How a “Dating Odyssey” Inspired Louise O’Neill

Bookshelfie: Women’s Prize Podcast

Bestselling author Louise O'Neill joins Vic Hope to discuss her literary journey, her new memoir 'A Bigger Life', and the books that have sh

Key takeaways

• Louise O'Neill's memoir 'A Bigger Life' details a 'dating odyssey' through Europe used as a way to find herself after a major breakup.
• O'Neill discusses how reading Marion Keyes' 'Rachel's Holiday' provided a pivotal moment of self-recognition regarding her own struggles with bulimia.

Main topics

• Memoir and personal healing
• Literary influences and book recommendations

Notable quotes

Rachel's an addict and so am I.

Conclusion

An inspiring exploration of how storytelling and literature can facili

Transcript preview

Speaker 1 (0:00) I do have to say that this episode includes discussion of disordered eating and eating disorders. So please do take care when listening if you find these topics difficult or triggering. Speaker 1 (0:11) Coming up Speaker 2 (0:12) on Boot Shelfie. And then I went on what I can only describe as a dating odyssey, where I went to Paris, London, New York, and then Rome. And I basically was there for like a month in each place and set up between one to two dates every day. It really woke me up. Like it was genuinely like, as I said, this bolt of understanding out of the blue where I thought, okay, Rachel's an addict and so am I. I had quite an advanced reading age and I think when I was like maybe eight she had to hide like I think her cosmopolitans or something because I asked at the dinner table what did masturbation mean and she was like, Speaker 1 (0:49) haha. Speaker 2 (0:51) She was Speaker 1 (0:52) like, less reading, less reading we think. Speaker 2 (0:56) I've never been allowed in a book club. It's very unfair. What do you mean Speaker 1 (1:00) you've never Speaker 2 (1:00) been allowed? I'll tell you, I'll tell you why. And it's like, it's honestly, it's like something I feel very sensitive about. Speaker 1 (1:07) Hello, I'm Vic Hope and this is Bookshelfy, the podcast from the Women's Prize that asks women with lives as inspiring as any fiction to share the five books by women that have shaped them. Now, before we begin, remember to subscribe or follow so you never miss an episode. With thanks to our sponsor, Bailey's. Speaker 1 (1:27) Today, I'm joined by Louise O'Neill. Louise grew up in Clonacilty in the heart of the rugged coastline of West Cork in Ireland. After stepping away from a career in the fashion industry, she returned home to dedicate her time to writing her first novel, Only Ever Yours, a dystopian feminist story which went on to win the bookseller's inaugural YA Book Prize in 2015. This success was quickly cemented following the release of her second critically acclaimed YA novel, Asking for It, which was voted Book of the Year at the Irish Book Awards the very same year and spent 52 consecutive weeks in the Irish top 10 bestseller list. In the decade that followed, she's written three novels for adults and a YA feminist reimagining of The Little Mermaid. and has not one but two more titles being published this year. Her latest novel, Whatever Happened to Madeline Stone, came out in April, and her first memoir, A Bigger Life, is published this month by HQ. Louise, welcome. You said before I started that, I'm just going to sit and have a stony face while you read my accolades. Speaker 2 (2:33) It's just a very strange, like... You know, if I was sitting here like listing out your accolades and you have to kind of like nod and look sort of slightly, you know, like humble, but also grateful. It's a very weird. So I just kind of keep my face very still. And I'm like, thanks. Thank you, Vic. Speaker 1 (2:48) Every single time. And I wonder if this is because this is the Women's Prize podcast. Are we as women less encouraged to. know how to take the compliments. No, for sure. No, Speaker 2 (3:02) absolutely. And I think there is this double standard. And I obviously I'm now guilty of like holding myself to it. And me too. And also, you Speaker 1 (3:11) see, Speaker 2 (3:11) I am also Irish. Like I'm a woman and I'm Irish. Like I'm absolutely screwed. Do you know, because as an Irish person, the idea of having notions about yourself is like social death. And then I think as a woman, the idea of being like boastful or seeming to Speaker 1 (3:29) yeah like too fond of yourself I think is definitely not approved of either. Well I think when reading out that sort of snapshot of your author journey what really stands out is the versatility of Speaker 2 (3:40) you Speaker 1 (3:40) as a writer huge success in the YA market a feminist fairy tale five novels now a memoir as well yeah when you move into uncharted territory do you find it daunting or do you actively seek new challenges? I actively seek it out. And, you know, Speaker 2 (3:57) I remember with my first novel, I had multiple offers of representation from