Fiona Lucas: Debunking Romance Myths and Crafting Connections

Fiona Lucas is my Christmas Eve guest and in our conversation, we talk about her journey through the world of romance writing, breaking down stereotypes and sharing valuable insights into her creative process. Listen as Fiona, with her vibrant personality, shares her creative process, delves into the chaotic yet humorous world of publishing, and offers insights into transitioning from series romance to wider commercial fiction. We also talk about being a BookTok influencer and her latest book, "Always and Only You"

Always and Only You
Erin is about to marry the love of her life. She and Simon have been together for eight years so it feels right that they’re finally tying the knot. It’s been stressful balancing the demands of friends and family – not to mention Simon’s difficult best man, Gil – but Erin couldn’t be happier.

Couldn’t be happier, that is, until she walks down the aisle and finds the wrong man waiting for her. But is the universe playing a cruel trick on Erin, or could it be that her perfect life isn’t quite what she imagined…?

Follow Fiona Lucas

Chapters

• 0:00 Romance Writing Stigma and Gratitude
• 3:26 Discovering a Writing Passion
• 14:49 Navigating the Publishing Industry
• 17:57 Navigating Family Reactions to Publication
• 22:27 Romance Writing Stigmas and Trends
• 35:37 Effective Strategies for TikTok Growth
• 43:07 Storytelling and Personal Boundaries
• 56:03 Navigating Writing Challenges and Inspiration
• 1:01:44 Lessons Learned on Writing Journey

Transcript

Fiona Lucas: 0:00

Writing romance gets, I mean, you get a bit of a flack for that. But writing Mills and Boone like the amount of people said to me, oh, is it trashy, like is it all your sex life in there, and like just make really inappropriate and just really kind of like look down their noses at it. But it's actually quite hard to write a short book that's kind of going to fill a reader expectation while it's still being completely fresh and new.

Nadine Matheson: 0:25

Hello and welcome to this week's episode of the Conversation with Nadine Matheson. As always, I hope that you're well and I hope you've had a good week, and I hope that you're ready for Christmas because, yes, today, today is Christmas Eve and I'm not sure how we got here. I'm really not. I mean, the year has gone so quickly. It really has. It honestly feels like, well, just a few short months ago it was summer and then I don't even feel like I even got to enjoy autumn. That just seemed to speed past, and now we're here getting ready for Christmas Day tomorrow. Anyway, I hope that you've had a wonderful year so far. I hope that you're going to have a wonderful Christmas and I just wanted to say thank you to all of my listeners over the past year who have tuned in to the podcast and have reviewed, left comments and shared the podcast and have also got in touch with me to say how much they've enjoyed the conversations that I've had with my brilliant guests.

Nadine Matheson: 1:28

Now it may sound like I'm wrapping up for Christmas and wrapping up for 2024, but I'm not. There will be another episode of the conversation podcast. You will have a final episode of 2024 next week, on New Year's Eve. But I just wanted to say thank you now. I don't want to forget because, as I said, tomorrow's Christmas and I'm going to be in some kind of stupor over the Christmas break and for those of my listeners and for my listeners in the States yeah, the UK kind of shuts down. It's Christmas Eve and the UK has shut down and it will be shut down until I can't even think till the 2nd of January, when everyone's back to work. So hopefully I won't forget to say thank you next week, but in case I do, because I'll still be in my stupor and probably forgetting what day of the week it is, I'm just wanting to say thank you now.

Nadine Matheson: 2:21

Now I'm going to get on with the show and this week I'm in conversation with the amazing and funny. She's so funny, she's so happy and in our conversation, as well as talking about Fiona's new book, always and Only you, we talk about how a dream drew Fiona Lucas to writing romance, the serious business of writing commercial fiction and how Fiona gives her audience value on TikTok. Now, as always, sit back, we'll go for a walk and enjoy the conversation. Fiona Lucas, welcome to the conversation. Hi, thank you for having me. We're both very excited for Wednesday, I know.

Fiona Lucas: 2:59

Very excitable. It's kind of my natural state sort of of.

Nadine Matheson: 3:08

I think it's a good way to be. Just be like light and bubbly the world is.

Fiona Lucas: 3:12

I know, I know well. When I was a kid, my stepsister used to say to me you laugh too much. And I was like what's wrong with that?

Nadine Matheson: 3:21

there's not. Honestly, there is nothing wrong with that. It's better than the alternative, right? So, talking about when you as a kid, fiona, my first question for you it's not a deep question, it's not like that crazy, but how would you describe, how would you describe your writing journey?

Fiona Lucas: 3:39

um, well, I mean, I suppose it's one of those ones where I think I should have realised I'd end up writing all along, but I didn't. To start off with, I mean, I loved imaginary worlds, stories, like my sister would moan because I would play imaginary games and not let her join in because she'd just get annoying. So I just play them by myself with all the imaginary characters around me. Sometimes I'd let her be a dog or something, but nothing important. You tell she's my younger sister, um, but yeah, so I always love telling stories.

Fiona Lucas: 4:14

I love kind of writing stories at school, but I kind of also like performing arts and things like that. So that's kind of where my passion was to start off with, and it wasn't until I kind of calmed down and got into my 30s and was desperate for something creative to do. That I had an idea for a story and thought, crikey, why don't I try writing it? I had two small kids at the time, so I wanted something I could do where I didn't need a babysitter or special equipment or. Um, it was something. I mean, most of it goes on in your head, doesn't it?

Fiona Lucas: 4:45

when you're kind of just driving and thinking and um, so that's how I decided to kind of sit down and try and write a story out of my idea. Um, but then um, and I quickly got hooked. So, um, that's how, my well, it wasn't my first book. I started a book, knew it wasn't quite working and then started a second book and that was the book that I sold. I went through the Romantic Novelists Association's new writer scheme so I sent that fully completed book in. They read it and they sent it on to Mills and Boone, who were my first publisher, and they sent it on to Mills and Boone, who were my first publisher, and I got a contract. It was like completely unexpected. I thought I was going to have to spend, like I said, I'll give myself five years, but it turned out from. Actually, it took me about a year and a half to get to my second manuscript and then probably a couple of months from sending it off to getting a contract, and I was overjoyed and terrified in equal measures.

Nadine Matheson: 5:51

What were you doing before that, before you started? Not the book you you sent off, but before you even sat down and started writing that first book. What were you doing before that? Because you know, when you're in your 30s, I think when you're in your like your teenage years, you think in your 30s. I think when you're in your, like your teenage years, you think in your 30s everything should be set. Because you're so delusional at 16 you don't have a clue. When you think in your 30s you, everything should be set. But then you find yourself in your 30s and sometimes it's not set. So what were you doing before? Um?

Fiona Lucas: 6:24

not achieving grown-up status, as I thought I would like you said.

Nadine Matheson: 6:30

That's what I was.

Fiona Lucas: 6:33

I was, uh, well, I had a must have been when I started writing. I had like a six-year-old and a two-year-old. So I was, I'd been working for a charity. Um, my performing arts dreams had died, sadly, by then, because I discovered, um, I was good at choreography but I wasn't the best technical performer so I wasn't going to get anywhere with dancing, which is what I did, my degree in um. So I'd ended up working for a charity doing they made cable tv programs, and so I came on kind of with like rackety old equipment that was 20 years old, trying to make tv programs and edit stuff. But I'd given that up by the time I went.

Fiona Lucas: 7:13

I went part-time when I had my first child, just because it was too full-on. So I ended up moving into doing kind of admin and kind of accounts and things like that just, and it was a nice part-time job that gave me flexibility to be home with the kids. So I think that's why I was screaming out for something creative to do. Um, because I was just like, oh, kind of I'm not doing anything, I'm not dancing, I'm not singing, and not that my singing is brilliant, but I do like to do it. Um, you know, I wasn't kind of doing artsy things, I just didn't have the time. But um, writing. Then I was like, oh yeah, I always thought I'd write a book one day. I just never got around to it. So and I was like, oh, how did I not realize this is my favorite thing of all, all along yeah, how did you not realize that?

