Art, Tech and the Courage to go your own way: A conversation with Tor Roxburgh
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You can listen above or on your favourite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below.
Subscribe: Spotify | Apple | RSS | More
You can listen above or on your favourite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below.
Show notes
The conversation with Tor Roxburgh covers her journey as a writer, the transition from traditional publishing to independent publishing, and the use of AI in writing. It delves into ethical considerations, productivity, and the future vision for writing. Additionally, it explores the marketing and business side of independent publishing, as well as the tech side of podcasting. The conversation delves into the themes of radical acceptance, longevity over money, redefining success, navigating creative challenges, embracing authenticity and fun, and the future of creative exploration. Amra shares her journey of shedding shame, embracing freedom, and finding joy in writing and art. She redefines success, emphasizes the joy of creation, and discusses the importance of consistency and routine. The conversation concludes with a focus on authenticity, representation, and the future of creative exploration.
Takeaways
Chapters
Takeaways
- Adapting to change in the publishing industry
- Utilizing AI as a creative partner Radical acceptance
- Longevity over money
Chapters
- 00:00 The Tech Side of Podcasting
- 40:44 Journey into Art and Writing
- 48:25 Navigating Creative Challenges
- 59:50 Embracing Authenticity and Fun
- 01:06:28 Conclusion and Future Conversations
Connect with Renee Robinson
Today I’m speaking with Renee Robinson — someone who doesn’t just talk about sustainability, she actually lives it. Renee drives an electric car, powers her home with her own electricity generation, and has taken the kind of practical steps most of us only daydream about. She’s proof that an electrified, low-emissions lifestyle isn’t some futuristic fantasy; it’s happening right now in an ordinary Victorian home.
Her efforts caught the attention of the Victorian Government, and in November 2024 her house became the launch site for the State Electricity Commission’s new electric-home planner pilot, with Minister Lily D’Ambrosio and the Member for Eureka turning up to showcase what’s possible. In February 2025 Renee was selected as one of 20 women from around Australia to be part of the 1 Million Women enjoy to Canberra to convince political to support the electrification of one million homes across Australia. Today, Renee joins me to cut through the hype and talk honestly about what works, what doesn’t, and what it really takes to live sustainably in a world that’s still playing catch-up.
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/peppercorn_mill/
Her efforts caught the attention of the Victorian Government, and in November 2024 her house became the launch site for the State Electricity Commission’s new electric-home planner pilot, with Minister Lily D’Ambrosio and the Member for Eureka turning up to showcase what’s possible. In February 2025 Renee was selected as one of 20 women from around Australia to be part of the 1 Million Women enjoy to Canberra to convince political to support the electrification of one million homes across Australia. Today, Renee joins me to cut through the hype and talk honestly about what works, what doesn’t, and what it really takes to live sustainably in a world that’s still playing catch-up.
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/peppercorn_mill/
Transcript of episode
Amra (00:01)
Welcome to Amra's Armchair Anecdotes. I'm Amra Payalich, writer, teacher and storyteller. Pull up a chair and let's dive into stories about writing, life and lessons learned, sharing wisdom from my armchair to yours. You can find the episode show notes, your free episode handouts and my how-to guides at amrapayalich.com slash podcast.
Now it's time to dive in.
Hello, welcome to Abra's Armchair Anecdotes. So I am here with Tor Roxburgh. She's a fiercely creative Australian multidisciplinary artist who refuses easy categorization. So she's the author of 17 published works spanning speculative fiction, young adult novels, nonfiction and short stories. And her narrative imagination leaps across genres from science fiction to mystery. Her writing is grounded in deep curiosity about worlds both possible and impossible.
She's the author of the epic fantasy saga, Promise of Stone series with book one, The Light Heart of Stone, and she has just published book two, The Rush of Stone. Be on the page, Tor paints expressive, narrative rich visual art and co-designs public sculpture in a creative partnership that has spanned decades. Her work has been exhibited both in Australia and internationally from gallery walls to urban spaces. And she also co-hosts the Technology and Innovation podcast,
Okay Smartass with Patrick Bonello where she talks all things tech with humor, insight and fearless questioning. So she's not just a creator, she's an independent maker who builds her art on her own terms, whether that's self-publishing, studio practice or curious conversations about the future tech and ideas. Thank you so much. Thank you for having me, Amara. Thank you. So we were talking earlier and I was saying you're a really interesting person to interview because you have done so much.
So you, in terms of, we'll start a little bit with the writing maybe, but like you started with traditional publishing and you published all these young adult novels ⁓ and had a very successful career. I think you actually were living off your writing. was, I was. Yeah, which is so rare. Look, romance has always been a genre where you can make money. Yes. And I wrote 12 teenage romances.
for a series called Dolly Fiction. I used to read those. Oh my gosh, that's my youth! That's my adolescence! I'm like, I've been reading some of your books. Possibly, possibly. So what happened was I was working in a women's refuge. I was a general coordinator helping women who are escaping domestic violence and incest. And that was my first book. I wrote a kind of a self-help book.
compiling all the things you would have learned if you went into a refuge. So for those people who didn't go into refuge. And I really loved writing. I really loved writing before I did that. And my publisher said, we're starting a series of women's romance and teen romance. The women's romance was Women's Weekly. The teen romance was Dolly Fiction. And I thought I can't write women's romance because I've just seen the kind of
brutal side of women's romance. Certain jobs change your perspective. Like me, I used to love teacher-student romance stories. And now that I'm a teacher, am repulsed. As soon as there is a hint of something between a teacher and a student, I'm like, ugh, get away. Yeah, yeah. So I that. But I thought, look, I can write teen romance because relationships, when you're a teenager, they are...
They're everything aren't they? They are. Like you never feel the way that you feel as an adolescent. the, I don't know, the bright colour and the...
And the intensity of the feelings. So I did that and that was lots of fun and it supported the family and the children when they were young, which is amazing. It really is. Like now especially because even I was reading an article about the Hay days, there was this very short period of time probably when you were writing when there were so many bookstores, the publishing industry was huge, people were actually able to make a living off their writing.
And then things changed. Yeah. Well, with change comes, you know, huge opportunity. I think if you had grabbed that change at the right moment, you could then be making lots of money publishing independently. Yes. A little more challenging now, but still there's, it's wonderful really to not have so many gatekeepers. It is because we're both doing that. Like that's what you're doing with your series. And that's what I'm
doing it and I'm finding so much joy in it in all those different parts that we're doing all the different hats that we're wearing. Yeah. Yeah. How have you found that whole process? Exciting, stretching your skills and I don't mind, I find business interesting. So I think if you're a writer that really abhors business then it'd be awful.
Yeah, I find it very interesting. What I find difficult is swapping between. I can write all day, but I can't do writing in the morning and business in the afternoon. And I still haven't worked out how to manage that transition to the different parts of my brain.
Yeah, I know it is kind of tiring, all of those different things. But we weren't talking earlier, so maybe we should swing back to that discussion about AI and how there are opportunities for us both as writers and as independent authors and business people in terms of using AI to help streamline a lot of things. So I've been using it a lot for marketing. Have you been doing the same? I've definitely been using
it for marketing. I've been using it for as a thought partner which is a way I like to describe it and I usually do my prompts by saying you know I don't want you to come up with plot ideas, I don't want you to come up with character ideas.
Well, recently I have a mythical creature and I was thinking to give it a point of view and then I thought, well, it can't just sound like a person. Yes. But I also don't want it to sound like a cliched mythical creature. Yes, with the British accent and the formal speaking or the prophecies sort of thing. So I had a long, long chat.
What would the world feel like? What would I feel like? Would I feel like an I? Yeah. ⁓
Yeah, it's sort of replacing because we used to be in a writing group together. Then the writing group got too successful. Yes, they're all too big. Too many people who are like their careers have progressed and they're like a good day. But also something about as our life speeds up, we know the value of writing groups, but it does become sort of difficult to prioritise them.
I'm not going to say something controversial now, like we know the value of critiquing and getting critiqued.
We also get to the point where it's like, I don't want to be spending time critiquing other people's work when I really need to move forward with my own writing. And so for us, using AI is like using that hive mind that we used to get the benefit from, where we would do that brainstorming, we would do that thinking. Because some things that I've used it for is, you know, for one of the books in my series, it's set in a...
at school so I'm like write a manifesto, a history, create a logo. So you know all these things about uniform, all these things that I could do myself absolutely but it would take me days to create this and I'm only going to use like three sentences of like describing the uniform or a couple of sentences of setting the tone of what the school is like and then a few sentences of describing the buildings but I need to
to do that world building and know what it is. And so it's just kind of jumpstarting a lot of things in that way. Yeah, it's fun. And also when I meet with other writers now at this point in my career, I...
socialise with them. Yes and just sort of share the lessons. Yeah. Like what are you trying? What's going on? Um and just having those moments where we're just having a conversation and we're learning through it. Yeah. Or just enjoying the moment really. And also you know when I think back to when I started writing if you say in one of my books I wanted to to have a police officer and I don't know anything about the police.
I would have had to get on the phone and ring someone and convince them to talk to me. And, you know, I would have had to say things like unpublished by, you know, greenhouse publications and like it was really, really time consuming and difficult. But then came along the internet and you could get that information and it was a static, but you could get it. And now you can say to...
or chat to GPT, like I want a probationary constable for this purpose. Have I got the purpose right? And actually, you know, maybe, maybe I want someone who's maybe a firefighter would be better and you can enter into that dialogue. It's not going to take you weeks to find it out. also like a lot of the times when I do the brainstorming, like for example, this latest book ⁓ that I'm working on, is book five,
I was like, I need to start plotting from now on. And so I used chat GPT to do the plotting. But of course I'm hearing off. I'm not following that plotting. ⁓ But sometimes just being able to put the ideas in where it's like, help me brainstorm. How would they get out of this situation or how would they do this? And then it gives you all these possibilities. And then you're sort of thinking through and going, okay, which one would work and how do I build that in? And like that part of it is really, really helpful.
where I would try and have conversations with people and harass my husband to talk to me, like, does this make sense? Does this make sense? I'm going to do this. And then I remember being like a crazy woman where you sort of had these conversations by yourself where you're sitting in the corner going, you can't do that. Will, oh yes, that will. And you're a bit loony. Whereas this way you're actually having that moment and processing it all. And then you're still leaving it in your subconscious and things are coming out.
But I find it really, really helpful. Yes. And look, I am a very tech positive. You are because of your podcast, which we're going to get to also.
