Ask the Author: Adeline Knight
Answered Questions (6)
Adeline Knight
A writer I admire deeply gave me great advice years ago: that the only cure for writer's block is 'bum on chair.' What she meant is that you just have to keep putting yourself back at your writing desk, and put one word after another, and silence the critic in the corner/on your shoulder, and eventually...eventually!!!...you'll drop into flow.
But if this doesn't work, then I usually try to trick myself into feeling that writing fiction is a very, very naughty and sneaky thing to do - like a secret act of rebellion against the world. Make writing feel less like a chore and more like a guilty pleasure by making arbitrary rules for yourself like:
1) You can only write fiction in bed (this was Edith Wharton's rule for herself - and clearly it worked for her!)
2) You can only write fiction when you're meant to be doing other things (like your normal day job, or your tax return, or your homework, or your grocery list)
3) You can only write fiction when a pet is sleeping on your lap
4) You can only write fiction when your in-laws are visiting and you really should be entertaining them as the perfect host...but you're actually locked in the en-suite bathroom, writing on the loo
5) You can only write fiction on your computer at work, in full view of all your colleagues in your open-plan office (but beware, this is high-risk writing...which is exactly the point!)
6) You can only write on trains, buses or planes, when everybody else in your row or cabin is fast asleep.
But if this doesn't work, then I usually try to trick myself into feeling that writing fiction is a very, very naughty and sneaky thing to do - like a secret act of rebellion against the world. Make writing feel less like a chore and more like a guilty pleasure by making arbitrary rules for yourself like:
1) You can only write fiction in bed (this was Edith Wharton's rule for herself - and clearly it worked for her!)
2) You can only write fiction when you're meant to be doing other things (like your normal day job, or your tax return, or your homework, or your grocery list)
3) You can only write fiction when a pet is sleeping on your lap
4) You can only write fiction when your in-laws are visiting and you really should be entertaining them as the perfect host...but you're actually locked in the en-suite bathroom, writing on the loo
5) You can only write fiction on your computer at work, in full view of all your colleagues in your open-plan office (but beware, this is high-risk writing...which is exactly the point!)
6) You can only write on trains, buses or planes, when everybody else in your row or cabin is fast asleep.
Adeline Knight
The way you get to leap out of your own mind and into somebody else's - whether they are real or entirely invented! I find that the only break I get from the voice in my own head (which sometimes drives me nuts) is by reading fiction or writing fiction. It gives me a very nourishing change of perspective - and that's always a good thing.
Adeline Knight
I'm working on two more feel good fiction/romance books that will also be audio-only Audible Originals! One is set on Lord Howe Island (a tiny island off the east coast of Australia), and another is set in a fictional fishing village in Cornwall.
Adeline Knight
I would travel to the planet Gethen, from Ursula Le Guin's feminist sci-fi novel The Left Hand of Darkness. She is one of my favourite authors of all time - in her work, she always manages to build worlds that are deeply strange, yet eerily mirror our own world in unsettling ways. I've also always been interested in how she was the daughter of two anthropologists, and as a social anthropologist myself, I can see how that outsider/observer gaze is an essential tool in both anthropology and writing fiction.
Adeline Knight
Hi Jessica, that makes *my* heart happy to hear - thank you so much! That's exactly my aim in writing feel good fiction/romance...to bring a bit of happiness, joy and humour into your day. This is a great question, and the answer is that I was lucky to have an incredibly supportive publisher at Audible, Karen Yates, who right from the beginning wanted this book to be something new: an audio-only novel that was written and designed to create a special listening experience...somewhere between an audiobook and audio play, with many cast members bringing the scenes to life. I wrote it to explore new creative possibilities in this golden age of audio storytelling, and key to that was having a mix of traditional audio narration (as Eira and Ru have in their chapters), plus loads of other audio elements (like Eira and Ru's live 'Lonely Harts' call-in radio show, and the scenes where other actors become part of the narrative). It was so exciting to see (or 'hear'!) how the audio production came together (thanks to the hard work of the Audible team; Mike Cowap at Princess Pictures; the director Stuart McDonald; and the actors), and it was thrilling to have my words transformed and elevated into a completely different format like this.
Adeline Knight
Hi Katia, thank you so much for your question - it's such a good one! I definitely drew on some real-life experiences from living in New York City when I was younger (in a tiny rent-controlled apartment in Greenwich Village very similar to the one that Jerry owns in the book - and where Eira stays). It actually was on Jones Street - which is the narrow road that Bob Dylan is walking down on the cover of his album The Freewheelin' - so of course I had to use that detail in the book! I'm also from a generation that is lucky to remember what it was like to date (and fall in love) before smartphones/social media/online dating existed, and it was fun to draw on some of that nostalgia in setting the book in 1999. And to remember the brief (and irrational, as it turned out) panic about Y2K! I've also hiked along the coast near St Davids in Wales (where Eira grows up) and feel very connected to that part of the world, so I enjoyed being able to bring that into the story - and was so thrilled that the Welsh actress Erin Richards agreed to be Eira for the audiobook, so that her Welsh accent is authentic (and that Ru's is authentically Australian, thanks to Adam Demos playing him!). I'm Australian and live in Sydney, so I also tried to weave in some of my observations of other Aussies in New York back in the day - and some Aussie humour :)
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