Five minutes with author Emma Grey
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Emma Grey is likely a familiar name to many of our long-time HerCanberra readers.
A supporter of our Founder and CEO Amanda Whitley from the beginning (over seven years ago!), Emma’s Monday Moment columns on time management, work/life balance and fiction writing were layered with just as much warmth and humour as they were practical advice.
But in 2016, Emma’s world changed forever when her beloved husband Jeff died unexpectedly from a heart attack. Three years on, Emma is a fierce advocate for heart health and awareness, as well as a campaigner for openness around grief and mental health – still with that trademark warmth and wry humour. She’s also just published her fourth book and second work of fiction, Tilly Maguire and the Royal Wedding Mess.
We caught up with Emma to discuss anxiety, fairy tales and what happens when the rug is ripped out from under you.
Tilly Maguire has been described as a heroine of this era – one battling social media mishaps as well as anxiety issues. Where did Tilly come from?
Anxiety is something we’ve been living within our family, and it’s something many of my teenage readers face. I wanted Tilly to be dreamy and ambitious (she’s an aspiring writer) and passionate and funny, while her anxiety does its best to thwart those dreams. In addition to her perspective, I sought to weave some positive and thoughtful responses from the characters around Tilly, including her love interest.
It’s something she learns to manage, even as her life seriously derails in the kind of chaotic and public way that you’d expect if you’ve read the first book, Unrequited. It’s been reviewed as ‘gloriously soapy’, while tackling some serious issues.
You’ve described the book as an “unashamed fairytale”, what made you want to write it as such?
I wrote the first half of this book in the last few months of my marriage. My husband, Jeff, died unexpectedly from a heart attack in 2016 (and of course the HerCanberra community responded to our tragedy with extraordinary care and generosity — I will never forget it).
After Jeff died, all I could write about was grief. When I picked up Tilly again (because the HarperCollins deadline was approaching), it became my bolt-hole from the real world. There’s so much darkness in reality, we need places to escape that demand nothing from us other than a belief in love and frivolity and fun. This book is one of those places.
There’s a bit of world crossover with Unrequited, can we expect any cameos?
Yes! It’s a stand-alone title set in the same world — this time, the story of Angus’s band-mate Reuben. We do meet Angus and Kat again, so there’s an opportunity to catch up on what’s been going on for them. Without giving away too many spoilers, there’s the introduction of a same-sex couple in this story, too.
Sally Whitwell, the co-creator and composer of the Unrequited musical, told me that, when we were at school together as teenagers in Canberra in the 80s, there were simply no titles in the library that had a love story with which she could identify. Gay characters, if they appeared at all, would rarely ‘get the girl’ (or boy) at the end of the story. They didn’t get the big, fairytale ending. I promised Sal that wouldn’t be the case here, and now she cries every time she reads it!
And like Unrequited, could Tilly Maguire ever become a musical…?
Sally started writing the second show before I’d even finished the first draft! At one point she was firing along so fast, I thought it might be easier if she finished the songs first and I just filled in the rest of the story in retrospect!
Since our first show premiered at St Clare’s College in 2017, we’ve had some wonderful opportunities, including being selected for a Home Grown Grass Roots musical theatre workshop in Melbourne last November. We were able to perform the first 30 minutes of the show in front of Industry Experts, who provided constructive feedback. The consensus was that there is a clear path for the show, and it would be ideal for high schools, and even a young Broadway chorus! Watch this space – unless you’re a high school drama teacher looking for a contemporary Australian show composed by a dual ARIA-winner, in which case please get in touch because we’d LOVE to talk to you!
What are you currently working on?
I’m twelve chapters in with a third book in the Unrequited series. This one is about Angus’s younger sister, Ruby, and his high school best friend, Xavier, from the band. It’s a darker book, but still ridiculously romantic.
I’ve known since very early on that I want to write something significant about grief. I’ve toyed with various approaches, including fiction. I want to write about rebuilding your life after the rug is ripped from under you. Our culture doesn’t handle grief well, and the conversation is so important as it’s something none of us can evade.
Audrey Thomas and I are also planning a sequel to our 2017 book on productivity, ‘I Don’t Have Time’. The new book is affectionately titled, ‘I Can’t Be Bothered’. We still offer our 90-day online productivity program, My 15 Minutes, as well as ‘Fast Forward Coaching’. The latter is an approach that has personally worked for me, particularly over the last couple of years when I’ve been juggling work and family and writing with deep grief and the pressures of the ‘sandwich generation’, needing some additional accountability if I wanted to achieve anything.
There’s a sitcom idea brewing about a frazzled middle-aged widow with three kids and ageing parents … and writing for TV and the big screen is high on the career bucket list. It’s also terrifying, but good terrifying.
Finally, I’m delighted to say I’ll soon be returning to the regular HerCanberra writing team. I’ve missed it, and now the kids and I are largely adjusted to our ‘new normal’ and looking outwards into the world again, it’s time for the next chapter, whatever that will be…
Stay tuned to Emma’s HerCanberra columns here. You can find Tilly and the Royal Wedding Mess at all great Canberra bookstores.
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