Sarah Bullen and Kate Emmerson — Writers, coaches, mentors, authors of "Write Your Book in 100 days"

Right, it is yet another edition of what's involved and I got a double treat for you today because initially I thought I was only going to be speaking to one of The two day of the dynamic jury that I was going to speak to and I've got both of them Joining me on the line that is of course Sarah Bullen and Kate Emerson. Hello to you ladies David lovely to join you from Cape Town and lovely to join you from the UK Wonderful stuff. So the reason we're talking to you is you've just Released a book Published a book recently called write your book in a hundred days Stop mucking about and just write your book You know and and I'm fascinated about that because I've often heard it said that Everybody has got at least one book in them and for most people they should probably leave it there

Absolutely, so this is Sarah speaking David and you know What many people find out and we know this because we've been working with writers I'm a writing coach and mentor and literary agent and Kate has been working coaching writers for many years We do know that sometimes the process of writing a book Proves that maybe it's not exactly what you do want but other times it tends to prove that it is what you want and writing a book is a journey you want to go on in your Life and just a dream you want to fulfill or something. You just want to tick off the list of things you've done and achieved All right. Okay. No, I can buy into that I mean every now and again I have these little fantasies that perhaps I should write a book and then I think What am I gonna write about what I have to say, but we'll get on to my stuff. Maybe a little bit later Let's start off with you first though Sarah. Tell me a little bit about Sarah Bullen Where does Sarah come from and how did you get into being? this this writing coach

Background really I've been a journalist for many years working in financial working at newspapers and worked in radio worked on television as a journalist and Over the course of my career as a journalist. I was actually commissioned to write a book So my first book I wrote in 2003 and that was commissioned by penguin at the time It wasn't penguin random-house-strike and they really it was sort of the beginning of a bigger boom in publishing in the country And they asked me to write a very humorous take on motherhood. So I was so lucky I mean, you know writers battle and struggle to get a publishing deal and and there I was asked to write a book So really I mean, it was just ridiculously lucky. So I wrote my first book in 2003 and then in 2005 I did my second book which was a humorous take on relationships after your baby So what happened David is I had really moved a little bit away from short-form writing and short-form writing is journalism It's writing for a an audience that's reading an article in let's call it ten of eight minutes if you're lucky It's delivering a powerful and concise touch piece of writing and I've moved into long form which is writing a book Which is a big thing and a long thing and a complicated thing?

So in doing that I started really to work with writers. I started editing books. I started coaching writers and I developed some courses and mentorships that I've now been running for 15 years and Really just a love of books a love of stories a love of working on novels or love of working with writers on exciting stories and that really just develops and develops until my Full-time job is as a writing mentor and I've been very lucky in having worked all over the world With writers, you know because we live in as we all discovering now We live in a digital world where we can connect with anybody So it's been very exciting working with writers all over the world of the last 10 to 15 years on their books And then you know, one of my key things that I really love to do is to mentor writers So the book we are actually Kate and I wrote together because we work together a lot and we'll talk about that Which is an evolution really of working with sunny writers to get their books out there And we and other mentorships we run and we've just learned a few things over the years We've really learned a few things on what it takes to write a book what makes a good book what makes a book publishable You know how you actually write it the actual nuts and bolts of sitting down and writing the book And so we decided to pour all of that into what is my actually tenth book And I'll tell you a little bit about that in a little bit and Kate's book so we put this into the book and the hope of sharing a Lot of the things we've learned over the years with writers who really have that dream to write to get their story out there And this book is very particularly David for authors who want to write a nonfiction memoir So that is really a book of either about their own lives or about their professional expertise or about something that's factual And this really is honing in on that particular genre of book, which is highly readable Highly publishable and you know a really great way to share your knowledge or love or story of the world I must say I mean I've been through the book it terrifies me It's exceptionally well written and you literally do cover all the bases the reason it terrifies me is then you know If I if I actually acknowledge that I've taken any of this in it means I'm gonna probably be obliged to give it a bash So we'll just stick with it terrifies me at the moment. Let's move on to you Okay, tell us a little bit about Kate and where do you come from because you're a bit of a do we call you a digital?