Nadine Matheson: 7:59

I think I sound really rude saying it and I could hear it in my head. It sounds like a rude question, but it's like you have like this creative person screaming like battering, trying to get out, but you didn't realise that writing was that creative outlet for you.

Fiona Lucas: 8:17

No, I suppose, because I was doing other things. I was still kind of dancing a bit and doing stuff like that more on a kind of local community level and just enjoying that kind of side of things. Um, and I did. It's interesting that some of the when I was at university doing dance what the? The thing I got marked best one was something was a dance based on a letter that I wrote that, um, it was based on, it was a silly. It was not silly, it was a funny, humorous dance based on a complaint letter and um, and I was based on, it was a silly. It was not silly, it was a funny, humorous dance based on a complaint letter and um, and I was like clearly there was something like the words thing was there. I don't know how I didn't realize it. My dad's a journalist, his dad's a journalist, they're all everyone in my family's good words and writing, so I think maybe I was just being rebellious it's.

Nadine Matheson: 9:02

You know what, when you listen to a lot of other stories especially when I say creative people, mainly writers that's what I'm talking to. Talking about their background there's not many who have like that. Their worlds may be filled with books in terms of they love books and they'll go to libraries and that sort of thing, but in terms of being surrounded by people who write, a lot of them of them didn't meet their first writer until maybe they'd written their first book, like met their first author face-to-face. So it's interesting to hear the other side of the story, when you know you're surrounded by words, people creating words.

Fiona Lucas: 9:39

Yeah, although I suppose it was, I was kind of making stuff up whereas they were reporting facts and kind of writing about real life stuff. But yes, you're right, I was kind of. I was a total bookworm. My dad was always. I've got pictures of me on holiday, like on boats in the sunshine, everyone else is sunbathing and I've got my head in a book and my husband's nickname for me is Edna, as in Edna Berg. Um, so so yeah, I probably should have worked it out sooner, but I was like, where is where this has been missing? This is what was missing from my life. I just love it so much.

Nadine Matheson: 10:20

I'm obsessed now did it feel when you, even though it the first book, didn't go anywhere? But when you completed that first book, did you feel? Did you like feel that transitional moment, like, oh my god, this is it, this is what I should have been doing all this time?

Fiona Lucas: 10:39

I think I probably felt that before that while I was still writing. But I do remember having one of those. You know, if I could have done a victory lap around a stadium with a flag, I would have done it. Writing the end for the very first time I was like I was on my own. I think I went punch the air on my desk, um, uh, but, but yeah. So, uh, uh, it was to get to the end, because I think writing the first one I mean writing any book is hard like some. I'm surprised it doesn to get to the end, because I think writing the first one I mean writing any book is hard like some. I'm surprised it doesn't get huge, hugely easier. But the first one was definitely. I think I described it to someone like climbing a mountain with using just your fingernails.

Nadine Matheson: 11:17

Um, it was hard oh, I'm a crime writer and I'm like oh, that's harsh and descriptive. I keep wanting to kill people in my books.

Fiona Lucas: 11:31

Yeah, I keep wanting to kill people off, but my editor often tells me I'm not allowed to because it's not like it's not romantic enough. It's like can I, even you know, bury the side characters? Horrible husband under the patio. Go on, please.

Nadine Matheson: 11:46

That's like brookside whenever I think of bodies under the patio I'm so my age. I think of bodies under the patio. I always go back to brookside when I found the body under the patio.

Fiona Lucas: 12:00

I think I remember that. Yeah, yeah, what, what drew?

Nadine Matheson: 12:02

you to romance? Did you know from the beginning that's what you wanted to write, or did it just happen by?

Fiona Lucas: 12:07

accident. I think it's just because, weirdly I mean this sounds really weird but I had a dream one night. I mean I don't know about you, but I have dreams where sometimes I'm not in the dream, I'm kind of watching. It's almost like a play or a television. I'm watching other characters, and it's almost like a play or a television. I'm watching other characters.

Fiona Lucas: 12:24

And I had to dream one night which was a bit of a love story and I didn't remember loads of it when I woke up, but I remembered one moment of like a look between the two characters and kind of who they basically were and I thought, oh, why don't you fight? You know, that's a great idea for a story. So I think it's because that was the kickstart to it that I then decided to try and write romance. And then I had come across an online romance writing community this is before Facebook and things like this. I'd come along a message board with lots of authors and they were all writing romance. So I kind of got immersed in that and that's what I ended up doing and I did quite enjoy kind of having a bit of escapism maybe from being a mum of two small kids and, you know, a little bit of fantasy in there yeah, no, no, not in a horrible, because I love.

Nadine Matheson: 13:16

I love a rom-com. Despite what I write, I do a rom-com and I can't remember who I was talking to about this like having those airport moments. We need to run off to the airport and grab the love of your life.

Fiona Lucas: 13:32

I've done a few of those. Oh, I might have done one in an airport actually, but like, yeah, there has to be some kind of big kind of you mean like climactic. Yeah, it has to be. It normally is one character going to the other and going sorry, I was such an idiot. I quite like it when I make the female characters do it, though as well. I know quite often in the films, whatever it's the guy. But maybe because the female character is often my main character, she often has the most growing to do, so I quite like flipping on his head and making her do the work if she's been the most growing to do. So I quite, quite, quite like flipping on his head and making her do the work if she's been the idiot.

Nadine Matheson: 14:07

So but I'm such a I always think about the practical side. I did mention this before on a previous podcast, talking to a romance author, and I said like yes, I love the airport run, but it's not really practical in Gatwick airport when you'll get to the airport and they don't let you through.

Fiona Lucas: 14:29

No, no, I mean, it used to be easier before. Um airline restrictions got a little tighter, I suppose. Uh, but yeah, now you can't do it. I just have a tearful farewell scene at just outside security at an airport in a recent book.

Nadine Matheson: 14:42

So, um, yeah, you can do the game, yeah you can do the barter just before you go through.

Fiona Lucas: 14:49

Yeah, your boarding pass it's just, it's not very sexy.

Nadine Matheson: 14:54

That is it, though, no it's not, it's so, it's so practical and it'll probably be a case of oh my god, where's my boarding pass. I thought I had it on my phone. Now I can't find find it. Is it in my bag? It's like probably be a case of oh my God, where's my boarding pass. I thought I had it on my phone. No, I can't find it. Is it in my bag? It's like probably be that sort of panic, not the I love you.

Fiona Lucas: 15:09

Yeah. Yeah, it was kind of pretty much that going on in the scene, but then sometimes those are fun to write. If it's not the traditional scene, if you've got lots of little, especially if it's a slightly more um, rom-commy scene, that it'll be a yeah, it that?

Nadine Matheson: 15:27

there are little irritations happening. I was watching um cheers this morning because when you get up early on for those who are not in the UK on channel four they just seem to show reruns of friends, not friends of them, of cheers, and like at seven o'clock in the morning. So I was up when I was watching this episode of Cheers and Rebecca she's going out with this plumber and she's like this is the man of my life, like I love him and I know he's gonna answer. He's gonna pop the question and I can't remember the character's name. But he comes along and he's sitting with her and he's like I need to ask you a question. And she's like this is it get the champagne ready? Like he's going to propose. And he's like then he does. He says will you marry me?

Nadine Matheson: 16:03

And her head does a complete free throw, 180. And she's like no. And he's like what do you mean? And then she leaves the table. She goes no, no, I mean to say yes, I meant to say yes. And she goes back and is like ask me again. He's like will you marry me? No, I can't do it oh, I loved Rebecca.

