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Suzy is back this week for part two of her interview with prolific author, Simon Rose. This week they chat about how to sustain a career in writing, and what that really looks like.
GUEST: Simon graduated from university with a degree in history and his first novel for middle grade readers, The Alchemist’s Portrait, was published in 2003. This was followed by The Sorcerer’s Letterbox, The Clone Conspiracy, The Emerald Curse, The Heretic’s Tomb, The Doomsday Mask, The Time Camera, The Sphere of Septimus, Future Imperfect, An Untimely Death, and The Order of Excalibur novels. He’s also the author of the Flashback series, the Shadowzone series, and The Stone of the Seer series. In addition, he’s the author of The Children’s Writer’s Guide, The Working Writer’s Guide, The Time Traveler’s Guide, and has written many non-fiction books.
Simon offers editing, manuscript evaluation, coaching, mentoring, and writing workshops for writers. He’s an instructor with the University of Calgary and offers online workshops for both children and adults. He also offers workshops and author in residence programs for schools and libraries.
Podcast Episode Transcript (unedited)
Suzy Vadori: [00:00:00] Welcome to Show. Don’t Tell Writing with me, Suzy Vadori, where I teach you the tried and true secrets to writing fiction nonfiction that are gonna wow your readers broken down step by step. We’re gonna explore writing techniques. I’m gonna show you a glimpse behind the scenes of successful writers’ careers that you wouldn’t have access to otherwise.
And I’m also gonna coach writers live on their pages so that you can learn and transform your own storytelling. Whether you’re just starting out, you’re drafting your first book, you’re editing, or you’re currently rewriting that book, or maybe even your 10th book, this show’s gonna help you unlock the writing skills that you didn’t even know you needed, but you definitely do.
I’m so looking forward to helping you get your amazing ideas from your mind onto your pages in an exciting way for both you and your readers, so that you can achieve your wildest writing dreams, [00:01:00] and you’re gonna also have some fun doing it. Let’s dive in. Today we’re gonna be chatting with a really special writer to me, Simon Rose.
He was one of the very first professional authors that I met in the flesh, in person because he was teaching at a local university, and I took a creative writing course more than 15 years ago Now. Simon became the very first editor that I worked with. Simon was actually my writing coach, and he met with me, and if it wasn’t for Simon, I probably never would’ve finished that book.
So he holds a special place in my heart. Still a really great colleague and friend. We love to geek out about the science behind writing and talking about processes and everything going on in the industry, so I’m incredibly, incredibly honored to have this conversation with him today. He has published 21 novels to be specific for children and young adults.
Eight guides for writers on how to write a book more than a hundred [00:02:00] non-fiction books, and he has created many articles on a wide variety of topics. Sinan is a writing instructor at the University of Calgary, which is where I first met him, and he has served as a writer in residence for the Canadian Authors Association.
He provides editing and coaching services for writers in a wide range of genres, and you can find details of the references and recommendations regarding his work on his website, and the link to his website will be in the show notes. Simon also offers in-person and virtual programs for schools.
Libraries and offers a variety of online writing courses and workshops for both children and adults. He has extensive experience in writing for a wide range of industries and offers copywriting services to the business community. Simon is a stellar example about how to create an actual career out of writing, and I am super excited to have this conversation with him today and for you to hear all about it.
Well, I pride myself on this podcast in bringing stories [00:03:00] that are behind the scenes. So I’m gonna ask you if you remember, what did you not like? And you were like, I’m not gonna put this book out. I’m done. What was it that you didn’t like about it?
Simon Rose: I think that one, and it was called I, I didn’t even like the title.
I mean, it was called I, it was going to be called a Saving Great Granddad, I think. And I’d originally, it was going to be called an untimely death because it was all about an untimely death. And then I went back, even went back to the title. I thought, no, I’m going to call it that. I like that. I don’t need to, I don’t need to, uh, appeal to the reader.
I’m gonna call it what I like. It’s my book. And I just, I, I think I just didn’t like it because it was a, another time travel story and it seemed to be much the same as, as I’d always done. Uh, and it was somebody going back in time and, but then, then he was going back in time. I changed it around a bit and then it turned around and he was going to go back in time inadvertently caused his great grandfather to be [00:04:00] killed in in World War ii.