And I think, you know, we have to acknowledge that the writing community and the world is really split about this. And there are people who are not violently, but passionately opposed. I'm not. I'm going to make a statement here and you tell me whether you agree with this or not. In your experience, is it that those authors who are traditionally published that are more opposed, whereas those authors who are independently published
a little bit more open? I don't know. I haven't asked enough people. Mainly the people I've seen who are opposed are traditionally published or already quite successful. I look...
I can't speculate why. Change is very difficult. Change in an industry is alarming. Yeah. I mean, I have seen it from both sides, to be honest, because even in the independently, those of us who independently published it in Facebook groups that we're in, there has been a lot of vitriol. Yes. And a lot of...
But we are also going to confess that we use it to help us with the writing process. So I'll go first and make my declaration. So I use ProWritingAid as the editing software, which also has AI suggestions. Some of them are atrocious, but it helps pick up a lot of the little grammar rules that just never stick in my head. I also use PseudoWrite. So PseudoWrite is AI-powered software where it's got all these different modes that you can do.
So it's got modes where you can do like rewrites where you put something in and rewrites it for you ⁓ You can put it in do descriptive where it adds descriptive detail and it's got things like you know with more internal conflict Etc now what I've found is the rewrite is the one that I use the most Because what it does is it just kind of cleans up things and just you know how we do those repetitive? ⁓ Motions and really like verbs we don't I use the good enough
Yes, yes. He nodded, she nodded. That's right, you just keep kind of doing the same things. But I do use the descriptive mode. It's not good to use it like just as it is because it really like adds that purple prose. But I find it really helpful where I'm like, okay, I'm going to set something in a hospital. Again, I can spend an hour preparing that scene and thinking about what sounds would you hear? What would it smell like? How do I describe it without
saying it's a hospital, know, all of those, that sensory imagery and kind of weaving it into the action together with all the other things. Or I can pop that into pseudo, right? And it will come up with a rewrite and then I will take a few sentences here and there and I'll just insert them in my prose and juj it up. Just juj it up. What about yourself?
⁓ I'm doing a bit the reverse. I'm not yet ⁓ publishing anything that I've been collaborating with AI.
but I will in the future and I'll probably declare that in the Yeah, I need to start declaring because the first three books that I wrote were pre-AI and it was just the pro-writing aid as they kind of, but then human eye. But yeah, these ones I'm gonna have to start declaring. So I've been playing around and how I've been playing around is I've been writing my own outline, characters. ⁓
and then getting down to the scene and I'll tell, again, Sue to write what I want to be in the scene. And then I'll give it the first pass. And what I found is I then completely rewrite it with my writing, but it makes me much faster and much more productive because I'm not struggling to think, now three people are walking into the room. Who's going first?
Logistics? Yeah. I've been writing for, you know, 40 years or something professionally.
logistics, moving groups of people, not forgetting leaving people kind of invisible floating, not doing anything. I still find that really hard. Yeah, we've all got our little things like for me it's description. You know, I like to just move the scene along. And then I thought, well, there needs to be some description. What are they wearing? You know, if they put in their head through their hair, can we add the colour maybe? You know, like you don't need to have the
looking in the mirror and my green eyes and you know like it's all of that sort of stuff and that's something that I used to really have to go back and spend time on a draft. So I would like do one draft where it's like laying down the story, one draft going through and adding the description and the plot points and the you know ⁓ building the layers and then I would have to do another one where I would go back and play with the writing and kind of go.
can I add a simile, can I add a metaphor, can I shush it up in that way? And so it would be a lot of work to do all that. The criticism is like, you know, what's the point of writing if you're not doing it all yourself? So what do you think about that?
I think that like you, I have been writing for long enough and I am completely confident in my writing ability, my ability to tell a good story and in having the skills required for that. I'm a pretty damn good teacher about it too. So I can do it all, but I want to speed up. want to move on. I've so many stories I want to tell.
And I feel the time. I feel, you know, like I'm 48 years old and I love being 48 years old. But I'm also aware of the fact that there's less time in front than there is behind me. That writing is my passion, my joy, my everything. It is my legacy. And I just want to speed up and do the stories that I want to tell.
And I also just want to use the technology that we've got. You know, when we had pen writing and then typewriters came in, everyone was like, oh, scandalous, it's going to ruin writing. Then we had computers and everyone's like, oh my gosh, that's going to ruin writing. Now we've got AI, that's going to ruin writing. No, no, it's not. No, it's not. Everything that I've got, I still have because I am a reader and love the written word and
you know, will always continue to feed that part of my brain. One of the conversations I had with my daughter that was interesting where she was talking about cognitive decline in terms of using AI and that people who are using it the way that their thoughts and you know, they're getting that cognitive decline. I mean, I won't ever use it where I will get it to do everything for me. Like at the end of the day, we're writers, we love writing, we love creating worlds,
creating stories for us it's not interesting to go this is the name of my character they are a doctor there is a scandal in the hospital now write it for me for us the joy is that creation ⁓ but using it as a creative partner using it to allocate and delegate some of the heavy lifting using it for the brainstorm coming up the names of things character names yes ⁓ my gosh ⁓
clicking through all the directories. And then the other thing is, you ⁓ you're writing fantasies of you, it's a whole different thing. But for me, I'm writing, you know, contemporary and I'm like, I want it to be a reflection of Australian society and that I have characters of all, you know, backgrounds. so, you know, I'm having to research all these different names. And I mean, even I use Scriven Art to keep track of all my writing and my character names.
and all of this. So we're already using tools that might not be AI based but they are tools to help organisation. And you can use it really creatively. Like I wanted a word that was not indigenous and was not native because they're so loaded those words. I'm vaguely working in a European Anglo-Celtic style.
even though it's epic fantasy and totally made up. And I said to Claude, tell me, you know, in the 17th century, what the word native would have been in Ireland, what would it have been in Scotland? What was it in England? I looked at all of those words, couldn't pronounce the Scottish or O. And I said, look, if that, you know.
Gaelic word had crossed into England and then evolved with language over the next 300 years. What would it be now?
Now, obviously that's not a factual answer, but it gave me really interesting word and it was really a very creative exercise. So it just depends how you use it really, I think. Yeah. a tool. And I think you use it as a tool, but also as we will be declaring. Yeah. So, know, with these novels moving forward, I will be declaring that, you know, I use pro-writing aid for the editing and then I use pseudo-writing, you know, to
expand and stuff and I think that is the ethical thing to do. But that doesn't take away because I know that the stories I'm writing, I'm the only one that can write those stories. I'm the only one that can come up with that world, that character, with what I'm trying to do with it to contribute to the world. Because you know as creators we always have that big lofty vision. What's your lofty vision with your fantasy?
Are you talking about the end results or what I'm trying to say? What are you trying to say? Tell us a little bit about the world and what they are. Look, I'm a bit of a dreamer, a bit of a what if a person, which I suppose all writers are. Basically I was driving...
From Melbourne to Belan and I was entering Backers Marsh and for those who don't know it, you come over a hill and you look down into a very fertile market garden landscape. Particularly, you know, 15 years ago it's a bit more developed now.
And there were, this particular day, were people in the field harvesting, bent over the crops, hand harvesting vegetables. And I thought, like, looks really magical. obviously that's disguising the complexities of what's really going on, the labor issues and all of that. But I thought, what if it was even more magical? What if...
humans could be companions to plants and animals in the same way that you have companion planting. So if a human had this talent, maybe you'd have the talent for...
and just with your presence rice could grow. So I like that idea and it really captured me and then because of the personality I have I thought well it looks really magical, it looks really perfect but obviously it isn't. There's something rotten.
Yes. Beneath all of this. And what if those companionships started to fail? And so, ⁓ the Lionheart of Stone is all about there's famine, the companionships are failing, and the efforts of various characters to solve that problem, some of them diabolically and some of them in a more ethical way. And then the Rush of Stone is when you think you've solved the problem.
it's actually going to be more complicated than you thought it was going to be. Because I believe it's a trilogy. It is a trilogy. That's right, we've got a bill to the third one. So yeah, I'm the third one.
every writer I'm also thinking about. Well, if only I was writing this...
the series that I want to write after I finish this one. Well, that's the thing. I'm starting this series and I'm like, I've got the first six books planned and I actually want to continue it after six books because I'm like, it said in the 1990s and she's actually born in the same year as me. And I'm like, wouldn't that be cool if it's like following her whole life and the changes and all the things that happen. And because the series is kind of now
something's going on in Australia, showcasing a scandal, showcasing a human rights violation or something happening. So I've got a whole bunch of ideas planned for it. But then I'm like, well, she has a mentor who's a war correspondent. Wouldn't that be great to do a series? and then she meets this police officer along the way.
wouldn't that be interesting? So you know I'm just like I want to because we want to challenge ourselves. The appetite and then you get down to that issue of productivity. Yes. Like I'm slow, I write slowly. I'm 65. I mean I want to write.
20 more books, I have to pick up the pace, really. Yeah, well, I'm with you. I have to juggle writing with working four days as a teacher. I feel quite happy with myself that I have done that. But these ideas are just kind of... And then I get random ideas of things I want to do or things that I've started. And then I'm like, well, I can't really... How many things can I start?
but there are so many because there's something about the joy now of no gatekeepers and just following your muse, following your creativity. Yeah. And actually having more contact with your readers. So when I was traditionally published, I
didn't really meet anyone who read my books. But of necessity, because you've got to hustle a little bit if you're an indie publisher, I get to meet people who read my books. And that's a really exciting experience. And also, we were talking about the business side and the marketing side. And, you know, when I started
doing this because for me initially it was getting rights back to books that were traditionally published and then republishing and kind of having that confidence where I'm like I know that they're good, I know. And so I had to learn that whole marketing because you know traditional publishing they kind of do everything for you whereas now we have to do everything for ourselves and it's a lot of new skills but this is also where the AI
comes in handy in terms of, you know, helping to write captions for social media posts, helping brainstorm content and things that you can create and things that you can put out there and creating book reels and, you know, just there's a lot of things like that that are really time consuming but then once it sort of helps you come up with all these assets and even, you know, using Kalva
there's a lot more AI technology now where it can do, you know, posts where you can like turbo charge them, you use an Excel spreadsheet and it creates different content. you experienced that? I haven't used Canva because I use a CorelDRAW, which is a different graphics program. And I can just do it. I'm not...
