April 20, 2025 • 53 mins
Amra shares her personal journey from childhood reader to award-winning author, exploring how she discovered her authentic voice after years of commercial detours and rejections.
• Growing up as an avid reader who found escapism and hope in books
• Finding early success with a fiery article about racism and injustice
• Navigating the traditional publishing world with a literary novel
• Detour into romance writing that ended in disappointment
• Life-changing advice: "Write something no one else can write"
• Writing a memoir about her mother's mental illness and migrant experience
• Discovering her strength in using personal stories to find universal truths
• Current focus on crime fiction that incorporates human rights advocacy
• Learning that authentic writing is more fulfilling than chasing commercial success
• Embracing evolution as a natural part of the writing journey
I'd love to hear about crossroads you're facing in your writing journey and what you're struggling with. Let me know if there are specific topics you'd like me to address in future episodes. You can find show notes and a special handout at amrapayalich.com/podcast. Keep writing and remember that your story matters.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to Amra's Armchair Anecdotes.
I'm Amra Payalich, writer,teacher and storyteller.
Pull up a chair and let's diveinto stories about writing, life
and lessons learned, sharingwisdom from my armchair to yours
.
You can find the episode shownotes, your free episode
(00:22):
handouts and my how-to guides atamrahpayalichcom slash podcast.
And now it's time to dive in.
Welcome to Amrah's ArmchairAnecdotes.
Today I'm talking about theevolution of an author, using
myself as a case study.
(00:42):
So I'm going to talk about theway that I have gone through
different things as an author.
I'm going to be talking aboutfinding your voice.
So it's not just about yourwriting style, but what it is,
what you want to say and reallyunderstanding who you are as a
person.
I feel like that's been thebiggest part of my journey
(01:03):
discovering what it is that Iwant to say and what it is that
my writing is about.
So I'm going to share mypersonal journey, you know, from
starting out as a child tobecoming an award-winning author
and an indie publisher, and how, along the way, I have learned
to embrace my voice, and I'mhoping that my story and my
(01:28):
takeaways will help you discoveryour voice.
So writing has always been morethan just the words on a page.
For me, it's about my journeyof self-discovery and about
empowerment, and this evolutiondid not happen overnight.
(01:50):
In fact it has been I don'tknow when to start, I think, you
know, as a professional writer,28 years, but as a emerging
writer longer than that.
So I was always that child thatwas reading, that found escapism
(02:14):
and hope and joy throughreading Not really a surprise,
because I did have a chaotichome life, and so reading gave
me the opportunity to sort ofexperience things that were
different to my home life, butalso the opportunity to learn
(02:36):
about the world and learn aboutdifferent things.
And I was always interested inwriting and I was always writing
stories and I was always theperson who I loved hearing
stories and I loved peopletelling me stories, and so in my
memoir I talk about being theconfidant to the adults in my
(02:58):
life and the way that the womenin my family especially, you
know, lonely women like mygrandmother and my mother really
sort of turned to me and wouldtell me their stories, because I
was one of those children whoknew how to be still and be in
the moment, and I was justalways enthralled by stories, by
(03:29):
stories, and in high school Ihad some early successes where I
had teachers really praising meand giving me the
acknowledgement of myself as awriter and my writing identity,
and when I had my first bookpublished I tracked down those
teachers and I sent them a copyas a thank you.
And that's something that I'mreally aware of now as an
English teacher myself aboutacknowledging the students who
(03:54):
really enjoy and embrace theircreativity and lifting them up,
giving them that boost andgiving them that acknowledgement
that they might not getanywhere else.
In high school I wrote in theschool setting and had pieces
published in the school journal.
And then I had my first publicrecognition when there was a
(04:18):
competition from the localnewspaper and my newspaper
article won Story of the yearand it was published in the
newspaper and a photographercame to the school and took a
photo of me and there wasanother girl who had also um won
for photography, and so we hadthis moment, uh, that we were
(04:42):
acknowledged publicly by thecommunity.
And that first story I wrote itwas called Bystanders Ignore
Racist Attack, and so it wasabout a friend of mine who was
of Indian background and she hadbeen beaten in a public place
by other young people andeveryone just walked past and
(05:05):
pretended it wasn't happening,and it was really distressing to
her because she'd come toAustralia as a migrant, from a
place where usually people wouldsort of you know, stop and go,
no, you don't do that.
And so she was very heartbrokenby it and that really inspired
my sense of injustice and so Iwrote this really fiery piece
(05:28):
about the way that this waspossibly racially motivated,
because she was a person ofcolor, and when I look back on
that experience now I can seehow, in one sense, I had my
voice.
In one sense, I had my voice, Ihad what it is that sparked me
up and that made me want towrite.
(05:49):
It's just that I got lost alongthe way, and so, as I tell you
my story, you're going to seehow this comes back to where I
am now, in a sense of sort ofgoing around in a loop.
So that was my big moment ofrecognition, and I always knew I
(06:09):
wanted to be a writer.
But the thing about it is youdon't know how to be a writer.
You're not really given sort ofthe keys to the kingdom and
told how to do this, and I didsome silly things in high school
in terms of stuffing up myopportunities for university,
because I was too intimidatedabout going to university.
(06:31):
Coming from a migrant backgroundwhere no one in my family had
gone to university, my mumhadn't finished high school.
My grandmother was illiterateyou know, this was a new world.
This was a world I was sointimidated and afraid of that I
couldn't envision myselfstepping into it.
(06:51):
So I stuffed up my unipreferences and I didn't get a
place into university and mycareers counselor supported me
by finding an admin course, andso I went out into the workforce
and I was working full-time,but I was bored, I felt really
adrift, and I ended updiscovering a diploma in
(07:13):
professional writing and editing, and this was the first
opportunity I had had to speakto people who were writers,
because all of the tutors wereprofessional writers who had
been published, who had achievedsome degree of success in their
fields and they could speakfrom experience.
So it was the first time that Ispoke to people and was
(07:34):
learning from people who arewriters.
But, more importantly, I wasinteracting with people who are
also like me, who were creative,who wanted to write, who were
searching for their voices andsearching for their path forward
, and that's the thing thatreally makes a difference.
You really need to find yourtribe, you need to find your
(07:55):
community.
Even now, as an indie author, Iam in online communities, in
Facebook communities, and I knowpeople in that online world.
I'm attending my firstin-person indie conference in
December and I'm really excitedbecause I am looking forward to
(08:17):
the opportunity to actuallymeeting people face-to-face and
to actually sort of create moreof a bond and create more of a
community in that face-to-facesetting, because when you're
stepping into a new world andthen you are talking to people
who are also in that world, itis so validating and also they
(08:38):
are the ones who understand, whounderstand what you're talking
about.
And so being in this writingcourse with other emerging
writers who, like me, werelooking for opportunities to get
published, to become a writer,to become validated, was
wonderful and very early on,because I had excellent tutors
(08:59):
and I had that drive.
I submitted pieces and I hadthree publications in a very
short period and then I wasacknowledged with short story
prizes and winning money fromshort story prizes, and there is
something amazing that happenswhen you get that
acknowledgement, and it's alsoreally strange how monetary
(09:23):
acknowledgement really does helpin terms of validating because
no one thinks anything of, oh, Igot published or this or that,
but when you attach money tothat.
I remember one of the firstthings that I had published was
a romantic short story inWoman's Day.
So in the magazine Woman's Dayand I was speaking to family
(09:46):
members who were kind of mockingme about being published in
this and about the fact that Iwas so proud about being
published in this, and they werekind of looking at me in a
condescending manner and then Isaid, well, I got paid $300 for
800 words and remember that thisis 28 years ago, so this is a
(10:10):
significant time ago where $300meant even more.
It's probably the equivalent of$1,000 today.
And their faces changed andthey were like, oh, that's how
much money you got for that manywords.
And suddenly they wereinterested in my writing career
and they thought that maybe ithad some value and some validity
(10:31):
.
And so that was my first entrypoint into this world, into the
professional writing world, andmy first successes were with
short stories, with writingfictional short stories and
having them published.
And the first short story thatreally validated my voice was my
(10:54):
short story Siege, which wasabout a couple, a Romeo and
Juliet romance between a Serbboy and a Muslim girl during the
time of war, while they wereunder siege, and it was the
first story that I had usedresearch to recreate.
So I had used research that Ifound online in terms of a real
(11:19):
life couple that I was sort ofbasing this on, and then I also
had letters from my husband'sfamily about what it was like
under siege, and so this storygot published and got
acknowledged, and it was aboutBosnian characters.
It was about people like me.
It was the world that I knewand that I understood, and so
(11:42):
seeing that recognised out therein the world made me realize
that had value.
However, I was caught up in whatsort of a writer I wanted to be
, and I was torn because I hadspent my adolescence reading
romance novels, which I stilllove.
I love romance fiction, romancemovies.
(12:04):
It's my happy place, and so Iwanted to be a romance writer
because that was the world thatI really, you know, enjoyed
reading, and so I startedwriting a romance novel.