Which meant he shouldn’t have been alive in the first place to go back in time to meet his great-grandfather. The classic paradox and I thought, oh well that’s actually quite in, that’s actually quite interesting. And uh, people have actually even bought it sometimes. Yeah, occasionally.
Suzy Vadori: I’m sure you’ve sold a lot, but you hit the nail on the head, Simon, and that is.
When people are just writing their first book, it’s hard to imagine having written their 21st book. And I’m gonna talk about, I know you’ve written many more, these are just your fiction novels. I’m gonna talk about that in a second. But it’s true. As writers, we have, we don’t want to keep regurgitating the same thing.
And I love how. You keep making it fresh and you keep changing that time travel device, even though it’s something that you love to write about and near and dear to your heart. You, you keep it fresh and you challenge yourself and you continue to make it more complex or, or more difficult. Would you agree with that?
Simon Rose: Well, because how it’s, um, uh, [00:05:00] being made fresh each time you mean.
Suzy Vadori: Like that you, ’cause you’re saying, oh, I’m writing another time travel novel. And yet you were able to turn it on its head and find some spark that inspired you to keep writing so that you were writing all these pages that you wouldn’t remember or be able to read your head writing later, but you found that thing that you needed to change to make it inspired to you to be able to finish that novel and, and that’s a skill.
Simon Rose: It was just the inspiration. It was simp, it was just something as simple as being out with the dog or out at the grocery store or some everyday activity that, and I suddenly thought, oh, wait a minute, I could do that. And I, you know, and I had to hurry home and write it down as quickly as I could or make some notes somewhere on a piece of paper and, and just, and decide to do it in that way.
And. The next projects that I’ve got happening are not time travel stories or, or even historical and everything. The, the one I’m currently [00:06:00] working on is, uh, it’s, um, had originally started off similar to my, uh, paranormal ones, but then it’s, it’s veered off into something else now, but I’m quite, I’m quite happy with it and I think if I, uh, it’s what currently it’s October.
As we’re recording this, my plan with this is to probably. It may not happen. It’s already middle of October. My plan is to try and get it done in the first draft in rough form by the end of the year.
Suzy Vadori: Oh, amazing.
Simon Rose: And start, start to refine it and things in the early part of next year. And, and if I can do that.
There’s no reason why I can’t get eight out in say, September of next year. Then I have another couple of projects as well that are reasonably well advanced that also aren’t, I’m just trying to think. Are they, one of them is, is a bit historical, as I do sometimes worry if I’m plagiarizing myself. Chris,
Suzy Vadori: you remember what you’ve written already.
I love it, [00:07:00]
Simon Rose: but this is the, this is the problem. This is the problem. I mean, I know that with one idea. One of the, I’ve got, which is quite nicely advanced and everything, as I was writing that, I think I was at the coffee shop looking at the ideas and everything for it, and I thought, well, wait a minute.
This looks, this sounds very much like the Alchemist portrait from 2003. I’ve got this character Evil villain is very much the same and all this sort of thing. It, it just doesn’t involve a picture frame. This time it involves something else. Uh, I’ve got one that’s a fantasy universe thing that’s very similar to one that I did called the Sphere of Septus for the Fantasy universe.
But there was also one that I wrote about called The Emerald Curse about a kid getting trapped in a superhero comic world. Whereas I don’t have an idea for another book like that. This fantasy universe story. I’ve got. Idea I’ve had. I [00:08:00] worry that it might be similar to that as well.
Suzy Vadori: Well, ideas are never really the problem.
As a fiction writer, I love it when people try to give you ideas and you’re like, man, that is not my issue. Well, you’ve actually had a fairly steady career with writing, and yes, you’ve put out 21 novels, you’re still working on novels, but you also do other things. And I wanna talk about for a minute, because you also write nonfiction.
For children and you have over a hundred books in that realm. Is that right? Am I getting them? Mm-hmm.
Simon Rose: I’d have to count them up on the, on my website. There’s, that’s your
Suzy Vadori: bio.
Simon Rose: It’s on there. It’s on, on the, on the website. On my website, there’s a page that’s got all the covers on there, and I’d have to count them up, but there’s more.
It’s about 125, I think, but I, I don’t know exactly without,
Suzy Vadori: but tell us about that. And because you do, you know, you, you make a living writing and it’s more than just novels that you do. [00:09:00] So what’s sorts of nonfiction writing have you done? Because I, I think this is a, a realm that not all writers think about when they think about writing.
