Soulmates (38 page)

I actually can’t believe I’m writing my acknowledgements page for my first novel! You’ll have to bear with me a bit here because I’ve fantasised about doing this since about the day I discovered what books were.

So, firstly, a huge thank you to Maddy, for making this pipe dream real. Thank you for not only being a totally kick-ass agent, but also one of the loveliest people I’ve ever met. Your support of, and dedication to,
Soulmates
has literally changed my life. There will never be adequate words to express my gratitude for that.

A massive bigs-up to Usborne, the perfect home for Poppy. I don’t think there is anything else you guys could’ve done for this book and I am so happy you took
Soulmates
on board. Thank you for all the tireless hard work you put in to make it so much better.

*cue emotional orchestral music*

Writing this book has been a bit of a journey, so I just want to thank the people responsible for holding me together throughout the process.

To Mr. Dundas, for helping me believe I could write when I was a disgusting grumpy teenager who thought everything I did sucked. And to Jonathan Foster, whose brilliant-albeit-terrifying teaching made me the writer I am today. It is a beautiful gift to have a teacher in your life who inspires and moulds you. I was fortunate enough to have two.

To Rich, for being there from the beginning, and helping me right through to the end. Even when you didn’t have to. Words are silly things, really, when it comes to such a thank you.

To Lisa, my unrelenting cheerleader. Thank you for reading the MESS that was the first draft and championing it from day one. Your support has been unyielding and wonderful, and yet I repay you by blatantly plagiarising bits of your life. Thanks for a) not minding, and b) generally being a frickin’ fantastic mate.

I want to thank my colleagues at TheSite.org, for their incredible support throughout this process. Especially to Emma and Nic, for dealing with my emotional rollercoasters eight hours a day, five days a week. I am so proud to work with you guys and to be part of the amazing work you do helping young people.

To my wonderful sisters, for putting up with me. Eryn, I only hope your Poppy has less drama than mine. And to Willow, for being so patient with me constantly trying to hack into your young brain.

To Owen…well for everything. For holding my hand through this process, especially when I’d made some tough decisions that I didn’t know were going to turn out okay. Thank you for seeing the light when I couldn’t. Thank you for reading a 140,000 word messy manuscript about two lovestricken teenagers, and thank you even more for liking it. I couldn’t have done it without you…but no, you’re not getting a joint byline.

And, finally, the biggest thank you typing can muster to my beautiful and amazing parents. To Larz and Olivia – thank you for absolutely everything. I am so lucky to have you, you don’t even know. Everything I do is to make you proud.

Holly graduated with a first-class degree in Journalism Studies and spent two years working as a local news reporter on the
Surrey Mirror
, garnering a nomination for Print Journalist of the Year in 2010. She now works as a journalist for TheSite.org (www.thesite.org), an advice and information website for 16-25 year olds. Holly is twenty-seven and lives in London.
Soulmates
is her first novel.

Find out more about Holly at

www.hollybourne.co.uk

www.soulmates-book.com

Where did the idea for
Soulmates
come from?

I’ve always thought there’s this big disconnect between what we want love to be, and what love actually is. That we’re spoon-fed happily-ever-afters and dramatic romantic gestures as love, whereas real relationships are a lot more complicated than that.

I started writing
Soulmates
in the midst of the
Twilight
epidemic, where huge sections of bookstores were suddenly dedicated to dark romance stories. I read the
Twilight
books and quickly became utterly obsessed with the “forbidden” love of Edward and Bella. And it was also a bit like,
Why has nothing this romantic ever happened to me?

It got me thinking about why we always want love to have this huge overarching dramatic narrative. Why do we crave fireworks and drama and forbidden-this-and-that, when it’s actually probably not very good for us? So I took the most romantic idea of all – soulmates – and thought,
What would happen if finding your soulmate was actually the worst thing ever?

What is your favourite part of the writing process, and what was your favourite scene to write?

I have two favourite parts:

1) The wonderful heady early days when you get A New Idea and all the excitement that comes with that.

2) When the whole thing is finished and you didn’t screw up aforementioned idea and there’s a half-decent first draft sitting on your laptop.