Nomad or a global nomad? Yeah, we can call me that now and so my motto is live light and live large And but I'll go back a little bit. So in 2003 I qualified as a master life coach in the UK because at the time there weren't actually qualifications in South Africa So I then came back to South Africa and started this business not really knowing anything about what I was doing although I had been an entrepreneur all my life with my first business at 25 in the health and wellness industry and life coaching was sort of a natural transition from that for me and Because coaching was such a new it was like this unknown in South Africa and the world I was very blessed David because I was pretty much invited as an expert in every magazine every newspaper TV I was really like one of the sweetheart of the time because there weren't many people talking about it So I found myself writing articles or giving my supposed expert opinion because it was such an interesting fascinating and new world that people needed and wanted to know about and Because I had been an entrepreneur all my life. I had never wanted to be a corporate coach so I mostly coached entrepreneurs predominantly women and What I found was that I had never personally had a dream to write a book I had been journaling since I was a wee lass of 13 years old But not a writer per se But what I found happening was that the more I started writing the more I realized I could write but I loved Writing and I did have something to say and I'm a little cheeky and I got a bit of chutzpah And so what I also realized is that so many of my clients were paying for coaching out of their own pocket And of course that's got a you know, an impact on their own income and their bottom line So I started thinking about how could I leverage my expertise and my ideas into a more affordable format?

And so back in 2000 within my first year end of 2004 I started creating online courses I didn't even know they were online courses at the time because that digital world was completely new and it was quite like a maverick type of energy and I'm talking about those days when Reminding me of meetings. I'm talking about those days when there were no such things as auto responders You couldn't just add someone into a newsletter and magically things went off to their email address I wrote these courses and I was basically offering them at almost a fifth of the price of coaching and I would systematically take people through coaching processes either One of my expertise is to declutter your life so I would help them sprinkling your life or how to get your groove back or ignite your life and these courses were sold as one of my life coaching products and then only Seven years ago back in 2013 I thought wouldn't it be nice to see if I have a little more credibility and I thought it would be wonderful to publish a book So that someone else might be able to say actually hey kiddo, you kind of know what you're doing So I didn't want to self-publish my first book and I like Sarah said she was so lucky to get commissioned I actually was picked up by the first publisher I approached and launched my first book back in 2013 and it became a best seller in South Africa and Then the bug had bitten and the way Sarah and I started writing together was that when I was penning my second book I was on a very tight deadline and I literally put out a post on Facebook people were used to me running mastermind groups and I said hey guys, I'm about to write my second book who wants to do this process with me and really, I didn't know anything about structuring and and the the real nuggets of Book writing and I pulled Sarah and I said hey I need your help Will you come and teach everybody about book structures and she gave everyone a session and at the end of that we said well That was fun. Can we do this a little better a little deeper a little, you know Like in another way. And so our work together was born I think five or six years ago and we've been having heaps of fun changing people's lives helping others write their books ever since

Wonderful and I mean as I'm talking to you guys I'm just I'm paging through this book again And I'm just I'm modeling it how well and I think that's the bit that terrifies me is how well it's been put out because That is always when I thought about, you know, maybe I want to do this because you know We do in my other side of my life I do a lot of training as well a communication training sales training, etc, etc, etc And as you know, everybody goes well You have to have a book if you're needed if you want to be seen as an expert And then I've thought about and I've gone I don't know how to write a book now No, you can sort of you've given everybody a road map, which I think is grossly unfair But well done guys, I mean I've got to be honest it's it's brilliantly written and it's not A hard read. I thought initially I was gonna be a bit of a pain to wade through but it's not and now Talking to you. I mean your personality certainly do do come out in the book. How long did it take you Sarah to put this book together? Okay. Now. Well David that's a little bit of a funny story and We this is actually quite hilarious Kate and I decided that we had been walking so many writers through this process That we were going to actually put it together in a book and we just felt like we just actually wanted to have a little bit Of fun. We talk all the time about it. We do so many international seminars We coach so many people and we thought let's walk our talk, you know We're telling everybody all the time stop mucking about write a book. We're gonna write this book So Kate flew to Cape Town, okay, can't you actually tell this a little bit better than I but you can but in We decided we were going to literally write a book in five days. So it started with a little high-level strategy session What is this book about and that's really how all books start like?