Fiona Lucas: 16:22

She's my favourite Cheers character, I think.

Nadine Matheson: 16:26

I just, you know, you see, just talking about it's the moments that are not necessarily the romantic moments. There's stuff that happens around it that are the most hilarious. I think it was hilarious just her whole face, because she wants to say yes, but it's like mentally she just couldn't get herself to respond to it, so it was just a no, yeah because clearly I don't remember the plumber, so she can't have ended up with him no, I think I left anyway.

Nadine Matheson: 16:51

I went to get a cup of tea and I was like, oh, it's an advert and I missed the end of it. So what was it like going back to when you, um to when you submitted to Mills and Bean? Did you understand how the publishing industry worked? Because unless you're in it and then when you do come in it, you realize it's this very big, strange machine at times. But did you understand how it worked?

Fiona Lucas: 17:13

I. I think that that online community was a good place to learn because there were other unpublished writers, there were recently published writers, so there was a little bit of information. But I do have to say Mills and Boone is its own little strange corner of the publishing universe, that it operates slightly differently to mainstream publishing but similarly enough that when I then moved out of that to doing kind of more commercial fiction, I did feel a bit like I'd left primary school and gone to big school because there were some things I just didn't know anything about. I was in some ways I'd written by that point 15, 16 books, but at the same time there was stuff I didn't know about some things, some parts of the process it worked a little bit differently. So there was a learning curve, even just switching from like series, romance, as it's called to commercial fiction well, you wouldn't even think that, would you like?

Nadine Matheson: 18:07

I think anyone else listening you just think, once you're in, it basically works wherever you know, wherever you, wherever you go throughout the industry, it, the systems, are the same, but the thing you know Meals and Boons has its own things in some respects yeah, yeah, it was.

Fiona Lucas: 18:24

I didn't know what I didn't know. Sometimes I was going to say I got more things that were different. If that's what you're going to ask like, yeah, um, well, one of the advantages of meals and boom was that everyone's treated the same. Um, the advances might vary depending on your experience, but everybody's books go out, they, they publish. How many is in each, each series? Each month, they publish four books, or six books, or eight books. So as a new author, you're always guaranteed to get a slot.

Fiona Lucas: 18:53

So it was a great way to to start selling books, because people will pick up the book just because, oh, I like that line, I like the medical romance, or I like the sweet romance, or I like the you know, the billionaires romances. So people would give your book a try, even if they'd never heard of you. So that was nice. Um, but there was much less like, my covers were my covers, my titles were my titles. There wasn't a lot of discussion about that, or if I did try and suggest them, they normally weren't right. Because actually I'm discovering I suppose it's a bit like indie romance titles. Now you have to have the hooks in the titles. Yeah, and I wasn't very good at writing hooky titles, so in the end I just gave up. My books would just be delivered as my characters' names and I'd let my editor sort out the call it what you want, yeah because even if I tried to come up with one, it was never right.

Fiona Lucas: 19:45

I think I got one and a half titles kind of in while I was writing series romance, like I had one that's, I think it was. It was a blind date, I think was my first one. Um, that kept in the title, but they chose I think I called it the blind date bride, but they they wanted to call it blind date marriage because someone else had already had blind date bride. So I kept the half a title but coming up with titles isn't easy.

Nadine Matheson: 20:11

No, because I mean I always have to. I always say when I'm writing, when I'm starting the project, I have to call it something, even even if I know in the back of my head that's not going to be the final title. But I will call it, yeah, something. But before we started, like I'm working, I'm working on a short story and I'm trying to come up with a title for it and in my head it has to be a one word title. It's so hard because you want that title to sum up everything but also tell you nothing, if that makes sense yeah, it can tell you, it just isn't.

Fiona Lucas: 20:42

It has to be the sort of title that signals to readers that this book is like maybe some other books you like, but it's not. So the title is similar that you can um, you're going to get them mixed up or you've stolen someone else's title. Um, it's really tough. I don't think I'm getting better. I'm better with the commercial fiction titles, I have to say. But the current book is just called the Anniversary, which is not what it's going to be called. I don't think it's not a kind of book or Book 30. It's also what I call it.

Nadine Matheson: 21:18

How did your family respond when you got that first book published by Mills and Boone? Were they like well, your family, how did your family respond when you got that first book published by mills and boone? Were they like we knew?

Fiona Lucas: 21:23

we just knew it was time it was going to happen, and were they surprised I think they were quite surprised, mostly because I I was so sure that probably nothing was going to happen that I didn't tell anyone I was writing a book, apart from my husband, like nobody knew. I just kept it secret.

Nadine Matheson: 21:41

I thought then, if I crash and burn, nobody knows you can crash and burn in quiet, in the quietness of your life in privacy, so, um.

Fiona Lucas: 21:50

so I I once I my book had gone through the RNA's new writer scheme and I knew it'd been sent to an editor somewhere. Then I actually fessed up. So I think some some of my family were like, oh, okay, I don't think they were like completely taken aback, but it was like okay, that's new, but I think it made sense on some level as well. And my sister was like, oh, but I was going to write a book. It's like you still can, and she has done since. But yeah, but I don't think she'd realised it was something I'd thought of doing, you know, apart from maybe us both talking about it when we were teenagers.

Nadine Matheson: 22:27

So yeah, was anyone surprised that you were writing romance? Because I think you know when you talk about the commercial genres, it can have such a there can be like a stigma around it and people can hear it. You, yeah, you know people like they 'll talk down like, oh, you're writing crime, you're writing romance, it's not deemed serious.

Fiona Lucas: 22:49

No, hard work, yeah, and actually, um, I've discovered writing romance gets I mean, you get a bit of a flack for that. But writing Mills and Boone like the amount of people said to me, oh is it trashy, like is it all your sex life in there, and like just make really inappropriate and just really kind of like look down their noses at it. But it's actually quite hard to write a short book that's kind of going to fill a reader expectation while it's still being completely fresh and new. Um, and actually most Mills and Boones aren't what people think they are anyway, you know people think they are how they were back in the 60s or something that's a long time ago. But yeah, so I did get family members saying when are you going to write a proper?

Nadine Matheson: 23:33

book. It's like a stab in the heart, it's like what do you mean?

Fiona Lucas: 23:38

I know it's a proper book. I know, or a real book. So I think had I been writing crime, I'd have probably got more kudos actually. But yeah, after a while I just developed a tough skin. You just kind of let it roll off you because, let's face it, crime and romance are some of the best-selling genres and you know, readers love, love them, no matter what other people say. So you know, as long as you've got readers loving your stories and wanting to buy them, that's, that's brilliant.

Nadine Matheson: 24:08

That's all I need yeah, I was doing a um. A couple of days ago I did a live, a live episode of the podcast and it was with crime writers and obviously doing your research beforehand. And when you're looking at the number of books books that are sold in the United Kingdom even though the levels are slightly dropped I can't find the number now but it's such a high number of the books that are sold, but always at the top it's crime and romance. Those are the biggest selling genres in when it in. Those are the biggest selling genres in the UK when it comes to book sales. So it seems a bit rude. I'm being polite.

Fiona Lucas: 24:47

I know, and I think maybe this is why, because I'm a big fan of TikTok, I think maybe this is why particularly romance in the early days took off on TikTok, because you're kind of not allowed to say you like romance anywhere else. You get a little bit kind of um. So I think maybe it was readers then saying, well, I'm gonna say, you know, because you can, there's a little bit more freedom on TikTok to say what you want to say and be yourself. That readers just embraced it and said, well, I like romance, so um and off it went.

Nadine Matheson: 25:19

Yeah, it's weird because you know people quite happily, like I did in the beginning of the podcast, say you know I love rom-coms, despite what I write and despite what I worked in, like prior to becoming a writer like I love a good rom-com, but you wouldn't have this you didn't necessarily have the same openness probably prior to social media of saying, oh yeah, I love, I love a good romance novel.