And this is the thing whenyou're writing your first book
it takes much longer becauseyou're battling self-discipline,
(12:26):
motivation, self-confidence,the real world, and so I was
battling this book for threeyears and trying to write this
book and in the process I havefelt like I had evolved and I
felt like maybe I didn't want tobe a romance writer after all
(12:47):
and I decided not to submit thatnovel and to just sort of leave
it as my practice novel.
And I don't.
I can't remember now whatconference I went to.
I actually think it was theRomance Writers of Australia
conference, which I've got togive a shout out.
Romance Writers conferences theRomance Writers of Australia
Conference, which I've got togive a shout out.
Romance Writers Conferences andRomance Writers Organizations
(13:09):
are amazing.
They are so good atself-promotion.
And there was this course.
I think it was Donald Mass, whois a big New York literary
agent and he had written a bookabout writing.
And I went through this courseand as I was doing it, I was
sort of filling out notes and Istarted coming up with this idea
about writing a book aboutmyself, about writing about
(13:34):
being a young adult, having amother who had bipolar, about
being from the western suburbs,being from a migrant background,
and so I thought, okay, this iswhat I need to do.
Okay, this is what I need to do, this is what I need to focus
on, and it does get easier.
The second book was easier towrite because I'd had that
(13:54):
practice of the first one andeverything sort of clicked in
place with that book where Iwrote it and I entered it into a
competition.
So we have still in Victoria anunpublished manuscript
competition, and so I gotshortlisted and I got attention
(14:19):
for that and I had already sentit out to agents on submission
and hadn't heard at that pointanything.
So I contacted the agentsbecause while I was at this
amazing ceremony where my facewas up on a big screen that I
was shortlisted, I had thisamazing experience where
(14:41):
publishers and editors werecoming up to me and giving me
their business cards and saying,oh, can you submit this novel
to us?
And so I contacted the agent Ihad submitted to and said that I
was shortlisted for this prizeand that I had now received
contact from all thesepublishers who wanted me to
(15:02):
submit.
And so the agent signed me andthen they took on the submission
process and I have to say Isort of had a dream run with
that first submission.
The agent submitted to fivepublishers and I went and met
(15:25):
with a few of the publisherswhich was amazing hearing people
talking about your novel andhearing people talking about you
, know the marketing of it andwhat they thought the value of
it was, and got an offer veryearly on from one publisher and
then got a rejection frompublisher two, three and four
(15:48):
and then got an offer frompublisher five.
And so I was in this amazingposition of choosing which
editor I wanted to go with, andI went with the editor that I
thought aligned the most with mybook vision.
Um, and so that was who I.
I went through and the you know.
(16:09):
When the book was eventuallypublished, it was a wonderful
ride.
I got shortlisted for acompetition, I won a competition
, I got all these great award,these great reviews, well,
appeared in public appearances,had interviews done, so it was
(16:32):
amazing to sort of step intothis world and be an author.
But on the other side of thecoin, it took 18 months.
It took 18 months from signingto my book being published.
Before that, it took a year forthe agent to sign me.
(16:52):
So this was a very long processand when my book was published,
I had given birth to mydaughter and I was now also a
mother and I made a sillymistake.
Now that I look back on.
I mean, it worked out, but itwasn't great.
(17:13):
I had gone on maternity leavefrom the job that I was doing at
that time because I was like Iam an author now and this is
what I should be doing with mylife.
The problem with that is thenthere was nothing, and so I
really struggled in terms offinances and being home with my
(17:36):
daughter.
I applied for a grant and I gota $12,000 grant, which helped
support me in writing my secondbook, and at this point I was
really committed to this novelthat had been published the
first one and I still wanted tocontinue the story of these
(17:59):
characters, and so I startedwriting a sequel.
At this time, two things weregoing on.
One of them was that I fellpregnant with my second child
and I had a miscarriage, andthis miscarriage was quite
traumatic and quite difficult,because I'd had one pregnancy
(18:21):
and it took me a long time toget pregnant, and so then I had
this one pregnancy that wassuccessful.
I was, in a sense, unpreparedfor the fact that it doesn't
matter.
Fertility is a big questionmark and you are at the mercy of
mother nature, and so thismiscarriage was really a shock.
(18:43):
But then it was alsocomplicated by the fact that I
developed an infection thatwasn't picked up for a very long
time, that when they did thecurette they had actually left
behind some of the fetus whichled to the infection.
So there was months and monthsof agonizing, pain and real
(19:06):
health issues that I was goingthrough, not to mention the
grief and the heartbreak of themiscarriage.
And so in this space, my agenthad submitted the second novel
to the publisher who hadpublished the first novel and
(19:26):
they rejected it.
And up until that point,writing had been everything for
me and I had genuinely thought Iwould like die of a broken
heart if I received a rejection.
I thought this is not somethingthat I would be able to survive
.
But when you have been throughsome truly life-altering events
(19:53):
and experienced profound griefand loss and also experienced
that thing of life where yourealize not every dream is going
to come true, that life willcome at you and things will
happen that you don't expect andyou just have to move on.
And so this miscarriage was myfirst big loss and my first big
grief and my first realizationof heartbreak and how you are
(20:19):
just going to experience pain atsome point in your life if you
live long enough.
And so when I received thisrejection, I remember my agent
actually called me and I was onthe phone with her and she said
they passed.
And I had this moment where Ithought, oh, this isn't the
(20:40):
worst thing that's happened tome, I'm going to be okay.
And so, even though it wasreally disheartening to be
rejected within the context ofwhat was going in my life, it
was survivable.
After my health issue had hadresolved, I was looking at my
(21:03):
writing career.
At that point my agent wascalling on Young Adult Fiction.
She could not submit the secondbook anywhere else because it
was a sequel and the first bookwas published by the publisher
who had rejected it.
She didn't see any pointsubmitting it elsewhere.
(21:23):
I actually look back on thatand I'm like, well, I actually
could have changed names, Icould have changed things and
probably submitted it elsewhere,but at that point I did not
feel I had the power to take onmy writing life and to make
those decisions.
I was being guided by my agent,and so we did sort of a
strategy, talk about how wewanted to move forward.
(21:46):
She wasn't interested in youngadult.
Young adult fiction was sort ofconstricting.
So it was like, what else did Ihave?
And so I told her about thisromance novel that I had written
and left in my drawer and thatthat was something that I had
been interested in pursuing.
So she asked me to submit thatnovel and left in my drawer and
that that was something that Ihad been interested in pursuing.
(22:07):
So she asked me to submit thatnovel.
At that time there were thesepublishers that were looking at
digital first.
It ended up being a disaster,but more on that in a minute and
so she read this romance novel.
She went, yeah, this, this isgood, this is something I can
sell.
She submitted it to twopublishers at that time who were
(22:27):
looking into this digital firstmodel, who were looking for
romance novels, and they bothoffered me a contract.
So again I had the choice and Ichose one of the publishers and
so now I was embarking on acareer as a romance writer.
(22:47):
At this point we made thedecision because I had been a
young adult author and alsobecause I was a teacher.
I wanted there to be a cleardifferentiation between my young
adult fiction and between myromance, and I also wanted to be
very clear so that my young anystudents, you know would not
(23:10):
read this fiction because it wasadult, it was geared toward
adults in terms of romance andin terms of sex scenes, and so I
chose the pen name, may Archer,and the first novel was
published, had some publicity,had some opportunities, but, um,
(23:31):
it was very limited and the Iwas caught up being a full-time
teacher and I was not reallysavvy with social media or
knowing how to manage that orreally having the space and time
to do it.
So they wanted a second book.
So I wrote a second book and atthis time I was thinking a
(23:53):
series.
So, just to go back, the firstnovel that was published is
Return to Me by May Archer,which has now been republished
under my imprint.
And then the second book wasHollywood Dreams, which I was
thinking as a series, the Dreamsof Destiny series.
(24:15):
So they published the firstbook, hollywood Dreams, and I
started working on the secondbook in the series.
In that time, these digitalfirst publishers because when I
had gotten the publishingcontract, my agent and I had
talked and she had said that Ineeded to commit to writing one
(24:37):
book a year because thispublisher was sort of keen on
having books and continuationand sort of building that
progression, and they wereactually basing their business
model on indie authors in termsof selling, doing the digital
first, selling ebooks for theprice points that indie authors
(25:00):
were doing, using reader magnetsto try and capture readers.
The problem is that in a sensethey were a publisher trying to
do those things but they did notreally know and this is the
problem I find with thepublishing world they don't
really know how to get theauthors as their partners.
(25:20):
We actually need some training.
Publishers should be actuallydoing some brief training in
terms of how to support writersto actually market their books
and what their role is inmarketing their books.
So I wrote the third book andsubmitted and it got rejected
(25:42):
and at this point point I hadnot made much money from these
books at all.
I think I made about tendollars per book, which is
pretty disappointing.
So the returns on these bookswere very disappointing because
they were sort of doing thespaghetti on the wall and just
doing a bit of everything to seewhat would stick, because they
(26:05):
weren't paying any advances.