I don't have enough skill to do it well, but I can manage to put together the things I need to put together. I'm struggling at the moment because I'm trying to make a new map for book two because I realised the map I've made was not really the map that...
concerned with why I did that you know sometimes sometimes we have to be a little bit assistive and I'm pushing up against the limits of my skills at the moment but it's kind of fun you know you need a break from writing and go tinker with the...
graphics program. That's the thing so many new skills like you know so many new packages that we're trying so much new tech and so this is something that sort of led you well I don't know how did your podcast come about and the tech side of it. I think it was maybe at the end of COVID my dear friend Patrick Benello
said you like science and tech we should do a podcast and I thought I was in a period of saying yes, yes indeed to everything at the time. ⁓ So it's a news.
based podcast, we collect what's going on in the news with science and tech and then we chat about it. we have various things that we're particularly interested in. So I've always been interested in reproductive technology. So we had, for example, one episode where we talk a lot about artificial wounds and where the experiments are going with that at the moment.
I think last I looked, they were able to keep a land fetus in an artificial womb for a few days a week. Did they move on since Dolly?
yeah. Donny the sheep. Look it up. Yeah. And, and you know, Patrick's got his things he likes talking about. And so we, we'd look for articles that we had shared interest in. And then ⁓ we moved on to just doing episodes occasionally. ⁓ Recently we did three episodes about technology and aged care and we interviewed people from age 19 to 84.
about what sort of tech they wanted in their aged care. And we're now talking about maybe combining a science fiction book review, linking it to actual science that's happening at the moment.
We haven't quite knotted that out, but that's the next iteration. And it's fun to have that vehicle of, okay, smart ass, because we can reinterpret it how we want Yes. Well, I think I did a general Amra Zamchi anecdotes because I wasn't sure what I wanted. I started out just talking about writing stuff. And now it's like talking to creative people, but also just talking to people about things that I think are interesting and that should be talked about.
And so yeah like there is a freedom of creativity and not holding ourselves back We are in that matriarch and you know crone phase I'm counting my days. I'm looking forward to that entry point. Yes, I'm thinking a lot about
to redefine my relationship to failure. want, you know, don't, people say, ⁓ fail forward and failure is cool. And I haven't, neither of those quite work for me. Failure is still painful. But I want it to translate into more creativity instead of withdrawal.
Yes. From the enterprise. Well for me, I'm finding that for me the failure is to be just creative and trying. Because I would stop myself. And I remember having moments of bitterness where I'd be like, am so much more talented than so-and-so. And look at them coming up with this and doing that and putting themselves out there. How dare they? And now I've entered this era of my life where I'm honestly shameless. I don't
It's experience shame as a concept anymore. It's joyous. It is so joyous. I have moments sometimes, you how you do certain things or you say certain things and afterwards you reflect on like a facial expression or like, ⁓ did I... Ruminations? Yeah, yeah, did I hit something or do I need to explain or do I need to apologize?
I don't even do that anymore. I had a moment the other night where I kind of got into, because I get a little bit like hyper and I was sharing some stories and I'm like, oh, I was trying to make a point, but that might have landed wrong. But I'm like, I don't care. I'm not going to explain myself because either people I'm talking to know who I am and they're like, yeah, that's Emma. That's where she's at.
or they're going to judge me and that's okay. I'm okay with that. I like being hated and I'm doing something right. That's interesting. I think in good healthy relationships there should be a lot of room for those things to not be important. know, looking the wrong way, saying slightly the wrong thing.
And as women, we can get completely sort of constrained by all of that. And I don't want to be constrained by all of that.
No, just like when I think about all the time I wasted second guessing and agonizing and feeling shame and even for me like as a child I was sexually abused so there was a lot of shame associated with that, that scolding shame of being complicit in some way and so there's been a lot of sort of shedding of those things, of shedding those skins and writing really helped and my memoir writing really
helped you know with those memories of being a child and the things that happened and I just I don't want to hold that space anymore and I don't want others to hold it either like you know I don't there are certain things that I won't ever sort of make well unless I really hate them then I will like in terms of you know saying things incorrectly or stuff like that yeah but just not holding yeah holding that and just you know just kind of going what's important
what's important and people if they want to misunderstand you they will do it you don't you don't need to worry about it they will take whatever they want to take and so I'm just finding that freedom and so yeah to go back to failure just I'm just sort of putting everything out there and just
It works, it doesn't work, I enjoy it. My test now is, I enjoying it? Is it contributing to my life as opposed to metrics and, you know, like this podcast, listener numbers and ⁓ audience and stuff. I mean, having said that, it is growing because the more you do something, the more it happens. But it's just actually the joy of these conversations and learning from people.
than I talk to. Yeah. Yeah, it's not easy to shake off those old habits. And yet we live in a world now where the possibility of not offending anyone is a completely so ridiculous concept that...
that in a way you do have to let go of that. Well yeah, content warnings and even like writing about certain things. Yeah that's interesting. I'm not going to put any content warnings in my book. You... I do. I'm hyped. am. But your subject matter is like quite... Well I just sort of thought it's a book about genocide. Yeah. I mean...
You know, but then because I've my young and old novels before all of this, like the first one, it was was traditionally published as The Good Daughter. And then I continued the series and there was this content warnings popping up and it was an issue and it was like, how do you do it? What do you do? And I'm like, I'm young and old stuff, but there's also this stuff. So I've done it in the way that there's a QR code that takes people to a website.
and on that website I list, which AI helps me with by the way, I list the themes and I do it because I personally don't want content warnings, I don't want anything, I don't want to know my... I mean...
I can deal with very dark themes, I write dark themes, I'm interested in dark themes. And so I just want to read and I don't want to know, I just want that surprise of reading. But if there are people out there who really feel strongly that they need to know certain things, they can scan the QR code, go to the website and get the information. But it is a spoiler. It does count as a spoiler because by the time you list all the possible things, it's basically saying there will be this, there will be that.
this you know and in fiction I do think that it is a spoiler. So I think there's probably no right or wrong answer but I like the way you handled that with the QR code I thought that was a really good way to do it because it's not there in someone's face if they don't want to
Yes. They can just jump in and read. Yeah. And there's also like on the imprint page, go to this website and then the link. Yeah. Like it is. ⁓ Yeah. I kind of, playing it on both. I personally don't want them. I don't look at them. I don't care. ⁓ I think it came about more for those dark romance where they really have. And to be honest in that dark romance, what seems to me is that the content warnings actually act as a list of tropes that people are interested in.
want to read. So I actually sort of think I don't know that it's really relevant for anything else. But I've now gotten into the habit and I'm like well for consistency's sake I will continue the practice because I've already got that page on the website. And all I'm doing is I'm just adding the book and just listing all things. know and so again it's a spoiler because if someone goes to it and they haven't read one of other books then they'll be like oh there's those things in there. Well what can you do? I'm not going to do a separate page
for every book. need to keep it simple. yeah, so there's a lot of things to think about like that. ⁓ But you're, you've had a very rich creative life because you're also an artist. Thank you, thank you. But that, well that I suppose was somewhat accidental. So my partner is a sculptor and.
properly trained, I'm not trained. I'm what's actually now called an outsider artist, which is quite nice. What outsider artist? You outsider artist as well. Oh, because you haven't been trained in it I haven't been trained. Okay. So my partner and I ran a public sculpture business together and necessarily, well, I should preface that by saying that public sculpture is usually awarded by tender now.
Occasionally people will be invited directly to make a work but usually it's a governmental competitive tender and I was doing all the tender writing and he was doing the designing but because I'm a busy body I am
have a lot of opinions, I would start saying, like, think it, why don't you try doing this? And anyway, I got involved in the design aspects and, and he also taught me a lot about, he'd say things like, well, that's a great idea, but it can't be made, you know, so I started to learn from him and that sort of barrier that,
between the non-artist and the artist started to become transparent for me. And then when my father died, I had a lot of emotions about it. And I thought I can't write this because it would take me, you know, 500,000 words to express it. But maybe I can paint some of it. And...
that intensity of emotion seemed to unlock something inside me because I was always one of those people who would have said I can't draw.
talent but that unlocking which was really an emotional process meant that I certainly could. It was weird. So do you think that we put barriers on ourselves? ⁓ yeah. And that sometimes it's just about us giving ourselves permission? I mean I remember being told as a school girl and probably lots of people told things like this you know
you're not very good at art. Yes. Yeah. But that's not true. I could also say, I'm not very good at spelling. And that's true. I'm not very good at spelling. And some more old fashioned views would be, well, you can't be a writer.
Yes. Well obviously you can be a writer and even more with technological assistance. Well you know the people who suffer from dyslexia. Yeah. But they want to be writers and then it is you know the intellectual. Does that mean that they shouldn't just because their brain is wired a little bit differently? No. So it's the concept that matters and you learn that that's the case with visual art also.
And you think of those famous artists who actually don't touch the material at all. They have the idea and they have assistants who make the work.
So there's all sorts of possibilities for being creative. Yeah, that's the whole thing like that whole thing of idea versus execution because everyone can have an idea. to go back to our earlier discussion about AI, it doesn't matter. You have the idea, but it's the execution that is only you. Yeah. I mean, I think execution is...
part of the idea, I would argue. Because if I decide that I'm going to paint a painting of flowers, that's kind of meaningless. I have to have a much more complete vision than that. If I use some technological assistance to do that, it's still, ⁓ it's gotta be a more complete vision of mine.
to result in something that's worth looking at. I think anyway. Yeah, but when we look at your life, you have just followed where things lead you. So where are you being led right now? ⁓ Both into art and into writing. And writing was not so much just...
following where life led me, there was an impetus for it. My mother, ⁓ it was her greatest dream to be a published writer and she didn't make it. But I think it lodged in my mind that becoming a writer was the highest call in human. So when the opportunities arrived in the form of me working in the refuge, having the subject material, having the...
motivation and the impetus, then I also had this vision that being a writer is the greatest thing you can do in the world.
Well, it kind of is. How many conversations have we had with people and they're like, I to do it too. Because everything else, even in terms of art and being an artist, there's a quicker way. Obviously, it still requires a lot of practice and lot of dedication. But to write a novel or a book, there's a lot more work as opposed to one canvas and executing that canvas and kind of building
the skills to be able to do that. And so it's that time that takes the most. I that's why we're also drawn to AI because... Time. Yeah. Time. Yeah. And you talking earlier about, you know, you've kind of taken breaks from writing and gone back. Yes. Well, that ties in with what we're talking about, Fadina. So I wrote a pregnancy book.
collaborating with my niece who did some of the research. And it was not as successful as my hopes and dreams wanted it to be. This was when I was in my, I suppose, mid-30s. And it coincided with me having this experience that when I walked into bookshops, instead of feeling the joy of being in a bookshop, I think... ⁓
And I didn't want to be that person. I've met a lot of bitter writers. I didn't want to be that. I thought, step away. And so I stopped. And that's when I got involved in the public art for 12 years or so. Then I came back writing again. Again, feeling of not meeting my own expectations and step back for another decade.
