Hello, I'm Hazel Butterfield, and this is Get Booked, the women's and men's radio station. Here on Get Booked, we love talking to authors and book enthusiasts about new releases, going into detail about the topics covered, the inspiration, the mental health and well-being elements, opening discussions and offering support via the incredible writing community out there, and giving you the extra special insight into a different book and the author each week. Now, first up on today's show, we have Elise Cranson on, on stage here, who's just released her book Under My Skin. This book had me absolutely spiraling with joy. The Bronx colloquialisms, the heady Studio 54 music era, the storytelling of the beginning stages of women having a place in the music media, or at least fighting for it, paving the way for others to come. How being strong-willed has its challenges, but when directed properly can produce an interesting life, all with lashings of predictable and yet so paradoxically unpredictable schutzpakt. Elise, who endured a complicated afflicted upbringing, not encouraged to be herself and thrive, which she later took upon herself to do herself. She has stayed with a Nazi, her non-Nazi boyfriend's dad, while traveling in Europe just to spite him because, you know, that's Elise. A rock journalist who toured Japan with KISS, then stayed in Tokyo, you know, because it just seemed like an adventure. And wasn't it just Sometimes you've got to work harder for what you want, but isn't it great when you know you've fought hard for what you've achieved? And this is what Under My Skin is about. Elise, thank you for joining us on the show. Oh, thank you, Hazel, for that extensively detailed introduction. You're very welcome. I, I mean, we have so much to talk about. I love it that 'Under My Skin,' we're gonna spend, we're gonna run out of time talking about it, and yet it's only part one of a trilogy, isn't it? Yes, and I think the best way to start, because it tells us a little bit about, well, a lot actually, about you and what has driven you, is maybe let's start at the beginning, your family life and how you fit in, or not necessarily fit in, as you were growing up, how that shaped you. Well, I can only say that in retrospect because as I was going through it, it was hell. So how did it shape me? It shaped me as a very sensitive child. And, you know, I think it's still true today where certain parents will say, "Oh, you're too sensitive." Even siblings or colleagues, "You're too sensitive." No, I'm a human being with feelings. I'm not too sensitive. I'm sensitized. And so being downtrodden in the sense of humiliated by your mother for having feelings, for showing those feelings openly. You could say as a child, I guess pretty innocently. Children don't learn to cloud and, and veil their feelings. No. Unless they are taught to do that. Yes, and the thing is as well is that we— it's modeling, isn't it? And sometimes we need to break away from what our parents want us to do because maybe we don't agree with that, or we can be different. We can still love our family and be incredibly different. And you are most definitely creative and wanted something new and exciting, so you needed to break away from that in some way, which you most definitely did. But it's hard. When you're growing up in a family where you don't necessarily feel like your views and your motivations are aligned. Well, that is true, and thank you for the word modeling. I was lost for that word a few seconds ago. I think also there's one other part to this story which, which makes my life growing up quite interesting, which was that my mother was a feminist, a sort of hippie, because she was also a businesswoman on her own, very creative. And so she encouraged me to express myself artistically. It wasn't emotionally though. So here she's encouraging me to go against the grain, be artistic, express yourself, and yet I wasn't allowed to express myself at home. Home. So it was only in ways that were— you were told to express yourself, which kind of defeats the whole object really, doesn't it? Well, it did and it didn't. For example, I was of course seeking love in all the wrong places, as we humans do when we don't get it from our sources of origin. And yet I didn't want to compromise in order to be accepted by girls in my primary school. So that was an interesting conflict that stayed with me for quite a long time. How do I balance independence and codependence? Do you know what I find quite interesting? As I was reading, I think I was actually messaging you on Instagram. I was reading this book on my own in a café, drinking wine, randomly speaking to lots and lots of strangers, and I kept on having to stop to kind of just digest because we have very, we have a lot of similarities in our personalities, but also it was to do with other people that I've known in this industry who are creatives. Can you imagine if you 100% were aligned with your