Fiona Lucas: 25:42

I just want to dive into that yeah, and I think even even I was guilty of it that when I first, when I when I realized that I was going to target Mills and Bean that's where I was going to send my books I then bought the line that I wanted to write for. I buy the four books every month and read all of them, but I used to get them at Sainsbury's and use my handheld zapper and just then hide them in my car at first but then after a while I was like no, I'm gonna be proud I'm reading romance, so like, and then I sit them proudly on top.

Fiona Lucas: 26:15

So but yeah, I felt like even as a reader and a writer of it, I kind of had to get over that stigma.

Nadine Matheson: 26:23

There's so many things that people do Like they hide their true self. It just brought me back to this memory, like I say, really showing my age, what God I must've been going to. I think I was going to uni, so I was on the train, I was on the tube, so we're talking mid to late, no late nineties. And there train, I was on the tube, so we're talking mid, yeah, mid to mid to late, no late 90s. And there was a guy. I sat next to him on the train and he had, you know when, the, when the times and the guardian were big, massive broadsheets, yeah, yeah, and he was sitting on the train and he had the big, massive broadsheet. And I'm sitting next to him and I looked, I just turned to my right and he had the sun hidden behind the newspaper, behind the broadsheet. It's like like my guy's just hiding what he's doing and then fast forward to when, oh, actually not even fast forward around the same time.

Nadine Matheson: 27:14

And I was working at books etc. Because that was my part-time job when I was at uni and I remember when the Harry Potter books came in, and obviously they're children's books, but then they had another set that were designed for adults. So the cover, it wasn't the cartoon, the animated cover, it was just a black cover with a train on it, so very Hitchcock-like, and it said Harry Potter and a Philosopher's Stone, but they made it to look like it was packaged to look like an adult book and it's said harry potter and a philosopher's stone, but they made it to look like it was packaged like an adult book. And it's this whole thing of people hiding, like their true intentions, what they're interested in because they're worried about what people will say yeah, and I think so, and I think maybe this is why romance really took off in ebook when kindle came around.

Fiona Lucas: 27:58

It's because you can be reading anything on your Kindle and no one sees the cover, and you can be reading all the steamy stuff on the train if you want, and unless someone's literally looking over your shoulder, nobody knows.

Nadine Matheson: 28:10

On the 745 to London Bridge. I know.

Fiona Lucas: 28:14

It's a bit early for that in the world.

Nadine Matheson: 28:17

It is a bit, but it's probably why Fifty Shades of Grey took off like it did. I think that came out around that whole, you know, when e-books were accessible.

Fiona Lucas: 28:32

Yeah, and I think as well, again, that didn't have what you would think of as a traditional steamy romance cover. There was no man with a bare chest, it was just a grey tie on the on the cover. Um, I haven't actually read it, I have to confess to that, uh. But yes, but the cover was kind of was was not the typical romance cover. Maybe that made it easier for people to pick up and feel like, oh, I'm not going to be judged reading this on the train, although by the time everybody knew what it was. They probably were judging you reading it on the train, but that's their problem.

Nadine Matheson: 29:08

It's their problem. Can I ask you about? You know, once you're in it and I'm talking about the romance industry, is there a difference between the UK I don't know if I'm saying it the right way the UK audiences of romance't know if I'm saying it the right way the UK audiences of romance in comparison to the US.

Fiona Lucas: 29:26

A little bit. Yeah, I kind of. I think the US romance market was much more narrowly defined. This is a romance, so for it to be a romance in the US it has to have the two well, two main characters normally, but it can be more depending on your genre. It normally, like when I first started, it would be like your two main characters and the focus of the story was mostly on them and there would have to be a happy ending, whereas in the UK I think, it's more what we call romantic fiction. So sometimes it would be more women's fiction, it's the woman's journey, but there's like a strong thread of a romance in there. That would still be considered romance in the UK, whereas that would be like oh no, that's not a romance, that's women's fiction in the US.

Fiona Lucas: 30:15

So there are kind of definitions that are a little bit different and certainly the covers were very different when I first started. I think now with you know, everything's become global, amazon's become global. Now covers work, you'll get one cover across the board. But certainly my covers were often really different, like so I might have cartoony characters or illustrated covers in the uk, but they were much more literal in the us. So much more pictures of couples and things on the front rather than that. So it's interesting to see. Yeah.

Nadine Matheson: 30:47

Listeners, it's time for a very short break. If you're enjoying this conversation with Nadine Matheson and want to help keep the podcast going, why not buy me a cup of coffee? Your support goes such a long way in keeping these conversations flowing. Just check out the link in the show notes. Are the fandoms different, like the US, in comparison to the UK? I don't know. I just get a feeling that the US and I don't mean to be offensive, I just get a feeling that they're probably more I don't want to say obsessive, that's not the right word. I can't think of what. The right word more intense.

Fiona Lucas: 31:29

Maybe I mean maybe with the current generation of romance readers. Maybe not, but I do remember like in the UK we would have nothing like some of the conventions they had in the US.

Nadine Matheson: 31:38

Yeah, I think that's what I'm mainly talking about.

Fiona Lucas: 31:41

I always wanted to go to the Romantic Times convention.

Fiona Lucas: 31:44

That was a romance books magazine that was out because it sounded wild, like it was mostly for readers. They would be like cover models with bare chests and people dressing up and doing all the things you expect to do, cosplaying as different things, which we just didn't have anything like it in the uk at all. Um, I did go to a writer's conference in the us. That was quite large and we did like a book signing and there were probably about 500 authors at the book signing and I happened to be sitting next to um like a paranormal romance bestseller and like the, the fans were just like shaking when they were coming to, like shaking when they were coming to, like crying when they were coming to get their book signed. And, of course, over the course of two hours, three people came and wanted my book. But like I didn't mind, it was quite good fun watching what was going on elsewhere. But yeah it, there was certainly. But I'm starting to see that enthusiasm for romance in the UK as well, which is nice you don't get that in crime.

Nadine Matheson: 32:43

No one's dressing up as Hannibal Lecter coming along like no one's got. Well, not, not the one. Not to the festivals I've been invited to no one's cosplaying. I only ever see cosplaying if I go to comic con, which is completely different because, like you expect to see, yeah, hundred spider-mans running around like that, it's not a surprise. But you don't get that level of um.

Fiona Lucas: 33:05

You know intensity and dedication in crime fiction it's definitely coming in, but I think kind of generally. I think like people I've got daughters in my their 20s and I think their people, their age group, are much more likely to just cosplay for whatever reason, whereas I was like I wish I'd been allowed to kind of dress up as book characters and things. You know, when I was younger I'd have loved it. There's a cosplay thing that happened when I was younger. I was like who wouldn't want to walk around with elf ears and a flowing dress?

Nadine Matheson: 33:36

I don't know yeah, we never got that. If you went to primary school, you went to school back in the 80s and 90s, you never got.

Fiona Lucas: 33:43

The whole world book day thing is able to dress up as your characters we just went to school, yeah, in my school uniform, polyester school uniform, yeah, so when you got into publishing, what was something that most surprised you?

Fiona Lucas: 33:59

um, I think, initially I think I had this idea that authors were all kind of, you know, oxford or Cambridge educated and lofty, high artistic beings, but actually I found that lots of people were mums with small kids just like me, especially in the romance writing industry, that actually authors come in all shapes and sizes from all different backgrounds, and that's, that's lovely. And actually I think people think, oh, I can't be an author because I'm not that kind of person. But actually anyone can be an author. Um, it's only what you think about that that stops you doing it.