Books begin with the question in your head Not what do I want to tell but what is a reader looking for a reader who is picking up this book? They're choosing this book off the shelf. What do they want out of it? So we stepping out of our ego This is what I want to share. I know so much and we asking ourselves. What does a reader want? They want they're buying this because they want to write a book. How best can we deliver that process to a reader? Right, so that's the beginning of all book writing high-level. What's the reader looking for? We got that done we kind of knew us we knew how to do this and Kate flew to Cape Town and Arrived here and we started the process of writing this book now We did this in five days our first draft Now that is not what anybody else can achieve and we do say to people you're gonna take a minimum of four months But we were compiling this book more than writing it because we have been teaching these online courses and mentorship So we had a lot of written stuff So really the process was David all of our expertise all of our notes and I'm sure so many people out there who are Professionals in their field. You've got a lot of this written down already. You've got workbooks you've delivered or talks you delivered So we sat down and we took all of this massive writing We already had quite a well thought-out process and we put it in one document and that

Because David one of the hardest things it's not just the knowledge and the wisdom and the ideas that you've got and maybe readers Want to read this body of work. It's actually about managing yourself as a writer. That's the biggest challenge So in those five days, we also decided to make a whole bunch of fun videos and we did some Facebook lives because it's also Heaps and heaps I was gonna swear of Bumtime is what we call it and you've actually got to walk yourself over to your chair sit down Glue yourself to your chair glue your hands to your computer Sarah and I are very different in how we work she prefers Excel spreadsheet out from prefer mind mapping and we had to put our two energies together and one of the hardest things was to Stop Sarah cooking eggs or for me to paint my nails or to actually go we need to go out shopping and get food and actually Just to manage ourselves in the process of writing the book because it requires you to dig Really deep from a almost like your personality level your ego level your I actually can do this. I can sit down I can't stop mucking about so we actually had to pin ourselves down And also remember to have some fun at the end of the day We would pour a glass of wine turn on the TV have a big laugh Try and get the best night's sleep and wake up and do it all over again Because we always say it's not necessarily about how talented you are as a writer It's that you've got the tenacity and the determination to sit down and do it and I think one of our biggest challenges was actually I had five days and I had an uber booked and I had a flight going up to Joburg to see my partner and we knew that the title we got to that deadline the faster and more furiously we Worked because we'd also put ourselves on the line by telling our community we're doing this so we had people watching us So accountability is the other massive part about writing a book because writers It's too easy for them to let themselves off the hook and that's one of the things that we do is we hold you to your Own promise and we had to do that because we had our community watching us as well Okay, well this sounds this sounds fantastic and when we come back I'm gonna I'm gonna ask another question and I'm gonna throw it open to to either Sarah Okay, because a little bird told me that during those five days of writing when you when you mentioned that you had some fun I want to talk a little bit about that when we come back. It is what's involved my special guests at the moment Sarah Bullen and Kate Emerson we're talking about their book write your book in a hundred days Stop mucking about and just write your book Right. We're back. Okay, lady so this as I said a little birdie mention something about fun and You skipped over some of that when you were talking about your five days Do you want to join it, you know, drop a couple of pills of wisdom there about the fun aspect? I Will start and A lot of the time Writing is not a fun process and that can take you by surprise because you have these very exciting ideas about writing a book and it's going to be so brilliant writing is a Job of sitting on your bum alone with a computer, right?