Back to it again, and as I was saying to you earlier, I'm 65. If I step away for another decade, I'm saying I'm giving up. So I'm not gonna do that. I'm now.
going to push through whatever that part of me is that gives up when I feel like it's failing. anyway, deep psychology from No, no, I can really relate because I had the traditional publishing success story but then didn't sell enough to continue the series and with the publisher and then did it. ⁓
which actually ends up being the most best-selling thing, the one with Domet, the grand Muslim in Australia. Which is great. Yeah, which is still, you know, taught in schools and bought by schools and I still learn royalty. wow. Which is fascinating. And so I too had to like redefine what is success for me.
working as a teacher I have seen so many incredibly creative people give up that part of themselves give it up and just you know teaching takes everything from them and so for me it was I know that if I don't write I'm not okay I'm not okay psychologically I'm not okay in any facet of my life so writing is an absolute necessity and so I had to redefine my success
and make it about longevity, not make it about the money, not make it about the audience or am I in bookshops or all of these other things, how many sales have I made, how much money have I made. I just had to redefine it in terms of...
Am I doing it? Am I still doing it? And I am. I'm still doing it. I will continue doing it. And so for me, ⁓ it's fascinating because like what's happening now is I enjoy getting reports of sales and I enjoy getting royalties in my bank account. They're not huge, but there is a little drip feed there. But honestly, it's the readers. That is the real thing.
Yeah. You know, those moments when people message me and they're like, my god, this book and that is the stuff. But ⁓ even that, to be honest, while enjoyable, is nothing compared to the high of the writing. Yeah, it's the expression, isn't it? Yes. Like I find that with my writing and I probably find it even more so with the visual art. I mean, I just...
Really enjoy it. Yeah. And when the writing works, ⁓
Yeah, yeah. I'm at the point now in this novel, it's, you know, the rough draft, just I made a goal of a thousand words a day. I was like, you every day. And then it's just accelerated where it's like, you know, yesterday and today, I'm just like, you know, getting words down. I'm like, oh, this is happening. Oh, yes. And this is, you know, it's sort of just that excitement and that where I can see the scenes and I can see, and I just need to get them down. And that high.
Like even yesterday I was getting ready for bed and I just sat there and I was like, I feel happy. I just, I really feel happy. I just feel joy. And I'm like, why am I feeling just this pure joy? Creation. You know, it is that creating part. And when you're deep in it, you wake up like you dream of it and you wake up with it. And when you're writing,
It's that flow state that's incredibly enjoyable. It really is a privilege to be able to have it.
creative life. And when you think of people, so many people stopping when it doesn't quite work in the beginning, what a tragedy. Well, that's the thing, like when I was traditionally published, I used to say, I have met many more talented people than me. ⁓ this. Yeah, I just kind of kept going. Like that little, you know, what is it, tortoise in the hair? Yeah. You know, just kind of, you keep plodding along and plodding along and that's
is my superpower. I just kind of keep going even when no one else is showing up. I'm the one showing up. That's great. but yeah it's just about that longevity. It's like this is what I will be doing ⁓ until the day I die and I don't know like whatever time I've got in my life. You know whether I when I was working five days a week when I had my daughter and she was really small and it was a real struggle.
now I've got a little bit more space. ⁓ So it's just that side of it. And are you making that transition within yourself too? Yeah, and when you talk about that, it just reminded me about how I view family support. I've heard various writers say, ⁓ it's so upsetting, my partner's never read my book or my children have never read my book.
For me, children and partners reading books, that's not what support is about. Support is when I say, I have to go and do my writing and they say, yeah, that's right. And the fact that that year I might earn nothing or be in the red, no one says, you shouldn't be writing. Everyone says, yeah, yeah. Exactly. I've trained my husband and my daughter.
because they are the same, where it's like, my daughter is beautiful, I need to get my words down. So she just occupies herself, we were waiting to do something. And my husband also in terms of, like even I was talking earlier, I went to the Indie Capstone conference that Craig Martel ran. He's a successful fantasy author, he runs this group.
20 books to 50k which is all about you need at least 20 books to try and earn a living from your writing and you know as you said the economics have changed now but it still holds true you need a certain fact. And you know that was at a loss that was money I spent to go over there to stay for one night to you know attend the conference which was very cost effective that wasn't the expensive part.
But those moments of transformation was that time that you're taking out, you're focusing on yourself. And so what I got out of it was the writing sprees. So I have used these in the past. But we were just here doing workshops. It's like, OK, now 10 minutes, now 10 minutes, now 10 minutes. I have to write 3,500 words in a day. I mean, it was also because it was a protected environment where it wasn't doing anything else. But now...
I'm like, I've got 10 minutes. All right, I've got 10 minutes. And like I always had to do that, but you kind of always have these things sometimes in your head where you're like, the perfect conditions. Yeah, I need two and a half hours. Yes, yes. And so I'm learning to let go of all of those things in terms of how and when and just.
making sure to do it and just making sure to be consistent. Because like you, I've struggled with, I'm either doing the marketing or I'm doing the writing. I need to do both. You know, you need to do both consistently. what's your balance now? How are you handling that? Are you doing different days or are you breaking up the day?
At the moment it's a little bit odd because it's like I'm trying to schedule posts and schedule things in terms of marketing and I'm kind of more just wanting to retreat into the writing and I find myself that that's what happens when I'm doing the writing, you know, but...
There are things like I'm starting to experiment with Facebook ads and those sort of things you just set it up and you let it go. And then I used to but I got out of the habit, you you'd apply for all these promos. So it'd be one day a month sitting down and applying for all these promos. ⁓ So that's the thing I need to bring back routines. I had this social media schedule which I loved but now it's too expensive. ⁓
all of my social media posts organized on repeat. And it was great because all my backlist books were coming into prominence. And even growing up in Muslim Australia, which had disappeared for a while, I started getting bookings again where libraries would contact me and stuff. So I'm like, this is really good and very worthwhile. But I haven't quite been able to replicate that.
yet because I'm like now using Meta Scheduler and it doesn't have that repeat function and it's like but I do need to sort of do some work. So I don't know I do need to do some thinking but like it does have to be routines where it's like you know writing every day or you know sometimes writing every day is not a viable thing but writing every week a certain amount of words we can do and if we set it as a very reasonable goal like 2,000 words a week we can
do that. But yeah, I have to set up those routines also in terms of marketing. But some of the stuff is just you set it up and you leave it and then it just goes. And then, know, with Facebook ads, it's setting it to a certain date because you need to test it anyway. You can't. What I used to do again, you know, that's failure. I'll turn off the ad. And then the last one I just left and it dropped per click like the sense.
per click and I went ⁓ this is what they're talking about that has to go through a cycle and then has to sort of find the audience and then you know so it's it's those sort of things that are that learning parts but also just setting up the schedules yes that's something I'm gonna be working on next year I guess one of the challenges is there's so many avenues that you could be engaging in
TikTok, Instagram Reels, Facebook ads, Amazon ads. Etsy now people are talking about. I know it's coming back. ⁓ that was like Pinterest. was doing Pinterest too. Reddit, which ⁓ AI keeps telling me my readers naturally are on Reddit. Substack.
I started the Substance Journey because I put all my podcast episodes on there. And also because I keep writing articles and every once in while they get picked up and then they don't get picked up. And so I'm like, I just want to publish these articles. I'm like, not doing anything sitting there. If I'm not going to get paid for them, that's fine. At least that's an avenue of readership because I just...
I just want release. I just want to have an idea. want to follow it through and then I want to release it out into the world. And either it will find an audience or it won't. But I just find the more I follow through on the ideas, the more creative I get. That's good. Because it's like cleaning out and starting again. Yeah. Where do you see next year for you? Look, I really want to do more Instagram and TikTok.
which I keep saying to myself, oh, I'm ready to do it. I know what I wanna do. This is gonna be really great. In fact, it might even be fun. I haven't done it yet. You know what might help you? This is what helped me. Yeah. Cause you know, you get self-conscious about being on camera and talking to people. And so I said to myself,
people need to see more 48 year old women in real life on social media. And so I'm like, it's not about me anymore. It's about the world seeing what a 48 year old face looks like and what we sound like and what we feel like. And so I'm like, that's it. Just out there. Because, you know, at this time,
the anti-aging, the plastic surgery, the altering and I have had a nose job, I can't speak. really? Yeah, yeah. ⁓ I had a nose job when I was 17 because I had a heart operation and I have a scar dissecting my chest and when I have x-rays, they're like, ⁓ you've had something done because my ribs were cut open. Yeah, and so I had a heart murmur that had to be repaired. ⁓
⁓ I was absolutely just horrified by having this scar and people looking at this scar and not being able to wear the things people wore. And I did have a big nose. ⁓ Big noses are in my family. Big nose people. I'm actually obsessed with small nose. Yeah, I've always been obsessed with small noses. And so I couldn't deal with my big nose. I put all of my body dysmorphia about
my scar onto my nose and I had the plastic surgery when I was 17 and like a lot of young people did not really understand the surgery part and I remember being in the hospital and having the black eyes and having an IV drip and being in agonising pain and going where's my glomer story and then expecting that I would have a new life because I did my hair differently and I was like I'll do a makeover. It's a very good nose. Yeah it is a good nose.
It is. You know what the fascinating part of this whole story is? No. My daughter has a nose that looks like this nose. Wow. I don't know. does it come from? She is a DNA thief and she has stolen all the good DNA and
She made a deal dealing utero with someone. With your nose. and she got this beautiful... people like they look at it even when I look at their eyes I'm like oh my gosh they are mean mine's more scoopy but it's got the same... And people probably say things like I've got the same nose. Yeah yeah yeah.
Yeah, well we also share scars. You can't show yours without getting undressed but I've got massive scars. Because when I was... Can the camera see it? I think so. I was four years old I was standing in front of the stove and I knocked a pot of boiling water ⁓ over myself. How's that affect your life? Well...
Look, it was weirdly fine. My parents visited me in hospital every day. They treated me very well in the children's. I've got a slice off my inner thigh and a slice off my ass. That's what you want the ass to take more of. Only once, I thought. Because I had to have two skin grafts. I like...
I mean, it always felt like...
I guess like people like their tattoos, I like my scars. Yeah, I'm at the point now where I like them, I'm used to them, but I do find myself with my daughter, like, because mine are here, so like it's there, and goes all the way down. And so I find myself touching her there, and going, oh, this is what it feels like not to have a scar. There's also, changes, it's like thin, and then it's thick, and I'm like that bloody surgeon didn't know how to cut the skin nicely, and then they...