agents, which I kind of hadn't been expecting because I think everyone spoke about, you know, how difficult it was just to like get that first step. And I remember one of them telling me that, you know, if I signed with them, that they would make me a brand. And they said, you know, when you go into a a bookshop in an airport and you see a John Grisham novel or you see like a Danielle Steele novel, like you know what you're going to get, you know, like that is the brand. And as he was talking, I went, oh no, hundreds of millions of euros. No, not for me. I don't want that. No, absolutely not. But I think it was more this like understanding of, I think I would find that really boring. And I suppose everyone is different. But like for me personally, I think I always wanted to have the flexibility and the freedom in my career to write whatever book I felt. most drawn to writing. And that has varied, as you know, as you can tell, like it has varied, like, you know, my first novel was dystopian and then there was contemporary and then there was, you know, a feminist retelling of The Little Mermaid. And I've gone from YA to adult fiction and now I'm in nonfiction. And I think it is always about, I don't know, feeling creatively inspired, creatively fulfilled. And for me, a lot of that is taking risks. giving myself new challenges and I think it probably makes me quite difficult though as an author like to brand like you know sometimes you'll hear bookshops say oh we're not quite sure where to place this you know like where in the bookshop you know we're going to put this in Speaker 1 (5:40) boxes it's not a bad thing to be difficult to brand Speaker 2 (5:42) yeah it's Speaker 1 (5:43) more to help others than it is to help ourselves yeah that's true But yeah, I suppose I just, I like the challenge. I think it's exciting. Thank you. Well, on the subject of taking risks of that flexibility, that freedom, let's talk about your memoir, A Bigger Life. Yes. Speaker 2 (5:58) And Speaker 1 (5:58) it begins with you telling your dad how at 38, your life is not what you envisaged it would be. What had you thought your life would look like? I mean, Speaker 2 (6:10) at 38, I went through a really painful breakup. And, you know, we had just bought a house together six months previously. I was very much like, you know, we're on this trajectory of marriage and children. And this is where my life is going. And then I think when we broke up, it felt like this sudden sort of realization that perhaps that wasn't going to be. my life path, you know, perhaps that's not that was just wasn't going to work out for me. I went into almost like a free fall and I took a year off work, not because, like, you know, I just felt like it, but more because I genuinely thought like my brain had broken and and I decided that I needed to properly heal. So I took a year off and which I which sounds I think that sounds a little bit self-indulgent, but I think it was. genuinely necessary because I was at the point where I was like I really feel like I'm either if I keep pushing I'm going to have a breakdown like I'm not going to I won't survive this um so I decided to take the year off went very eat pray love um you know went to Thailand on like a five-week um uh yoga and wellness um retreat I did like Yeah, it was so fun. Like I did ayahuasca. I did like, you know, I was went with a shaman into the forest and I was sort of reborn spiritually. Like I did every type of holistic, spiritual, both emotional and mental healing work that you could think of. And like, obviously very deep into therapy work. And then the year afterwards, I was like, you know what? I think I'm ready to start dating again. And then I went on what I can only describe as a dating odyssey, where I went to Paris, London, New York, and then Rome. And I basically was there for like a month in each place and set up between one to two dates every day and met the most incredible people, like just really interesting men, like really nice men. And I think... I suppose so much of the rhetoric around dating at the moment is like really depressing. And I had so much fun. And I think that made me feel really hopeful. And I suppose I had lost so much of that hope, I think, in the midst of the breakup. And yeah, and then I was supposed to go to L.A. for a month and then to Stockholm for two weeks to sort of finish the experiment. And then something happened, which I won't say here, but you'll have to read A Bigger Life in order to find out what put a halt to Speaker 1 (8:49) my gallop. What a journey. Yeah. There's one quote that I really like. Your dad's advice to you is to take risks. 