down if I didn’t deliver.

In the end I realised if I wanted to write a good book, I had to stop seeking approval from everyone – would this make a good book? How about this? How about now? – and remember that nobody else could actually tell me what to write. That’s my job. I had to actually listen to the lovely readers telling me I was good at that job and trusting me to do it again. (I’m still working on that part, really, but I’m doing better than I was!)
 
AN: Are you allowed to share anything at all about book number 3, which as you've mentioned a few times on your social media, is in progress?
 
BL: It’s all top-secret for now, I’m afraid – even my editor hasn’t read it yet! But I’m really excited about it and can’t wait to share it with you all.
 
AN: What are some of your interests outside of books and writing?
 
BL: Oh, god, this is like that interview question where you need to make yourself sound interesting! The truth is, books and writing are most of my life, really. But I also love to bake and cook, and I love the outdoors – I’m not running at the moment because I’ve had trouble with shin splints, but I’ve replaced that with long dog walks in the beautiful fields around our new house in rural Hampshire. If I don’t get enough time outdoors, in a big open space, or somewhere wild, then I’m just not myself.

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Hope you've enjoyed this first edition - next month on The Storyteller you'll be introduced to E.J. Koh and her latest book, the memoir The Magical Language of Others.

Until next time!

Anu

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I'm going to leave Beth's details here for anyone who wants to follow her on social media as well as links to buy or pre-order her work:

betholearyauthor.com
Instagram
Twitter

The Flatshare: UK | US

The Switch: UK | US