So we have to mix up and writers really get into this place where we can get very stuck in a slump You know when you actually writing a first draft and you're working for four months or six months or eight months Jeffrey Diva takes eight months just to plan a plot his book write the outline, you know you can really go a little bit muggy, so We really had to work in like this very specific times where we broke away had a laugh Did some exercise and it just reminded ourselves that this wasn't life or death, you know We were doing this because we had a choice. We wanted to write a book. It was gonna be a life and fun process and Laughing and we do do that. Don't be kidding. We have a lot of people. Yes, I'll tell you the egg story so I think it was our Second morning. So first day was getting back into the structure because we've done sort of the the proposal a year before So getting back into the structure. What are we doing? Oh, no, God what we were mad And I think the first day was quite sort of a mind shock for both of us and second day We're like, okay, we're really getting into this and we'd set up our computer side by side We had a whiteboard we had water always we had already three cups of coffee probably in us And I'm sitting at my computer with my back to Sarah's kitchen because we were in the hot bay and as I'm at my computer And I hear this noise behind me and I've got the video on cuz I'm saying to everybody. Okay, here we are live We're in Sarah's home. We're on day two. We're going at it. This is what we're gonna do We'll check in later and I had clunk clunk clunk behind me and I turn round live and I'm like What the hell are you doing? And there is Mrs. Bullen frying eggs now breakfast wasn't on our radar yet But they're on an eating frenzy and she just arrives tada in this in this shot And there she's got like three fried eggs on toast. Maybe no toast. Maybe it was ever I can't remember that but and then we sit down and it's just those crazy things because We're all different how we need to get our energy and how we procrastinate and often writers go On an eating frenzy when they're writing or a drinking frenzy. So mine is always coffee. Yes, come on more coffee And it's just you know We also are great friends and we just we are we are silly together and we laugh together And then we put on loud music and dance and do silly Jane Fonda moves And then we would also take time apart. So Sarah would go off to yoga or crossfit and I would go stomping up Chapman's peak to try and get some energy going Um, we were also busy training to get fit for a ratting retreat in Spain So yeah We have to maintain a really big sense of humor and a dose of reality and just not take it also seriously Because I gotta say when I when I heard about this and and I have heard from a couple of people that the two of You together it's just it's like you walk into the middle of a hurricane because you've got so much energy and you're bubbling and And buzzing all the time. Um, the fact that you got to write this in five days is unbelievable, but I understand When you say why you've done that?

Um, it's now it's now been released and uh, it's almost time. I believe uh, kate you've got to go to Another another call now, so we're going to be saying about you. But before we we go kate And we before we let you go and then i'll continue chatting to to Sarah Um, you've written the book you're involved in it. The book is out We were getting ready for the big launch. We were going to have you guys in studio with us and then Coronavirus happened and everybody got shut down Um, where what are you busy with now? Where to next? Uh, okay So what we did was obviously we had to just postpone and just pause all of our plans We also were about to shoot a digital course to go with the book. So that's all just on pause for now We also have tried to be super respectful and mindful of what's going on in the world And while right now is a fantastic time to write we also didn't want to go hard hitting into sales mode So we have just carried on like we do working with our writers. We have online mentorships. We have online groups Looking after our writers. We're in the process of a 21-day challenge So just doing the work that we do coaching people through their own writing process Um, i'm busy editing another book of my own You know and life also carries on when you are writing and running a family and running a business and doing Whatever it is that everybody needs to do at this time So we know that we'll be able to come back out and do Another launch, you know when the time is appropriate and for now, we're yeah, I just head down and we keep on working David Fantastic. Mr. Caddy if somebody wants to get hold of you the website the best way to do that It's kate-emison.com And that's two m's in my surname There we go. Okay. Thank you so much for for for stopping in and dropping in and having a chat with us I really do appreciate it. We wish you all the best fantastic. Thanks, David Good. Bye. Yes. Well, there we go. So so kate's on her way She's she's busy and you know, you often think uh, you know during this period of time at least you go Oh, well, maybe people aren't that busy, but there are certain people who are very busy. So i'm very appreciative of the time Sarah we still got you with us. So, um You wrote the book in five days. Um, is this literally a book?