You know put it together so it like changes. It's it's very much and like there's a like a crooked bit Oh, oh he lost a little bit tired did he? he was cutting and he had to make course correct So yeah, I had a lot of issues coming to terms with as a teenager. Yeah, but the thing about the nose job is
that was it. I was done. I was like, yep, surgery, ⁓ done, acceptance, radical acceptance. And so now I'm at the point I accept and love this body. I'm cuddly. I'm okay with that. I just, I don't want to spend time on that anymore. I don't want to waste time on that anymore.
Yes, yes, like creation, creating things, enjoying, finding joy, fun. We don't have enough fun, we? Yeah, no. Yes, we're finding fun.
Yeah, definitely. Well, thank you so much for coming on and for being a part of this interview, for talking about your creative life. It's been really great. I'm going to put links to all the things, but you know, if you're tech interested and tech positive, check out the podcast and if fantasy, check out the fantasy and follow social media because you're posting some of your art and you're working on something at the moment, I think. I am, I am. I'm going to...
break the secret but I'm going to make some representation sculpturally of AI robots. So I posted recently some paper clips cast in resin. Yes I saw that. It's about the alignment problem of what if AI was told to make paper clips and Yes.
Yes, because that's the thing, can't, it's only as good as the prompt that you give. It's only as good as the prompt that you then manipulate further and you do something with. Well thanks for having me, Emma, because it's really fun to talk to you about writing. We're going to continue this conversation on camera. Indeed, with cups of tea. That's right. Thank you. Bye.
Thank you for tuning in to Amra's Armchair Anecdotes. If you enjoyed today's episode, don't forget to subscribe and follow for more insights, stories and inspiration. From my armchair to yours, remember, every story begins with a single word.
Welcome to Amra's Armchair Anecdotes. I'm Amra Payalich, writer, teacher and storyteller. Pull up a chair and let's dive into stories about writing, life and lessons learned, sharing wisdom from my armchair to yours. You can find the episode show notes, your free episode handouts and my how-to guides at amrapayalich.com slash podcast.
Now it's time to dive in.
Hello, welcome to Abra's Armchair Anecdotes. So I am here with Tor Roxburgh. She's a fiercely creative Australian multidisciplinary artist who refuses easy categorization. So she's the author of 17 published works spanning speculative fiction, young adult novels, nonfiction and short stories. And her narrative imagination leaps across genres from science fiction to mystery. Her writing is grounded in deep curiosity about worlds both possible and impossible.
She's the author of the epic fantasy saga, Promise of Stone series with book one, The Light Heart of Stone, and she has just published book two, The Rush of Stone. Be on the page, Tor paints expressive, narrative rich visual art and co-designs public sculpture in a creative partnership that has spanned decades. Her work has been exhibited both in Australia and internationally from gallery walls to urban spaces. And she also co-hosts the Technology and Innovation podcast,
Okay Smartass with Patrick Bonello where she talks all things tech with humor, insight and fearless questioning. So she's not just a creator, she's an independent maker who builds her art on her own terms, whether that's self-publishing, studio practice or curious conversations about the future tech and ideas. Thank you so much. Thank you for having me, Amara. Thank you. So we were talking earlier and I was saying you're a really interesting person to interview because you have done so much.
So you, in terms of, we'll start a little bit with the writing maybe, but like you started with traditional publishing and you published all these young adult novels ⁓ and had a very successful career. I think you actually were living off your writing. was, I was. Yeah, which is so rare. Look, romance has always been a genre where you can make money. Yes. And I wrote 12 teenage romances.
for a series called Dolly Fiction. I used to read those. Oh my gosh, that's my youth! That's my adolescence! I'm like, I've been reading some of your books. Possibly, possibly. So what happened was I was working in a women's refuge. I was a general coordinator helping women who are escaping domestic violence and incest. And that was my first book. I wrote a kind of a self-help book.
compiling all the things you would have learned if you went into a refuge. So for those people who didn't go into refuge. And I really loved writing. I really loved writing before I did that. And my publisher said, we're starting a series of women's romance and teen romance. The women's romance was Women's Weekly. The teen romance was Dolly Fiction. And I thought I can't write women's romance because I've just seen the kind of
brutal side of women's romance. Certain jobs change your perspective. Like me, I used to love teacher-student romance stories. And now that I'm a teacher, am repulsed. As soon as there is a hint of something between a teacher and a student, I'm like, ugh, get away. Yeah, yeah. So I that. But I thought, look, I can write teen romance because relationships, when you're a teenager, they are...
They're everything aren't they? They are. Like you never feel the way that you feel as an adolescent. the, I don't know, the bright colour and the...
And the intensity of the feelings. So I did that and that was lots of fun and it supported the family and the children when they were young, which is amazing. It really is. Like now especially because even I was reading an article about the Hay days, there was this very short period of time probably when you were writing when there were so many bookstores, the publishing industry was huge, people were actually able to make a living off their writing.
And then things changed. Yeah. Well, with change comes, you know, huge opportunity. I think if you had grabbed that change at the right moment, you could then be making lots of money publishing independently. Yes. A little more challenging now, but still there's, it's wonderful really to not have so many gatekeepers. It is because we're both doing that. Like that's what you're doing with your series. And that's what I'm
doing it and I'm finding so much joy in it in all those different parts that we're doing all the different hats that we're wearing. Yeah. Yeah. How have you found that whole process? Exciting, stretching your skills and I don't mind, I find business interesting. So I think if you're a writer that really abhors business then it'd be awful.
Yeah, I find it very interesting. What I find difficult is swapping between. I can write all day, but I can't do writing in the morning and business in the afternoon. And I still haven't worked out how to manage that transition to the different parts of my brain.
Yeah, I know it is kind of tiring, all of those different things. But we weren't talking earlier, so maybe we should swing back to that discussion about AI and how there are opportunities for us both as writers and as independent authors and business people in terms of using AI to help streamline a lot of things. So I've been using it a lot for marketing. Have you been doing the same? I've definitely been using
it for marketing. I've been using it for as a thought partner which is a way I like to describe it and I usually do my prompts by saying you know I don't want you to come up with plot ideas, I don't want you to come up with character ideas.
Well, recently I have a mythical creature and I was thinking to give it a point of view and then I thought, well, it can't just sound like a person. Yes. But I also don't want it to sound like a cliched mythical creature. Yes, with the British accent and the formal speaking or the prophecies sort of thing. So I had a long, long chat.
What would the world feel like? What would I feel like? Would I feel like an I? Yeah. ⁓
Yeah, it's sort of replacing because we used to be in a writing group together. Then the writing group got too successful. Yes, they're all too big. Too many people who are like their careers have progressed and they're like a good day. But also something about as our life speeds up, we know the value of writing groups, but it does become sort of difficult to prioritise them.
I'm not going to say something controversial now, like we know the value of critiquing and getting critiqued.
We also get to the point where it's like, I don't want to be spending time critiquing other people's work when I really need to move forward with my own writing. And so for us, using AI is like using that hive mind that we used to get the benefit from, where we would do that brainstorming, we would do that thinking. Because some things that I've used it for is, you know, for one of the books in my series, it's set in a...
at school so I'm like write a manifesto, a history, create a logo. So you know all these things about uniform, all these things that I could do myself absolutely but it would take me days to create this and I'm only going to use like three sentences of like describing the uniform or a couple of sentences of setting the tone of what the school is like and then a few sentences of describing the buildings but I need to
to do that world building and know what it is. And so it's just kind of jumpstarting a lot of things in that way. Yeah, it's fun. And also when I meet with other writers now at this point in my career, I...
socialise with them. Yes and just sort of share the lessons. Yeah. Like what are you trying? What's going on? Um and just having those moments where we're just having a conversation and we're learning through it. Yeah. Or just enjoying the moment really. And also you know when I think back to when I started writing if you say in one of my books I wanted to to have a police officer and I don't know anything about the police.
I would have had to get on the phone and ring someone and convince them to talk to me. And, you know, I would have had to say things like unpublished by, you know, greenhouse publications and like it was really, really time consuming and difficult. But then came along the internet and you could get that information and it was a static, but you could get it. And now you can say to...
or chat to GPT, like I want a probationary constable for this purpose. Have I got the purpose right? And actually, you know, maybe, maybe I want someone who's maybe a firefighter would be better and you can enter into that dialogue. It's not going to take you weeks to find it out. also like a lot of the times when I do the brainstorming, like for example, this latest book ⁓ that I'm working on, is book five,
I was like, I need to start plotting from now on. And so I used chat GPT to do the plotting. But of course I'm hearing off. I'm not following that plotting. ⁓ But sometimes just being able to put the ideas in where it's like, help me brainstorm. How would they get out of this situation or how would they do this? And then it gives you all these possibilities. And then you're sort of thinking through and going, okay, which one would work and how do I build that in? And like that part of it is really, really helpful.
where I would try and have conversations with people and harass my husband to talk to me, like, does this make sense? Does this make sense? I'm going to do this. And then I remember being like a crazy woman where you sort of had these conversations by yourself where you're sitting in the corner going, you can't do that. Will, oh yes, that will. And you're a bit loony. Whereas this way you're actually having that moment and processing it all. And then you're still leaving it in your subconscious and things are coming out.
But I find it really, really helpful. Yes. And look, I am a very tech positive. You are because of your podcast, which we're going to get to also.
And I think, you know, we have to acknowledge that the writing community and the world is really split about this. And there are people who are not violently, but passionately opposed. I'm not. I'm going to make a statement here and you tell me whether you agree with this or not. In your experience, is it that those authors who are traditionally published that are more opposed, whereas those authors who are independently published
a little bit more open? I don't know. I haven't asked enough people. Mainly the people I've seen who are opposed are traditionally published or already quite successful. I look...
I can't speculate why. Change is very difficult. Change in an industry is alarming. Yeah. I mean, I have seen it from both sides, to be honest, because even in the independently, those of us who independently published it in Facebook groups that we're in, there has been a lot of vitriol. Yes. And a lot of...
But we are also going to confess that we use it to help us with the writing process. So I'll go first and make my declaration. So I use ProWritingAid as the editing software, which also has AI suggestions. Some of them are atrocious, but it helps pick up a lot of the little grammar rules that just never stick in my head. I also use PseudoWrite. So PseudoWrite is AI-powered software where it's got all these different modes that you can do.
