Susan Wiggs, author of 'Welcome to Beach Town' - Multi-million bestseller discusses the joys of research, how to find your voice, and the sweet-spot that makes a classic

Writer's Routine

Dan Simpson

Arts, Books, Hobbies, Leisure

4.9 • 599 Ratings

🗓️ 14 September 2023

⏱️ 52 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Susan Wiggs has written more than 50 books and sold more than 25 million copies in more than 20 languages.

Her new one is 'Welcome to Beach Town'. It's a warm, summer read, about the idyllic beach town of Alara Cove. On graduation day, class valedictorian Nikki Graziola veers off script to reveal secrets that will break down the whole community, and have repercussions which never leave Nikki's life.

We talk about the sweet spot of classics, how they blend literary language and an unputdownable plot. Also, how to find your voice and how to know where your work sits on shelves. You can hear why she gave a school student the most boring time of their life, and how it feels being in the early days of a new project.

You can support the show at patreon.com/writersroutine

@writerspod

writersroutine.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Well, hello and welcome to a brand new episode of writers' routine. This week we're chatting to Susan Wiggs. She's written more than 50 books, sold over 25 million copies in more than 20 languages. She is prolific and successful. Her new
0:23.0	book is Welcome to Beach Town. We talk about the little exercises that she does to know characters
0:28.8	better, also about the joys of research, and I guess most importantly of all, why she writes
0:36.6	stories. I need to feel like I connect with the character deeply and emotionally because that's how I'm going to reach the reader.
0:47.3	And I know I've done my job when a reader will say, you know, this scene just touched me so much.
0:55.5	You know, sometimes they'll say, oh, it made me cry, but it was happy tears or something
0:59.8	like that.
1:00.7	Because I think a story is driven by emotion.
1:05.8	Emotion is kind of the fuel that fuels the engine of the story.
1:15.1	And so I need to make sure that the emotion is very specific and very authentic. There's more from Susan Wiggs in this week's writer's routine.
1:35.6	Yes, welcome along to the show. My name's Dan Simpson. This is Rises routine. The idea is simple.
1:49.2	And the conversations get quite deep. We take a look through an author's working day to see how they get stuff done to see how they take an idea they run it through their minds, uh, through their hands down onto the page and they get it out there. We chat to all sorts of writers just to see how different people plan their life and their work
1:55.5	and their day and their space to help them get it done. This week we're chatting to Susan
2:00.7	Wiggs published more than 50
2:02.6	books in more than 20 languages. She sold more than 25 million copies. Her Lakeshore Chronicles
2:09.3	series is phenomenally successful. And her new novels is Welcome to Beach Town. It's set in the
2:15.8	idyllic beach town, would you believe it, of a Lara
2:18.5	Cove. And at graduation, the class valedictorian Nikki Grazieola veers off script to reveal a secret
2:25.9	that will break open the whole community. And the repercussions of that follow Nikki
2:31.3	throughout her life. We discuss voice. There is a brilliant shout about voice in this.
2:37.9	How important it is to get a feel for yours, understand what it is, figure out where your books
2:42.6	might sit on the shelf. Why sometimes the making of the really incredible books are the ones
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Dan Simpson, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Dan Simpson and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.