Um that if i'm an executive somewhere, maybe I do like i've said to you. Maybe I do sales training can I pick up this book and Literally follow it cover to cover and will I have something at the end of that?

So david, I want to when I when I finished chatting about actually the process, I just want to clarify that we may have initially said We're writing it in five days and a little bit later I'll tell you how long it actually took us and really where the magic in the book comes in but If you have a book in your heart or you really as you said you want to somehow have a business card a calling card You know, you're a professional speaker Or maybe you're a life coach and you actually really don't know where to start and that's a problem Most people have david is they don't know how to start a book And when I say start I most often break that down into they don't know how to structure a book They don't know how to take this mass of thoughts that are in their head all this thing These things you've learned all this expertise all these stories. You may want to tell all of your client Nuggets, how do you actually take that swirling large mass of information? And drive it into a linear process, which is what a book is because a book is read from cover to cover so the beginning point of all books and the beginning point of our book is starting to ask the right questions To allow you as the writer to come up with what your book really is And how will this play out for the reader and really we're talking about What is your title?

What is the genre and how will your chapter outline or your table of contents really look? And how will you put your information in the right place? Um, so you can so the the book is actually a workbook. It starts with task one It walks you very systematically through all the things you need to think about Things you've got to write and questions you've got to answer which is coming. Maybe it's in I think it's in the second week Asking yourself. Why are you an expert? because to write a book On a level you have to own a level of expertise about something And it's really asking you as the author to find that and not just think it because that's a problem Of course we have is a lot of people who have the dream of a book spends a lot of time thinking Thinking thinking about the book. Should I write a book? What could the book be? The aim of my coaching and my you know Workshops in this book is to try and show you that writing is not thinking writing is a physical action It is actually something you do with your fingers So i'm trying continually to get you out of that thinking about your book to driving that into words or copy And pushing you continually to do what we call drive up your word count And that is a step by step process where you putting words on paper and slowly systematically you building a book Which which is fantastic and you know one of the things that I noticed I don't know if you've if you've chatted to or if you know matt brown, uh, he runs the matt brown show And he's just I think he's last year He he wrote his own book called your inner game, I believe and when I tell it to him about writing the book He said his biggest challenge was this imposter syndrome um, and I wonder if if if that is something that is common because For me every time I think maybe I should write a book Maybe there is a book in me that needs to come out then this imposter kicks in and goes really Really? Do you think anybody's going to care about a book?

Yeah, I think all writers have that I think you know anybody who puts themselves out there in the world, you know And a book is is that you know whenever you commit something to paper Or show or you put yourself in the public domain You really are hanging out Your life for other people to look at and I think that always Creates doubt but you know david there's just so many Reasons that it's really valuable to share your story and share your life, um with the public Um, and you know, you've got to find out what is that calling within you? You know, some people want to write it for their family a lot of our authors who come on our retreats or work with us They just want to share a memoir You know with their so their family know who they were and where they came from um other people want they have a story to tell you know, and I always say, you know, there is a massive appetite for books There's a reason that book there are bookshops packed with books that amazon I mean you sure jeff bezos is is is coining it during um During this corona virus lockdown because people all readers Want to step out of their ordinary lives and step into somebody else's for a little bit and that's why we pick up books Um, we pick up books as a reader because we want to be entertained So there's two reasons most people buy a book. The one is to be entertained and the other is to be informed so There's a huge demand for this. So your story When you're choosing to write your story and put it out there, it's not unique There's lots of other stories. It doesn't matter if it's an addiction story if it's a abuse story if it's a success story if it's a sports story There's other people who've written books about that um But the calling of a writer Is to somehow document them their time and bring their voice and bring their edge and bring their take On what really is an age old tale?