2024 became, as you write, a year of big swings, of taking risks, of refusing to settle or make myself smaller, a year of prioritising fun and pleasure and adventure and most importantly, finding myself again. I have never felt... more alive, that embracing risk. I can see that you do that in your life. You do it in your writing. I would like to ask, are you a risk taker when it comes to reading? Speaker 2 (9:20) Oh, I don't, I mean, that's a really good question Speaker 1 (9:22) because Speaker 2 (9:22) I feel like the risk is very small when it comes to reading. I feel like, you know, when I give someone a Speaker 1 (9:27) hand to your book, if you don't like it, I'm not. Speaker 2 (9:29) Life or death, got a situation here. But do you stay in your comfort zone? Do you know what? I think when I was younger, I definitely probably read, like when I'm talking when I was a child, I read probably more widely than I do now. I think now a lot of what I read is dictated by people sending me proofs of books to read. And because I know how much that means, like I know that when I was a debut novelist and two people quoted for my first novel, it was Marion Keys and Jeanette Winterson. And it was just. It meant so much to me because I didn't have, you know, my parents own a butcher shop in Clannachilty. I had no connections in the publishing world. And I think to have that sort of like validation of the work before it went out into the world felt. Speaker 2 (10:23) so I can't I don't I don't even really know how to put it into words like what it meant to me and how important it was and so I've really tried my best to kind of pay that forward but definitely when I was a child I read everything and I think it was because I just always wanted something to read remember when I was I can't even remember what I did, but I was bold. Sorry, that's quite an Irish. I was naughty. That's more of an English way of saying it. Bold. I like Speaker 1 (10:50) that. Speaker 2 (10:51) That Speaker 1 (10:51) was very bold. I feel like here it means more Speaker 2 (10:53) like courageous, whereas in Ireland it would be like you're being very naughty. You're being very bold. I say Speaker 1 (10:58) that about pigeons or seagulls when they come too close. And I think that's quite an aligned description. Yes, there you go. They're being very Speaker 2 (11:05) bold. So I had been naughty. And sorry, I just feel like I know. but again, that sounds almost sexual. Okay, look, I've been badly behaved. We're just going to leave it at that. And my dad banned me from reading for a week because he knew like that was going to be like really like the big punishment. And I just remember like reading the back of a cereal box, like just to have something to just any words to sort of fill my mind. So when I was a child, whatever I found. in the library, whatever I found in a bookshop, like anything. Speaker 2 (11:41) You know, I would just read it, even though I think my mother had to hide her. I had quite an advanced reading age. And I think when I was like maybe eight, she had to hide like I think her cosmopolitans or something because I asked at the dinner table, what did masturbation mean? And she was like, oh, Speaker 1 (11:54) she's like less reading, Speaker 2 (11:58) less reading, we think. Speaker 1 (12:01) Well, from cosmopolitan to cereal boxes to the books you have loved the most. Let's delve into your bookshelfy picks. Speaker 2 (12:07) Also, I feel like when you say the books I've loved the most. It was so hard. I'm sorry. It was so hard. I was like, there was about, I mean, a hundred that I could have chosen. The Speaker 1 (12:17) thing is, it's not necessarily the books that you've loved the most in your whole life, but whatever feels like it has impacted you in a way that you feel you really want to express right now, because it can change. When I say right now, I mean... today because Speaker 2 (12:32) it could be different tomorrow yeah exactly exactly so listen we're going to put that disclaimer on it yep these are my favorite books today today and if Speaker 1 (12:39) we were doing this interview tomorrow that could have changed entirely Speaker 2 (12:42) well your first bookshelfy book Speaker 1 (12:44) today Speaker 2 (12:44) yeah louise is how Speaker 1 (12:46) to fail everything i've ever learned from things going wrong by Elizabeth Day. This spin-off book from the wildly popular How to Fail podcast is described as a book for anyone who has ever failed, which means it's a book for everyone. Part memoir, part manifesto, it's based on the simple premise that understanding why we fail ultimately makes us stronger. This is a book about learning from our mistakes and not being afraid of making them because it's not failure that defines us, it's how we respond to it. I know this had a significant impact on you can you take us back to when you first read it and why it resonated this time in your life I Speaker 2 (13:24) think Speaker 1 (13:24) I Speaker 2 (13:25) mean I think I probably could have read this book at any stage over the last 30 years and it would have resonated deeply with me because I when people say things like I'm a perfectionist I often think that comes across as like you're almost like a humble brag, you know, where