So it's got modes where you can do like rewrites where you put something in and rewrites it for you ⁓ You can put it in do descriptive where it adds descriptive detail and it's got things like you know with more internal conflict Etc now what I've found is the rewrite is the one that I use the most Because what it does is it just kind of cleans up things and just you know how we do those repetitive? ⁓ Motions and really like verbs we don't I use the good enough
Yes, yes. He nodded, she nodded. That's right, you just keep kind of doing the same things. But I do use the descriptive mode. It's not good to use it like just as it is because it really like adds that purple prose. But I find it really helpful where I'm like, okay, I'm going to set something in a hospital. Again, I can spend an hour preparing that scene and thinking about what sounds would you hear? What would it smell like? How do I describe it without
saying it's a hospital, know, all of those, that sensory imagery and kind of weaving it into the action together with all the other things. Or I can pop that into pseudo, right? And it will come up with a rewrite and then I will take a few sentences here and there and I'll just insert them in my prose and juj it up. Just juj it up. What about yourself?
⁓ I'm doing a bit the reverse. I'm not yet ⁓ publishing anything that I've been collaborating with AI.
but I will in the future and I'll probably declare that in the Yeah, I need to start declaring because the first three books that I wrote were pre-AI and it was just the pro-writing aid as they kind of, but then human eye. But yeah, these ones I'm gonna have to start declaring. So I've been playing around and how I've been playing around is I've been writing my own outline, characters. ⁓
and then getting down to the scene and I'll tell, again, Sue to write what I want to be in the scene. And then I'll give it the first pass. And what I found is I then completely rewrite it with my writing, but it makes me much faster and much more productive because I'm not struggling to think, now three people are walking into the room. Who's going first?
Logistics? Yeah. I've been writing for, you know, 40 years or something professionally.
logistics, moving groups of people, not forgetting leaving people kind of invisible floating, not doing anything. I still find that really hard. Yeah, we've all got our little things like for me it's description. You know, I like to just move the scene along. And then I thought, well, there needs to be some description. What are they wearing? You know, if they put in their head through their hair, can we add the colour maybe? You know, like you don't need to have the
looking in the mirror and my green eyes and you know like it's all of that sort of stuff and that's something that I used to really have to go back and spend time on a draft. So I would like do one draft where it's like laying down the story, one draft going through and adding the description and the plot points and the you know ⁓ building the layers and then I would have to do another one where I would go back and play with the writing and kind of go.
can I add a simile, can I add a metaphor, can I shush it up in that way? And so it would be a lot of work to do all that. The criticism is like, you know, what's the point of writing if you're not doing it all yourself? So what do you think about that?
I think that like you, I have been writing for long enough and I am completely confident in my writing ability, my ability to tell a good story and in having the skills required for that. I'm a pretty damn good teacher about it too. So I can do it all, but I want to speed up. want to move on. I've so many stories I want to tell.
And I feel the time. I feel, you know, like I'm 48 years old and I love being 48 years old. But I'm also aware of the fact that there's less time in front than there is behind me. That writing is my passion, my joy, my everything. It is my legacy. And I just want to speed up and do the stories that I want to tell.
And I also just want to use the technology that we've got. You know, when we had pen writing and then typewriters came in, everyone was like, oh, scandalous, it's going to ruin writing. Then we had computers and everyone's like, oh my gosh, that's going to ruin writing. Now we've got AI, that's going to ruin writing. No, no, it's not. No, it's not. Everything that I've got, I still have because I am a reader and love the written word and
you know, will always continue to feed that part of my brain. One of the conversations I had with my daughter that was interesting where she was talking about cognitive decline in terms of using AI and that people who are using it the way that their thoughts and you know, they're getting that cognitive decline. I mean, I won't ever use it where I will get it to do everything for me. Like at the end of the day, we're writers, we love writing, we love creating worlds,
creating stories for us it's not interesting to go this is the name of my character they are a doctor there is a scandal in the hospital now write it for me for us the joy is that creation ⁓ but using it as a creative partner using it to allocate and delegate some of the heavy lifting using it for the brainstorm coming up the names of things character names yes ⁓ my gosh ⁓
clicking through all the directories. And then the other thing is, you ⁓ you're writing fantasies of you, it's a whole different thing. But for me, I'm writing, you know, contemporary and I'm like, I want it to be a reflection of Australian society and that I have characters of all, you know, backgrounds. so, you know, I'm having to research all these different names. And I mean, even I use Scriven Art to keep track of all my writing and my character names.
and all of this. So we're already using tools that might not be AI based but they are tools to help organisation. And you can use it really creatively. Like I wanted a word that was not indigenous and was not native because they're so loaded those words. I'm vaguely working in a European Anglo-Celtic style.
even though it's epic fantasy and totally made up. And I said to Claude, tell me, you know, in the 17th century, what the word native would have been in Ireland, what would it have been in Scotland? What was it in England? I looked at all of those words, couldn't pronounce the Scottish or O. And I said, look, if that, you know.
Gaelic word had crossed into England and then evolved with language over the next 300 years. What would it be now?
Now, obviously that's not a factual answer, but it gave me really interesting word and it was really a very creative exercise. So it just depends how you use it really, I think. Yeah. a tool. And I think you use it as a tool, but also as we will be declaring. Yeah. So, know, with these novels moving forward, I will be declaring that, you know, I use pro-writing aid for the editing and then I use pseudo-writing, you know, to
expand and stuff and I think that is the ethical thing to do. But that doesn't take away because I know that the stories I'm writing, I'm the only one that can write those stories. I'm the only one that can come up with that world, that character, with what I'm trying to do with it to contribute to the world. Because you know as creators we always have that big lofty vision. What's your lofty vision with your fantasy?
Are you talking about the end results or what I'm trying to say? What are you trying to say? Tell us a little bit about the world and what they are. Look, I'm a bit of a dreamer, a bit of a what if a person, which I suppose all writers are. Basically I was driving...
From Melbourne to Belan and I was entering Backers Marsh and for those who don't know it, you come over a hill and you look down into a very fertile market garden landscape. Particularly, you know, 15 years ago it's a bit more developed now.
And there were, this particular day, were people in the field harvesting, bent over the crops, hand harvesting vegetables. And I thought, like, looks really magical. obviously that's disguising the complexities of what's really going on, the labor issues and all of that. But I thought, what if it was even more magical? What if...
humans could be companions to plants and animals in the same way that you have companion planting. So if a human had this talent, maybe you'd have the talent for...
and just with your presence rice could grow. So I like that idea and it really captured me and then because of the personality I have I thought well it looks really magical, it looks really perfect but obviously it isn't. There's something rotten.
Yes. Beneath all of this. And what if those companionships started to fail? And so, ⁓ the Lionheart of Stone is all about there's famine, the companionships are failing, and the efforts of various characters to solve that problem, some of them diabolically and some of them in a more ethical way. And then the Rush of Stone is when you think you've solved the problem.
it's actually going to be more complicated than you thought it was going to be. Because I believe it's a trilogy. It is a trilogy. That's right, we've got a bill to the third one. So yeah, I'm the third one.
every writer I'm also thinking about. Well, if only I was writing this...
the series that I want to write after I finish this one. Well, that's the thing. I'm starting this series and I'm like, I've got the first six books planned and I actually want to continue it after six books because I'm like, it said in the 1990s and she's actually born in the same year as me. And I'm like, wouldn't that be cool if it's like following her whole life and the changes and all the things that happen. And because the series is kind of now
something's going on in Australia, showcasing a scandal, showcasing a human rights violation or something happening. So I've got a whole bunch of ideas planned for it. But then I'm like, well, she has a mentor who's a war correspondent. Wouldn't that be great to do a series? and then she meets this police officer along the way.
wouldn't that be interesting? So you know I'm just like I want to because we want to challenge ourselves. The appetite and then you get down to that issue of productivity. Yes. Like I'm slow, I write slowly. I'm 65. I mean I want to write.
20 more books, I have to pick up the pace, really. Yeah, well, I'm with you. I have to juggle writing with working four days as a teacher. I feel quite happy with myself that I have done that. But these ideas are just kind of... And then I get random ideas of things I want to do or things that I've started. And then I'm like, well, I can't really... How many things can I start?
but there are so many because there's something about the joy now of no gatekeepers and just following your muse, following your creativity. Yeah. And actually having more contact with your readers. So when I was traditionally published, I
didn't really meet anyone who read my books. But of necessity, because you've got to hustle a little bit if you're an indie publisher, I get to meet people who read my books. And that's a really exciting experience. And also, we were talking about the business side and the marketing side. And, you know, when I started
doing this because for me initially it was getting rights back to books that were traditionally published and then republishing and kind of having that confidence where I'm like I know that they're good, I know. And so I had to learn that whole marketing because you know traditional publishing they kind of do everything for you whereas now we have to do everything for ourselves and it's a lot of new skills but this is also where the AI
comes in handy in terms of, you know, helping to write captions for social media posts, helping brainstorm content and things that you can create and things that you can put out there and creating book reels and, you know, just there's a lot of things like that that are really time consuming but then once it sort of helps you come up with all these assets and even, you know, using Kalva
there's a lot more AI technology now where it can do, you know, posts where you can like turbo charge them, you use an Excel spreadsheet and it creates different content. you experienced that? I haven't used Canva because I use a CorelDRAW, which is a different graphics program. And I can just do it. I'm not...
I don't have enough skill to do it well, but I can manage to put together the things I need to put together. I'm struggling at the moment because I'm trying to make a new map for book two because I realised the map I've made was not really the map that...
concerned with why I did that you know sometimes sometimes we have to be a little bit assistive and I'm pushing up against the limits of my skills at the moment but it's kind of fun you know you need a break from writing and go tinker with the...
graphics program. That's the thing so many new skills like you know so many new packages that we're trying so much new tech and so this is something that sort of led you well I don't know how did your podcast come about and the tech side of it. I think it was maybe at the end of COVID my dear friend Patrick Benello
said you like science and tech we should do a podcast and I thought I was in a period of saying yes, yes indeed to everything at the time. ⁓ So it's a news.
based podcast, we collect what's going on in the news with science and tech and then we chat about it. we have various things that we're particularly interested in. So I've always been interested in reproductive technology. So we had, for example, one episode where we talk a lot about artificial wounds and where the experiments are going with that at the moment.
I think last I looked, they were able to keep a land fetus in an artificial womb for a few days a week. Did they move on since Dolly?
yeah. Donny the sheep. Look it up. Yeah. And, and you know, Patrick's got his things he likes talking about. And so we, we'd look for articles that we had shared interest in. And then ⁓ we moved on to just doing episodes occasionally. ⁓ Recently we did three episodes about technology and aged care and we interviewed people from age 19 to 84.
about what sort of tech they wanted in their aged care. And we're now talking about maybe combining a science fiction book review, linking it to actual science that's happening at the moment.
We haven't quite knotted that out, but that's the next iteration. And it's fun to have that vehicle of, okay, smart ass, because we can reinterpret it how we want Yes. Well, I think I did a general Amra Zamchi anecdotes because I wasn't sure what I wanted. I started out just talking about writing stuff. And now it's like talking to creative people, but also just talking to people about things that I think are interesting and that should be talked about.