They could give a contract toanyone.
They were offering higherroyalties because it was the
ebook model.
So I think I was getting 25, sothey were still taking the bulk
of it and they rejected thisthird book and the very soon
(26:26):
after that they shut their doors.
You know, these digital firstmodels shut their doors because
they had expected that this wasgoing to lead to revenue and it
didn't.
So at this point I was actuallyfeeling pretty bitter and angry
.
(26:47):
I had been working full time asa teacher, and very early on in
my career.
So this is the first five yearsof my career as a teacher,
which is so demanding and sodifficult.
Not to mention, I was themother of a young child.
When I started teaching, mydaughter was five years old, and
so you know, this is betweenthe ages of five to ten, and I
(27:12):
felt really angry about the factthat I had tried this only
because I thought this was theway to make money.
And while, yes, I do likewriting romance novels and I do
love these romance novels, therewere other ideas that were
percolating and there were otherthings that I sort of wanted to
do, but I pushed them away forthis commercial pathway that I
(27:38):
thought would lead to success.
And that was sort of my firstlesson in not doing things for
only the commercial value,because you cannot judge whether
it will succeed.
You don't know.
So when you're chasing thatcommercial success and not
(28:04):
following your heart, and thenthat commercial success doesn't
pan out, that bitterness takes awhile to process.
And so that's where I foundmyself and that's when I had a
conversation with my husband whogets me and gets this world,
(28:27):
husband, who gets me and getsthis world and I was telling him
how angry and bitter I was andI felt like I had wasted my time
and I had put all this energyinto something and into these
romance novels and they didn'tgo anywhere.
And now I just lost time when Icould have been working on
building something else.
And he said to me well, youneed to write something that no
one else can write.
(28:47):
You need to do the things thatno one else can do.
Anyone can write a romancenovel.
That is a big genre.
You're not contributinganything unique.
In one sense, you know, becauseI was writing romance novels
that you know I found reallyinteresting and tropes that I
found really interesting andtropes that I found interesting,
but I wasn't using my cultureor my identity in that I was
(29:11):
using Anglo characters and justsort of doing that romantic
aspect and that romantic storyand that really made me look
back at what it is that I wantedto say what it is that I had
that was unique.
And after I'd had my daughter, Ihad been experiencing some PTSD
(29:33):
about my childhood and I hadexperienced postnatal depression
when she was 10 months and Ihad gone to counselling.
And I started writing about mychildhood when I did my first,
my debut novel.
I started that out as a memoir,but it felt too raw, it felt
(29:55):
too much, it felt like somethingI couldn't do at that time.
I wasn't ready to be trulyhonest and to truly look at it
and so I fictionalized it and Istill sort of got my story out,
but I protected myself andprotected my family.
Now I found myself as a mothergoing back to things that had
happened in my childhood, goingback to my mother's life and
(30:16):
having a different perspective.
And so I started writing thatmemoir and I started writing
what that story was.
And at first I tricked myself.
I wasn't writing memoir, I wasjust writing pieces, I was
writing essays.
I had them published indifferent journals, I got some
recognition and then I realizedI needed support in order to
(30:40):
continue writing this memoirbecause I was working full-time.
I was really tired and writinga memoir is really emotionally
taxing.
It is very, very difficult.
And then there are the ethicalissues about writing about
someone who is mentally ill,writing about your community,
and so I really felt like Ineeded support with that and I
(31:02):
applied and got funding forAlice Pung to mentor me, which
really helped me get through thewriting process.
And the interesting thing withthe writing process is I wrote
one version of that memoir andin one version of the memoir it
was dual point of view, so itwas my mother's story in her
point of view and her chapters,and then it was my perspective
(31:26):
as a young person and how Iexperienced that.
I was kind of really happy withthat.
But my agent didn't feel likethat was commercially viable and
so she encouraged me to changeit all to my point of view.
And I remember having thisconversation with Alice where
she's like she's, you know, youragent is advising you based on
(31:48):
what she thinks is thecommercial success.
She goes.
Your memoir, the way you wroteit, was beautiful.
Um, you know, I think it'spublishable as it is and I have
no regrets about the decision Imade.
I think that was a lesson thatI needed to learn, but I do
(32:10):
think now, looking back on it,that was also another example of
me not being true to myself andme just bending in to fit in
with what commercialexpectations might be and how it
might lead to greatercommercial success.
Plot twist, as usual, my agentsubmitted my memoir to five
publishers and she was kind oflukewarm on it.
(32:33):
I'm going to be honest.
It really wasn't her genrewasn't what she was really
interested in or, you know, hadin her wheelhouse, was really
interested in or, you know, hadin her wheelhouse.
But after the romance fiasco Iwas like no, I'm going to write
what I want to write.
I'm going to write the thingsthat matter to me.
So she submitted it to fivepublishers.
(32:55):
It wasn't picked up, theydidn't want it and at this point
she was done.
She did not want to submit itelsewhere.
I was not.
I really believed in this bookand I really wanted to fight for
this book and I wanted it to betraditionally published, even
though at this point I'd startedlooking at and thinking about
the self-publishing world.
But I really wanted it to betraditionally published and that
(33:18):
was more for my mother.
I really wanted my mother'sstory to get that validation and
so I took on the submissionprocess and I submitted to five
publishers and I had publishersinterested publishers asking for
full manuscripts, because yousubmit a query letter in some
instances, a partial in others,and then it's a matter of
(33:41):
whether they want to request apartial or they want to request
the full manuscript.
So there was interest in it andalso my agent had submitted to
like the five big publishers andthen I went down the list to
the five independent publishers.
So there was still like a lotof publishers that I could go
through.
It was just sort of workingdown the hierarchy in terms of
(34:01):
the big publishers and then thesmaller independent publishers.
And I wasn't interested at thispoint in commercial success.
I wasn't interested in making adeal.
All I was interested wasgetting this memoir published
and so as soon as I had thefirst offer, I took the first
offer and I withdrew it from theother publishers and I have no
regrets about the decision.
(34:22):
I'm really happy because thatmemoir was published very and my
mother passed away I thinkwithin five months.
It was published in May.
She passed away in November ofthat year and so having that
moment with her is worth morethan words.
(34:43):
The interesting thing is,though, that that memoir being
published you know, I got allthese beautiful reviews, and
then my publisher submitted itfor a prize and I got
shortlisted for the NationalBiography Prize, which had prize
money attached to it, so I won$2,000.
So I actually didn't get anadvance on that book.
(35:07):
I was only being paid and I'monly paid for sales and
royalties, but winning thatprize actually gave me some
money and, you know, led tocommercial success in one sense
for that book.
For me, at this point, I wasrethinking my direction and my
(35:27):
voice, and I knew that it wastime to part ways with my agent.
And this was a very harddecision because she was an
agent with the biggest agency,curtis Brown, and so there was a
certain amount of credibilityin having her as an agent.
But I knew that we weren't agood fit, and I also knew at
(35:51):
this point that I was done withthe traditional publishing world
.
I really wanted to take my mystrength back, my story back,
and I wanted to make all of thedecisions, and I wanted to just
follow my voice and not sort ofbe led into certain directions
(36:13):
based on possible commercialsuccesses.
The one thing I will say is myagent was really wonderful where
she let me make that decision.
She, um, it was fairly obviousto me that we weren't a fit, and
it was fairly obvious to methat she didn't think.
(36:34):
You know also that we were afit in terms of what I wanted to
write and what I wanted toexplore, but she did not, um,
you know, do anything other thansupport and sort of give me the
green light to submit furtherthings to her.
I was the one who actually, um,said that I would like to part
(36:55):
ways and went through theprocess of that, and I I really
appreciate that about her.
I really appreciate her, um,being so supportive of writers
and understanding that.
You know, it is veryheartbreaking, and if she had
been the one to like dump me, ina sense it would have been, I
(37:16):
would have been able to copewith it, but it would have been
still a little bit disempowering, and so she really left it the
ball in my court and let me feelempowered, you know, by making
that decision and by takingcontrol of that.
So I'm very, very grateful toher and I am very grateful for
(37:36):
the experience of her taking achance on me of her working with
me and trying, um, you know, toget my traditional writing
career in a commercial direction.
I've just realized that I havedifferent values and different
things that I want to exploreand that, um, you know that that
(37:59):
wasn't quite the way for me.
So I have now um being, youknow, published with this memoir
, and the one thing that thismemoir also did for me was it
made me realize the value ofnon-fiction.
Um, I actually was not a bigreader of memoir when I was
(38:24):
writing and when I wassubmitting memoir which is
terrible, like I would not givethat advice to anyone at all
read in your genre, and so youknow that presented some
difficulties for me during thewriting process.
I'll be very honest, if I haddone some reading and some, you
know, immersing myself into thatgenre.
(38:45):
But I was just sort of in avery overwhelmed place at that
time in terms of jugglingfull-time work as a teacher,
being a mother, and then tryingto write the memoir, and I just
sort of had to focus on thewriting as a way of getting
myself out of.