Simon Rose: It’s mostly been books. These only short, non-fiction books, uh, say 24 pages, 32 pages full of photographs. These are selected and everything by the publisher. They, they’ve got photographs, maps, and charts and goodness knows what else in them. And these are books about animals, about, about famous buildings, about nature, about earthquakes, things like that.
And, uh, educational books that go into libraries and, and, and are bought by schools and things like that.
Suzy Vadori: And you’re usually asked to write about a certain topic, or do you choose those topics?
Simon Rose: No, I’ve usually been, I was, I met a publisher at an event a long time ago. I’d seen these books before, these types of books before, and I always assumed that they had staffed writers.
I knew nothing about how it all [00:10:00] worked. And, uh, I, I gave them a business card and I got one of theirs and we, we got into contact and everything and they asked me if I wanted to write a book for them about something or other. I went on from there and I, and I wrote maybe 25 to 30 odd books with this particular publisher.
And then once I was established with them, I could approach other publishers or they approached me knowing that I’d written this book about, I’m looking at all of them now on my shelf next to the computer here, there’s one here called Indigenous Peoples in the World Wars, for example. Something like that.
Or just about Canada. Canada in World War II or Canada at D-Day and things like that. Historical ones about World War II and uh, occasionally they need to have a book updated. One of the publishers has recently, uh, asked for one to be updated that I wrote on [00:11:00] Canada’s political parties,
Suzy Vadori: which needed I bet, I bet there’s a lot of change needed there.
It’s been a tumultuous 20 updating.
Simon Rose: Updating and everything. So he did that. And then there’s, um, the most recent one I did was a series of six, which was all about animals. It was about predators versus prey, like a grizzly bear against the salmon or the polar bear against the seal and things like that.
Only 24 pages, series of six nice books. And I’m able to, I have enough copies of those to take them to events and, uh. Uh, younger children because there’s, because of all the pictures in them that the younger children quite like them, and so the parents will buy them for them at these events, which is very nice.
Suzy Vadori: I love, I love talking to writers about how they make it work because there are a lot of things in the writing space that you can do with your creativity and your specific skill of research and, and your love of history has translated into all [00:12:00] of these really cool opportunities for you to write. Okay, Simon, we’re into the quickfire portion, so I’m gonna ask you a couple of quick questions here.
How long did it take you to write your very first book? I
Simon Rose: can’t remember, but, uh, because I know I didn’t have an outline for it and everything, and I’ve got, I know that one of the outlines complete with the editor’s scribbles at the side and everything I used to take to all the school visits I did, and I still have it.
I, if I ever resumed school, uh, school visits had not resumed after COVID. Yeah, I found
Suzy Vadori: the same. I, I do a few, but I don’t do as many as we used to. First,
Simon Rose: I used to take it with me to show, just to show kids, you know, and it’s, it’s, I know you can’t see me on the podcast, but it was, it, it was quite thick. I mean, this was like 200 pages of this thing on paper.
And, uh, just to show kids that, look, this is what. All the work you have to do to make your story work. And this is like, and then at [00:13:00] that time, somebody had
Suzy Vadori: written on it in a red pen. Like it wasn’t
Simon Rose: No, no, no. It was just a, it was just a black, it was just a black scribbles in writing at the side. This was from the first, the first publisher with the second one.
It was a word document with, with, you know, with corrections and, and what have you. Everything. So how long did it take me to write the first book? I don’t know. I don’t, it didn’t take 10 years or anything like that.
Suzy Vadori: How long did it take you to answer this question? No one just speaks,
Simon Rose: I would say, let’s say it took me because I was still working in the real world and things like that.
I would say, let’s say with the first book, it took me two years. How about that?
Suzy Vadori: Two years? Yeah. I mean. And the reason I, I ask this of all writers that come on the podcast because it’s, it varies, right? And, and whether it’s taking you two years or, or six, you know, they, they hear these stories now. And if I’d asked you, how long does it take you to write one of those 125 nonfiction books, that answer’s gonna be really different.
20 odd. Some, yeah. Years into your career. But [00:14:00] your first book especially, it takes a long time.
Simon Rose: No, no. Yeah, because she’d mentioned that with those nonfiction books, when I was asked in, in, uh, June, I think it was of 2023, if I wanted to write the, uh, predator versus Prey series of six books, I was given a deadline with that.
