Book Club Meets: Tradwives and the manosphere, with Caro Claire Burke

Natalie Heller is a tradwife influencer online. She’s got the perfect life: a brood of beautiful children and a handsome cowboy husband who eat her homemade bread and jams in their gorgeous red barn. What her millions of followers don’t know is that she’s got a whole army of hidden staff and industrial kitchen appliances helping her out. Then, one day... she wakes up in the 1800s, and is forced to live this traditional fantasy for real. Yesteryear was our Happy Place Book Club read for May. In this chat, author Caro Claire Burke joins Fearne to talk about the manosphere, motherhood, religion, and modern feminism. Plus, what does Caro make of Anne Hathaway turning her book into a film? In June, we’ll be reading Honey by Imani Thompson. If you liked this episode of Happy Place, you might also like: Book Club Meets: Josie Lloyd and Emlyn Rees https://pod.fo/e/40a0df Book Club Meets: Emma Gannon https://pod.fo/e/39d084 Book Club Meets: Maggie O’Farrell https://pod.fo/e/388539 Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy https://acast.com/privacy for more information.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:01Speaker 00

  I watched through the mirror as Clementine crossed the room and sat next to the girls on my bed. What does trad wife mean?

• 0:08Fearne Cotton?

  Hello and welcome to the Happy Place Book Club with me, Fern Cotton.

• 0:12Speaker 00

  Who said that word to you?

• 0:14Fearne Cotton?

  Today, "Yesterday" by Caro Claire Burke.

• 0:17Speaker 00

  Trad wife, Jessa said and giggled. She threw her head back and said it again. Trad wife. It almost seemed possible Clementine might hear the mechanical clicks of my brain as it whirred into warp speed, sorting through 500 possible answers to that question. My eldest daughter was like me, not just in likeness, but in disposition too. She held her intelligence like a knife behind her back. Now that she was creeping toward womanhood, I found our similarities a bit unnerving, like watching a clone of myself walk slowly toward me from a faraway point in the distance.

• 1:02Speaker 00

  What would happen when she arrived? I'm aware this isn't the kind of thing you're meant to feel about your own daughter, but motherhood is its own kind of curation. Which is to say, every woman I know lied to me about what it would be like before I became one myself.

• 1:26Fearne Cotton?

  Right, now Natalie Heller is a trad wife influencer online. She's got the perfect life, a brood of beautiful children and a handsome cowboy husband who eats her homemade bread and jams in their gorgeous red barn. What her millions of followers don't know is that she's got a whole army of hidden staff and industrial kitchen appliances helping her out. Then, one day, she wakes up in the 1800s and is forced to live this traditional fantasy for real. You will not see the mad twist in this book coming, I blimmin' well didn't. It's absolutely incredible. Even as I was reading the twist, I was like, wait, what is going on?

• 2:09Fearne Cotton?

  I'm so delighted that we picked "Yesterday" as our Happy Place Book Club read for me, because you lot have been loving it too. Here's Steph.

• 2:16Speaker 02

  Hi Fern, I absolutely loved Yesteryear. What I found really interesting was the way that it explored how easy it was to romanticise the past, whereas the reality is if people were actually to go back there, I don't think they would be able to cope. I know I certainly wouldn't. I found the main character really believable and scarily similar to a lot of trad wife influencers that we kind of see, which is again scary. And one of the bits that really stuck for me was the fact that she thought she was experiencing like part of a reality TV show, which is quite scary in a way because when you think about it, reality TV has become so extreme and outlandish that she could almost rationalise that the abuse that she was suffering was that there's something that people would

• 2:58Speaker 02

  actually watch and accept. I thought the book handled it in a really clever way and it was just very interesting to kind of see.

• 3:05Fearne Cotton?

  Well Steph, Vicky's got some thoughts on main character Natalie too.

• 3:09Speaker 03

  Hello Fern and Happy Place Book Club. What a book Yesteryear was. I absolutely adored it. What I wasn't expecting from Yesteryear was how deeply unsettling it was to read. It's almost like I had a knot in my stomach when I was reading it because it was so uncomfortable at times. Part of the reason for this is that Natalie is such an unlikable main character and we as readers are not used to protagonists who have next to no redeeming qualities when they are portrayed as not a typical evil person. I had several theories whilst reading the book as to what the ending would be and how it would play out, but I was thrilled to discover that I was completely wrong.