You know, I think when you'reworking full-time there's this
(39:06):
fear, especially in a careerlike teaching, that really takes
everything from you.
There is this huge fear aboutlosing yourself and losing your
creativity.
And so I had to keep writingthe memoir in order not to do
that, in order to not lose myidentity as a writer.
To do that in order to not losemy identity as a writer.
(39:31):
And so when I wrote this memoirand then really started
immersing myself into the world,I started seeing opportunities
about being able to write memoirpieces for publication, opinion
pieces for publication, and soI slowly embarked on that world,
and that was something I hadwanted to do for so long.
I had wanted to be a freelancewriter and I wanted to have
(39:54):
articles published, but it wasthis world that was beyond me,
and, as usual, I had manysupportive people who I spoke to
, who helped me think about howto do that, and all it takes is
one.
And so the first article that Ihad published I remember it was
somebody had written aboutdelivering a writing course and
(40:19):
EAL the English teachersinterfering with their writing.
So I wrote a rebuttal and I hadpeople encouraging me.
We were out of contact and Iwas like, oh, I'm thinking about
doing this, and they were like,well, do this and do that and
the other thing, and so I gotinto this freelance writing and
it's just so fascinating how,when you enter a new world, at
(40:41):
first it's so hard and you don'tknow what you're doing, and
thankfully I had editorssupporting me and helping me
develop my voice, and then ideasjust keep coming and ways of
using this as a method ofpromotion and of advocacy just
started coming together for me.
(41:01):
Just started coming togetherfor me, and I think also because
I had started, you know,looking at the self-publishing.
I'd already embarked on thefreelance writing, but then,
when I was becoming an indieauthor, I was really looking at
ways to monetise my skills andwhat I had to offer, and so
(41:22):
freelance writing became an evenbigger aspect of my life, and
I'm now at the point where Ihave enough recognition where I
actually get editors contactingme and commissioning me to write
articles, which is beautifuland heartening.
But I found that my strength isdelving into personal stories
(41:47):
and finding the universal in thepersonal, and so I'm not a
freelance writer where I canlook at something as an issue
and I can just write an articleabout that or hit on things that
are, you know, issues at thetime.
It has to be something that ispersonally connected to me,
(42:08):
something that I can see myselfin.
So I always need that personalin order to be able to write it.
And so, during this process ofdiscovery, I've sort of gone
deeper into what it is that I'mwriting, what it is that I want
to say, what it is that'simportant to me.
(42:29):
And you know, I've realized afew things in terms of my
evolution as an author, which isI have to write things that are
personal, things that I thinkare doing something in some way
to change the world and thathave meaning to me.
So currently I'm pivoting again.
(42:51):
I am looking at a another typeof writing.
So I'm entering the crime worldand writing a crime series, but
I'm focused on telling storiesand advocating for human rights.
So you know, the first book isset in a steppard and it deals
with the genocide that happens.
(43:12):
It's a war story and it dealswith nationalism and othering,
and I have all of these thingsI'm going to be doing in terms
of promoting this book, but alsoin terms of sharing things that
I think are really important.
So, you know, looking at doingtalks and articles about these
(43:32):
issues in order to promote thebook, but also in order to get
people to think about thesethings.
So book two is about genocidedenial and war criminals hiding
in Australia and about, you know, migrants in Australia and that
experience.
Book three is about mentalillness treatment in migrants,
(43:55):
about national servicemen inAustralia during the Vietnam War
and about LGBTQ rights, and allof this happened organically.
I was just writing things andideas were coming to me, but
then, when I started thinkingabout the marketing side and
preparing blurbs and preparingall these things that I can do
(44:16):
to market it, I realized thatthere was a theme and so I
realized that, you know, it'sabout human rights, and so I've
actually now mapped out thisseries and I've mapped out, you
know, book four, five and six interms of human rights issues
and in terms of advocacy workthat I want to do, but also
(44:36):
writing just, you know, crimenovels that operate on that
level, and I've also.
One of the things that happensis when you are writing series,
especially in the indie world,I've been seeing a lot of talk
about how do you createinterconnected series, how do
you sort of get people into yourfictional world and then they
(44:58):
continue reading through thatfictional world.
So I've actually mapped out twoother interconnected series.
And so at this point I'm at acrossroads, because I published
my romance novels under MayArcher and I was going to
continue the series.
So Return to Me was going to bepart of a series Leap of Faith
(45:23):
and it was going to be followingcharacters two and three.
But when I published that, um,I realized that had been too
long since I had written thatbook and so I was like I don't
think I'm going to continuethose characters.
Then I published hollywooddreams and vintage dreams and I
was going to work on the thirdbook in the series.
But then I saw this opportunityto be a part of an anthology
(45:47):
where it had to be a beach theme, and so I wrote a novella to be
a part of that.
And then I mapped out a romanceseries I was going to write in
that world, since now thatanthology is not published
anymore.
But I haven't published thatnovella because I'm not sure
(46:08):
what I'm doing with it.
I think I need to just offer itto my subscribers as a free
book, um, but then I'm alsoconcerned about building, uh, my
newsletter with romance readerswhen I'm not pursuing that.
So I think, think, possibly,but you know, it all depends on
the news.
I think possibly that romancepart is going to be left and I'm
(46:34):
just going to pursue anddedicate myself to this crime
series and to writing the sixbooks of the main series and
then looking at the other seriesthat I want to connect.
So, remember, the first threebooks are done.
I'm actually just trying toprepare the first book for
(46:56):
publication, but I've got allthese things that I want to do
with it and I'm also in thesishell right now with my PhD, so I
need to sort of, you know,clear the decks, clear some
space.
So, yeah, that evolution ofwhat am I doing.
I'm in that crossroads again andyou know, things might change
(47:20):
in terms of what I want to do.
So I think I just want to wrapup and talk about lessons and
talk about, you know, someadvice that I would give you if
you are looking for your voiceand looking for things that
happen, looking for things thatyou want to do and are at
(47:42):
crossroads.
So I would say to you writewhat feels true to you, not what
others expect.
While I have no regrets aboutthe detours that I have taken
and the way that my writingjourney has progressed, I did
delay things.
I did sort of do the long wayaround.
(48:03):
If I hadn't done that detourwith romance, I might have
advanced sooner with otherthings, but you know.
Then again, you don't know.
So I do think that focus on youand your voice and not what
others might expect.
Don't be afraid to tell storiesfrom your lived experience.
(48:25):
You know they are uniquelyyours.
Each and every one of us hasbeen through a unique life
journey and we have a point ofview and we have something worth
saying.
So if you can get in touch withyour core values, get in touch
with your core truth and usethat to guide you in your
writing, so write often and giveyourself permission to evolve
(48:50):
as a writer.
I actually haven't done acounter right now as to how many
books I've written, becauseI've actually not published all
of my books that are hidden onmy hard drive because I have not
had the time.
Uh, so I don't know.
I might have written 15 books,to be honest.
And you do evolve as a writeras you go, and so just give
(49:13):
yourself permission to do that,to write different things, to do
different experiments and tosee what works for you and what
leads you to that and I thinkthe last tip that I think is
really, really important is yourvoice doesn't have to be
perfect, but it has to beauthentic, and that is something
(49:35):
that I've realised in terms ofmy writing.
I go back to my core value and,you know, being authentic, being
real, not sugarcoating anything, not trying to be anyone.
So, for me, it's been a longjourney to get to this point of
complete confidence and completestrength in who I am and what I
(50:01):
want to do.
It has been a wild ride.
It has been, you know, a lot ofheartbreak.
I think that is the truth oflife.
We do have to go through somethings, but I think we also do
lose ourselves.
We lose ourselves in othervoices and in what other people
are doing, and I'm learning notto do that anymore.
(50:23):
So, in the indie world, thingsare changing very, very quickly
and there are lots of shiny new,wonderful things, and I'm
learning now to pause, toevaluate and to really, you know
, think about whether that issomething that I want to do.
And, in terms of my writing, Iam learning that I have to write
(50:47):
what is truth to me, and I'malso, you know, I've gone
through a midlife crisis and Iwill do an episode about that.
But, having gone through amidlife crisis, there is this
element of how much time do Ihave left and what do I want to
do with this time, what is thelegacy that I want to leave,
(51:10):
what are the books that I haveto write and have to leave?
And so when I look at mywriting life through that lens,
it becomes really simple.
It becomes really simple aboutwhat I need to work on and what
I need to write, because it'sthese books that I'm working on
now that are really addressinghuman rights issues and that are
(51:33):
really giving me thatopportunity to do advocacy and
to continue to build on mycareer as a freelance writer and
as well as a speaker, and alsoto look at, you know, academic
opportunities and academia andpossibly stepping into that
world through some of thesepassions.
(51:53):
So thank you for joining me inthis episode.
I hope that this has inspiredyou to trust in your voice to
share your stories.
I'd love to hear from you, solet me know if you enjoyed this
episode, what you found helpful.
Let me know about crossroadsthat you are hitting and where
(52:15):
you are in your writing journey,and what are the things that
you are struggling with and alsolet me know if there's anything
in particular that you wouldlike addressed in episodes you
would like to hear from in thefuture.