Nadine Matheson: 34:37

I think that's a good thing about, I say, this time and age is that everything is so accessible and so open and the information is there and that it's a lot. I say it's not. It's not transparent in all regards, but in the in the part that that matters in terms of seeing the authors, you do have that transparency and you and you're able to see the people behind the books yeah, I like that.

Fiona Lucas: 34:59

I mean it's nice to see authors on social media and kind of get to know a bit of who they are, and sometimes I'll just end up buying people's books because I think they're funny or I like their personalities or things like that as well as.

Nadine Matheson: 35:13

As well as maybe it's something that might appeal to me did the TikTok thing surprise you, and I'm talking about like you on TikTok, because I was like I know Fiona. Why do I know Fiona? I followed Fiona on TikTok, I see her face?

Fiona Lucas: 35:33

I does, and it makes you feel like you know people, doesn't it? Yeah, it really does. Um, well, tiktok started because, um, it was locked down. So as far as I, looking back now, I've done a bit of research. Book talk had literally just started. About a month or two beforehand it started becoming a bit of a thing. Um, I didn't know that, I just knew that I was stuck in a house with my whole family and my daughters were always on their phones going and I know what you're laughing at now, tiktok. I say what you're laughing at now, tiktok? I say what are you laughing at now, tiktok? I'm going, okay, I'm gonna, I'm gonna what, I'm gonna see what they're doing.

Fiona Lucas: 36:06

So I downloaded TikTok and then I looked up, in two hours it disappeared. I was like, how did that happen? It is, it is. And then I thought thought, okay, um, are there any writers or authors on here? And I could find readers, but not many other authors at the time. Um, and so I kind of I thought TikTok was quite fun anyway and, having done a little bit of video and stuff in my background, I thought, well, I probably could make videos using the app if I wanted to.

Fiona Lucas: 36:35

I wasn't too scared about that prospect, um but um. I also knew like that if you get on social media early, you've got a chance to build a following before everyone else finds it. And I thought, could this be something that could work? And it took me about two months to get up the courage to post anything and I did not show my face to start off with, um, no, not for the first few videos I was too scared, and then I would only do ones where I didn't have to talk like a point of bits of text I don't know what I'm pointing?

Nadine Matheson: 37:09

no one can see us pointing um, so, um.

Fiona Lucas: 37:17

So it kind of became my lockdown project. I thought, well, you know I'm stuck in the house, I've got plenty of time on my hands. Um, let's see if you know, if I can find some readers and people who might like my books here. Um, and so I mean, I I know other authors who've got followings like 10, 20, 30, 100 times more than me, but I kind of built a fairly solid following in about a year or so. I got to over 20,000 quite quickly and I think that's because there wasn't as many people. Then people start asking you well, how do you, how do you do this? How do I form up my chapters? How long should my chapters be? And so I started answering questions and people. Those videos did really well, so I just did more of it because I like, I like talking about that stuff and reading craft books and thinking about those things. So I thought, well, yeah, I might as well do it on TikTok as well, as well as talk about me and my books, yeah, and I just kept going with it.

Nadine Matheson: 38:11

Yeah, you know you found your niche, because social media is such a funny thing, because you know you caught it. Like you caught that wave but you didn't even realize I suppose you were catching the wave and it was going to get so big, but it's always yeah, I don't know say it's always interesting. For for me, because I'm just maybe there's something odd about me, but seeing how people react when they're they're now trying to catch on the wave that's already crashed on the shore, and the frustration that comes from that, yeah, like you know why my views only stuck on 200. How do I get from a thousand to five thousand? And there's a frustration there. It's like, what do you tell people? Because I'm like, well, you know, I've had I don't know, I don't know, my numbers are 1700 on TikTok and I'm cool with that.

Fiona Lucas: 39:02

I know my goal initially was just to get to a thousand so.

Fiona Lucas: 39:06

I was happy when I got to a thousand and I think and I was definitely there I've definitely been that person trying to grow Twitter, trying to grow Instagram and not really knowing what I was doing. I think nowadays I think I mean I do kind of follow people who talk about how to utilise TikTok, and a lot of it is you've got the best thing you can do as an author is not think about, well, what do I want to show people? What do I want to tell them about me? Because that's all about you On TikTok, nobody cares. There's so many people there they don't care what you had for breakfast or you know where you're going today.

Fiona Lucas: 39:43

You need to give them something that they want to know and that could be knowing that you've got a you know a book that's going to take them on an emotional roller coaster ride or a kind of a thriller where they're going to have to know. You know they're going to be taken to sort of dark, scary places and, you know, investigate something. It's so even your books can be something people want to know. But it's giving, giving your audience value and then also packaging it in a way like have that first kind of three to five seconds of your video is like, if you don't say something interesting, like so saying hi, guys, you've waited.

Fiona Lucas: 40:17

Most people have scrolled past by the time you finished. Um, you know, using text on it or saying something, guys, you've waited, most people have scrolled past by the time you finished. Um, you know, using text on it or saying something that you let people know this is what my video is going to be about. Or you say something that's curious, or you doing something entertaining that stops and makes people watch a little bit longer, because the the thing that matters on tiktok is the watch time how long people watch your videos. They don't necessarily have to watch them all the way through, but the longer they watch them, the longer the watch through, the better the video does.

Nadine Matheson: 40:49

It's all about. It's the same thing, in a weird way, is what I say to the baby lawyers when I'm teaching them advocacy and, you know, explain to them how best to present their closing speeches or make applications. I said you need to grab people's attention immediately. The minute you start waffling and going off on a tangent, I'll say sometimes they're a good time. I say for my podcast, we have good tangents, but you need to grab your audience attention in that in those first few seconds. If you can't do that then you've lost them. And also timing is an issue. You have to think about how long you want your. You know I say fast speeches. I always say everyone's attention span. It cuts off after 15 minutes because after 15 minutes if you're watching someone you're like you start drifting off. So if you haven't grabbed their attention in that first block of time, then you're gonna.

Fiona Lucas: 41:41

You're gonna struggle yeah, yeah, and it's the same with TikTok, but you probably only got seconds and it's. There's so much competition. But then I see videos of just ordinary people doing you know, saying something like, oh, you never guess what happened to me today, and I'm like, oh, what? So nosy? Um, so like, yeah, making somebody put people curious, or kind of um, sometimes it's just like if I'm doing something about writing, quite often I'll just say, look, this is my top tip or this is my secret method of doing blah, blah, blah, and if people are interested in that video they'll hang around, and I don't mind.

Fiona Lucas: 42:18

If people are like, oh, I don't like writing, that's fine. They're not my audience, they can scroll on, but it's more about finding your audience. So you need to kind of almost make that beginning part of your video, let people know who you want to talk to and that you actually it's you, you who's got this problem or wants to know this about writing or or wants to read this kind of book. This is who I'm talking to and you've got to find some way to communicate that to them yeah, it's such a weird.

Nadine Matheson: 42:44

I mean I find social media um, I enjoy it, but I try not to get too hung up on it because I said I could see that especially I say with writers that that obsession on the numbers like, yeah, they're more obsessed about the numbers than they are about their own book and I'm like you need to let it go.

Nadine Matheson: 43:04

I mean, let's just move. In general, I'm like, just let it go, let's move on. I'm happy because you know, sometimes my most random I say my most random post. I love comic books and I remember I did a comment, a post about um, about x-men. Like I just watched an episode and I don't know what made me. I'm like, oh, I just need to, I just need to talk about it. And I spoke about it, I put it on YouTube and I put it on TikTok and forgot about it, came back. I'm like, why are there all the people having their own little conversations? Oh, that's the best. Yeah, which is the best? And I'm like, why are there so many views? Because I literally made it.