• 3:52Speaker 03

  Finally, upon finishing and reflecting on the book, I also loved the contradictions and differences between the life choices of Natalie and her college roommate Rena as they go down very different paths. But neither was without judgement, struggle and complications, emphasising the fact that no matter what choices women make in life, we can never win in this society.

• 4:18Fearne Cotton?

  And this is Taylor. She's got some great takes on the writing itself.

• 4:21Speaker 03

  I absolutely devoured Yestier. I found the story totally gripping from the get go. I thought the writing style was really interesting because you felt kind of uncomfortable when you were reading the book. And it was almost like you were watching it from the outside, kind of like following her on social media and getting the two sides of the story. I felt like it covered really good themes in terms of the manosphere and other amazing topics like femininity, social media and this idea of, you know, perception and basically the two sides to every story. I've recommended it to so many people.

• 5:00Fearne Cotton?

  As you lot have just got into it there, there are so many meaty topics in this book. The manosphere, motherhood, religion, modern feminism. So I was really fascinated to hear from Caro how she managed to weave such heavy topics into a fiction so seamlessly. And of course, I had to talk to her about the fact that Anne Hathaway is turning Yestier into a film.

• 5:27Speaker 04

  Hey, we're Nick and Jack, hosts of The Best One Yet. Behind every episode, there's research, emails, spreadsheets and our shared Google Doc, the headline hammer. With Google Workspace with Gemini, Google's AI is built right into the premium versions of tools we already use, like Gmail, Docs and Sheets. No new tools or extra logins, just personalized AI for the way we work. That means less time on the work around the work and more time finding the stories worth talking about. Get AI tools for work. Upgrade to Google Workspace with Gemini at goo.gle/workspacewithGemini. That's goo.gle/workspacewithGemini.

• 6:01Speaker 05

  Hello, I'm Joanna Fletcher.

• 6:03Speaker 06

  And I'm Marco Burchella.

• 6:04Speaker 05

  And this is Boots Off.

• 6:08Speaker 06

  We are friends who have spent a decade together, walking up mountains, across deserts and along coastlines with some seriously awesome groups of humans.

• 6:16Speaker 05

  And something happens when you're out there, feet on the ground, surrounded by nature. The conversations just spill out of you.

• 6:22Speaker 06

  This series is about the adversities that lead to adventure.

• 6:25Speaker 05

  The adventures that lead to adversity.

• 6:27Speaker 06

  And how life can be one big adventure in itself.

• 6:31Speaker 05

  Listen every Thursday. Just search for Boots Off.

• 6:38Fearne Cotton?

  Right, let's do it. Here's the show.

• 7:01Fearne Cotton?

  Caro, welcome to Happy Place and welcome to the UK.

• 7:04Speaker 07

  Thanks for having me. This is so fun.

• 7:06Fearne Cotton?

  I am so thrilled to meet you because this book, holy shit, I don't even know where to begin. I don't know, I don't even know what to say. Like, I, from the second I started reading the first page, I was like, oh, I am in.

• 7:23Speaker 07

  Oh, I love it.

• 7:24Fearne Cotton?

  And I couldn't put it down. One of those books where I was like, you know, come back from work, deal with the children, get into bed, got heavy eyes. And then actually, you know, it's midnight and I'm still, I think I read it in about three days.

• 7:35Speaker 07

  Oh, this makes me so happy.

• 7:36Fearne Cotton?

  It's genius.

• 7:37Speaker 07

  Thank you.

• 7:38Fearne Cotton?

  It's genius. Now, there are many themes in this book which jump out. You've got the, the sort of modern day trad wife. You've got social media and the sort of fake ass reality that it's sort of constantly see on there and can't differentiate between, is this someone's reality or not? You've got sort of internalized misogyny going on. You've got money and power. There's so many interesting themes. Was there an initial one that you were like, I want to write about this?

• 8:08Speaker 07

  No, you know, the themes really weren't on purpose. I think it was because I knew the general conceit that I wanted, like the idea of this woman waking up in a different time period. And I had never written a thriller before and I had also never written comedy. And so when I found Natalie's voice, it was almost like she was obsessed with these things. And so then I, I think that if I had tried to include all these themes consciously, it would have not worked.

• 8:31Fearne Cotton?

  Why?

• 8:32Speaker 07

  Or at least like, you know, I like to think that it works. And, and I think I would have been really jammed down with it. And I think because I was just focusing on Natalie, it just kind of came. And then in later drafts, you can edit it and start to really think about it. But with the first draft, I think it was really just her obsession with motherhood or with the modern workplace or what have you, that kind of came out as an aside and I didn't really think about it too hard.