And so yeah like there is a freedom of creativity and not holding ourselves back We are in that matriarch and you know crone phase I'm counting my days. I'm looking forward to that entry point. Yes, I'm thinking a lot about
to redefine my relationship to failure. want, you know, don't, people say, ⁓ fail forward and failure is cool. And I haven't, neither of those quite work for me. Failure is still painful. But I want it to translate into more creativity instead of withdrawal.
Yes. From the enterprise. Well for me, I'm finding that for me the failure is to be just creative and trying. Because I would stop myself. And I remember having moments of bitterness where I'd be like, am so much more talented than so-and-so. And look at them coming up with this and doing that and putting themselves out there. How dare they? And now I've entered this era of my life where I'm honestly shameless. I don't
It's experience shame as a concept anymore. It's joyous. It is so joyous. I have moments sometimes, you how you do certain things or you say certain things and afterwards you reflect on like a facial expression or like, ⁓ did I... Ruminations? Yeah, yeah, did I hit something or do I need to explain or do I need to apologize?
I don't even do that anymore. I had a moment the other night where I kind of got into, because I get a little bit like hyper and I was sharing some stories and I'm like, oh, I was trying to make a point, but that might have landed wrong. But I'm like, I don't care. I'm not going to explain myself because either people I'm talking to know who I am and they're like, yeah, that's Emma. That's where she's at.
or they're going to judge me and that's okay. I'm okay with that. I like being hated and I'm doing something right. That's interesting. I think in good healthy relationships there should be a lot of room for those things to not be important. know, looking the wrong way, saying slightly the wrong thing.
And as women, we can get completely sort of constrained by all of that. And I don't want to be constrained by all of that.
No, just like when I think about all the time I wasted second guessing and agonizing and feeling shame and even for me like as a child I was sexually abused so there was a lot of shame associated with that, that scolding shame of being complicit in some way and so there's been a lot of sort of shedding of those things, of shedding those skins and writing really helped and my memoir writing really
helped you know with those memories of being a child and the things that happened and I just I don't want to hold that space anymore and I don't want others to hold it either like you know I don't there are certain things that I won't ever sort of make well unless I really hate them then I will like in terms of you know saying things incorrectly or stuff like that yeah but just not holding yeah holding that and just you know just kind of going what's important
what's important and people if they want to misunderstand you they will do it you don't you don't need to worry about it they will take whatever they want to take and so I'm just finding that freedom and so yeah to go back to failure just I'm just sort of putting everything out there and just
It works, it doesn't work, I enjoy it. My test now is, I enjoying it? Is it contributing to my life as opposed to metrics and, you know, like this podcast, listener numbers and ⁓ audience and stuff. I mean, having said that, it is growing because the more you do something, the more it happens. But it's just actually the joy of these conversations and learning from people.
than I talk to. Yeah. Yeah, it's not easy to shake off those old habits. And yet we live in a world now where the possibility of not offending anyone is a completely so ridiculous concept that...
that in a way you do have to let go of that. Well yeah, content warnings and even like writing about certain things. Yeah that's interesting. I'm not going to put any content warnings in my book. You... I do. I'm hyped. am. But your subject matter is like quite... Well I just sort of thought it's a book about genocide. Yeah. I mean...
You know, but then because I've my young and old novels before all of this, like the first one, it was was traditionally published as The Good Daughter. And then I continued the series and there was this content warnings popping up and it was an issue and it was like, how do you do it? What do you do? And I'm like, I'm young and old stuff, but there's also this stuff. So I've done it in the way that there's a QR code that takes people to a website.
and on that website I list, which AI helps me with by the way, I list the themes and I do it because I personally don't want content warnings, I don't want anything, I don't want to know my... I mean...
I can deal with very dark themes, I write dark themes, I'm interested in dark themes. And so I just want to read and I don't want to know, I just want that surprise of reading. But if there are people out there who really feel strongly that they need to know certain things, they can scan the QR code, go to the website and get the information. But it is a spoiler. It does count as a spoiler because by the time you list all the possible things, it's basically saying there will be this, there will be that.
this you know and in fiction I do think that it is a spoiler. So I think there's probably no right or wrong answer but I like the way you handled that with the QR code I thought that was a really good way to do it because it's not there in someone's face if they don't want to
Yes. They can just jump in and read. Yeah. And there's also like on the imprint page, go to this website and then the link. Yeah. Like it is. ⁓ Yeah. I kind of, playing it on both. I personally don't want them. I don't look at them. I don't care. ⁓ I think it came about more for those dark romance where they really have. And to be honest in that dark romance, what seems to me is that the content warnings actually act as a list of tropes that people are interested in.
want to read. So I actually sort of think I don't know that it's really relevant for anything else. But I've now gotten into the habit and I'm like well for consistency's sake I will continue the practice because I've already got that page on the website. And all I'm doing is I'm just adding the book and just listing all things. know and so again it's a spoiler because if someone goes to it and they haven't read one of other books then they'll be like oh there's those things in there. Well what can you do? I'm not going to do a separate page
for every book. need to keep it simple. yeah, so there's a lot of things to think about like that. ⁓ But you're, you've had a very rich creative life because you're also an artist. Thank you, thank you. But that, well that I suppose was somewhat accidental. So my partner is a sculptor and.
properly trained, I'm not trained. I'm what's actually now called an outsider artist, which is quite nice. What outsider artist? You outsider artist as well. Oh, because you haven't been trained in it I haven't been trained. Okay. So my partner and I ran a public sculpture business together and necessarily, well, I should preface that by saying that public sculpture is usually awarded by tender now.
Occasionally people will be invited directly to make a work but usually it's a governmental competitive tender and I was doing all the tender writing and he was doing the designing but because I'm a busy body I am
have a lot of opinions, I would start saying, like, think it, why don't you try doing this? And anyway, I got involved in the design aspects and, and he also taught me a lot about, he'd say things like, well, that's a great idea, but it can't be made, you know, so I started to learn from him and that sort of barrier that,
between the non-artist and the artist started to become transparent for me. And then when my father died, I had a lot of emotions about it. And I thought I can't write this because it would take me, you know, 500,000 words to express it. But maybe I can paint some of it. And...
that intensity of emotion seemed to unlock something inside me because I was always one of those people who would have said I can't draw.
talent but that unlocking which was really an emotional process meant that I certainly could. It was weird. So do you think that we put barriers on ourselves? ⁓ yeah. And that sometimes it's just about us giving ourselves permission? I mean I remember being told as a school girl and probably lots of people told things like this you know
you're not very good at art. Yes. Yeah. But that's not true. I could also say, I'm not very good at spelling. And that's true. I'm not very good at spelling. And some more old fashioned views would be, well, you can't be a writer.
Yes. Well obviously you can be a writer and even more with technological assistance. Well you know the people who suffer from dyslexia. Yeah. But they want to be writers and then it is you know the intellectual. Does that mean that they shouldn't just because their brain is wired a little bit differently? No. So it's the concept that matters and you learn that that's the case with visual art also.
And you think of those famous artists who actually don't touch the material at all. They have the idea and they have assistants who make the work.
So there's all sorts of possibilities for being creative. Yeah, that's the whole thing like that whole thing of idea versus execution because everyone can have an idea. to go back to our earlier discussion about AI, it doesn't matter. You have the idea, but it's the execution that is only you. Yeah. I mean, I think execution is...
part of the idea, I would argue. Because if I decide that I'm going to paint a painting of flowers, that's kind of meaningless. I have to have a much more complete vision than that. If I use some technological assistance to do that, it's still, ⁓ it's gotta be a more complete vision of mine.
to result in something that's worth looking at. I think anyway. Yeah, but when we look at your life, you have just followed where things lead you. So where are you being led right now? ⁓ Both into art and into writing. And writing was not so much just...
following where life led me, there was an impetus for it. My mother, ⁓ it was her greatest dream to be a published writer and she didn't make it. But I think it lodged in my mind that becoming a writer was the highest call in human. So when the opportunities arrived in the form of me working in the refuge, having the subject material, having the...
motivation and the impetus, then I also had this vision that being a writer is the greatest thing you can do in the world.
Well, it kind of is. How many conversations have we had with people and they're like, I to do it too. Because everything else, even in terms of art and being an artist, there's a quicker way. Obviously, it still requires a lot of practice and lot of dedication. But to write a novel or a book, there's a lot more work as opposed to one canvas and executing that canvas and kind of building
the skills to be able to do that. And so it's that time that takes the most. I that's why we're also drawn to AI because... Time. Yeah. Time. Yeah. And you talking earlier about, you know, you've kind of taken breaks from writing and gone back. Yes. Well, that ties in with what we're talking about, Fadina. So I wrote a pregnancy book.
collaborating with my niece who did some of the research. And it was not as successful as my hopes and dreams wanted it to be. This was when I was in my, I suppose, mid-30s. And it coincided with me having this experience that when I walked into bookshops, instead of feeling the joy of being in a bookshop, I think... ⁓
And I didn't want to be that person. I've met a lot of bitter writers. I didn't want to be that. I thought, step away. And so I stopped. And that's when I got involved in the public art for 12 years or so. Then I came back writing again. Again, feeling of not meeting my own expectations and step back for another decade.
Back to it again, and as I was saying to you earlier, I'm 65. If I step away for another decade, I'm saying I'm giving up. So I'm not gonna do that. I'm now.
going to push through whatever that part of me is that gives up when I feel like it's failing. anyway, deep psychology from No, no, I can really relate because I had the traditional publishing success story but then didn't sell enough to continue the series and with the publisher and then did it. ⁓
which actually ends up being the most best-selling thing, the one with Domet, the grand Muslim in Australia. Which is great. Yeah, which is still, you know, taught in schools and bought by schools and I still learn royalty. wow. Which is fascinating. And so I too had to like redefine what is success for me.
working as a teacher I have seen so many incredibly creative people give up that part of themselves give it up and just you know teaching takes everything from them and so for me it was I know that if I don't write I'm not okay I'm not okay psychologically I'm not okay in any facet of my life so writing is an absolute necessity and so I had to redefine my success
and make it about longevity, not make it about the money, not make it about the audience or am I in bookshops or all of these other things, how many sales have I made, how much money have I made. I just had to redefine it in terms of...
Am I doing it? Am I still doing it? And I am. I'm still doing it. I will continue doing it. And so for me, ⁓ it's fascinating because like what's happening now is I enjoy getting reports of sales and I enjoy getting royalties in my bank account. They're not huge, but there is a little drip feed there. But honestly, it's the readers. That is the real thing.