I was, they wanted those books probably within a. Or six weeks. Oh my goodness. Or something like that. So I had a strict deadline with that. And it was the same thing with the political parties one that is, although it’s a redo. I was asked about this late September, I think, and, and they wanted them before the end of, end of October or something like that.
This the re the redone book. So with those, quite often with those nonfiction books, there’s a strict deadline.
Suzy Vadori: Okay. And that’s fair. And having said
Simon Rose: that. If it’s, if it’s a, if it’s a book about indigenous people in the World Wars or Canada’s role in D-Day or something, you have to do research into that [00:15:00] quite often.
So there was quite a lot of work
Suzy Vadori: like Yeah. And I’m assuming that they get sensitivity readers and people that are affected by it and you know, some primary research as well. Yeah, some level. Okay. So what was your first big break as a writer where you’re like, alright. This is my thing. I’m gonna keep doing it.
I think I know the answer, but I’m not gonna feed it to you.
Simon Rose: But what do you think? Well, I don’t know really. I think, I think really it was a case of, are you talking about before I had a book published or anything
Suzy Vadori: up to you? When, when did you think, oh my gosh, this might actually be my past?
Simon Rose: One of the things that you’d mentioned earlier, and I’m sure this would be for all your other listeners as well, was.
Making a living as a writer, it is like, well, I’d need to, I’d need to say that I, you know, anybody can really make a living to making a living. Writing your own books and selling them on Amazon or whatever your own novels, fiction and things is. Normally you have to do all the things and [00:16:00] I, I knew around the time the first book came out, ’cause I was still working in the real world and everything back then as well.
Back then, I knew that authors could visit schools and get paid for doing that. Uh, and uh, also that, uh, you could probably edit books for other people and, and things. There was all sorts of things within the writing industry, but I had no credibility for doing things like that when I only had, well, I had, I didn’t have a book published at all.
And it was not, wasn’t until I probably, when the clone book came out and I got three books published, maybe two or three books published, I suddenly got this credibility that was, oh, you could go and edit books for other people, or you could do, and I was doing all sorts of things that non-related to all this.
I, I was writing websites for plumbers and electricians and things like that because I was a writer. And I could even go to my [00:17:00] local pub and, and rewrite offer to rewrite their menu for them and things, business writing, corporate writing, uh, because they didn’t want to do it. And uh, and I was able to offer my services and I was able to do that kind of thing as, so I knew there was, I would’ve preferred to make millions from my fiction, but I knew there was a way, sometime around the time the second book came out, I knew there was other ways.
Related to the book where you could actually make a bit of a living.
Suzy Vadori: Yeah, very inspirational and yeah, you’re right. There are many, many ways and, and there are people who make a living selling just their fiction, but most of us, we do other things. Right. Um, and, and we love it so much. Uh, you have such a talent for it that you can apply it in many different ways.
We’re still
Simon Rose: doing it to this day. I mean, it’s, uh, it’s uh, yeah. Right now I’m working still reinventing,
Suzy Vadori: right. You gotta keep showing up and keep figuring out how to make it work
Simon Rose: well. That’s [00:18:00] right. I mean, the, one of the things that you’ve noticed as well, I mean we, um, well October now we reacquainted ourselves back in the spring when we were at the Young Writers Conference.
Which. Those kind of things had, had stopped happening during COVID and everything.
Suzy Vadori: Yeah.
Simon Rose: And
Suzy Vadori: they’re, they’re slow to come back. The funding just isn’t there for some of these things. And so we’ve had to, I, before COVID, I made a living as you know, speaking and touring, selling books. And then, and then those events disappeared and now I do a lot more online and coaching and, and editing.
And it’s been. Reinvention, but I welcome it. Um, you gotta, you gotta watch for these things as publishing is changing and writing is changing and the industry is changing, we just have to keep showing up and doing our best and trusting that there is work. And it’s the thing, it’s all
Simon Rose: with, with the editing side of it.
I, I do, I, I currently, I think I have about five [00:19:00] different people I’m working with. In various stages of their books, and they’re in all genres and everything. And, um, and I’ve met them through various different, in various different ways. One of them, uh, she was in one of my classes at the University of Calgary, and this is a novel she’s written and I’ve, I’ve been working with her on that for a while.