• 8:55Fearne Cotton?

  Oh, it's so clever because I think also. I don't know how it feels in the States at the moment, but in the UK, there is a lot of conversation around the whole trad wife situation.

• 9:04Speaker 07

  Oh, big time in the States.

• 9:05Fearne Cotton?

  Toxic masculinity.

• 9:06Speaker 07

  Yeah.

• 9:06Fearne Cotton?

  And we're really sort of seeing those themes rise up culturally in terms of documentaries that we're watching and more factual stuff that we're reading. So to weave it into a fiction seems so perfectly timed. Was that kind of a coincidence or it's just on your mind at the moment?

• 9:24Speaker 07

  Can I tell you? So I sold this book two years ago and when I went to auction with it, I spoke with a bunch of editors in New York and there were a small handful who said, we've got to rush this because it won't be relevant in a few years. And I'm not happy that it's relevant. Like, wouldn't it have been nice? I would happily have taken my book no longer being relevant for a world where this, you know, was solved. But it is funny when I think about it that over the last two years, so much has happened that I think makes this book more relevant than ever before. But really, no, when we were writing it, there was, I mean, there was a period of time right after I sold Yestir where we thought in the States, we were going to have our first woman president. So there have been so many different political moments that have taken place in the past two years. And yeah, the manosphere is one example that has just exploded in conversation in the last two years.

• 10:09Fearne Cotton?

  Oh, my God. I know. There's a documentary over here at the moment.

• 10:12Speaker 07

  Yeah.

• 10:12Fearne Cotton?

  Have you watched it with Louis Theroux?

• 10:13Speaker 07

  He's a Brit, right?

• 10:14Fearne Cotton?

  Yes.

• 10:14Speaker 07

  Yeah, yeah.

• 10:15Fearne Cotton?

  And it's fascinating. I think you would absolutely, well, you won't love it because you'll feel deeply angry, but it's very, very interesting watching the interaction between Louis Theroux and the men that are kind of in the manosphere, quite actively in the manosphere.

• 10:29Speaker 07

  Wild.

• 10:30Fearne Cotton?

  Natalie, the protagonist, as you say, is obsessed with motherhood, but she's obsessed with like the idea of it rather than doing it. She actually, to me, seems to hate every part of it. Was that quite complicated to write?

• 10:45Speaker 07

  Yeah. It was complicated because she also wants so badly for it to work. Like, Natalie is someone who has been told her whole life that motherhood would come naturally to her. So I think she almost feels an entitlement to it in a way, which is interesting. And yeah, she's very cold. Like, she has a very transactional relationship to it. And I think, you know, so many books about motherhood are very sensual or like about the body and talk a lot very fairly about how motherhood changes the body. And Natalie never thinks about that at all. Like, she doesn't think about how breastfeeding changes, you know, her nipples or how it really feels. And I think that part of it is because she's kind of dissociating.

• 11:22Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah. But I think also it speaks massively to

• 11:27Fearne Cotton?

  Whether you're like Natalie or not, the societal pressures for women, in particular when it comes to parenting, are so huge and disproportionate that all of the weight of parenting, or a lot of it, is put on the female in the relationship. If they're in a heterosexual relationship, the pressure to be the perfect mum. And I think when I look back at my mum's generation, parenting was like, feed them, clothe them, love them.

• 11:53Speaker 07

  So much less pressure.

• 11:54Fearne Cotton?

  We're done. And now, it's this exactly what Natalie is aspiring to, which is this perfect, from the outside, parenting, where everyone looks a certain way, and they're doing baking, and everything's natural, and everything's organic, and everything's amazing. And I think a lot of us are feeling that pressure and going, this seems mad.

• 12:15Speaker 07

  Yeah. Did you, were you around for the Tamagotchi craze?

• 12:18Fearne Cotton?

  Oh, yeah, yeah.

• 12:19Speaker 07

  I feel like kids have become like, the most complicated Tamagotchi of all time. And they're already complicated. Like, I've spent time with newborns before, and like, it's already a very intense experience regardless. But the idea that your child continues to be complicated, and not just the care of your child, of keeping them alive and keeping them loved, but the performance of care, and the idea of other people seeing you as the right type of parent. I mean, I am like amazed at how intense and frankly judgmental conversations are, even just between women about, are you breastfeeding or giving your kid formula, you know? What school, what type of childcare? Do you have a nanny? Do you do daycare? And the irony is that most people just make these decisions based off of what they can do.

