Emerging Writers Series: Zoë Coyle
“Only you can write your stories: take pleasure in doing it... Writing is a gift unto itself. And, of course, it is, right? Writing allows us to distil and make sense of all sorts of things. To live lives that are not our own. To fall in love over and over again. To behave absolutely appallingly. To create worlds. It is fiercely, life-affirmingly beautiful.”
If you haven’t read Zoë Coyle’s debut novel, Where the Light Gets In, you might want to get it on your radar (and check out our guest review if you need any more convincing!).
But if you haven’t read it, don’t worry too much about cramming it in before you pick up a copy of her forthcoming novel, The Dangers of Female Provocation, published this coming May. Where her debut focused on family love, grief and self-discovery, her latest offering promises a much darker thrill ride into the murky waters of marriage, patriarchal structures - and what happens when it causes one woman to finally snap.
Ahead of its release, I had the absolute pleasure of catching up with fellow dachshund lover, Zoë, to chat all about navigating second-novel nerves, creative philosophies, and the top writerly lessons she’s learned so far.
I tend to start these interviews with a similar question to help readers learn more about you! Could you tell us a little about your journey to becoming a writer and what inspired you to start writing?
Reading is one of my great loves. I grew up in a home filled with books and a mother who put plenty of them into my hands. So for me, because I adore books and writers, it took me a long time to build up the courage to write my first novel and follow through to completion rather than abandoning it as was my earlier dispirited mode.
When I turned 40, I felt it was high time to do it, to clamber over the voices of fear, self-criticism and comparison. That success would be the doing of the thing in and of itself, and as long as I made a self-respecting piece of art, it didn’t matter what happened thereafter. That kind of thinking is very liberating. I wish I had the wisdom to come to it sooner. I like that Latin proverb that fortune favours the brave.
The Dangers of Female Provocation is your second novel, due to be published this May through Ultimo Press. Can you tell us more about it and what readers can expect?
Ah, well, hopefully, a really fun ride.
Odessa Odin, our main character, has it all – a successful career, an adoring husband and a close circle of friends to whom she is fiercely loyal. On the surface, they’re living a glittering London life of wealth and cosseted privilege, but underneath this veneer lies painful truths of betrayal, neglect and unfulfilled ambitions. It’s a tightrope of holding themselves and their marriages together as their men transgress the promises they made at the altar with the blithe entitlement they’ve enjoyed all their lives. For the women, there’s just too much to lose.
When Odessa discovers her husband is having an affair, her carefully constructed life falls away. The mask slips to reveal a vast reservoir of rage, fed up with how the patriarchy stacks the odds against her sisterhood. Training her sights on her friends’ husbands, Odessa becomes an avenging warrior – aiming to chasten them into being better partners, picking them off one compromising situation at a time…
But as Odessa’s mission becomes all-consuming, it blinds her to the reality that the score is about to be evened in a way she could never anticipate.
I wanted to write about friendship, marriage and the patriarchy. My aim was to wrap it up in a wild, gripping story about one woman snapping and taking male re-education into her own hands. Hopefully, I found the balance, as I didn’t want this book to be an exclusionary feminist rant. I want to invite everyone to the table. The response to some early male readers has made me very happy indeed.
How did you find the process of writing your second novel compared with your first - did you feel any of the dreaded ‘second book syndrome’ that seems to plague many?
My first novel is about grief, family secrets and finding your way home to self. A spiritual road trip of sorts. My second novel is about female rage, gender, sex and love, so funnily enough, I found my second a much more fun novel to write.
It was an absolute delight from beginning to end. I occasionally would take my hands off my computer keys and cackle at Odessa’s audacity. I didn’t want to write that old trope of a mad woman going berserk; I was interested in exploring the idea of a brilliant but traumatised woman being able to justify her most extraordinary mission to re-educate her beloved friends’ husbands. She really goes all out, but she is not insane; she is furious. An emotion we don’t much like women to feel, let alone express.
You wear a lot of different hats in your professional life, and I love your ethos that this allows you to bring a breadth of knowledge and insights to your work. I’d love to learn more about your creative process and what creativity means to you as a writer and in general?
What a beautiful question, thank you for asking it. Creativity is a driving force in my life. Isn’t that a lucky and privileged thing to be able to say? And I’ve learnt it can be found in many places. I choose to lean into creativity as a mother, within my company, by what I wear, with my dog, how I curate my home, where I channel my attention and how I use my mind. In theatres, art galleries, podcasts, reading and inside beautiful conversations.