um So we have rules that we always ask writers to follow So when they start the book i've got series rules of writing your first draft and one of those rules David is an absolute undertaking But during the writing process you're not going to read any similar books Because that's where it starts, you know, but this guy. Oh this guy's story is much bigger than mine They had a worse time they handled it so much better. His tone is so much funnier than mine He explains this or she explains this better than I could so so dealing with imposter syndrome is also just limiting the other Don't look at other stories your story is unique and you need to tell it in your way for this generation for these readers And for your future I think that's that's uh, that's that's a fantastic Um way of looking at things. Um, we are uh, this is we are this is you see it's getting to me English is actually my first language believe it or not. Uh, this is what's involved My special guest uh, we've had kate emison on the line with us. She had to pop off due to prior commitment Sarah still with us and we were talking about their book write your book in a hundred days Stop mucking about and just write your book Um, we'll find out more from sarah when we come back

Right, we are back it is what's involved. Thank you For listening in. I hope you're enjoying it so far. The whole concept of writing a book to me Is is absolutely fascinating. Um, I am a voracious reader. I love reading and You know in part of what we're do we're doing in in our training and our communication training in ourselves training is we're talking about storytelling Storyselling the art of the story and you know, that is something You know that is it's very primal to all of us. I'm sure you'd agree sarah Um, because you know, it goes back to to ancient ancient days and we love a good story Don't we? Yes, we do. We absolutely do. You know, storytelling is and it started with uh with oral storytelling, you know stories Are what hold us together? Stories are what show us the way? um and for centuries humans have told each other stories and As at moments that are important when sometimes advice isn't what's required there are stories that merge art and creativity and magical creatures that sometimes show us Uh an answer that we can't really get in society that they blend the magic with the actual process of life and that is why we are just so captivated by them, you know and

There is just a beautiful beautiful opening in society for any story, you know I'm a literary agent which basically means david. I saw books to publishers on the behalf of writers And I want to tell you that all publishers know and all booksellers know that human beings love stories And they're looking for them um, you know, I just remember that when harry potter came out the you know the that that that unbelievable exciting magic that came with these kind of stories, so there's so many different stories and Humans are seeking them and searching for them and captivated by them um, and you know storytelling since time began has really followed the pattern of the hero's journey because in a story We are always following a hero on the road to redemption um And when you start to become a writer a lot of the process of writing Is to start to break down how stories work? Um, you know this wonderful dream of I want to write a story and my first love of course on novels um And we start really when you start to write a book, um, you start to break down. How does the story work? What are this? What are the elements that are making? this particular novel work And to try and unpack that and what is a hero's journey? Why must my character be a hero? Why is that so important?

Why if it's a story about my life, why am I a hero? And how does that arc that story arc play out? um and You know, there's just um, it's just a magical world really isn't it where you can open the covers of a book And disappear into somebody else's life for 10 hours or 18 hours or however long it takes you to work your way through the 80 000 words of a full-length novel as reader It is it is one of those things and I think it's one of the greatest joys and i've i've used um, i'm reading uh as an escape many many times and you're right sometimes I read purely for The enjoyment for the entertainment and yeah for the escapism and other times I if I want to learn something where we should have you know, the youngsters of today generally will turn to the internet I would turn to books Um, and and I reluctantly a couple of years ago bought a kindle because I loved you know books I love the smell and the feel of books and I was one of those radical only books only paperback and hardcover books I love my kindle now because I can take 50 books with me wherever I go Um, and and this this book of yours, uh, write your book in a hundred days is available on amazon, isn't it? It is on amazon. Yeah, of course because we've had this lockdown It's not actually in bookshops at the moment and it will be But um, we've actually had wonderful um success already with our writers and downloading it and working through it already because it is so practical Um, so it's on amazon and you just look search for write a book in a hundred days or I suppose you just search for it um And and really, you know what you mentioned um there david about you shifting to a search for information Is also reflecting the bigger reading trends that we've noticed over the last decade Where you know novels have always outstripped non-fiction in sales and in the last five years That has started to swing where non-fiction sales are starting to overtake Novel sales, which is quite an interesting trend in the publishing world um Over the decade when we analyze the whole decade. So that's 20 the you know, the up to 2020 novels have still outstripped um, um non-fiction books, but that will change and it did change significantly in the last five years So and I I tease this out and I just mentioned that because one of my My strongest pieces of advice to somebody who has a book in their heart or who who wants to write a book is Look at the trends Start to become aware of what kind of books are being published. Like what is the contemporary market looking for?