family and you never felt the need to break away? And I think there's a lot of people that have created greatness or achieved incredible things when they've felt the need to spur themselves forward. And sometimes, you know, it's something to, be thankful for that, you know, just because life wasn't exactly how you wanted it to be, and because your family, as I said, you know, the whole, the whole element of not feeling completely aligned with them. Do you not think that's what spurred you on to challenge life and to break the mold? Absolutely. And at this point, I have not only forgiven everyone, deceased and alive, I accept gracefully and with such gratitude that even whatever struggles I had growing up, and there were more painful ones than just not being accepted, you know, there was all sorts of abuse. I am so grateful because I was able to handle it. And it helped you to develop strength, which you also needed. Yes, and that is— when I was younger, being so headstrong and arrogant, I thought everyone should be that way. My way or the highway, as they say. However, it is not true for everyone, as was the case with my brother. He was not strong that way. Well, he was kind of babied a bit more, wasn't he? I mean, you had to develop strength and individuality and independence. But also what I found really quite enlightening, there's so much that's happening in the 2020s where there's all these teenagers and 20-somethings going around talking about gender fluidity and how, you know, people shouldn't be defined by particular sexuality. Yeah, back in the '60s and '70s you were already mastering this. Well, not the '60s. I was then just a preteen. Okay, give me a break. I mean, I was ahead of my time, but not exactly. However, actually, because you were at the later stage, it was still the '70s. You actually went— when you were going to Tokyo, it was actually, uh, in the '70s as well. That's right. There you go. That's my excuse. I'll put it this way: I'm not a boomer. I'm a, I'm a Gen Jones, which not a lot of people know what that is. No, I don't. Well, a Gen Jones is the generation born between 1955 and 1964, right? So Obama is a Gen Jones. No, we like him, and I like to compare myself to Obama. Um, it's, it's the generation whose parents were keeping up with Joneses. Oh, I see. I've not heard of that before. I like that. Ah, good. Okay, so in any case, my crowd of friends were progressive. I'm not saying the nation was or everyone was, but yes, a certain element of the population were, um, gen— not only gender fluid but experimental. And that had to do with the time frame, the sex, drugs, and rock and role and the overturning of the old or of the old guard, or at least the attempt to overturn it. The war, the anti-war, the civil rights movement. You have so much in the background. And so 10 years on, women's lib. My mother took me to Washington when I was 10 years old to burn our bras. I had a training bra. I burned it. I've only just got my bra, why do I have to burn it? And then we didn't even wear bras for years and years. Oh wow. I mean, but this is it. I did find that it was a bit of a history lesson as well, reading Under My Skin, just about what was going on at certain times, and especially, as I said before, you know, that kind of rock and roll era where You, you were there at the start of kind of trying to break through, making it easier for women to be there. And you— absolutely. I mean, somebody with less strength would have succumbed to some of the influences that you— people tried to put on you, should I say. That, that, that's saying it in a very mild-mannered way. I do try. Yeah, so there is so much that happens in this book, and I just think it was, it was so joyful just because of the way that you actually talked about it as well. It was very endearing and just with such good humor, but I must say, like, you went off traveling around Europe, you met, you met and basically bonked your way through. Europe, and then you decided to go back and go and spend some time with a boyfriend whose dad was a Nazi, and I just love the thought that you were sitting there with the biggest Jewish necklace you could possibly find and just stood in his face staying at his house, and I just love that kind of, that concept and that strength of character which People need to draw on now. Yes, they do, more than ever. Tell our listeners a little bit more about, about this situation and how you decided to basically just, just kind of parade in front of a Nazi going, "Haha, I'm Jewish and I love it." Well, actually it was like, "Haha, I'm Jewish, I'm still alive." Wow. And I'm not even that Jewish. It was a statement. It was not because I follow the religion, because we were brought up irreligious. We were brought up as— it wasn't even agnostic, it was just nothing. It's just— yeah, just because my parents rebelled against their parents. So my mother was a rebel, I have to give her that credit. She really