• 13:04Fearne Cotton?

  Exactly.

• 13:05Speaker 07

  It's just about survival, most of the time.

• 13:07Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, I mean, it absolutely is. And I think you're so right, the new sort of visual medium of seeing parenthood as something performative, if it's online. And some people do a very good job of showing their reality and the ups and downs and the mess of being a parent. But of course, you also get those Instagram pages, or YouTube, whatever, where it all looks perfect, and then you start to compare yourself to other people. And like, oh my god, my kid doesn't eat kale, or you know, whatever it might be. It's kind of this whole new realm of parenthood. That is there for us to see, whereas, you know, 10, 20 years ago, it'd be, what are my mates doing? Are we kind of got the same set of values here? Are we kind of all trying our best? Whereas now it's like, oh my God, my kids haven't got matching outfits and they're not clean all the time,

• 13:51Fearne Cotton?

  or whatever it might be. It's a whole nother layer.

• 13:53Speaker 07

  Totally. Yeah, it is. And I think, obviously, there are a lot of different political themes in this book. But I think my experience of writing it was realizing how universal these struggles are, regardless of what your politics are. Like, the pressure of being the right type of mother, the right type of wife, I don't think it ever goes away. And I think that that's something that we could find more common ground on, not to use like a really annoying phrase, but it really was something. Like, I've had so many interesting conversations with deeply religious, deeply traditional women in the States while on tour. And the amount we have in common is staggering. Like, it's just, everyone is up against the wall.

• 14:31Fearne Cotton?

  How interesting. So when you're having these conversations, because, you know, Natalie isn't particularly likeable as a character, which again is a very...

• 14:39Speaker 07

  But both liberal and conservative women don't like her, so that's kind of the...

• 14:42Fearne Cotton?

  Well, that's handy, but I think it's tricky to write a book with a protagonist who's unlikable and keep people along with the character, because you could easily go, I'm ditching her. I don't want to know about her. But you're so intrigued and fascinated by her psyche that you want to know where she ends up mentally and how she manages to navigate it. It's a very tricky thing to do. But I'm interested, so when you're having these conversations with people that may align with Natalie's religious beliefs or political beliefs, or the way that she wants to live her life, and you're writing about her in quite an unlikable way, how does that go down with people that resonate with her?

• 15:19Speaker 07

  You know, before the book came out, I was more worried about it. And I really was worried that she would just be too off-putting. I love her, but I am aware, you know, I've been writing for a long time. I got my graduate degree in writing, so I know the game with unlikable women. And I think what's been really amazing is that so many women see her struggle. And I think that experiencing that struggle on the page allows people to have a little bit of catharsis of their own. And so, for example, when... Women come up and talk to me about Natalie. The first forty five seconds are about, oh, my God, she was so difficult, but I also loved her. But then we are very quickly talking about their lives. And so someone is saying, you know, my postpartum experience was really rough. And it was really cathartic to read that.

• 16:01Speaker 07

  Or like, you know, I have gone down these rabbit holes of what type of birth I want to have. Medicated or home birth or what have you. Or, you know, uh, my mom didn't have access to her finances. My, my dad totally controlled the finances and when they got divorced, it was a nightmare. And so it's so interesting how I feel like Natalie is almost a Rorschach test. And women are immediately thinking. And again, not everyone, some people might hate her, but the women I've spoken with really seem to connect, not with her personality, but with the adversity that she moves through. And that's what they're more fixated on.

• 16:34Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, I get it because she's just coping in the best way that she can.

• 16:37Speaker 07

  Yeah, and she might not be relatable, but what she's going through is very common.

• 16:41Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah. The twist. The twist.

• 16:46Speaker 07

  Are we doing spoilers or no?

• 16:48Fearne Cotton?

  I don't think we're even going to say what the twist is because I want people who are listening to this, who haven't read it.

• 16:53Speaker 07

  I know.

• 16:54Fearne Cotton?

  To just have their own experience. I'm going to be very careful with the words that I choose, but I didn't. I didn't understand what was happening in the twist until I was literally deep in. I was like, oh, right. Like, you're so, you just, the way that it unfolded is so smart.

• 17:13Speaker 07

  Oh, thank you.

• 17:13Fearne Cotton?

  So smart. I mean, how, how, because you could have gone in so many different directions.

• 17:19Speaker 07

  Yeah.