So don't forget that there areshow notes, there's a special
handout, it's all on my website.
(52:36):
So go to amrapayalichcom slashpodcast and you can find all of
that information there.
And, yeah, keep writing andremember that your story matters
.
What you have to say matters,thank you.
Thank you for tuning in toAmra's Armchair Anecdotes.
(52:59):
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 beginswith a single word.
Welcome to Amra's Armchair Anecdotes.
I'm Amra Payalich, writer,teacher and storyteller.
Pull up a chair and let's diveinto stories about writing, life
and lessons learned, sharingwisdom from my armchair to yours
.
You can find the episode shownotes, your free episode
(00:22):
handouts and my how-to guides atamrahpayalichcom slash podcast.
And now it's time to dive in.
Welcome to Amrah's ArmchairAnecdotes.
Today I'm talking about theevolution of an author, using
myself as a case study.
(00:42):
So I'm going to talk about theway that I have gone through
different things as an author.
I'm going to be talking aboutfinding your voice.
So it's not just about yourwriting style, but what it is,
what you want to say and reallyunderstanding who you are as a
person.
I feel like that's been thebiggest part of my journey
(01:03):
discovering what it is that Iwant to say and what it is that
my writing is about.
So I'm going to share mypersonal journey, you know, from
starting out as a child tobecoming an award-winning author
and an indie publisher, and how, along the way, I have learned
to embrace my voice, and I'mhoping that my story and my
(01:28):
takeaways will help you discoveryour voice.
So writing has always been morethan just the words on a page.
For me, it's about my journeyof self-discovery and about
empowerment, and this evolutiondid not happen overnight.
(01:50):
In fact it has been I don'tknow when to start, I think, you
know, as a professional writer,28 years, but as a emerging
writer longer than that.
So I was always that child thatwas reading, that found escapism
(02:14):
and hope and joy throughreading Not really a surprise,
because I did have a chaotichome life, and so reading gave
me the opportunity to sort ofexperience things that were
different to my home life, butalso the opportunity to learn
(02:36):
about the world and learn aboutdifferent things.
And I was always interested inwriting and I was always writing
stories and I was always theperson who I loved hearing
stories and I loved peopletelling me stories, and so in my
memoir I talk about being theconfidant to the adults in my
(02:58):
life and the way that the womenin my family especially, you
know, lonely women like mygrandmother and my mother really
sort of turned to me and wouldtell me their stories, because I
was one of those children whoknew how to be still and be in
the moment, and I was justalways enthralled by stories, by
(03:29):
stories, and in high school Ihad some early successes where I
had teachers really praising meand giving me the
acknowledgement of myself as awriter and my writing identity,
and when I had my first bookpublished I tracked down those
teachers and I sent them a copyas a thank you.
And that's something that I'mreally aware of now as an
English teacher myself aboutacknowledging the students who
(03:54):
really enjoy and embrace theircreativity and lifting them up,
giving them that boost andgiving them that acknowledgement
that they might not getanywhere else.
In high school I wrote in theschool setting and had pieces
published in the school journal.
And then I had my first publicrecognition when there was a
(04:18):
competition from the localnewspaper and my newspaper
article won Story of the yearand it was published in the
newspaper and a photographercame to the school and took a
photo of me and there wasanother girl who had also um won
for photography, and so we hadthis moment, uh, that we were
(04:42):
acknowledged publicly by thecommunity.
And that first story I wrote itwas called Bystanders Ignore
Racist Attack, and so it wasabout a friend of mine who was
of Indian background and she hadbeen beaten in a public place
by other young people andeveryone just walked past and
(05:05):
pretended it wasn't happening,and it was really distressing to
her because she'd come toAustralia as a migrant, from a
place where usually people wouldsort of you know, stop and go,
no, you don't do that.
And so she was very heartbrokenby it and that really inspired
my sense of injustice and so Iwrote this really fiery piece
(05:28):
about the way that this waspossibly racially motivated,
because she was a person ofcolor, and when I look back on
that experience now I can seehow, in one sense, I had my
voice.
In one sense, I had my voice, Ihad what it is that sparked me
up and that made me want towrite.
(05:49):
It's just that I got lost alongthe way, and so, as I tell you
my story, you're going to seehow this comes back to where I
am now, in a sense of sort ofgoing around in a loop.
So that was my big moment ofrecognition, and I always knew I
(06:09):
wanted to be a writer.
But the thing about it is youdon't know how to be a writer.
You're not really given sort ofthe keys to the kingdom and
told how to do this, and I didsome silly things in high school
in terms of stuffing up myopportunities for university,
because I was too intimidatedabout going to university.
(06:31):
Coming from a migrant backgroundwhere no one in my family had
gone to university, my mumhadn't finished high school.
My grandmother was illiterateyou know, this was a new world.
This was a world I was sointimidated and afraid of that I
couldn't envision myselfstepping into it.
(06:51):
So I stuffed up my unipreferences and I didn't get a
place into university and mycareers counselor supported me
by finding an admin course, andso I went out into the workforce
and I was working full-time,but I was bored, I felt really
adrift, and I ended updiscovering a diploma in
(07:13):
professional writing and editing, and this was the first
opportunity I had had to speakto people who were writers,
because all of the tutors wereprofessional writers who had
been published, who had achievedsome degree of success in their
fields and they could speakfrom experience.
So it was the first time that Ispoke to people and was
(07:34):
learning from people who arewriters.
But, more importantly, I wasinteracting with people who are
also like me, who were creative,who wanted to write, who were
searching for their voices andsearching for their path forward
, and that's the thing thatreally makes a difference.
You really need to find yourtribe, you need to find your
(07:55):
community.
Even now, as an indie author, Iam in online communities, in
Facebook communities, and I knowpeople in that online world.
I'm attending my firstin-person indie conference in
December and I'm really excitedbecause I am looking forward to
(08:17):
the opportunity to actuallymeeting people face-to-face and
to actually sort of create moreof a bond and create more of a
community in that face-to-facesetting, because when you're
stepping into a new world andthen you are talking to people
who are also in that world, itis so validating and also they
(08:38):
are the ones who understand, whounderstand what you're talking
about.
And so being in this writingcourse with other emerging
writers who, like me, werelooking for opportunities to get
published, to become a writer,to become validated, was
wonderful and very early on,because I had excellent tutors
(08:59):
and I had that drive.
I submitted pieces and I hadthree publications in a very
short period and then I wasacknowledged with short story
prizes and winning money fromshort story prizes, and there is
something amazing that happenswhen you get that
acknowledgement, and it's alsoreally strange how monetary
(09:23):
acknowledgement really does helpin terms of validating because
no one thinks anything of, oh, Igot published or this or that,
but when you attach money tothat.
I remember one of the firstthings that I had published was
a romantic short story inWoman's Day.
So in the magazine Woman's Dayand I was speaking to family
(09:46):
members who were kind of mockingme about being published in
this and about the fact that Iwas so proud about being
published in this, and they werekind of looking at me in a
condescending manner and then Isaid, well, I got paid $300 for
800 words and remember that thisis 28 years ago, so this is a
(10:10):
significant time ago where $300meant even more.
It's probably the equivalent of$1,000 today.
And their faces changed andthey were like, oh, that's how
much money you got for that manywords.
And suddenly they wereinterested in my writing career
and they thought that maybe ithad some value and some validity
(10:31):
.
And so that was my first entrypoint into this world, into the
professional writing world, andmy first successes were with
short stories, with writingfictional short stories and
having them published.
And the first short story thatreally validated my voice was my
(10:54):
short story Siege, which wasabout a couple, a Romeo and
Juliet romance between a Serbboy and a Muslim girl during the
time of war, while they wereunder siege, and it was the
first story that I had usedresearch to recreate.
So I had used research that Ifound online in terms of a real
(11:19):
life couple that I was sort ofbasing this on, and then I also
had letters from my husband'sfamily about what it was like
under siege, and so this storygot published and got
acknowledged, and it was aboutBosnian characters.
It was about people like me.
It was the world that I knewand that I understood, and so
(11:42):
seeing that recognised out therein the world made me realize
that had value.
However, I was caught up in whatsort of a writer I wanted to be
, and I was torn because I hadspent my adolescence reading
romance novels, which I stilllove.
I love romance fiction, romancemovies.
(12:04):
It's my happy place, and so Iwanted to be a romance writer
because that was the world thatI really, you know, enjoyed
reading, and so I startedwriting a romance novel.
And this is the thing whenyou're writing your first book
it takes much longer becauseyou're battling self-discipline,
(12:26):
motivation, self-confidence,the real world, and so I was
battling this book for threeyears and trying to write this
book and in the process I havefelt like I had evolved and I
felt like maybe I didn't want tobe a romance writer after all
(12:47):
and I decided not to submit thatnovel and to just sort of leave
it as my practice novel.
And I don't.
I can't remember now whatconference I went to.
I actually think it was theRomance Writers of Australia
conference, which I've got togive a shout out.