was. Anyway, and she allowed me to go to Europe, so thank you, Mom. What happened was that going there was a challenge for me. Give me a challenge, I love it. I grab it. So some people like thrilling sports, adventure sports. I like— I liked thrills in life that would almost put my life on the edge. Yeah, I can identify with that, you know. And, and I think, um, being an emotional person who feels and acts before thinking has led me into some quite dangerous and interesting situations. Um, yes, but this is a fine line, isn't there, between shying away because of the potential dangers in life and actually grabbing life by the horns and running with it? Because You have to find that nice balance or kind of using the line of acceptability a bit like a skipping rope. Right, exactly. However, Hazel, I wasn't into dolls, so skipping rope wouldn't have been my metaphor. I liked Marco Polo growing up. So when I would read, or Theodore Thor Heyerdahl, Heyerdahl, who wrote the book about Kon-Tiki, the raft that he built to duplicate a raft that was supposedly taken from South Africa across to Europe hundreds of years ago. Adventure stories of men, mostly men, or Amelia Earhart's some women that, that chose life adventures that put their lives in danger. That appealed to me. And later on, I thought about— didn't take action on it— instead of rock journalism, why don't I be an investigative journalist or a war correspondent? But I, um, I decided for rock and roll. That was dangerous enough. I mean, they both are kind of a lot— are on the lines of thrill-seeking, and you do seem to find any way to find a thrilling situation. I mean, you can't even go out for a quick drink in Tokyo without having people hunting you down. Well, to answer that, the Nazi question, what I found fascinating was the fact that this man who invited, who allowed me to come into his house, was what? He was trying to give me a lesson? Was he trying to intimidate me? What was his statement in listening to these Hitler recordings? Was he supposed to shout me out of the house? So I wanted him to— I wanted banter. So I put on this Jewish star, but more than him, it was a thrill to wear that and get on the bus in the neighborhood with the geriatric crowd who just were so guilty, they would— they put their face down, and I just walked by like, "Aha, here I come, yeah, in your face!" I was— I would say, this book, if you're reading it out and about with— in public, the amount of times I got some funny looks because I'd sit there giggling. So I'd be like, I don't know, I mean, I like to be contentious, I like to challenge boundaries and challenge perceptions, But I don't know how much, whether I'd have had the guts to do what you did. And yet I found it thrilling. I found it just, I found it hilarious. And it's just, this is why I like books like this, because it challenges people's ideas of what they should be doing and what they're capable of. Or what normal is. Who wants to be normal? That is the cruelest, cruelest of terms. Well, Hazel, correct. My fear growing up, my one of my fears, let's say a superficial fear, um, an existential fear was being just like the Joneses, was being suburbanized. Yeah, I do remember actually, um, when I was about 18 and I was like, oh, I'm so proud of myself, I bought a car, I've done this, I've bought a house. And I looked at the house. Wow. And I looked at the car and I went, whoa, whoa, whoa. This house is the same as my mum's. The car is the same as pretty much my mum's last 6 cars. And literally, I swear to God, within 2 weeks I'd moved to London and I haven't moved back to my hometown since. And that's over 200 miles away. Where's your hometown? It's Huddersfield. It's in Yorkshire. I don't know if you know, like the kind of Leeds and Manchester way. I was just like, oh wait a minute, I'm turning into my mum. Like, there's nothing wrong with my mum, it was not a life I necessarily wanted. And yeah, so within 2 weeks I was living in London, bang. And I was all right, I kept the car but I put the house up for rent. Oh, good on you, because I have something for your listeners, which is this: the material acquisition of possessions will never bring you happiness, folks. No, you're not going to be thinking about your material possessions. You're going to be thinking about experiences and what you've got out of life and just who you got to meet. It's those sort of things. And you know what, if you can do them, you know, it's a lot nicer to, uh, cry in a Bentley than on a bus. But still, you know, well, my jewel box are these experiences and I used to liken myself to an archaeologist where my life was the laboratory experiment. So let's keep going. I love that. We are constantly evolving and we can constantly just try new experiences. We don't have to just stagnate. That is true. What we are. Um, however, some of us, Hazel, devolve. We do indeed. And you know what, if that's what they want to do, then each their own, but