um and start to ask how could you and your book fit into this, you know modern publishing world right now where trends like young adult new adult novels are rising and rising middle grade fiction is one of our biggest growing Genres at the moment Memoirs are still huge with this emphasis on celebrity memoirs. Of course, they are always snapped up but also You know, ordinary life memoirs are highly publishable um and another trend which I have just spoken about actually the talk I did to writers is that When we think about writing a book again Just go into the bookshops Look at those books that are highlighted best sellers people are buying these books and one trend Kate and I were actually in london together and we went to Piccadilly Circus waterstone books five Laws of books just sitting there. I mean it was so exciting. It's it's a book lover's dream. I was in heaven

And one thing I noticed that really and you can always tell the trends in these big bookshops because they Tease them out and the trend that I was noticing that people are buying is something called smart thinking Smart thinking books. So if you're thinking of writing a book look at that genre go, you know These are your mark mansions the subtle art of not giving a bleep. We won't swear on air um They you're um, tim ferris's these kind of clever idea books Challenging the status quo challenging thought processes having a disruptive idea in the marketplace And these are current books that are great So if you want to write and you want to get published, it's a double whammy of having a great story and also knowing What the market's looking for and then you know, you've got a fighting chance Yeah, and I and I mean, you know, particularly with us Where we are now across the world that the other day that like half of the world's population is in some form of lockdown now None of us know what is coming. So I think this quest for knowledge and like, okay, how do I prepare? Myself what I do. What do I do? These would be and I mean, I know that i've been doing it I've been going. Okay. What does it kind of look like? Is there a futurist who's looking at the book?

Is there somebody you know, what can I do? How can I prepare myself and everything? And I think books are the perfect way to do it now Just to talk a bit more about your book just before we uh, we let you go because I realize you've probably also got a lot to do um You claim okay that this is this is a challenge writing your book in 100 days Okay, but you say by the end of the workbook if I finish this workbook and I work through it diligently I will have completed the first draft of my book I will have mapped out a second draft I will have written and to quote you guys a kick-ass pitch deck ready to submit to publishers And crafted an achievable plan for your author brand This is this sounds like a lot of work. But now when i've done all of this then what? So that comes back finally to the question actually of did it actually take us five days and will this take you a hundred days? Yes, it will You can get to the place Of writing what we really call the first draft now The first draft of a book is not that thing that's going to sit on the shelf. The first draft is the beginning of the process When we finished our five days, we went into what we have what was an editing process and in our editing process between ourselves So cakes and I both I mean i'm a professional editor. She's written five books Doesn't matter. We still called in the experts. We sent our book to an editor the editor sent it back We sent it back and every time we went through these revision cycles We really improved our book And I would say honestly david did at the end of the day took us another four months of toing and froing To actually look at the product and go Damn Actually, i'm i'm kind of proud of this. I can I can I can get behind this so this A book is a series of many steps to get a book from an idea in your heart to a finished product Standing on the shelf. I will tell you straight up. It's never going to happen in under a year unless You're gonna you know, it's been commissioned. It's jake white. You've won the rugby world cup They and penguin are rushing your book out and they want it delivered in two months. It's the process And the beauty of a book is that it's a big thing. It's a big thing It takes you time It takes effort. It takes energy So not only you first write your book then you do your next draft, which is a bit better Then you do the third then you do the fourth and every time you make it better Parallel to all of that you're building your pitch deck and the pitch deck is that thing you send to somebody like me?