Romance Writers conferences theRomance Writers of Australia
Conference, which I've got togive a shout out.
Romance Writers Conferences andRomance Writers Organizations
(13:09):
are amazing.
They are so good atself-promotion.
And there was this course.
I think it was Donald Mass, whois a big New York literary
agent and he had written a bookabout writing.
And I went through this courseand as I was doing it, I was
sort of filling out notes and Istarted coming up with this idea
about writing a book aboutmyself, about writing about
(13:34):
being a young adult, having amother who had bipolar, about
being from the western suburbs,being from a migrant background,
and so I thought, okay, this iswhat I need to do.
Okay, this is what I need to do, this is what I need to focus
on, and it does get easier.
The second book was easier towrite because I'd had that
(13:54):
practice of the first one andeverything sort of clicked in
place with that book where Iwrote it and I entered it into a
competition.
So we have still in Victoria anunpublished manuscript
competition, and so I gotshortlisted and I got attention
(14:19):
for that and I had already sentit out to agents on submission
and hadn't heard at that pointanything.
So I contacted the agentsbecause while I was at this
amazing ceremony where my facewas up on a big screen that I
was shortlisted, I had thisamazing experience where
(14:41):
publishers and editors werecoming up to me and giving me
their business cards and saying,oh, can you submit this novel
to us?
And so I contacted the agent Ihad submitted to and said that I
was shortlisted for this prizeand that I had now received
contact from all thesepublishers who wanted me to
(15:02):
submit.
And so the agent signed me andthen they took on the submission
process and I have to say Isort of had a dream run with
that first submission.
The agent submitted to fivepublishers and I went and met
(15:25):
with a few of the publisherswhich was amazing hearing people
talking about your novel andhearing people talking about you
, know the marketing of it andwhat they thought the value of
it was, and got an offer veryearly on from one publisher and
then got a rejection frompublisher two, three and four
(15:48):
and then got an offer frompublisher five.
And so I was in this amazingposition of choosing which
editor I wanted to go with, andI went with the editor that I
thought aligned the most with mybook vision.
Um, and so that was who I.
I went through and the you know.
(16:09):
When the book was eventuallypublished, it was a wonderful
ride.
I got shortlisted for acompetition, I won a competition
, I got all these great award,these great reviews, well,
appeared in public appearances,had interviews done, so it was
(16:32):
amazing to sort of step intothis world and be an author.
But on the other side of thecoin, it took 18 months.
It took 18 months from signingto my book being published.
Before that, it took a year forthe agent to sign me.
(16:52):
So this was a very long processand when my book was published,
I had given birth to mydaughter and I was now also a
mother and I made a sillymistake.
Now that I look back on.
I mean, it worked out, but itwasn't great.
(17:13):
I had gone on maternity leavefrom the job that I was doing at
that time because I was like Iam an author now and this is
what I should be doing with mylife.
The problem with that is thenthere was nothing, and so I
really struggled in terms offinances and being home with my
(17:36):
daughter.
I applied for a grant and I gota $12,000 grant, which helped
support me in writing my secondbook, and at this point I was
really committed to this novelthat had been published the
first one and I still wanted tocontinue the story of these
(17:59):
characters, and so I startedwriting a sequel.
At this time, two things weregoing on.
One of them was that I fellpregnant with my second child
and I had a miscarriage, andthis miscarriage was quite
traumatic and quite difficult,because I'd had one pregnancy
(18:21):
and it took me a long time toget pregnant, and so then I had
this one pregnancy that wassuccessful.
I was, in a sense, unpreparedfor the fact that it doesn't
matter.
Fertility is a big questionmark and you are at the mercy of
mother nature, and so thismiscarriage was really a shock.
(18:43):
But then it was alsocomplicated by the fact that I
developed an infection thatwasn't picked up for a very long
time, that when they did thecurette they had actually left
behind some of the fetus whichled to the infection.
So there was months and monthsof agonizing, pain and real
(19:06):
health issues that I was goingthrough, not to mention the
grief and the heartbreak of themiscarriage.
And so in this space, my agenthad submitted the second novel
to the publisher who hadpublished the first novel and
(19:26):
they rejected it.
And up until that point,writing had been everything for
me and I had genuinely thought Iwould like die of a broken
heart if I received a rejection.
I thought this is not somethingthat I would be able to survive
.
But when you have been throughsome truly life-altering events
(19:53):
and experienced profound griefand loss and also experienced
that thing of life where yourealize not every dream is going
to come true, that life willcome at you and things will
happen that you don't expect andyou just have to move on.
And so this miscarriage was myfirst big loss and my first big
grief and my first realizationof heartbreak and how you are
(20:19):
just going to experience pain atsome point in your life if you
live long enough.
And so when I received thisrejection, I remember my agent
actually called me and I was onthe phone with her and she said
they passed.
And I had this moment where Ithought, oh, this isn't the
(20:40):
worst thing that's happened tome, I'm going to be okay.
And so, even though it wasreally disheartening to be
rejected within the context ofwhat was going in my life, it
was survivable.
After my health issue had hadresolved, I was looking at my
(21:03):
writing career.
At that point my agent wascalling on Young Adult Fiction.
She could not submit the secondbook anywhere else because it
was a sequel and the first bookwas published by the publisher
who had rejected it.
She didn't see any pointsubmitting it elsewhere.
(21:23):
I actually look back on thatand I'm like, well, I actually
could have changed names, Icould have changed things and
probably submitted it elsewhere,but at that point I did not
feel I had the power to take onmy writing life and to make
those decisions.
I was being guided by my agent,and so we did sort of a
strategy, talk about how wewanted to move forward.
(21:46):
She wasn't interested in youngadult.
Young adult fiction was sort ofconstricting.
So it was like, what else did Ihave?
And so I told her about thisromance novel that I had written
and left in my drawer and thatthat was something that I had
been interested in pursuing.
So she asked me to submit thatnovel and left in my drawer and
that that was something that Ihad been interested in pursuing.
(22:07):
So she asked me to submit thatnovel.
At that time there were thesepublishers that were looking at
digital first.
It ended up being a disaster,but more on that in a minute and
so she read this romance novel.
She went, yeah, this, this isgood, this is something I can
sell.
She submitted it to twopublishers at that time who were
(22:27):
looking into this digital firstmodel, who were looking for
romance novels, and they bothoffered me a contract.
So again I had the choice and Ichose one of the publishers and
so now I was embarking on acareer as a romance writer.
(22:47):
At this point we made thedecision because I had been a
young adult author and alsobecause I was a teacher.
I wanted there to be a cleardifferentiation between my young
adult fiction and between myromance, and I also wanted to be
very clear so that my young anystudents, you know would not
(23:10):
read this fiction because it wasadult, it was geared toward
adults in terms of romance andin terms of sex scenes, and so I
chose the pen name, may Archer,and the first novel was
published, had some publicity,had some opportunities, but, um,
(23:31):
it was very limited and the Iwas caught up being a full-time
teacher and I was not reallysavvy with social media or
knowing how to manage that orreally having the space and time
to do it.
So they wanted a second book.
So I wrote a second book and atthis time I was thinking a
(23:53):
series.
So, just to go back, the firstnovel that was published is
Return to Me by May Archer,which has now been republished
under my imprint.
And then the second book wasHollywood Dreams, which I was
thinking as a series, the Dreamsof Destiny series.
(24:15):
So they published the firstbook, hollywood Dreams, and I
started working on the secondbook in the series.
In that time, these digitalfirst publishers because when I
had gotten the publishingcontract, my agent and I had
talked and she had said that Ineeded to commit to writing one
(24:37):
book a year because thispublisher was sort of keen on
having books and continuationand sort of building that
progression, and they wereactually basing their business
model on indie authors in termsof selling, doing the digital
first, selling ebooks for theprice points that indie authors
(25:00):
were doing, using reader magnetsto try and capture readers.
The problem is that in a sensethey were a publisher trying to
do those things but they did notreally know and this is the
problem I find with thepublishing world they don't
really know how to get theauthors as their partners.
(25:20):
We actually need some training.
Publishers should be actuallydoing some brief training in
terms of how to support writersto actually market their books
and what their role is inmarketing their books.
So I wrote the third book andsubmitted and it got rejected
(25:42):
and at this point point I hadnot made much money from these
books at all.
I think I made about tendollars per book, which is
pretty disappointing.
So the returns on these bookswere very disappointing because
they were sort of doing thespaghetti on the wall and just
doing a bit of everything to seewhat would stick, because they
(26:05):
weren't paying any advances.
They could give a contract toanyone.
They were offering higherroyalties because it was the
ebook model.
So I think I was getting 25, sothey were still taking the bulk
of it and they rejected thisthird book and the very soon
(26:26):
after that they shut their doors.
You know, these digital firstmodels shut their doors because
they had expected that this wasgoing to lead to revenue and it
didn't.
So at this point I was actuallyfeeling pretty bitter and angry
.
(26:47):
I had been working full time asa teacher, and very early on in
my career.