we should all let people be. And just— oh yeah, yeah, I think it's great. And we can just learn from other people, and hopefully hearing certain stories about other people can help us increase our confidence and broaden our horizons somewhat. And there's some things that you did in Under My Skin would be adventurous and exciting to people in 2022, never mind the '70s. I mean, you managed to, um, if you can tell us a little bit more about how you happen to just end up touring with KISS in Tokyo, as you do. Okay, well, at 16 years old, while I was still in high school, um, or junior high, uh, as they called— or middle school, as they call it now— I had decided that I wanted to couple my two talents, which was writing and my love of music. So I'd be I started writing, and by that I would do album reviews. I would go to concerts. I would write concert reviews. Hundreds of stories later, I submitted and was eventually accepted by one of the then top music magazines, Circus magazine, just like Musical Express in the UK. And that launched my career. And as a freelancer, I was still working a full-time job. I was going to university at night. I was attending concerts on the weekend or at any point that I could squeeze it in. And you don't make a career out of freelancing, or at least not then. I think it's even more difficult now, uh, without paying the price. And the price was that it took determination, a couple of years until the next story was released. And I— so I created a strategy, and the strategy was, look, I'm not famous in New York City, I have terrific competition. How can I get my name out so that I can get swag and be invited, be invited to the parties, interview rock bands, be on the list of the publicists? And I became the New York correspondent for both British and Canadian magazines. So then I could wave my press credential and say, I'm a New York correspondent. Boom, I was in. And within months, the PR manager of KISS called me and asked me to go on tour with 9 other journalists in 1977 to Japan, and I said no. No, I'm all right. That's— yeah, I'm good. I'm just gonna just hang out around here. Luckily you changed your mind. Well, it wasn't even that. It was more that I don't like the music, I don't like the band, and if you cannot— if you cannot accept that I will write exactly what I want to write, okay, so be it. Bye. And 3 weeks later he called me back and convinced me. Plus there were a host of other things that happened, which, spoiler alert, I won't say it was in the book, that led me to say yes. And that changed my life. That was an opportunity, a moment where you, you do grab it by the horns and you go, and changed my life. And do you know what, I don't want to talk about too many of the stories that happen because this is for the readers, um, but one thing that just— I was getting so annoyed reading about it. We were just talking about how people can evolve and how some devolve, and I was getting so annoyed that, you know, even though it was happening back in 1977, it's still happening now where women have attitude and then they have a talent, how the old trick for men to humiliate and spread lies about women who are threatened by and to kind of cast a shadow over their success, which is what happened to you. With one of the other journalists in Tokyo. Yes, and what really incites me today is that women still are playing up to men as opposed to themselves, whereby creating that mini war between other women. Yeah. And no, no, don't you see that those that control the strings want you to do that? You must stand up for yourself and support other women because we are 51% of the world's population. So whether it is atrocities that are happening in a war zone, whether it's anti-abortion, whether it is Brexit or whatever your politics, you have to stand together. Equal pay, we still don't have it. No, I know, it's absolutely ridiculous. Completely, that is the word, ridiculous. And I think what this section of the book highlighted was don't trust what you hear about another woman, because it's either from a man who can't have her, or is threatened by her, or possibly by a woman who's listened to somebody else's lies, you know, take everything at face value. Correct. Yeah, I was just— I remember just sitting— do you know what, I slightly blame that part of the book for my slight hangover on Sunday, because you know when you get a little bit angry and you're just like, well, I don't know what happened to that red wine, but it went really quickly, and then there was another one, and I was like, but it's just so annoying, and the wine bar guy, you're giggling and now you look like you're getting annoyed, I'm I'm like, because this has just happened and it's still happening. And I was— and there was this woman who actually was making me a little cheese board and she's going, "Aha, so it's still happening 50 years later." I went, "Don't you think we should just drink?" You think of that, 