Fiona Lucas: 43:44

It was like two minutes and I was off to do something else. I know, predict those moments I can't. I've, I've definitely think the videos that I think, oh, this one's gonna blow up, no, it sits there at like my average amount of views or less, and the things that I, you know, like you say you spend a couple of minutes doing. Maybe it's because I haven't thought about it, or maybe it's because, um, it seems less rehearsed, or sometimes those ones are the ones that seem to do really well, like I had one that did quite well earlier in the summer, moaning about being charged the ULEZ because my car was on a trailer. I donated it to the scrappage scheme and they still wanted to charge me the ULEZ because it got caught by a camera. No, so all the ULEZ protested, ended up in my comment section it fell into that strange little community.

Nadine Matheson: 44:29

It found it. It takes one person. And because obviously that was the topic, ules, yeah, you became a viral moment it's not.

Fiona Lucas: 44:38

It's not not my normal content, but, um, yeah. So I'm not sure many people stuck around after that, but yeah, but I think more now than when I first started people would say just post bookish stuff, I don't do anything else. But I think with the, everything being flooded, it's becoming much more about you and your content and, and I think it's, it's more okay now on TikTok as an author to to talk about other things and show your life and actually people engage with that. Like I've got a whole saga going on with insurance claim about my kitchen and my followers come and go. What's going on with your kitchen and things like this are pretty long. They're not necessarily my best running posts but you know people who are keen followers will come, will kind of want to know what the next development is. Um, and it's so, yeah, every now and then I post to keep them updated.

Nadine Matheson: 45:26

Yeah, now people are.

Nadine Matheson: 45:26

I think people are genuinely just interested in the story of you because I because when I was in grenada and um, hurricane, hurricane, barrel, what happened, yeah, and I was with my parents and I said I was there for the whole thing and I'd done a bunch of videos when we had no power so I had no idea.

Nadine Matheson: 45:45

I was just recording these videos, I think mainly just for me to process what was going on. And then when I got back to London, I just put them all together, like one after the other, and I just posted it and I think, like one of them on I said my TikTok my YouTube following is not massive at all, but I looked at like 17,000 views, but I think one of them on my TikTok my YouTube following is not massive at all, but I looked at like 17,000 views. But I think people were interested in because it's like one up, this happened on Monday, it's happened on Tuesday and then this happened once I got home. But people were interested in the story and they want to know what happens next, which is what we know. We're storytellers, so I think you end up doing that in your social media.

Fiona Lucas: 46:23

That's so I think you end up doing that, yeah, in your social media. That's definitely. I think that is definitely what um and I've. Actually TikTok itself talks about storytelling as being the most effective thing to do. On TikTok, um and I, I have you know you can save things to favorites. I have a folder that is basically. It's called need more tea, because it's a post I've saved that I'm like I need to know how this turns out, or I need to know have the next gossip session when the next video loads, and I'll go back and check those videos, go, have they posted anything new on that story? And then I'll watch. Yeah, I have a deep dive running, you know, hearing all about somebody's dramas like I'm on TikTok. Earlier on this year there was a whole uh, someone who posted um, uh, I think it was a 50 part series with 10 minutes. Oh my god, I can't with that. Who the f did I marry? Because he turned out to be not who she and I was. I was so invested.

Nadine Matheson: 47:13

But it's been, that's been optioned, hasn't it?

Fiona Lucas: 47:18

yeah, I'm sure it has. I'm 100% sure it's been optioned and that was just somebody telling their story. You know no frills, sometimes sitting in their car, you know no big production and text and effects or anything, um. So yeah, there's a few people I kind of I follow just to get their next installment on. You know their court case or their situation with their, their family or whatever's going on it's great.

Nadine Matheson: 47:46

I was just thinking, if I was, if TikTok had been like a thing when I'd been practicing um law full-time, it just my stories would have been rubbish, because it just would have been here's me going to court. No, you can't come in the courtroom because there's no cameras allowed in there, and it would just be the courtroom door closing and that was the end of my story.

Fiona Lucas: 48:05

I don't. Well, yeah, I don't know how you know. Well, I don't know. I mean, when I first started writing, I was mostly, you know, changing, chasing toddlers, um, and taking kids to school, but I suppose people make channels out of that now. I would never have thought that um be interesting, but I kind of decided early on that I wouldn't show my kids on social media. And when they got to teenagers, we had an agreement in the family after somebody, after people who should not be mentioned, posted photos of me looking horrendous on Facebook or wherever I was like. No, I think we all need to get each other's permission to post about each other. You know, you get to vet the photo before it goes up. So there's lots of things I wish I'd posted but I couldn't because I wasn't allowed.

Nadine Matheson: 48:50

I think that's good. I think it's nice to be respectful of people. Yeah, I'm so gone.

Fiona Lucas: 48:59

I was going to say I had a friend, um, I knew a family who's had a horrible experience, uh, with their child being kind of, um, people being interested about their child online and security and things like that. So I was like after that I was like, no, I'm not just gonna put, put my, my kids online. They can decide that for themselves when they get old enough.

Nadine Matheson: 49:22

Yeah, just so.

Nadine Matheson: 49:24

I think security is such a thing because, you know, with 2020 and being stuck in the house and everything moving online and I was published in 2021 was when my first book was published, but I started doing online stuff earlier, so that would have been the summer of 2020, and I remember doing this one online event and I used to record do it downstairs and that's like you know, downstairs is where all the family photos are, so my books are where everything is, and I remember doing this online festival thing and then we could see the chat and I'm looking at the chat because you just get, I got distracted by the chat and one of them was like oh, I'm really interested to see you know what's on her bookshelves and who's that photo and who's.

Nadine Matheson: 50:07

You know, I've got my nephews, I've got my good kids, I've got it's like personal stuff and I felt so not offended. Not offended isn't the right word, but I didn't like it. I didn't like that invasion, in a sense, into behind the scenes of my life, which is why I do everything here in this room. Yeah, you'll see a poster, you'll see some books and you can see my plant, which is far too big, but that's it.

Fiona Lucas: 50:36

Well, my plants are plastic, so because I kill everything I try and grow. So I'm quite impressed with the plant.

Nadine Matheson: 50:41

But but yeah, no, I same thing.

Fiona Lucas: 50:43

I've. Um, I mean, this room's a mess at the moment. It's my attic room, but all this because nothing's in my kitchen at the moment. Everything's up here instead. Yeah, um, but yeah, now I've got. I didn't have an office for a long time, so now I've got a space that is mine to write in. Um, it's really, and I'm not in my bedroom because initially I was. When I was first filming my TikToks, I was in my bedroom and I didn't want to show my bed behind me because it felt too personal. So I would turn my chair around and I've got like some shelving that sits above my desk, so I would turn my, put the camera the other direction and turn around. So my desk was behind me because I felt that's my writer persona and stuff to do with me as a writer. I didn't necessarily want everyone seeing my bedroom, it just felt a bit weird.

Nadine Matheson: 51:30

It does feel weird Even when I was teaching online. I think halfway through the term. When it moved online, I switched my whole desk around. Because when it moved online, I switched my whole desk around. I just switched my whole setup. So it faces this way because the other side well, in this room it's the guest room stroke my office, it's all the beds I'm like you don't need. I feel like it's too much of me yeah, the same same here.

Fiona Lucas: 51:55

Yeah, this is my kind of loft extension, so it's got. It is my, normally my spare room although I'm giving it to my, my daughter, who's come back home from uni, and I will be moving into the tiny bedroom soon, which, so I will miss this lovely, big, spacious, airy room you might get it.

Nadine Matheson: 52:13

You might get it back. So, fiona, can I ask you um, because I'm talking to you as Fiona Lucas? Yeah, yeah, but basically here's Fiona Harper.

Fiona Lucas: 52:25

Why did you do the name change? Okay, this is. I suppose this is another thing about publishing that people don't realise is, although kind of earlier on as Fiona Harper, I had a really big bestseller that was a Kindle number one and that was really great. But then the next book after that and the next book after that they didn't get into the supermarkets, they didn't sell in the same numbers, and once your numbers go down, you get stuck in a loop of not being able to get out of that because retailers will look at your previous sales and go, oh, we love the cover, we love the concept. They look at the sales and say, oh, I only sell this many amount of coppers. No, it's not for us.

