Performance Tips For Authors, And Writing Climate Fiction With Laura Baggaley

How can authors write about climate change without preaching? What happens when your publisher goes under just before your book launch? How do theatre skills translate to better dialogue, readings, and author events? With author and theater director Laura Baggaley. In the intro, Indie presses are in existential crisis [The Bookseller]; what to do when things are hard [Wish I'd Known Then]; Book marketing with garlic-infused ink [The Guardian]; Writing Storybundle; Halloween horror promo; Blood Vintage folk horror; My new author photos; Day of the Dead [Books and Travel]; Today's show is sponsored by ProWritingAid, writing and editing software that goes way beyond just grammar and typo checking. With its detailed reports on how to improve your writing and integration with writing software, ProWritingAid will help you improve your book before you send it to an editor, agent or publisher. Check it out for free or get 15% off the premium edition at www.ProWritingAid.com/joanna This show is also supported by my Patrons. Join my Community at Patreon.com/thecreativepenn Laura Baggaley is an award-nominated children's and YA author, theater director, and also teaches acting, writing, and literature at City Lit College in London. You can listen above or on your favorite podcast app or read the notes and links below. Here are the highlights and the full transcript is below. Show Notes How to write climate fiction that embeds solutions in world-building rather than lecturing readers Dealing with publisher collapse and finding empowerment in regaining control of your books Using theatre techniques to write better dialogue and avoid clunky exposition Essential performance skills for author readings, interviews, and public speaking Practical tips for preparing workshops and managing nerves at literary events Building collaborative writing projects and the benefits of author support groups You can find Laura at LauraBaggaley.co.uk. Transcript of Interview with Laura Baggaley Jo: Laura Baggaley is an award-nominated children's and YA author, theater director, and also teaches acting, writing, and literature at City Lit College in London. So welcome to the show, Laura. Laura: Thank you, Jo. It's lovely to be here. Jo: Yes, I'm excited to talk to you today. First up— Tell us a bit more about you and how you got into writing and publishing. Laura: Well, I was one of those kids who always had their nose in a book, you know, loved reading. Whenever anyone said, “What are you going to be when you grow up?” I would say, “A writer,” like, straight away, no question about it. So that was always the plan. In my late teens, I changed schools for sixth form. I went to this school that was really strong on performing arts. I started to get into drama and doing lots of acting and school plays. Then at university started directing plays, which was even more fun than acting. I just found myself pursuing a different path and became a theater director for about 15 years. That was really creatively exciting, but after a while, I started to feel something was missing, I guess. Of course the writing had been completely sidelined, but I came back to it and I started writing again. First of all, I started working on a literary novel that I was trying to craft with extremely beautiful language and lovely sentences. When I got to the end of the draft and I read it, I realized it was incredibly boring because like nothing happened in the book. So I put that in a drawer and started again. I started working on another one and I was sort of crafting my sentences. And anyway, fortunately about halfway through that one, I had this idea, this story came to me about a 15-year-old kid in a dystopian future. It had to be a young protagonist and it had to be a YA book. I just really wanted to tell this story. So I chucked the boring literary half-written draft in that same drawer and started working on the YA book. So that's where I really started to sort of find my voice as it were. Jo: Where did it go from there? When was that? Laura: Oh gosh, before the pandemic, which is kind of how we judge everything time-wise these days, isn't it? I think it was 2019 that I was a finalist in the Mslexia Children's Fiction Competition with that manuscript. So I'd obviously written it before then, and then through that competition, got an agent and had wrote another book, and got a publishing deal with a small indie publisher called Neem Tree Press. Jo: I wanted to talk to you about this. So you were a finalist, Mslexia, if people don't know, is very prestigious magazine here in the UK. You've got an agent, you've got a deal. So what happened then? What happened with the publishing experience? Laura: Well, I think the term is probably rollercoaster. I was really excited to sign this contract and obviously to have this publishing contract. But what happened was, publication obviously takes a long time. So it was going to be 18 months or...