The Mechanics of Great Storytelling
The Shit No One Tells You About Writing
Bianca Marais, Carly Watters and CeCe Lyra
4.8 • 842 Ratings
🗓️ 15 January 2026
⏱️ 63 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
In this week’s double author interview, Bianca sits down with New York Times bestselling author Simone St. James to talk about her chilling new novel, ‘A Box Full of Darkness’—a return to the eerie town of Fell that readers of ‘The Sundown Motel’ will lose their minds over. Simone reveals how a single idea—children playing hide-and-seek and one never returning—sparked a locked-room mystery layered with trauma, memory, and supernatural suspense. She shares why she loves writing in the ’80s, how nostalgia shapes atmosphere, and why Fell was the only place this story could happen. This episode is a masterclass in suspense, atmosphere, and emotional depth—and a must-listen for writers and readers of dark, twisty fiction.
Part two of this week’s episode, Bianca connects with Isabelle Engel and shares her journey as a writer, detailing her experiences with rejection, mentorship, and the creative process behind her debut novel, ‘Most Eligible’. She discusses the importance of conflict in storytelling, the extensive research she conducted on reality TV, and how her previous writing experiences shaped her voice and humor. The conversation also touches on the significance of female friendships in her narrative and the challenges of editing and revising for publication.
Note: CeCe Lyra is a literary agent at Wendy Sherman Associates. If you’d like to query CeCe, please refer to the submission guidelines at www.wsherman.com. Carly Watters is a literary agent at P.S. Literary Agency, but her work on this podcast is not affiliated with the agency, and the views expressed by Carly on this podcast are solely that of her as a podcast co-host and do not necessarily reflect the views, opinions, policies, or position of P.S. Literary Agency.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hi there. We've got a lot. We're really excited to tell you about, but I'm going to make this real |
| 0:04.9 | quick so you can get to the episode. The deep dive is coming up at the end of January. The lineup of |
| 0:10.9 | speakers is incredible and the range of topics is mind-blowing. You do not want to miss out on the last |
| 0:17.3 | deep dive ever. Then the beta reader matchup is open once again |
| 0:21.3 | with the matchups going out early in February. |
| 0:23.9 | Sign up to kick your creative year off with a bang. |
| 0:27.2 | Lastly, there's an amazing writer's workbook available |
| 0:30.0 | which will make the perfect gift for you |
| 0:32.3 | or the writer in your life. |
| 0:34.4 | Head to our website, The Shit About Writing, to find out more. |
| 0:44.6 | Hi there and welcome to our show. The Shit No One Tells You About Writing. I'm best-selling |
| 0:51.1 | author Bianca Murray and I'm joined by Cece Leera of Wendy Sherman Associates |
| 0:56.4 | and Carly Waters of PS Literary. |
| 1:00.0 | Hi everyone, welcome to today's author interview. |
| 1:03.9 | Today's guest is the New York Times bestselling author of Murder Road, |
| 1:08.0 | the book of cold cases, the sundown Motel, and The Broken Girls. |
| 1:13.6 | She spent 20 years behind the scenes in the television business before leaving to write full-time. |
| 1:19.7 | It's my pleasure to welcome Simone St. James. Simone, welcome to the show. |
| 1:24.5 | Hi, thank you for having me. |
| 1:26.0 | Thank you so much for joining us. I tried to get you on the show for the Sundown Motel and wasn't able to manage to arrange that one. So I was very, very happy to get you for this one. For those of you watching on the YouTube channel, I'm holding up the book. It's called a box full of darkness. It is a very striking, creepy cover. |
| 1:45.1 | Absolutely love it. |
| 1:46.4 | I'm going to read you the flap copy just to set the stage, and then we're going to dive in. |
... |
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