Who's a literary agent or you send it to a publisher and the pitch deck goes like this This is my book idea This is who I am. I'm totally qualified to write this book because this is what I do And here's a little bit of a sample of my book So by the time you get to the end of all your edits You've got in hand a book proposal that you can send to a publisher and an agent You've got a really solid workable version of your book And hopefully if you followed our book or our advice You've also built an author brand and that's very important. David in this day and age the writers are getting published People publishers are looking at are people who have a following That it doesn't matter necessarily how big or how small but they people who somehow have built a little following around them um, rachel hollis is one of the best sellers on the amazon bestseller chart for the last year, um And she you know her first book is girl wash your face Her second one girl stop apologizing and she is a lifestyle blogger um And these are the kind of writers who've developed a little brand a little following um that all the publishers and agents are wanting to pick up because they have a really a built-in sales function where we Understand you're going to sell your own books and that's very important as well Well, I mean what what struck me is, you know, um and Is is you've got in your book as well?

Um at the back there, there's a section of what some of your writers say now Um, I never realized that he'd attended your course. There's two people in fact, uh, brad shawken Um, because I said it to brad a couple of months ago and i've chatted to him on and off During the the years, um, and you know, he's his book is uh, what we are human. We are still human I think and work shouldn't suck Um, and he's given you guys a beautiful write-up in the book and then also Um, somebody I didn't realize had uh written a book at all Um, and it's a dietheton now dietheton and i'll go back Many many years, um, and I knew her husband john very well um, and just to see that she's also written a book and and gone through your course, I think that speaks volumes and You know This is this this gives me hope and then of course, uh, the addendum at the back of the book is uh, Very interesting to me. I love going through that and it's going. Okay. All right, and then it spurred on so many ideas So as I said initially i'm terrified about writing a book. Um, I might have a book in me Looking through the addendum. I suddenly felt I might want to write 10 books. Um, but now Sarah if people want to talk to you, are you open to people talking to you?

Um, you know now we've we've gotten the book now what or you know, maybe I need a bit more help What's what's the best way to talk to sarah then? Yeah So my my role really and it has been for many years is to support writers to get published. I mean, that's my business That's my passion Um if I can and it's a great book. I want to try and sell it to you to a pub for a publisher So there's many way, you know, the best way to get hold of me is through my website Which is the writing room dot co dot z a and you will find that because kate and I have run mentorships And we work we really support writers and we really do it for a long time We have a lot of mechanisms. I have a writer's author support group on facebook in which you Join when you bought the book and we have authors of all stages there They ask questions have direct access to me. We organize you a beta reader if you need which is we get you manuscript appraisals We can we will support you through the publishing process um So so the best way is always just to go to my website the writing room dot sierra today and there you'll see through that All the ways in which you can connect with me. I do sessions with writers. I do sessions with publishers We have a series of calls and informative lectures we do and also just one-on-one work, you know, it's just such a great job talking about stories all day and um, you know working with people whose passion is words because that's my passion, um and And working in the world of literary stuff. I mean what what a treat

Fantastic sarah. Thank you so much for chatting to us and of course kate as well joined us earlier on there I do greatly greatly appreciate it You can get hold of sierra at the writing room dot co dot za So i'll be happy to chat to you the book is available on amazon right now Write your book in a hundred days stop mucking about and just write your book Uh, if you believe you've got a story in you, I think you should go out and get it It's a brilliant book. Um, and and and it's made me do a lot of thinking and those are the kind of books. I Love sierra. Thank you so much for taking time out and having a chat to us. Thanks, david