Fiona Lucas: 53:05

And even though I felt like I'd upped my game with what I was writing and we were trying really hard with actually what the books were in the packaging, we just weren't getting any pickup, particularly from the supermarkets, which is where you sell volume of books. Um, and so we talked about doing a different pen name for a while and I I came up with a new idea um, uh, for HQ. Who's my publisher and yours isn't it?

Nadine Matheson: 53:31

so.

Fiona Lucas: 53:32

I came up with a new idea and at this point they said well, we think maybe you should write it under your own name. We didn't go ahead with that because actually my surname is well, it's same as mine got it from my husband, but it's so unusual that it'd be really easy for people to find me online. Yeah, so I think there's only two of us in the UK. You've got the same name, weirdly. So, um, I kind of felt again that privacy thing. I thought, once the cat's out the bag, you can't you know, you can't put it back again. So in the end we went with Fiona Lucas instead, which is kind of similar to my real name, but not quite, and, sure enough, managed to get the next book. The retailers picked it up because for them you're a new commodity at that point. So it's a really boring kind of explanation to do with sales and distribution, but I'm definitely not the first person to have done it and I won't be the last.

Nadine Matheson: 54:25

No, no, you won't, but I think that is another surprising thing about which you learn about publishing once you're in. It is how important the supermarkets are yeah and how much you don't really understand how the supermarkets in the book industry work, when you're just the consumer, because I always say you just think, you know, I don't know. The books just appear and that's the end of it.

Fiona Lucas: 54:48

But there's so much that goes on behind the scenes in order to get your book into the supermarket yeah, and actually I've had quite a few that didn't go into supermarkets at all and they just don't sell, even if they. Who sells your book in Waterstones and and I love waterstones, but it there's this yes, if it's great, if it's in waterstones, you sell a certain number of copies, but it'll be 10 times that if it goes into one of the big supermarkets it's such a crazy thing.

Nadine Matheson: 55:14

So let's talk about um your new book. It's always, and only you would you like to tell the readers? Not the readers. What am I talking? About listeners of the conversation about always and only you. It is, yes, not the readers. What am I talking about?

Fiona Lucas: 55:22

listeners of the conversation about always and only you yeah, well, we were, um, weirdly I was trying to find, my editor was saying to me you need an idea with a hook in it, fiona. So I, I came up with 12 different ideas that I put in a document. Um, for different books. Some are more with more fleshed out in my head and others weren't, and we shortlisted three. And then she said I'm going to read them all out, the elevator pitch out in an editorial meeting, and the one that makes everyone go ooh the most. Well, that's the one we'll write. So that's what I did. So this was my elevator pitch and this is all I had when I started writing the book. What if you walk down the aisle on your wedding day and the wrong man was waiting for you? But not only that. Nobody else thinks anything is wrong and they're quite happy for you to go ahead and marry him. What would you say? That's, that's, that's the start.

Nadine Matheson: 56:17

I know that's definitely. I already had the oh and it was the wrong man.

Fiona Lucas: 56:20

I was like oh yeah so, and then I had to work out, well, what's happening. So that took a while, but, yeah, so that's the that's the premise for the book that my bride-to-be is shocked to find, um, well, not only just a stranger, but it turns out because my editor said, oh, I think she should know him. So I went, oh yes, it's the best man and they don't like each other. So, um, we have a good enemies to lovers. Um, maybe something going on there, like because what's she gonna do when? You know, is she dreaming, is she like in an alternate reality? And what happens? You know she thinks she's dreaming because she'd be having wedding nightmares, but then she doesn't wake up. It's like like, do I go through with the ceremony, do I go through with the wedding night? What's happening?

Nadine Matheson: 57:05

I automatically I've got in my head and I don't. I don't. Hopefully I'm not getting two movies mixed up, but it's Kevin or Kevin Kathleen Turner, peggy Sue Got Married, oh.

Fiona Lucas: 57:15

I love that film.

Nadine Matheson: 57:16

Yeah, she goes back in time, doesn't she?

Fiona Lucas: 57:18

Yeah, yeah.

Nadine Matheson: 57:19

Yeah, that's what automatically came into my head. It's like is it a dream? Is this real?

Fiona Lucas: 57:25

Yeah, I've done books before with a bit of time traveling where I didn't explain what was going on, like somebody reliving. He did just that went back to the age of 21 and they could decide to make different choices. Maybe, you know, maybe you wouldn't pick the nice guy, maybe you different choices. Maybe you know, maybe you wouldn't pick this the nice guy, maybe you'd pick the, the bad boy who wanted you to run away with him instead and see how your life turned out differently. Um but um, so I really like that idea, but I didn't explain that in this book. But this book I ended up dip coming up for an explanation of why she's experiencing what she's experiencing. So, um, yeah, at some point she starts to work out what's going on and then she has to deal with the, the fallout over everything that's happened.

Nadine Matheson: 58:10

I was just thinking putting those ideas together and like submitting them to your agent or your editor. It's such a like I'm in that moment and I'm in that situation at the moment I'm giving some ideas to my agent for us to talk about for standalones, and two of them, like one of them I have. I have one like standalone idea, like I have it fleshed out, have the title, I've got the elevator pitch done. The other one is I've got the idea and I'm putting bits in. The third idea it's literally Fiona, it's a title. That's what I got and I'm so like in love with the title.

Nadine Matheson: 58:47

I'm trying to create a story I bet you anything?

Fiona Lucas: 58:50

that one, that's the one your agent says oh, I like that at the moment it's literally my title's two words.

Nadine Matheson: 58:57

I'm like why have I put this on the list? Like there's literally nothing?

Fiona Lucas: 59:02

but I'm like no, I have to make this work because your subconscious knows that you've got a story inside you that to do with that title and you're just gonna have to do. It's like mining, isn't it? You have to kind of dig it out, your subconscious. Sometimes, like you know, I know, when I hear something on the tv or I'll get an idea, you think, oh, that's interesting, and I'll write it down and tuck it away for later. There's something that's made my ears prick up, story-wise, that you don't always know why or how, but you think, oh, I kind of, yeah, that's, there's something in that. And those are the things I write down and come back to, and then I try and pick them apart and go where's the, where's the actual story in here? Have I?

Fiona Lucas: 59:40

got enough to make a whole book work.

Nadine Matheson: 59:43

I'm looking forward to going digging, because at the moment it's just a cursor flashing at me.

Fiona Lucas: 59:50

I hate the cursor. If I'm, if I'm, if that's happening, I I put my computer away and I get pen and paper out and I find like scribbling, doodling, yeah, letting myself write ideas down.

Nadine Matheson: 1:00:00

That really is really helpful um, that's a better way for me to find ideas and for me to stare at a screen. Get the notepad and pen out.

Fiona Lucas: 1:00:08

We've all done it, though just the blinking cursor it becomes aggressive, doesn't it like?

Nadine Matheson: 1:00:14

it intensifies and it gets. Yeah you can hear like a pounding noise right, fiona, I have some questions for you before we go. So the first one are you an introvert or extrovert, or a hybrid of the two?

Fiona Lucas: 1:00:30

I think I'm probably I'm a very social, sociable introvert like makes sense. So like at Christmas at some point when we've got a house full, I have to just escape upstairs where nobody is for half an hour and recharge and then come back down again. So yeah, I definitely like to recharge with company and time on my own, but I also like being around people and like being chatting and being sociable.

Nadine Matheson: 1:00:58

So what challenge or experience in your life shaped you the most?

Fiona Lucas: 1:01:03

Probably having kids. You have to grow like in patience and all sorts of things in order to be a good parent.