And there’s another one that came to that I worked with, uh, in summer camps for years. And this is a memoir. That, that, uh, we be, it’s stalled for a little bit only ’cause she’s been too busy. And then there’s another one that’s a, a more of a corporate thing that’s more like, it’s again, a bit of a memoir.
It’s like a story of my success type thing that he’s in the middle of. And some of it’s in notes and, and, and bullet points and things like that. And I’m having to sort through it and things. ’cause a lot of it I don’t understand. It’s very technical and, yeah. Yeah. So there’s all, all kinds of stuff really [00:20:00] that awesome.
We, uh, that we’re still doing.
Suzy Vadori: So in terms of, okay. If you could, to the listeners out there, Simon, who are listening to this, getting inspired by everything that you’ve done, what is your best advice to a writer? Just starting out,
Simon Rose: what is my best advice to a writer? Just starting out? Cool. What a question. I would say don’t give, don’t give up.
I would think, yeah, just keep going. Really. Uh, that’s what I did. Really, and I That’s you did, and that’s what you
Suzy Vadori: inspired me to do. So that is very, very, just keep showing up and keep going.
Simon Rose: Keep showing up. Yeah. I think so. I mean, the thing is, although I’ve got these, I’ve got this, um, project at the moment, my current project, which is, which is in good shape.
I’ve got, then I’ve got another couple as well. Then there’s another one that started to to, to bubble up to the surface as well, which I hadn’t really thought that I wanted [00:21:00] to do anything with. But it’s like you said earlier about it, having ideas isn’t a problem. I’ve got lots of that. And even some of these stories about the superhero comic book universe story.
I don’t think, I would never do a sequel to that, but I, I’d, but I think, well, yes, but the ideas I had for the sequel,
Suzy Vadori: let us say Never as Simon.
Simon Rose: Well, yes. Never, never. That’s the thing. I don’t think I’d do a sequel to that. But some of the ideas that I had, ’cause that book came out in 2006, I think, but I would probably, uh, I could certainly do a c uh, I could use some of the ideas that I had for it.
Things. And so there’s always stuff or there seems to be so somebody you’re stuck. Keep out. Yeah. Don’t, don’t give up.
Suzy Vadori: Don’t give up. Alright. We are at the end of our show. This has been super fun. Uh, yeah, we’re at the end of our show. It flew by. Right. Well [00:22:00] thank you very much Simon. We’ll drop all the links to all of your hundreds of books out there.
Uh, more than a hundred books. So thanks for coming on. You’re welcome Here. Anytime.
Simon Rose: Well, thank you very much. It’s been a pleasure to be here. Uh, and I hope that people have been inspired by it. People are all very, very welcomed to not be a stranger.
Suzy Vadori: No. Where can they find you, Simon? Well, where can they find you?
Simon Rose: I have a website@simonrose.com and I’m on, uh, some social media sites, not, and not on others. And I also have a newsletter that comes out once a month, uh, that, that people are happy, uh, they can subscribe to and things, and I’ve been reading
Suzy Vadori: it for years.
Simon Rose: Yeah, that’s right. And, uh, and then, uh, I, I will, uh, be at some, for those PE people in Calgary, I will be at certain events for the festive season.
Once we get into November, uh, I’ll have a table at some of those and I’ll be selling books and, and, and [00:23:00] autographing them and, and meeting my adoring fans.
Suzy Vadori: That’s right. Thanks a lot, Simon.
Simon Rose: Thank you very much. Bye for now.
Suzy Vadori: Thanks for tuning in to show. No. Tell Writing with me, Susie Vadori. I’ll me continue to bring you the straight goods for that book you’re writing or planning to write. Please consider subscribing to this podcast and leaving a review on Apple Podcast, Spotify, or wherever else you’re listening. Also, visit susie Vadori.com/newsletter to hop on my weekly inspired writing newsletter list where you’ll stay inspired and be the first to know about upcoming training events and writing courses that happen in my community.
If you’re feeling brave, check the show notes and send us a page of your writing that isn’t quite where you want it to be yet for our show notes, tell page review episodes. Remember that book and your [00:24:00] writing is going to open doors that you haven’t even thought of yet, and I can’t wait to help you make it the absolute best fast You’re feeling called to write that book.
Keep going, and I’m gonna be right here cheering you on. See you again next week.