• 17:20Fearne Cotton?

  With how it panned out. Like you said, you had the initial idea.

• 17:22Speaker 07

  Yes.

• 17:23Fearne Cotton?

  You wanted your protagonist to experience a different time in history. So you could have laid the book out in a completely different way, but the way that you just kept it, the momentum going. And then this twist, honestly, it blew my mind.

• 17:39Speaker 07

  Oh, thank you. Yeah, I mean. Twists are very controversial always. So I knew that it just had to be something, it had to be the twist that I would live with.

• 17:47Fearne Cotton?

  Yes.

• 17:47Speaker 07

  It was like, this has to be for me because any twist you write, only a certain number of people are going to find it satisfying. And so I knew from the jump what it was going to be. And I will say, um, I didn't, I didn't figure it out smoothly. Like it was really a trial and error on the, all the way. But we, me and my UK and US editors worked so hard to layer this out so that if anyone reads the twist, I really wanted it to be a book that like, when you find out the twist, it doesn't feel like, well, now I'm done. I really wanted it to feel like something of, oh, I feel like if I could reread this, it would still be meaningful.

• 18:22Fearne Cotton?

  Yes.

• 18:22Speaker 07

  So there are so many easter eggs. We worked so hard to make it feel like if anyone ever wants to read it again, to better understand it or just to enjoy it, every scene should be felt differently. And that was what I really want. More than like the landing of the twist, I wanted it to feel like something that held up under multiple rounds of scrutiny, and that was really important to me.

• 18:42Fearne Cotton?

  I mean, it does, without giving away

• 18:44Speaker 07

  It's so hard.

• 18:45Fearne Cotton?

  anything. The bit where she finds what she thinks is the head of a microphone.

• 18:52Speaker 07

  Yeah.

• 18:53Fearne Cotton?

  In the yard. I, that wouldn't leave my brain. I was like, what does it mean?

• 18:59Speaker 07

  Yeah.

• 18:59Fearne Cotton?

  And I just couldn't figure it out. Honestly, it's so clever. It's so clever. Now you, this has already been sold as a film. This has been made, being made?

• 19:07Speaker 07

  It's being made.

• 19:08Fearne Cotton?

  It's being made. I mean, that must be a huge trip. Something that you've dreamed up in your head. I can't even imagine that process of you've got the words, you've got the structure of it, and then it's quite literally brought to life.

• 19:20Speaker 07

  Yeah. I mean, I'm sure, I'm sure you've had plenty of these moments in your own career because you're such a multi hyphenate, but I don't think I will process that for another decade. I feel very lucky and I sold the rights shortly after I sold the book. And I remember when I found out the people who were interested in it, I, I still haven't fully processed it, but it's a, it's an unbelievable team. Obviously Anne is at the, is at the lead of it. And then it's basically like an all woman team at Amazon. And it's just, these people care so much about this story and it's going to be amazing. I think it's going to be amazing.

• 19:51Fearne Cotton?

  You sat with Anne Hathaway to chat about the whole project, the book.

• 19:54Speaker 07

  We've had a few conversations, yeah. Yeah, she's brilliant. I have, I mean, I already got the sense of that before I met her, but she is like truly an artist. And I remember I was kind of nervous going through that process because it's a lot. And I just felt really out of my depths. And I had felt kind of overwhelmed and that was the meeting where I finished it and just thought it has to go to her. And my agents were like, okay, hold on because now we have to go through negotiations. But I just said, it's only going to go to her.

• 20:21Fearne Cotton?

  Well, you want your baby to be in the best hands. You want to see it come to life in the way that you would imagine it to be fitting.

• 20:27Speaker 07

  Yeah, and I wanted it to go to someone who was enough of an artist that it doesn't, to me, I don't need the book to be a one to one faithful adaptation. I want someone to take this story and turn it into a movie. And, and a movie has totally different advantages than a book. And so any artist worth their salt would know that and would be like, here's how we're going to take the essence of this and then make it cinematic. And those were the conversations I had where I was like, you understand this really well.

• 20:53Fearne Cotton?

  And how much sort of letting go do you have to do in that process? Because obviously it is somebody else's adaptation of your story. Does that sit okay with you?

• 21:01Speaker 07

  Total, I totally let go from the jump. I think it's because I've had such a dissociative experience from the jump. It was very easy for me to be like, all right, click that part of my brain off, click that part of my brain off. But no, I mean, I don't feel precious about it. I think I wrote my novel. I think that they will make certain changes to make the movie better. And I think that's great. And that's kind of what it is. Yeah.