50 years later it is still happening. Yep. Do you know what? It's happened to me even the last couple of years where people have said lies about me just to kind of dim my shine. Because if you spread enough mud, some of it's going to stick, isn't it? Right. Well, you know, it's like, again, revert to Obama, what Michelle Obama said, you know, go higher, right? Yeah. They go low, we go high. And I like to say it this way: if I'm shining my light and it's too bright for you, get sunglasses. Move out. I love it. Or move into the light. You know, we'll shudder you into the light and you will be so blinded by it, you know, you'll scurry away like rats on a ship. I love that. I love that. Now I do want to make sure, because we need to make sure that people can read this book, just so they can kind of get people staring at them while they're giggling in public reading this book. And it is one of these kind of eye-catching books as well where you will get people kind of looking over. How can people find out more about you? Okay, so on social media, they can go to Facebook, and that's at Officially Elise, E-L-I-S-E. Instagram, Elise Crensell. They can buy the book on Amazon, and it is sold in the UK. It's sold in about 12 different countries. Yep, and they can actually go on to elisecrensell.com and all of your various links are on there as well. And you've done some nice and easy links for people to get hold of the book and find out just a little bit more about you as well. Yes, yes, exactly. They just need to know how to spell my name. Well, let's make sure that they know. K-R-E-N-T-Z-E-L. Correct. And first name, E-L-I-S-E. Boom! See, we've made it so easy for them. And something else that I want to know, I mean, this is a wellbeing show. I love the idea of, you know, this show is for books like yours, you know, it's about learning about other people's lives, learning and kind of educating people about what they can be capable of, and sometimes if we have certain elements in our family dynamics that we think haven't served us properly, sometimes it's about realizing that without those kind of problematic dynamics, we wouldn't have achieved what we've achieved, and it's kind of, you know, looking at the positivity of absolutely everything, but also it's humor, it's escape, it was very— it's completely— it's got nostalgia rippling all the way through it as well. I did, as soon as I was kind of reading, and I quite often when I read I have a pad at the side of me so I can scribble notes to make sure I can remember things, and I was like, "I'm gonna go and listen to that song from KISS," because you were talking about it, and it is one of those ones that makes you kind of stop and think, enjoy, and kind of appreciate how far we've come, but also reminding us that we've still got so much more to do as well. And, you know, that is the joy of a good book, isn't it? Yes. Now, are you a reader? Are you a fan of reading? I am a fan of reading. However, I keep myself so busy that sometimes I don't read enough. Right now, I am reading Tokyo Vice. Tokyo Vice, what's that? Ah, very interesting, and there's some, some, uh, parallel, some little parallel. So it is by an American, uh, Jewish journalist, Jake Adelstein, who was the first crime reporter for a major Japanese newspaper. I've just seen this has actually just been televised in the last couple of weeks. Correct, and I came across it and just purchased the book. I cannot put it down. Oh, it looks— oh, see, that's the thing, you've got that— do you read the book or do you watch? I mean, always you should read the book, but if you don't have time, then people have the opportunity to go and watch the series as well. So this is on— doo doo doo doo— I'm trying to find where it's on. It's Netflix, isn't it? I don't think so. I think it was on Showtime. I don't know. I have a service where I can get every single channel. They come through on different mediums sometimes over here in the UK. It's not as easy to get HBO, but I'm gonna— either way, this is going down on my list with my pen and pencil. I'm writing. Yeah, but so Jake was in the— it was in Japan and the '90s. I had left way before that. I left in '84 before really many foreigners were not even there. People used to come up to me on the subway in Tokyo and touch my hair like, "Are you real or are you a doll?" Wow. No, but this is the other element as well of the book where, where you're talking about the different culture in Tokyo and everything that you got to experience, and even getting, getting to grips with The language and social customs as well. This is, I mean, I'm not surprised, to be honest. And I was looking at your website that it is only part 1 of the trilogy. There is so much more for you to say. Can you tell us a little bit more about what's going to be coming for us in book 2? Yes. Book 2 is entitled Me, Men, and Moving. And it will cover about a 20, 25-year period period, uh, with all of my