Nadine Matheson: 1:01:14

I think and if you could go back to when you were 25 years old, so a bit like Peggy Sue got married? If you could go back to when you were 25 years old and give yourself one piece of advice, what would it be?

Fiona Lucas: 1:01:26

It would be. I always used to have this sense that I had to ask permission to do stuff, like almost like someone was, and I'd be like don't wait, don't, don't wait for the permission to come, just go, go out and do it. You know, take life by the horns.

Nadine Matheson: 1:01:44

I've got a couple more questions for you.

Fiona Lucas: 1:01:50

What has your writing journey taught you about yourself? I'm probably a lot more determined than I ever thought, because you have to just keep going through the ups and downs, because I think I always thought, oh, you get published and then you just grow as an author and you grow, and actually no, it's more like a roller coaster. Sometimes you have good periods, sometimes you have bad periods and you think, oh well, that's my career over, and then, if you keep going, though, something happens to turn a corner and off you go again.

Nadine Matheson: 1:02:17

We were talking about this on a special episode of the podcast I did the other night. We were talking about this on a special episode of the podcast I did the other night and we're just. It started off on my question about writer's block, but it just worked out to just being a writer in general and it could be hard, it could be frustrating. You can't even see. It's like, um, you're on the motorway and it's pitch black and all you've got is just your set of headlights, but you don't know what's on the other side, but you just have to keep pushing through. That's a brilliant analogy. Actually.

Fiona Lucas: 1:02:38

It's like that and you just have to keep pushing through. That's a brilliant analogy, actually. It is like that, and you just have to kind of not pay attention to everything that's going on around you, whether it's you know this friend, you've got suddenly got a six-figure deal, you know, and you're struggling to find a new agent, or whatever it is. You just have to keep going, you know what, Just keep plodding forward, just keep swimming.

Nadine Matheson: 1:03:08

Let's, let's, keep swimming. So this is a question that came up. It came up in my head from looking at your tiktok videos and when you're doing your advice videos, um, and answering readers, listeners, tiktokers I don't know what they are, but answering their questions, yeah, what is like. I'm trying to find the best way to phrase it, like what's the worst piece of writing advice that you've heard and what's the best writing advice that you could give, or your number one.

Fiona Lucas: 1:03:33

I think the worst, not a specific piece of advice, but anything that says you have to do it this way, because actually I've read brilliant books where people broke break all the so-called rules and they're amazing, but just because they've done that. So I think some sort of thinking that you have to do x, y and z when you're writing yes, there's, there's best practice and there's good ideas, and unless you, sometimes you need to know the rules before you break them. But I don't think anything's off the table. So telling people they can't do this or they've got to do that, I think it stifles your creativity a bit and sometimes it's. It's right to take a leap and do something different yeah, what's the best bit?

Nadine Matheson: 1:04:14

the best piece might be saying one ignored all the rules it is.

Fiona Lucas: 1:04:18

It's kind of like trust your creative self, but also I think, um, I think we can. I see a lot of um, especially younger writers coming to my tiktok saying I'm just so, I can't seem to start writing my book because I'm scared, um, and I think it is that it's like your first draft does not have to be polished like all the books on your shelf, um, that it's okay if you're, if your first try at something is a bit messy and imperfect, because that's what editing's for. Actually, it's more important to get it down on the page and you can make it better later, or you can delete it, write something else differently. But if you let the fear never, never let you start, then that's, you know, that's a missed opportunity.

Nadine Matheson: 1:05:00

You'll never get that book written, you'll never get that story told yeah, I always sound like a broken record because I always say the same thing. I'm like let your first draft be messy. Your first draft is allowed. It's allowed to be messy, you're allowed to change characters names or their sex or change the location, like you could do all of those things, because then you just want to get some kind of story down and then, when it comes to the next draft, that's when you can fix things but and there's freedom in the mess, in a sense there is, and actually that it stops me going.

Fiona Lucas: 1:05:31

Oh, I've got to get exactly the right setting, exactly the right thing going on in this scene, because I don't know where I need to go with my story and I'm like but what, which characters are going to be in this scene? What they're going to be doing, what they're going to be talking about, how am I going to show the things I want to show? But actually sometimes it's well, I've got this idea, let's just run with it. If I come up with something better later, I can change it.

Nadine Matheson: 1:05:51

And sometimes, you, I find I need to write the wrong thing before I need, before I know what the right thing is yeah, no, definitely, I was saying this the other day is that I because I'm a planner and so with the last book I've just finished I introduced a character and my plan from day one was to kill this character. I'm like they're gonna die, like I know it's gonna happen, like all this stuff, you know all the interactions they're having, they're gonna die. So I'm cool with that. And I got to the last third of the book probably not even that, like less than a quarter to go and I decided you know what, I don't think I'm gonna kill them.

Fiona Lucas: 1:06:27

And I had to be good with that because I'm like, okay, it's gonna change things, but you're allowed to, you're allowed to do that, you're allowed to make changes yeah, I've definitely gone back, or sometimes my editor will tell me to go back and make a whole load of changes, like, um, I had a book out a couple years ago called Never Forget you, where initially my characters didn't know each other when the book started, but my editor says I think they should met before, so I had to write a whole prologue and then, of course, it changed all their interactions throughout the book because it it's different than if you've never met someone.

Fiona Lucas: 1:06:59

You're building that relationship from the the get go rather than there's been something that happened in the past. So yeah, but it worked. But I wouldn't have been able to necessarily write that if I hadn't already written the rest of the book.

Nadine Matheson: 1:07:13

Yeah, you have to trust the process and ignore the crazy advice. There's lots of it.

Fiona Lucas: 1:07:21

And ignore the crazy voices in your head telling you you can't do it. You ought to stop because your staff are thinking you should be able to try, so just sing over the top of them or something.

Nadine Matheson: 1:07:32

Keep swimming, like Ne-Mai. Who would have thought this whole podcast would have got reduced to just keep swimming?

Fiona Lucas: 1:07:38

It's pretty good advice.

Nadine Matheson: 1:07:40

It's the best advice. So finally, fiona Lucas, where can listeners of the conversation find you online?

Fiona Lucas: 1:07:47

uh, mostly on TikTok. That's definitely where I'm most active, where I'm at Fiona Lucas author. Um, so pretty easy to find. I'm also on Instagram, although, and X as it is now. But I must admit I do neglect those platforms horrendously. I probably ought to be better at being more of an all-rounder, but, um, yes, and I'm. I'm on Facebook as well. I've got a Facebook page and if you're interested in TikTok and you're an author, I've got a Facebook group called TikTok for Authors.

Nadine Matheson: 1:08:18

So just, to give people a bit of help. I always say to um anyone, whether you're new, been doing it for 15 years. When it comes to social media, you don't have to be in all of them. I think you just need to find the platform that best resonates with you and your personality and then if that's the only one you use, then that's the only one. Yeah, you need to do everywhere.

Fiona Lucas: 1:08:40

I think I just about given up with other social media before I found TikTok and I think yeah, that kind of advice. Yeah, it kind of suits me, so yeah that's it.

Nadine Matheson: 1:08:50

Find what suits you. Well, that just leaves me to say Fiona Lucas, thank you so much for being part of the conversation oh, thank you so much for asking me.

Nadine Matheson: 1:08:59

I've had a blast thank you so much for listening to today's conversation with Nadine Matheson. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did. Be sure to tune in every Tuesday for a brand new episode featuring more amazing guests. Don't forget to like, subscribe and leave a review. It really helps the podcast grow and if you'd like to support the show, you can buy me a cup of coffee or sign up on Patreon. The links are in the show notes and if you'd love to join the conversation as a guest, feel free to send an email to theconversation at nadiemappersoncom. Thanks again for your support and I'll catch you next time.