• 21:23Fearne Cotton?

  Holy shit, imagine that moment where you're sat in a cinema.

• 21:25Speaker 07

  I don't know if I'll be able to watch it, to be honest. I feel like that'll, maybe that'll be when my brain clicks back on, like, oh my god.

• 21:30Fearne Cotton?

  I cannot wait. Do we have a timeline? Do we know?

• 21:33Speaker 07

  I don't think I can talk about timeline, but I know that they're chugging along. I think that's what I can say.

• 21:37Fearne Cotton?

  I am buzzing. I mean, I have told everyone who will listen about this book. Like literally every friend, I'm like, you have, this is the one novel you have to read this year. I am literally buzzing about it.

• 21:52Speaker 04

  Hey, we're Nick and Jack, hosts of The Best One Yet. Behind every episode, there's research, emails, spreadsheets, and our shared Google Doc, the headline hammer. With Google Workspace with Gemini, Google's AI is built right into the premium versions of tools we already use, like Gmail, Docs, and Sheets. No new tools or extra logins, just personalized AI for the way we work. That means less time on the work around the work and more time finding the stories worth talking about. Get AI tools for work. Upgrade to Google Workspace with Gemini at go.o.gle/workspacewithGemini. That's go.o.gle/workspacewithGemini.

• 22:25Fearne Cotton?

  Hello, this is Susie Ruffel. And Maisie Adam. And together we host Big Kick Energy. Hey Mais, what is it? Only the best podcast ever. Yeah. A comedy entertainment podcast with a focus on all things women's football, all things hilarious, all things friendship. It's a laugh is what it is, Ruffel. Yeah, and a fair bit of gossiping, too. Oh, and a lovely bit of gossip. Chow down on the gossip. Nom, nom, nom, nom, nom. You can listen wherever you get your podcasts. You just need to search Big Kick Energy. Grab a knife and fork and tuck in, baby.

• 22:58Fearne Cotton?

  I'd love to know more about your process in, okay, you've got the idea, it's landed in your head, you know you've got to flesh it out. What's your process in actually getting that down on paper? Is there a certain time of day you like to write? How long do you like to write for?

• 23:12Speaker 07

  The first draft of this was very urgent, and I do think that it shows in the pages. It was very much just me figuring out the plot and the emotional experience of the characters. And I wrote that very quickly over about a two-month period in the winter. And it was very, yeah, it was crazy. It was just me waking up. I had a job at the time, so I would wake up at like four in the morning and write. And then, you know, I would do work and then I would write at night. And I already had an agent at the time, which was amazing. So she was very in on this and I was sending her pages. And so we were working very quickly. And then, once I sold the book, I was able to kind of sit back with my editors and really think like, what, again, it's hard to talk about the research that I did and didn't want to do without talking about spoilers. But I'll just say, there were decisions about what to research,

• 23:57Speaker 07

  what elements of that to incorporate into the fiction. Um, what to manipulate, what to invert. Like, there are so many different elements of that, and that took a lot of time. And then making the twist land.

• 24:08Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 24:09Speaker 07

  The twist, I, I always had the same twist, but it was nowhere near as interwoven, as I will say that this one is now. And so, yeah, I, I really, that was what took the most time, was sitting with that and just feeling like, okay, does this actually all work?

• 24:25Fearne Cotton?

  Oh, my God. I mean,

• 24:26Speaker 07

  Yeah.

• 24:27Fearne Cotton?

  There, there are moments, I guess, well, I've only written one fiction myself, but where everything starts to fit together like a little puzzle, like, oh, and now we are in the place where this all makes sense.

• 24:39Speaker 07

  Yeah. It is truly the best feeling in the world.

• 24:42Fearne Cotton?

  Okay, so the process is you're getting up at four, it's urgent, you're getting it out. For anybody out there who is thinking, I've got an idea and I really wanna get this out of me and start writing my debut fiction, for, whether it's for fun or you actually wanna get it out there. Have you got any tips? What would you tell people who are in that position?

• 25:03Speaker 07

  Oh, I mean, you just can't stop. I, I wrote for a decade. You know, this is, this, obviously, it's, you know, my debut novel, meaning my first published novel, but I've been writing and chasing ideas since I was 20. So I think that there is a certain element of like, you have to believe in yourself to a delusional degree. And again, I'm sure this is something that you can relate to in a number of ways. The level of rejection that you move through as an artist would take down an elephant.

