Episode Details

In this special episode we go behind the scenes with memoirist Deepa Paul, essayist, cookbook author Gina Beach, and novelist Daisy Buchanan and talk about the two things that keep them going: the passion behind the work, and the practice that makes the work possible.

From an essay that no editor wanted to a Women's Prize-longlisted memoir, a personal research rabbit hole that became a four-year book project, and the journey from idea to novel, this is a personal conversation with three writers about about why they write the things they write — and what kept them going.

You'll learn

• Why an essay no editor wanted a decade ago turned out not to be an essay at all.
• How to break a book into tasks small enough to finish inside a single hour.
• The case for treating your own interior life as seriously as any grand subject.
• How a rabbit hole of personal research turned into a four-year book project.
• Why the hardest part of self-publishing has nothing to do with production.
• When procrastination is doing useful work, and when it's just filling the gaps.
• What changes in your writing once you stop trying to get it right.
• A reason to stop measuring a writing session by its word count.
• How sitting alongside other writers quietly rearranges your sense of your own work.
• The tidal metaphor that makes a bad writing day easier to let go of.

Resources & Links

• Writers' Hour
• Ask Me: A Memoir of Daring to Love Differently by Deepa Paul
• Deepa Paul
• 'The power of an hour' — Deepa Paul interviewed by the Women's Prize
• Nurture: Oil-Free, Plant-Based Cooking for Health by Regina Beach
• Regina Beach
• All Grown Up: A hilarious and heartwarming new novel inspired by Little Women by Daisy Buchanan
• Daisy Buchanan — Creative Confidence Clinic

About the Guests

Deepa Paul is a Filipina-Indian author living in Amsterdam. Her writing explores the balance between being a mother, wife, girlfriend, daughter, adventurer, and herself – all at the same time. Her debut, Ask Me: A Memoir of Daring to Love Differently, was longlisted for the Women's Prize.

Regina Beach is a disabled poet and essayist. Originally from the American midwest, she now calls the Welsh Valleys home. Her writing has appeared in Global Poemic, Boldly Mental, The Rail, Haiku by You, Five Minutes, Visual Verse, The Horror Tree, and Disoriented among others. She is the founder of the literary magazine Lesions | Art + Words, which features the work of people living with chronic health conditions. Her book is Nurture: Oil