All the stuff in between points one and two is generally HORRIBLE and fraught with neurotic obsession, insecurity, and a hermit-like existence.

My favourite scene to write was the last scene. I hadn’t planned to finish the book that day – I just thought I’d sit down and write a few words. And then, without warning, it all just kind of poured out of me and hours passed without me realizing. This never happens, and usually I find writing is like pulling out wisdom teeth with a teaspoon. But, with the ending of
Soulmates
, it just wrote itself and when it was done I was a sobbing mess – perched alone on this couch, in an empty flat, feeling massively melodramatic. The last few paragraphs of
Soulmates
haven’t been touched throughout the entire editing process.

How did you get into writing?

I trained to be a journalist and was a news reporter for two years on a local paper. In my humble opinion, news journalism is pretty much the best writing training the world will ever give you. Any self-indulgence with word counts, or jarring adjectives, or meandering away from The Story is beaten out of you pretty quickly by your terrifying editors.

Grateful as I am for that training, I found dealing with people’s problems on a day-to-day basis, and then having to write about it in an exciting way, almost utterly intolerable. The idea for
Soulmates
was floating about my brain for a while and, on one particularly gruesome news day, I came back from a twelve-hour shift and just started writing. It became my little sanctuary from the horrors of the job, and it built from there.

Who is your favourite character in
Soulmates
and why?

Funnily enough, neither of my protagonists! It’s probably Lizzie. I always wrote her with a big grin on my face. I love her brazen ambition, her no-nonsense delivery, her utter inability to keep a secret, and yet she would have Poppy’s back always. There is a big soft spot for Frank in my heart too.

How long did it take you to write
Soulmates
?

It took two and a half years of fitful writing bouts, punctuated with leaving my job and deciding on a whim to drive from one side of America to the other which, as you can imagine, took a while.

Did much change in the book from your first draft to the book we’re reading now?

You are fortunate enough to be reading the condensed version of this book which has been cut to normal-ish length. The first draft was at least 30,000 words longer, and much thanks to my agent and editors for saying “Umm, no, CUT,” and “No, we don’t need a 4,000 word chapter where the girls go shopping for Poppy’s gig outfit.”

The setting of the epilogue is also different, as in my first draft I jumped way waaaay into Poppy’s future where she was an adult and quite a few people found that jarring.

Do you have any tips for aspiring writers?

It’s so hard to not just regurgitate good advice I’ve nicked off writers much better than myself – mainly the whole of
On Writing
by Stephen King.

But – simple as it sounds – just sit down on your arse and write something! Stop thinking about doing it and do it. Stop telling people about doing it and do it. Stop worrying it’s a monstrosity against literature and do it (and, from my experience, the worse you think it is, the better it may be). Only from writing and writing and writing will you make a first draft, and only from a first draft can you start creating a half-decent book.

Oh, and when you’re not writing, read. Read all the time.

We all found ourselves tearing up at the end of
Soulmates
… Which books make you cry?

I am very much one of life’s criers. Anything sets me off – reality TV weddings,
that
Adele song, and, on an uber-emotional day, spotting a raggedy pigeon on a train platform which only had one leg.

That said, when it comes to books, I very rarely cry. Even if the author kills off my favourite characters. Without fail though, the end of
To Kill A Mockingbird
makes me cry every single time I reread it – which is at least once a year. It’s never a big bawly cry with snotting into a tissue, but a few stray tears leak whenever Scout is standing on Boo Radley’s porch and I marvel at just how beautiful words can be.

Can you give us a teaser of what we should expect from your next book,
The Manifesto on How to be Interesting
?

It’s about a girl called Bree, a loner and wannabe novelist who decides her life is too boring to be a writer, so she starts identifying what makes a person interesting and dedicates her life to conforming to those ideals, blogging about what happens.

And finally…do you believe in soulmates?

I believe in love. And I believe in souls. Whether souls are connected to love, and your soulmate is someone you’re romantically supposed to be with…well…I don’t ruddy know, and writing a whole book about them hasn’t helped me much.

But if you believe in soulmates, well then, that’s a gift, and don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.