• 25:29Fearne Cotton?

  Yep.

• 25:29Speaker 07

  And the, every single artist I have met who has succeeded has the same exact story, which is a delusional belief in themselves. Like, I, I could list, and, and something that helps me is start to look at origin stories, like Greta Gerwig, I know, applied to every screenwriting graduate school and was rejected from all of them. Ta-Nehisi Coates talks about this. So many famous books were rejected by dozens and dozens. To Kill a Mockingbird was rejected, I think, from 70 editors until someone published it. So I really think people often view it as like, how do I make this one project work? And my thing is, you don't know which project is gonna work.

• 26:04Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah.

• 26:05Speaker 07

  You just have to do every project. If you, if you want this to be your life, you really Just have to keep doing it until it works because otherwise it's too easy to kind of give up.

• 26:15Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah. Do you know what? I was having this exact conversation with a very good friend of mine last week. And he writes scripts and short comedy scripts and he acts in them too. And he'd had one really great project that had done very well online and is now on a second and a third one. And he's like, oh, I don't know if they're landing as well. And we had this whole chat about all of it's worth it because it's more mileage. You're you're learning. Yeah, you're it's more practice. It's more learning. It's more feedback. And some of that feedback, like you say, is so painful.

• 26:46Speaker 07

  Yeah.

• 26:46Fearne Cotton?

  Has there ever been a point where you've thought, I'm gonna give up or I'm gonna stop?

• 26:51Speaker 07

  Every other day. I will say, um, the reason I so this this novel came from a time period in the winter where I was on TikTok. The reason I was on TikTok that winter and the reason I became aware of tradwives was because I had just submitted. I'd finished my second novel, my second manuscript that I was working on the previous summer. I shopped it around. No one wanted it. Radio silence in New York. That fall, I reached out to my agent, who I still have, who I love. And I just said, I think I need to be done with writing for a year. I was just so exhausted, so burnt out. And so this novel essentially came out of me feeling like I had given up. And I think it's really indicative of by this point, I had developed such a muscle for writing.

• 27:32Speaker 07

  It really was just like, I I remember when I started writing, I just kind of told myself, well, if this one fails too, you've just lost two months. You just lost a few months. So you just really have to get comfortable with this idea of failure. Because, you know, it's not gonna, I this book has done really well, thank goodness, but I might write another manuscript and then trash it. Like, it never ends. It's really just a lifestyle.

• 27:54Fearne Cotton?

  It well, exactly. And what a healthy way to look at it. Cause I think if you're constantly chasing.

• 27:59Speaker 07

  Much less healthy when I'm crying in my bathroom.

• 28:01Fearne Cotton?

  It looks good right now. Exactly. It still hurts. Do you know what? It's it's such a um sort of pertinent conversation. Because I am halfway through two novels, two. One, I started writing. I was really into it. And then I had a bunch of stuff happening in my life. So I just naturally pressed pause. And then I couldn't get back into it. I'd let it too long. And I was like, I don't remember these guys, like, who are they? And what what do they feel? And I just thought, and then I had another idea. Started writing it, got halfway through, and then I started to have doubts about one part of it that sort of blocked me. And I've never really had that, where I'm blocked to the point of, and I don't think I can continue with it. Or I certainly feel like you did

• 28:43Fearne Cotton?

  that winter where you were like, I'm burnt out. I've written lots of books on the trot, and I maybe need to not write, so I like it again.

• 28:51Speaker 07

  Yeah, that's the thing. It's you cannot tie, you cannot tie your creativity to one project. And I have a few friends that I've spoken with who are like, if this one just doesn't work, then that's when I'm, I'm gonna quit. And I've been there, and I've, I've felt that a million times. But I think I realize now the secret is you don't know which one's gonna work. I've loved every project as much as I love this book.

• 29:12Fearne Cotton?

  Yes.

• 29:12Speaker 07

  I've been as proud of every project. The, no one works on books for years unless you feel like there's something there, however small that kernel is. So people always ask me, like, how did you know this one was different? And I'm like, I didn't. You think I would have spent years on those other novels if I didn't think those were gonna work?

• 29:30Fearne Cotton?

  That's so good to hear. Because I think, you know, I'll sit here and I'm so in awe of this book and your writing and your skill and your talent. And you could think, oh, I'm never gonna have a book that lands that well or resonates. But like you say, you don't know. You, you love all the projects you're working on as much. It's just some, it's the right timing. It's the right, you know, and you've obviously got put hours and hours into this to, to have the skill to write this in two months. But I think there is a certain amount of other people, the right time, a resonating with that story.