So this is the first five yearsof my career as a teacher,
which is so demanding and sodifficult.
Not to mention, I was themother of a young child.
When I started teaching, mydaughter was five years old, and
so you know, this is betweenthe ages of five to ten, and I
(27:12):
felt really angry about the factthat I had tried this only
because I thought this was theway to make money.
And while, yes, I do likewriting romance novels and I do
love these romance novels, therewere other ideas that were
percolating and there were otherthings that I sort of wanted to
do, but I pushed them away forthis commercial pathway that I
(27:38):
thought would lead to success.
And that was sort of my firstlesson in not doing things for
only the commercial value,because you cannot judge whether
it will succeed.
You don't know.
So when you're chasing thatcommercial success and not
(28:04):
following your heart, and thenthat commercial success doesn't
pan out, that bitterness takes awhile to process.
And so that's where I foundmyself and that's when I had a
conversation with my husband whogets me and gets this world,
(28:27):
husband, who gets me and getsthis world and I was telling him
how angry and bitter I was andI felt like I had wasted my time
and I had put all this energyinto something and into these
romance novels and they didn'tgo anywhere.
And now I just lost time when Icould have been working on
building something else.
And he said to me well, youneed to write something that no
one else can write.
(28:47):
You need to do the things thatno one else can do.
Anyone can write a romancenovel.
That is a big genre.
You're not contributinganything unique.
In one sense, you know, becauseI was writing romance novels
that you know I found reallyinteresting and tropes that I
found really interesting andtropes that I found interesting,
but I wasn't using my cultureor my identity in that I was
(29:11):
using Anglo characters and justsort of doing that romantic
aspect and that romantic storyand that really made me look
back at what it is that I wantedto say what it is that I had
that was unique.
And after I'd had my daughter, Ihad been experiencing some PTSD
(29:33):
about my childhood and I hadexperienced postnatal depression
when she was 10 months and Ihad gone to counselling.
And I started writing about mychildhood when I did my first,
my debut novel.
I started that out as a memoir,but it felt too raw, it felt
(29:55):
too much, it felt like somethingI couldn't do at that time.
I wasn't ready to be trulyhonest and to truly look at it
and so I fictionalized it and Istill sort of got my story out,
but I protected myself andprotected my family.
Now I found myself as a mothergoing back to things that had
happened in my childhood, goingback to my mother's life and
(30:16):
having a different perspective.
And so I started writing thatmemoir and I started writing
what that story was.
And at first I tricked myself.
I wasn't writing memoir, I wasjust writing pieces, I was
writing essays.
I had them published indifferent journals, I got some
recognition and then I realizedI needed support in order to
(30:40):
continue writing this memoirbecause I was working full-time.
I was really tired and writinga memoir is really emotionally
taxing.
It is very, very difficult.
And then there are the ethicalissues about writing about
someone who is mentally ill,writing about your community,
and so I really felt like Ineeded support with that and I
(31:02):
applied and got funding forAlice Pung to mentor me, which
really helped me get through thewriting process.
And the interesting thing withthe writing process is I wrote
one version of that memoir andin one version of the memoir it
was dual point of view, so itwas my mother's story in her
point of view and her chapters,and then it was my perspective
(31:26):
as a young person and how Iexperienced that.
I was kind of really happy withthat.
But my agent didn't feel likethat was commercially viable and
so she encouraged me to changeit all to my point of view.
And I remember having thisconversation with Alice where
she's like she's, you know, youragent is advising you based on
(31:48):
what she thinks is thecommercial success.
She goes.
Your memoir, the way you wroteit, was beautiful.
Um, you know, I think it'spublishable as it is and I have
no regrets about the decision Imade.
I think that was a lesson thatI needed to learn, but I do
(32:10):
think now, looking back on it,that was also another example of
me not being true to myself andme just bending in to fit in
with what commercialexpectations might be and how it
might lead to greatercommercial success.
Plot twist, as usual, my agentsubmitted my memoir to five
publishers and she was kind oflukewarm on it.
(32:33):
I'm going to be honest.
It really wasn't her genrewasn't what she was really
interested in or, you know, hadin her wheelhouse, was really
interested in or, you know, hadin her wheelhouse.
But after the romance fiasco Iwas like no, I'm going to write
what I want to write.
I'm going to write the thingsthat matter to me.
So she submitted it to fivepublishers.
(32:55):
It wasn't picked up, theydidn't want it and at this point
she was done.
She did not want to submit itelsewhere.
I was not.
I really believed in this bookand I really wanted to fight for
this book and I wanted it to betraditionally published, even
though at this point I'd startedlooking at and thinking about
the self-publishing world.
But I really wanted it to betraditionally published and that
(33:18):
was more for my mother.
I really wanted my mother'sstory to get that validation and
so I took on the submissionprocess and I submitted to five
publishers and I had publishersinterested publishers asking for
full manuscripts, because yousubmit a query letter in some
instances, a partial in others,and then it's a matter of
(33:41):
whether they want to request apartial or they want to request
the full manuscript.
So there was interest in it andalso my agent had submitted to
like the five big publishers andthen I went down the list to
the five independent publishers.
So there was still like a lotof publishers that I could go
through.
It was just sort of workingdown the hierarchy in terms of
(34:01):
the big publishers and then thesmaller independent publishers.
And I wasn't interested at thispoint in commercial success.
I wasn't interested in making adeal.
All I was interested wasgetting this memoir published
and so as soon as I had thefirst offer, I took the first
offer and I withdrew it from theother publishers and I have no
regrets about the decision.
(34:22):
I'm really happy because thatmemoir was published very and my
mother passed away I thinkwithin five months.
It was published in May.
She passed away in November ofthat year and so having that
moment with her is worth morethan words.
(34:43):
The interesting thing is,though, that that memoir being
published you know, I got allthese beautiful reviews, and
then my publisher submitted itfor a prize and I got
shortlisted for the NationalBiography Prize, which had prize
money attached to it, so I won$2,000.
So I actually didn't get anadvance on that book.
(35:07):
I was only being paid and I'monly paid for sales and
royalties, but winning thatprize actually gave me some
money and, you know, led tocommercial success in one sense
for that book.
For me, at this point, I wasrethinking my direction and my
(35:27):
voice, and I knew that it wastime to part ways with my agent.
And this was a very harddecision because she was an
agent with the biggest agency,curtis Brown, and so there was a
certain amount of credibilityin having her as an agent.
But I knew that we weren't agood fit, and I also knew at
(35:51):
this point that I was done withthe traditional publishing world
.
I really wanted to take my mystrength back, my story back,
and I wanted to make all of thedecisions, and I wanted to just
follow my voice and not sort ofbe led into certain directions
(36:13):
based on possible commercialsuccesses.
The one thing I will say is myagent was really wonderful where
she let me make that decision.
She, um, it was fairly obviousto me that we weren't a fit, and
it was fairly obvious to methat she didn't think.
(36:34):
You know also that we were afit in terms of what I wanted to
write and what I wanted toexplore, but she did not, um,
you know, do anything other thansupport and sort of give me the
green light to submit furtherthings to her.
I was the one who actually, um,said that I would like to part
(36:55):
ways and went through theprocess of that, and I I really
appreciate that about her.
I really appreciate her, um,being so supportive of writers
and understanding that.
You know, it is veryheartbreaking, and if she had
been the one to like dump me, ina sense it would have been, I
(37:16):
would have been able to copewith it, but it would have been
still a little bit disempowering, and so she really left it the
ball in my court and let me feelempowered, you know, by making
that decision and by takingcontrol of that.
So I'm very, very grateful toher and I am very grateful for
(37:36):
the experience of her taking achance on me of her working with
me and trying, um, you know, toget my traditional writing
career in a commercial direction.
I've just realized that I havedifferent values and different
things that I want to exploreand that, um, you know that that
(37:59):
wasn't quite the way for me.
So I have now um being, youknow, published with this memoir
, and the one thing that thismemoir also did for me was it
made me realize the value ofnon-fiction.
Um, I actually was not a bigreader of memoir when I was
(38:24):
writing and when I wassubmitting memoir which is
terrible, like I would not givethat advice to anyone at all
read in your genre, and so youknow that presented some
difficulties for me during thewriting process.
I'll be very honest, if I haddone some reading and some, you
know, immersing myself into thatgenre.
(38:45):
But I was just sort of in avery overwhelmed place at that
time in terms of jugglingfull-time work as a teacher,
being a mother, and then tryingto write the memoir, and I just
sort of had to focus on thewriting as a way of getting
myself out of.
You know, I think when you'reworking full-time there's this
(39:06):
fear, especially in a careerlike teaching, that really takes
everything from you.
There is this huge fear aboutlosing yourself and losing your
creativity.
And so I had to keep writingthe memoir in order not to do
that, in order to not lose myidentity as a writer.
To do that in order to not losemy identity as a writer.
(39:31):
And so when I wrote this memoirand then really started
immersing myself into the world,I started seeing opportunities
about being able to write memoirpieces for publication, opinion
pieces for publication, and soI slowly embarked on that world,
and that was something I hadwanted to do for so long.