It is the force that allows me to connect with deep thought, play, grace and awe – but it’s fundamental for me to carve out the time for creative output and all that creative input. Which means sitting down to write. That is hard, it can feel selfish and redundant. Elizabeth Gilbert’s book ‘Big Magic’ expresses this so well that the muse may or may not come if indeed you believe in her at all, but our job as writers is just about turning up at the desk and doing it.
I love how practical and disciplined that is. You’re not a writer if you don’t write, you’re imaginative. Writers write, so just do it.
Who are some of the key authors and writers that you’ve been influenced by - whose work is dominating your bookshelves that you think we should be exploring?
Oh, I wish I could answer this succinctly but the truth is I’m obsessed with many authors. So many best friends I’ve never met in real life. My home is crammed with books. Let me just name the ones whom I’ve read everything they’ve ever printed. Ian McEwan, Haruki Murakami, Oliver Sacks, Patricia Highsmith, Doris Lessing, Iris Murdoch, David Sedaris, Virginia Woolf, Jonathan Franzen, Kazuo Ishiguro, John Updike, Helen Garner.
Ok, that’s enough, you see my problem and now I feel a bit sick at all the masterpieces I’ve left out, Jane Eyre, Anna Karenina, Tess of the d’Urbervilles… Oh, I’ve just read ‘Reasons Not to Worry’ by my dear friend Brigid Delaney,it was fantastic, a brilliant Malcolm Gladwell-esque distillation on stoicism, and it’s also funny. I read about 160 books a year, more if possible, so if I live another 40 years that’s only about 6400 books left to me. It’s important to make sure each and everyone is a judicious choice. And that doesn’t mean they all have to stretch my mind. I love P.J. Wodehouse for the joy and comfort. The Brontes for my heart. Spiritual texts for my soul. Parenting books for my sanity.
Where I draw the line is bad/ugly writing or work that is just filler. I don’t look to books for numbing, I have wine for that.
Lots of our readers are emerging writers themselves. What would be three of your tips for others starting their writing journeys, based on your experience?
I don’t know who said it, but writing a novel is like driving a car at night, you can only see as far as the headlights reach. I found that very reassuring. That not knowing is all part of it.
Secondly, try to tie and gag your inner critic. Mostly I think they’re mean and anti-creativity. Truss your critic up in the garden and just quietly get on with your work. As they say, you can’t edit what’s not on the page. Google The Gap by Ira Glass if you’ve not heard his wonderful little riff on the gap in beginner creatives between their great taste and what they’re producing. I’ve held Ira’s words to my literary bumps and bruises like ice.
And lastly, be careful about who you show your work to. Protect it as you would someone you love who is vulnerable. I was silenced for probably a decade when I showed some work to a dear friend who is a writer. A few careless words from her delivered a near-fatal blow to my writerly resolve.
I would also say, only you can write your stories, take pleasure in the doing it, then, as I said earlier, writing is a gift unto itself. And of course, it is right? Writing allows us to distil and make sense of all sorts of things. To live lives that are not our own. To fall in love over and over again. To behave absolutely appallingly. To create worlds. It is fiercely, life-affirmingly beautiful.
And lastly, what’s next for you in terms of writing, can you tell us about anything you’re working on next?
It is very much in its infancy, but I’m once again looking at perspective-taking and how we can get it so wrong. It’s about a couple that meets and falls in love at a silent retreat. Unlike my first two novels, this one is written in two voices, hers and his. It’s about how we fall in love and how we co-create the reality of that.
Pilot Light Founder and Director Zoë Coyle is an author, leadership facilitator, MC and communications training leader with experience that spans over 20 years. Zoë has undertaken trauma training with the Blue Knot Foundation and graduated from NIDA with a Bachelor of Performing Arts. Her experience intersects corporate, coaching, writing, directing, acting, and charity work, with each area enabling her to bring a wide breadth of knowledge and deep insight to her work. In 2020 she signed a two-book deal with Ultimo Press, with her first fiction novel ‘Where the Light Gets In’ released in 2022 and her second novel ‘The Dangers Of Female Provocation, to be released in May 2023.
Zoë is the communication coach of choice for the CEO’s of some of Australia’s largest companies, small businesses and not-for-profit organisations, where she delivers bespoke content and culture programmes that enable true heart-based leadership and success. She is also a sought-after MC and keynote speaker. She is the mother of four children and a wirehaired dachshund named Solace.
Instagram: @zoe.hearts.books
My author website: zoecoyle.com
My company website: Pilotlight.co
LinkedIn: Zoe Coyle
Elaine Mead is a freelance writer and book reviewer, currently residing in nipaluna (Hobart), Tasmania. She is passionate about the ways we can use literature to learn from our experiences to become more authentic versions of ourselves and obsessed with showing you photos of her Dachshund puppy. You can find her online under www.wordswithelaine.com.