Yeah. You know, those moments when people message me and they're like, my god, this book and that is the stuff. But ⁓ even that, to be honest, while enjoyable, is nothing compared to the high of the writing. Yeah, it's the expression, isn't it? Yes. Like I find that with my writing and I probably find it even more so with the visual art. I mean, I just...
Really enjoy it. Yeah. And when the writing works, ⁓
Yeah, yeah. I'm at the point now in this novel, it's, you know, the rough draft, just I made a goal of a thousand words a day. I was like, you every day. And then it's just accelerated where it's like, you know, yesterday and today, I'm just like, you know, getting words down. I'm like, oh, this is happening. Oh, yes. And this is, you know, it's sort of just that excitement and that where I can see the scenes and I can see, and I just need to get them down. And that high.
Like even yesterday I was getting ready for bed and I just sat there and I was like, I feel happy. I just, I really feel happy. I just feel joy. And I'm like, why am I feeling just this pure joy? Creation. You know, it is that creating part. And when you're deep in it, you wake up like you dream of it and you wake up with it. And when you're writing,
It's that flow state that's incredibly enjoyable. It really is a privilege to be able to have it.
creative life. And when you think of people, so many people stopping when it doesn't quite work in the beginning, what a tragedy. Well, that's the thing, like when I was traditionally published, I used to say, I have met many more talented people than me. ⁓ this. Yeah, I just kind of kept going. Like that little, you know, what is it, tortoise in the hair? Yeah. You know, just kind of, you keep plodding along and plodding along and that's
is my superpower. I just kind of keep going even when no one else is showing up. I'm the one showing up. That's great. but yeah it's just about that longevity. It's like this is what I will be doing ⁓ until the day I die and I don't know like whatever time I've got in my life. You know whether I when I was working five days a week when I had my daughter and she was really small and it was a real struggle.
now I've got a little bit more space. ⁓ So it's just that side of it. And are you making that transition within yourself too? Yeah, and when you talk about that, it just reminded me about how I view family support. I've heard various writers say, ⁓ it's so upsetting, my partner's never read my book or my children have never read my book.
For me, children and partners reading books, that's not what support is about. Support is when I say, I have to go and do my writing and they say, yeah, that's right. And the fact that that year I might earn nothing or be in the red, no one says, you shouldn't be writing. Everyone says, yeah, yeah. Exactly. I've trained my husband and my daughter.
because they are the same, where it's like, my daughter is beautiful, I need to get my words down. So she just occupies herself, we were waiting to do something. And my husband also in terms of, like even I was talking earlier, I went to the Indie Capstone conference that Craig Martel ran. He's a successful fantasy author, he runs this group.
20 books to 50k which is all about you need at least 20 books to try and earn a living from your writing and you know as you said the economics have changed now but it still holds true you need a certain fact. And you know that was at a loss that was money I spent to go over there to stay for one night to you know attend the conference which was very cost effective that wasn't the expensive part.
But those moments of transformation was that time that you're taking out, you're focusing on yourself. And so what I got out of it was the writing sprees. So I have used these in the past. But we were just here doing workshops. It's like, OK, now 10 minutes, now 10 minutes, now 10 minutes. I have to write 3,500 words in a day. I mean, it was also because it was a protected environment where it wasn't doing anything else. But now...
I'm like, I've got 10 minutes. All right, I've got 10 minutes. And like I always had to do that, but you kind of always have these things sometimes in your head where you're like, the perfect conditions. Yeah, I need two and a half hours. Yes, yes. And so I'm learning to let go of all of those things in terms of how and when and just.
making sure to do it and just making sure to be consistent. Because like you, I've struggled with, I'm either doing the marketing or I'm doing the writing. I need to do both. You know, you need to do both consistently. what's your balance now? How are you handling that? Are you doing different days or are you breaking up the day?
At the moment it's a little bit odd because it's like I'm trying to schedule posts and schedule things in terms of marketing and I'm kind of more just wanting to retreat into the writing and I find myself that that's what happens when I'm doing the writing, you know, but...
There are things like I'm starting to experiment with Facebook ads and those sort of things you just set it up and you let it go. And then I used to but I got out of the habit, you you'd apply for all these promos. So it'd be one day a month sitting down and applying for all these promos. ⁓ So that's the thing I need to bring back routines. I had this social media schedule which I loved but now it's too expensive. ⁓
all of my social media posts organized on repeat. And it was great because all my backlist books were coming into prominence. And even growing up in Muslim Australia, which had disappeared for a while, I started getting bookings again where libraries would contact me and stuff. So I'm like, this is really good and very worthwhile. But I haven't quite been able to replicate that.
yet because I'm like now using Meta Scheduler and it doesn't have that repeat function and it's like but I do need to sort of do some work. So I don't know I do need to do some thinking but like it does have to be routines where it's like you know writing every day or you know sometimes writing every day is not a viable thing but writing every week a certain amount of words we can do and if we set it as a very reasonable goal like 2,000 words a week we can
do that. But yeah, I have to set up those routines also in terms of marketing. But some of the stuff is just you set it up and you leave it and then it just goes. And then, know, with Facebook ads, it's setting it to a certain date because you need to test it anyway. You can't. What I used to do again, you know, that's failure. I'll turn off the ad. And then the last one I just left and it dropped per click like the sense.
per click and I went ⁓ this is what they're talking about that has to go through a cycle and then has to sort of find the audience and then you know so it's it's those sort of things that are that learning parts but also just setting up the schedules yes that's something I'm gonna be working on next year I guess one of the challenges is there's so many avenues that you could be engaging in
TikTok, Instagram Reels, Facebook ads, Amazon ads. Etsy now people are talking about. I know it's coming back. ⁓ that was like Pinterest. was doing Pinterest too. Reddit, which ⁓ AI keeps telling me my readers naturally are on Reddit. Substack.
I started the Substance Journey because I put all my podcast episodes on there. And also because I keep writing articles and every once in while they get picked up and then they don't get picked up. And so I'm like, I just want to publish these articles. I'm like, not doing anything sitting there. If I'm not going to get paid for them, that's fine. At least that's an avenue of readership because I just...
I just want release. I just want to have an idea. want to follow it through and then I want to release it out into the world. And either it will find an audience or it won't. But I just find the more I follow through on the ideas, the more creative I get. That's good. Because it's like cleaning out and starting again. Yeah. Where do you see next year for you? Look, I really want to do more Instagram and TikTok.
which I keep saying to myself, oh, I'm ready to do it. I know what I wanna do. This is gonna be really great. In fact, it might even be fun. I haven't done it yet. You know what might help you? This is what helped me. Yeah. Cause you know, you get self-conscious about being on camera and talking to people. And so I said to myself,
people need to see more 48 year old women in real life on social media. And so I'm like, it's not about me anymore. It's about the world seeing what a 48 year old face looks like and what we sound like and what we feel like. And so I'm like, that's it. Just out there. Because, you know, at this time,
the anti-aging, the plastic surgery, the altering and I have had a nose job, I can't speak. really? Yeah, yeah. ⁓ I had a nose job when I was 17 because I had a heart operation and I have a scar dissecting my chest and when I have x-rays, they're like, ⁓ you've had something done because my ribs were cut open. Yeah, and so I had a heart murmur that had to be repaired. ⁓
⁓ I was absolutely just horrified by having this scar and people looking at this scar and not being able to wear the things people wore. And I did have a big nose. ⁓ Big noses are in my family. Big nose people. I'm actually obsessed with small nose. Yeah, I've always been obsessed with small noses. And so I couldn't deal with my big nose. I put all of my body dysmorphia about
my scar onto my nose and I had the plastic surgery when I was 17 and like a lot of young people did not really understand the surgery part and I remember being in the hospital and having the black eyes and having an IV drip and being in agonising pain and going where's my glomer story and then expecting that I would have a new life because I did my hair differently and I was like I'll do a makeover. It's a very good nose. Yeah it is a good nose.
It is. You know what the fascinating part of this whole story is? No. My daughter has a nose that looks like this nose. Wow. I don't know. does it come from? She is a DNA thief and she has stolen all the good DNA and
She made a deal dealing utero with someone. With your nose. and she got this beautiful... people like they look at it even when I look at their eyes I'm like oh my gosh they are mean mine's more scoopy but it's got the same... And people probably say things like I've got the same nose. Yeah yeah yeah.
Yeah, well we also share scars. You can't show yours without getting undressed but I've got massive scars. Because when I was... Can the camera see it? I think so. I was four years old I was standing in front of the stove and I knocked a pot of boiling water ⁓ over myself. How's that affect your life? Well...
Look, it was weirdly fine. My parents visited me in hospital every day. They treated me very well in the children's. I've got a slice off my inner thigh and a slice off my ass. That's what you want the ass to take more of. Only once, I thought. Because I had to have two skin grafts. I like...
I mean, it always felt like...
I guess like people like their tattoos, I like my scars. Yeah, I'm at the point now where I like them, I'm used to them, but I do find myself with my daughter, like, because mine are here, so like it's there, and goes all the way down. And so I find myself touching her there, and going, oh, this is what it feels like not to have a scar. There's also, changes, it's like thin, and then it's thick, and I'm like that bloody surgeon didn't know how to cut the skin nicely, and then they...
You know put it together so it like changes. It's it's very much and like there's a like a crooked bit Oh, oh he lost a little bit tired did he? he was cutting and he had to make course correct So yeah, I had a lot of issues coming to terms with as a teenager. Yeah, but the thing about the nose job is
that was it. I was done. I was like, yep, surgery, ⁓ done, acceptance, radical acceptance. And so now I'm at the point I accept and love this body. I'm cuddly. I'm okay with that. I just, I don't want to spend time on that anymore. I don't want to waste time on that anymore.
Yes, yes, like creation, creating things, enjoying, finding joy, fun. We don't have enough fun, we? Yeah, no. Yes, we're finding fun.
Yeah, definitely. Well, thank you so much for coming on and for being a part of this interview, for talking about your creative life. It's been really great. I'm going to put links to all the things, but you know, if you're tech interested and tech positive, check out the podcast and if fantasy, check out the fantasy and follow social media because you're posting some of your art and you're working on something at the moment, I think. I am, I am. I'm going to...
break the secret but I'm going to make some representation sculpturally of AI robots. So I posted recently some paper clips cast in resin. Yes I saw that. It's about the alignment problem of what if AI was told to make paper clips and Yes.
Yes, because that's the thing, can't, it's only as good as the prompt that you give. It's only as good as the prompt that you then manipulate further and you do something with. Well thanks for having me, Emma, because it's really fun to talk to you about writing. We're going to continue this conversation on camera. Indeed, with cups of tea. That's right. Thank you. Bye.
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