• 30:01Speaker 07

  Right.

• 30:01Fearne Cotton?

  And it comes to life.

• 30:02Speaker 07

  Well, and Ta-Nehisi Coates has talked about this, where the longer you stick it out, the better you are. And all of a sudden, you are one of the best people in the game. And so I, I've loved everything I've written, but I think this is probably the best thing I've written so far. Not because of some magic, but because I have 10 years now

• 30:20Fearne Cotton?

  Of course.

• 30:20Speaker 07

  of effort. And so I think that's another thing is like, I try to tell myself, well, if I just stick it out for another year, you've got another year under your belt. And I think I felt that way with yesteryear.

• 30:29Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah. Oh, my God. Well, it is just. Fucking phenomenal. I can't wait for everybody in our book club to go out and get this book and discuss it because there are so many themes to talk about, so many angles which you could come at this storyline and have a really deep debate about, which we can't do too much of because I don't wanna, I just don't wanna spoil too much because it is one of those books where you just need to start and within the first page you're like, I was so intrigued with Natalie from the fucking get go, like from the first page. Who is she? Why does she think like this? And how is this going to end? It's just brilliant.

• 31:09Speaker 07

  Thank you so much. I mean, I felt the same way. I'm grateful. I'm grateful for the experience of writing Natalie. It was truly a pleasure from start to finish.

• 31:16Fearne Cotton?

  I bet it was. It's amazing. Well, look, congratulations. And you can just see that this book is just gonna have a life of its own now. It's just gonna keep on going.

• 31:25Speaker 07

  Sure is. I'm gonna turn off my phone and I'm gonna let it go. Let it go into the world.

• 31:29Fearne Cotton?

  It's so brilliant. And thank you so much for being on Happy Place. And thank you for being our book of the month.

• 31:34Speaker 07

  Thank you for having me. It is the privilege of a lifetime. I am so honoured.

• 31:39Fearne Cotton?

  Oh, Caro, thank you so much for your time. What a book. I'm sort of unbelievably full of joy that I got to read it slash so jealous because what an idea. What an idea. And how brilliantly executed. This book will stay with me for a very long time. All right, then. Do you wanna know what we're reading next? June's book is called Honey and it's by Amani Thompson. Yersa doesn't really intend to kill anyone, but the Cambridge professor sitting opposite her has manipulated her friend and stolen her research. So when she flicks a bee into his drink, she just thinks he'll get a nasty little sting. But now he's dead

• 32:23Fearne Cotton?

  and it's a sweet, sweet feeling for Yersa, finally having some control. This is another bloody incredible debut novel. So let's chat about it on Instagram. Head to at Happy Place Book Club. That is where we're talking about this book. You'll get loads of behind the scenes stuff from our authors there too, which is just fascinating. Right, until next time. A massive thanks again to Caro and to you. I love you, bookworms.

• 33:11Fearne Cotton?

  Happy Place is researched by me, Fern Cotton. The producer is Anushka Tate at Happy Place Studios, with studio engineering by Basil Oxtaby.

• 33:22Speaker 04

  Hey, we're Nick and Jack, hosts of The Best One Yet. Behind every episode, there's research, emails, spreadsheets, and our shared Google Doc, the headline hammer. With Google Workspace with Gemini, Google's AI is built right into the premium versions of tools we already use, like Gmail, Docs, and Sheets. No new tools or extra logins, just personalized AI for the way we work. That means less time on the work around the work and more time finding the stories worth talking about. Get AI tools for work. Upgrade to Google Workspace with Gemini at go.o.gle/workspacewithGemini. That's go.o.gle/workspacewithGemini.

• 33:55Speaker 05

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• 34:08Speaker 04

  Everybody, listen up.

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• 34:24Speaker 04

  Help I Sexed My Boss is the podcast where manners meets mayhem. I'm William Hanson. I'm Jordan North. And together we take on the hilarious challenges of modern life. William's the arbiter of etiquette. And Jordan's the chaotic yin to my perfectly polished yang. So if you want laugh-out-loud stories and brutally honest moments, then you'll love Help I Sexed My Boss. Watch and listen every Tuesday and Friday. On YouTube and wherever you get your podcasts. Just search Sexted. Be warned, it's a bit rude.