adventures living in 5 different countries in Europe, um, being married twice to wasbins, creating businesses, false starts, big ego, huge downfall, deception. Treachery, betrayal, and coming to terms with a drug-addicted brother, the fact that my mother was an alcoholic, the fact that my father was a petty dictator in clown's clothing, and many other things. I mean, so I'm assuming it's going to be extremely relatable as well, like Under My Skin. So I cannot wait for this, and this is just just embracing so much that we all have to go through and just finding a way to kind of open discussions about it and kind of just help people through it. And this is what good fiction can help people do. So yeah, incredible. This is nonfiction. This is nonfiction. Nonfiction. Yeah, but it's both. Just a little taste, Hazel, like one of the chapters in book 2 is, The Great Swiss Cheese Meltdown. I was married to a Swiss, but there were holes in the marriage. Wow, can't wait. Yeah, brilliant. Absolutely fantastic. I love it. Um, it's been an absolute pleasure chatting to you, and will you come back on the show and tell us about your next book when it gets released next year. Thank you. Yes, I cannot wait. Just a bit of a reminder to all of you new listeners to please get on to elisekrenzel.com. Details will be up on my Twitter @nuttybutty and on my website at hazelbutterfield.com, but just type in Under My Skin and it will come up. It's, it's nice and easy for people to find, and it's a nice brightly yellow colored book as well, one of those ones that's really gonna pique people's interest when reading out and about. And I must say, I don't know whether you do this, but when you do read a book like yours, it's great to read it in public and just kind of start random conversations with complete strangers, which is most definitely what I did. Really? Really? Yeah, yeah, just, I love that. Do you know, funnily enough, that when you were talking about Michelle Obama, I read that in public, and the amount of women I had come up to me going, "What page are you on?" And we'd just start randomly chatting. But no, I love it. This is, books can give it can give us something to do in solitude, but it can also spark conversations and just increase our ability to share and understand and appreciate each other. Fantastic. Well, thank you so much, Elise, for joining us on Get Booked for Women's and Men's radio station, and thank you for waking up so early to chat to me. Thank you so much, Hazel, it was a delight. And you're very welcome. I cannot wait to have you back on the show next year. Thank you, thank you. Right, now we have Helen from Literally PR, an award-winning company that over the last 10 years has worked on over 400 campaigns, helping hundreds of authors over the past decade to just achieve their long-term goals through PR, marketing, and branding. You can find out more at literallypr.com, and I'm not going to delay any further. Helen, hi! Hello. Thanks for joining us on Get Booked. You've put so many fantastic authors my way who have been featured on Get Booked here at Women's and Men's Radio Station, and now we have you. Well, aren't I lucky to be here? I feel like I'm sort of, um, there's a little bit of imposter syndrome really going on here because usually I'm sort of putting authors to you and now I'm here chatting. I feel a bit, uh, like the tables have turned a little bit, Hazel. Hasn't it just? But if we want to talk to people about a love of writing and publishing and all the incredible books out there, who better than the person that's getting the books out there? Well, thank you very much. Yeah, I mean, basically every part of my job involves books, so I spent a lot of time reading. But as well as Literally PR, I'm the co-founder of Hashtag Press, which is a publishing house, and we have an imprint for underrepresented writers called Hashtag Black. And then I'm also the co-founder of The Author School, which helps to educate and empower authors so they make the right decisions about how to get published, and once they are published, what they should do. And then I'm also the co-founder of the Diverse Book Awards, which is in its third year now, and I'm doing that side of the business with a prize-winning author called Abiola Bello. So I have— all roads basically lead to books, so I kind of have all things covered when it comes to publishing now. You definitely have a fantastic client list. I must say, I've kept up quite a few friendships with some of the authors that you've put my way. And it is, it is. And you know what, some of the authors are following my dog, and they have an ongoing relationship with my dog too. Amazing. I've got to say, I am so lucky because every time we take on a new client, literally where we're, you know, we're building a relationship with them to help them do what they want to do, and because they're so passionate about their book and we are passionate about our books, then it