Writing can a tough old slog and writers are often told that getting published requires persistence. And lots of it.
My guest on this episode of Drinkglish, Lisa Fransson from This Writing Life, spent fifteen years navigating the publishing world’s obstacle course before her novel The Shape of Guilt finally saw the light of day. Rejections piled up, doubts crept in, and there was the occasional temptation to walk away entirely and throw in the towel.
Thankfully, she didn’t.
In our conversation we talk about that long journey: the setbacks, the small victories, where inspiration comes from, writing while raising children, literary influences, the challenge of promoting your own work, her Swedish background, and plenty more besides.
Below is an outline of our chat, and following that, I share a few words about my podcasting journey so far.
Our chat
Lisa’s 15-year publishing journey, the ups and downs and everything in between
Rejections and whether rejection is the norm
Why can’t a book about ‘nothing’ get published, or could it?
Conflicting advice in craft books - can we break the traditional craft writing rules?
Intriguing tidbits about her “dark and funny” novel
Writing for yourself versus writing to the market
Where she got inspiration from - a highly influential book
What’s more important, plot or characters? (a plot-driven v character-driven book)
Do children ‘get in the way’ of writing?
Getting inspiration from the unlikeliest of places
The temptation to throw in the towel
Are Swedes morbid and do they have a dark outlook on life?
Growing up in Sweden and moving to the UK
Promoting outside Substack, social media, being timid, having a platform
The future of Substack, is it becoming more like Twitter/X and Instagram?
What authors can do to increase their sales and profile
Published books in Swedish, can they be translated into English, is there a market for that?
Writers having way too many ideas and not being able to implement them
At this point in the chat, it might have been wise to say ‘thank you, Lisa, that’s enough,’ but I couldn’t resist asking more questions, even as some of them got dafter, but I wanted to know more.
Are Swedish kids more psychologically resilient than British kids?
Do kids read these days? Is reading amongst youth in decline?
Do we need to change the way we write to cater to the younger generation and their shorter attention spans?
Swedish book recommendations? And Finnish writers?
Final words of advice and struggling to get an agent
Slight spoiler alert (well, not really) - immediately after we stopped recording I did in fact buy The Shape of Guilt and within a couple of days I’d flown through half of it. Then I got sucked into a busy week of teaching and lost momentum - sadly little reading or writing gets done during my teaching weeks. I’m about to pick it back up shortly but that first half was indeed, dark, intriguing and I can’t wait to see where it goes.
I also got Jerusalem, by Selma Lagerlöf, who Lisa mentions as one of her favourite writers.
Read all about Lisa on her excellent newsletter, This Writing Life.
Get her wonderful book here: The Shape of Guilt
And now, a few words about this podcast and podcasting in general
When I recorded my first Drinkglish podcast in December 2024, it was with a Substacker I’d got to know, and we had a clear idea of what we were going to talk about. In the months that followed, when I reached out to other Substackers, it was always because I had a specific theme in mind. I was an inexperienced podcaster, still finding my feet, battling technical issues, and clinging to shakily scripted questions.
Now, with a few episodes under my belt, I can confidently say that… I’m still finding my feet and battling technical issues. But I have mastered the art of avoiding shakily scripted questions with one obvious, previously overlooked solution:
Don’t script any.
Off-air during my previous episode with Francesca Bossert, we talked about why I hadn’t been uploading the podcast to my Drinkglish YouTube channel. One of my early motivations for starting the podcast – which I’m somewhat ashamed to admit (though why should I be?) – was to build a more visible social media presence. You know, marketing myself. Establishing a “brand” (still not entirely sure what that means), and, ultimately, making more of a living from writing books.
Try as I might, I can’t quite get my head around the marketing and branding side of things – not to mention the dull technicalities of making everything look visually appealing, with bells and whistles and crisp, movie-studio sound. I felt very meh about it all.
What I didn’t feel meh about was talking to people – especially the generous and lovely writers I’ve met on Substack over the past two and a half years. I’ve loved these conversations. The hard part is staying disciplined: not going off topic (whatever the topic is, or whether there even is one) and not rambling past the unofficial time limit. We’re all busy, and I’m trying to keep these episodes short and digestible.
With Francesca before, and Lisa now, I knew they were both keen to do a podcast in general, not necessarily with me. So I invited them onto mine for a very simple reason: they’re wonderful people I’ve genuinely enjoyed interacting with, and they’re both terrific writers.
In my usual roundabout way, I suppose what I’m saying is this: I just wanted to talk to them. The topic almost didn’t matter.
Instead of pitching a theme, I found myself writing, “What would you like to talk about?” I’ve no idea if that’s how it’s meant to be done. I used to send messages like, “Hi Stephanie Clemons, let’s talk about Anglophilia!” or “Hi Gillian Fletcher, let’s talk about moving abroad and integrating into a new culture!”
But perhaps this way is better?
What I’m saying is, if you want to chat, get in touch, I’m highly unlikely to say no.
Find all my previous podcasts here:
Thank you for reading, listening and/or watching, likes and comments are always nice. If you’re new to my writing, I cover a wide range of topics, there are no limits when it comes to niche or genre.