I had wanted to be a freelancewriter and I wanted to have
(39:54):
articles published, but it wasthis world that was beyond me,
and, as usual, I had manysupportive people who I spoke to
, who helped me think about howto do that, and all it takes is
one.
And so the first article that Ihad published I remember it was
somebody had written aboutdelivering a writing course and
(40:19):
EAL the English teachersinterfering with their writing.
So I wrote a rebuttal and I hadpeople encouraging me.
We were out of contact and Iwas like, oh, I'm thinking about
doing this, and they were like,well, do this and do that and
the other thing, and so I gotinto this freelance writing and
it's just so fascinating how,when you enter a new world, at
(40:41):
first it's so hard and you don'tknow what you're doing, and
thankfully I had editorssupporting me and helping me
develop my voice, and then ideasjust keep coming and ways of
using this as a method ofpromotion and of advocacy just
started coming together for me.
(41:01):
Just started coming togetherfor me, and I think also because
I had started, you know,looking at the self-publishing.
I'd already embarked on thefreelance writing, but then,
when I was becoming an indieauthor, I was really looking at
ways to monetise my skills andwhat I had to offer, and so
(41:22):
freelance writing became an evenbigger aspect of my life, and
I'm now at the point where Ihave enough recognition where I
actually get editors contactingme and commissioning me to write
articles, which is beautifuland heartening.
But I found that my strength isdelving into personal stories
(41:47):
and finding the universal in thepersonal, and so I'm not a
freelance writer where I canlook at something as an issue
and I can just write an articleabout that or hit on things that
are, you know, issues at thetime.
It has to be something that ispersonally connected to me,
(42:08):
something that I can see myselfin.
So I always need that personalin order to be able to write it.
And so, during this process ofdiscovery, I've sort of gone
deeper into what it is that I'mwriting, what it is that I want
to say, what it is that'simportant to me.
(42:29):
And you know, I've realized afew things in terms of my
evolution as an author, which isI have to write things that are
personal, things that I thinkare doing something in some way
to change the world and thathave meaning to me.
So currently I'm pivoting again.
(42:51):
I am looking at a another typeof writing.
So I'm entering the crime worldand writing a crime series, but
I'm focused on telling storiesand advocating for human rights.
So you know, the first book isset in a steppard and it deals
with the genocide that happens.
(43:12):
It's a war story and it dealswith nationalism and othering,
and I have all of these thingsI'm going to be doing in terms
of promoting this book, but alsoin terms of sharing things that
I think are really important.
So, you know, looking at doingtalks and articles about these
(43:32):
issues in order to promote thebook, but also in order to get
people to think about thesethings.
So book two is about genocidedenial and war criminals hiding
in Australia and about, you know, migrants in Australia and that
experience.
Book three is about mentalillness treatment in migrants,
(43:55):
about national servicemen inAustralia during the Vietnam War
and about LGBTQ rights, and allof this happened organically.
I was just writing things andideas were coming to me, but
then, when I started thinkingabout the marketing side and
preparing blurbs and preparingall these things that I can do
(44:16):
to market it, I realized thatthere was a theme and so I
realized that, you know, it'sabout human rights, and so I've
actually now mapped out thisseries and I've mapped out, you
know, book four, five and six interms of human rights issues
and in terms of advocacy workthat I want to do, but also
(44:36):
writing just, you know, crimenovels that operate on that
level, and I've also.
One of the things that happensis when you are writing series,
especially in the indie world,I've been seeing a lot of talk
about how do you createinterconnected series, how do
you sort of get people into yourfictional world and then they
(44:58):
continue reading through thatfictional world.
So I've actually mapped out twoother interconnected series.
And so at this point I'm at acrossroads, because I published
my romance novels under MayArcher and I was going to
continue the series.
So Return to Me was going to bepart of a series Leap of Faith
(45:23):
and it was going to be followingcharacters two and three.
But when I published that, um,I realized that had been too
long since I had written thatbook and so I was like I don't
think I'm going to continuethose characters.
Then I published hollywooddreams and vintage dreams and I
was going to work on the thirdbook in the series.
But then I saw this opportunityto be a part of an anthology
(45:47):
where it had to be a beach theme, and so I wrote a novella to be
a part of that.
And then I mapped out a romanceseries I was going to write in
that world, since now thatanthology is not published
anymore.
But I haven't published thatnovella because I'm not sure
(46:08):
what I'm doing with it.
I think I need to just offer itto my subscribers as a free
book, um, but then I'm alsoconcerned about building, uh, my
newsletter with romance readerswhen I'm not pursuing that.
So I think, think, possibly,but you know, it all depends on
the news.
I think possibly that romancepart is going to be left and I'm
(46:34):
just going to pursue anddedicate myself to this crime
series and to writing the sixbooks of the main series and
then looking at the other seriesthat I want to connect.
So, remember, the first threebooks are done.
I'm actually just trying toprepare the first book for
(46:56):
publication, but I've got allthese things that I want to do
with it and I'm also in thesishell right now with my PhD, so I
need to sort of, you know,clear the decks, clear some
space.
So, yeah, that evolution ofwhat am I doing.
I'm in that crossroads again andyou know, things might change
(47:20):
in terms of what I want to do.
So I think I just want to wrapup and talk about lessons and
talk about, you know, someadvice that I would give you if
you are looking for your voiceand looking for things that
happen, looking for things thatyou want to do and are at
(47:42):
crossroads.
So I would say to you writewhat feels true to you, not what
others expect.
While I have no regrets aboutthe detours that I have taken
and the way that my writingjourney has progressed, I did
delay things.
I did sort of do the long wayaround.
(48:03):
If I hadn't done that detourwith romance, I might have
advanced sooner with otherthings, but you know.
Then again, you don't know.
So I do think that focus on youand your voice and not what
others might expect.
Don't be afraid to tell storiesfrom your lived experience.
(48:25):
You know they are uniquelyyours.
Each and every one of us hasbeen through a unique life
journey and we have a point ofview and we have something worth
saying.
So if you can get in touch withyour core values, get in touch
with your core truth and usethat to guide you in your
writing, so write often and giveyourself permission to evolve
(48:50):
as a writer.
I actually haven't done acounter right now as to how many
books I've written, becauseI've actually not published all
of my books that are hidden onmy hard drive because I have not
had the time.
Uh, so I don't know.
I might have written 15 books,to be honest.
And you do evolve as a writeras you go, and so just give
(49:13):
yourself permission to do that,to write different things, to do
different experiments and tosee what works for you and what
leads you to that and I thinkthe last tip that I think is
really, really important is yourvoice doesn't have to be
perfect, but it has to beauthentic, and that is something
(49:35):
that I've realised in terms ofmy writing.
I go back to my core value and,you know, being authentic, being
real, not sugarcoating anything, not trying to be anyone.
So, for me, it's been a longjourney to get to this point of
complete confidence and completestrength in who I am and what I
(50:01):
want to do.
It has been a wild ride.
It has been, you know, a lot ofheartbreak.
I think that is the truth oflife.
We do have to go through somethings, but I think we also do
lose ourselves.
We lose ourselves in othervoices and in what other people
are doing, and I'm learning notto do that anymore.
(50:23):
So, in the indie world, thingsare changing very, very quickly
and there are lots of shiny new,wonderful things, and I'm
learning now to pause, toevaluate and to really, you know
, think about whether that issomething that I want to do.
And, in terms of my writing, Iam learning that I have to write
(50:47):
what is truth to me, and I'malso, you know, I've gone
through a midlife crisis and Iwill do an episode about that.
But, having gone through amidlife crisis, there is this
element of how much time do Ihave left and what do I want to
do with this time, what is thelegacy that I want to leave,
(51:10):
what are the books that I haveto write and have to leave?
And so when I look at mywriting life through that lens,
it becomes really simple.
It becomes really simple aboutwhat I need to work on and what
I need to write, because it'sthese books that I'm working on
now that are really addressinghuman rights issues and that are
(51:33):
really giving me thatopportunity to do advocacy and
to continue to build on mycareer as a freelance writer and
as well as a speaker, and alsoto look at, you know, academic
opportunities and academia andpossibly stepping into that
world through some of thesepassions.
(51:53):
So thank you for joining me inthis episode.
I hope that this has inspiredyou to trust in your voice to
share your stories.
I'd love to hear from you, solet me know if you enjoyed this
episode, what you found helpful.
Let me know about crossroadsthat you are hitting and where
(52:15):
you are in your writing journey,and what are the things that
you are struggling with and alsolet me know if there's anything
in particular that you wouldlike addressed in episodes you
would like to hear from in thefuture.
So don't forget that there areshow notes, there's a special
handout, it's all on my website.
(52:36):
So go to amrapayalichcom slashpodcast and you can find all of
that information there.
And, yeah, keep writing andremember that your story matters
.
What you have to say matters,thank you.
Thank you for tuning in toAmra's Armchair Anecdotes.
(52:59):
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 beginswith a single word.
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Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.
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If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.