sort of becomes this really nice— it sounds a bit cheesy, but like a family, like a big extended family of people who just love talking about books. And so many people, we are the same, we still stay in touch with them long after the campaign's ended. And then there was a lady the other day called Abi Oliver who we did a campaign for her back in, I want to say like 2017, maybe even '16, and she's come back with her latest book saying, "Oh, can you help?" And that makes my heart go, "Oh." fizzy because it's like, that's so nice that she's come back to us all these years later, that she's still writing, that she's, you know, she's still doing exactly what she wanted to do and she wants us to be part of it again. It's really lovely actually. It's confirmation, isn't it? It doesn't matter how many campaigns you do, it's that confirmation that somebody is happy with what you do and they want to work with you. Yeah, yeah, it's really lovely. I mean, the whole point of us doing this. The whole reason why I set this up in the first place is because I could— I used to be a journalist and then I moved into food and drink PR, and I could see there was this big kind of growing, really exciting market around books that was so fast-changing, you know, with self-publishing was coming in much more and there was lots more indie publishing and stuff. And I was like, wow, I want to be a part of that. Like, that's like the cool cat, cool kids in the playground. Like, I want to be in that gang. And I kind of just threw myself into it really and learned about publishing. I'd never worked in a publishing house, I didn't really know how it really worked. And one of the things that I've learned really quickly was that people do need other people in when they're a writer. And even though actually writing is such a— can be such an isolating thing to do, you know, you do spend a lot of time on your own when you're a writer. When you then start taking the book out into the world, if you don't have a team of people around you, it's really quite scary because you've spent all this time on this book and then you just kind of are left and you don't really know what to do with it. And so I realised that people needed that kind of community feeling as much as they needed the PR and the marketing, social media. And, you know, so we try and make people feel welcome and warmly welcomed when they join. And I think that's probably what makes people come back because, you know, we are a friendly bunch, which is nice to have. I have noticed that the writing community is incredibly supportive. I spend quite a bit of time on Twitter. I like Twitter, especially for the aforementioned writing community, and a lot of my friends say, "Hey, you're on Twitter, don't you hate it? It's just people constantly bitching at each other and really dodgy opinions." I'm like, "Yeah, but I'm more involved in the kind of publishing side and the writing community where everybody just kind of is nice to each other. They share each other's books. They write reviews for each other and make recommendations, and it's actually really sweet." It is. I totally agree. And one of the first things I say to our authors when they join is you should get on Twitter because it is basically the publishing social media, isn't it? It's like the platform where people, if you like books, then you will get book recommendations. Like you say, you'll get to connect with authors. I mean, I still get really geeky and fangirly if like a really big named author who I've read sort of all of their books responds to one of my tweets. I'm like, oh my God, yeah, you know, it's such a good feeling. And I work with authors all the time, so like I can't imagine I can't imagine how even more exciting that must be just as like a reader who's not quite as in the world, in the publishing world, to get a response. I'm like, you know, it is such a cool place to be. But yeah, I mean, Twitter's got its bad side, don't get me wrong. I've seen plenty of like dodgy stuff on there. But as a whole, the writing community in particular does seem to be, and the book blogging community does seem to be really friendly and very inclusive, which is really lovely, isn't it? That was the exact word that I was going to use. And I must, I must say that I just, I love it that you send all these incredibly fantastic and very personable authors my way. And as I'm reading the book, I love my job because I get to actually write questions that I'm going to be able to ask the author for GetBooked, which is just, it is brilliant. Yeah, that's very cool, that's very cool. We actually do something similar, so when we So when we first take on a book and an author, we will read the book, obviously, and then we actually come up with a list of questions. And then there's a few sort of standard ones, you know, like, you know, why did you write the book and what's the inspiration? You know, sort of standard ones. But that's our chance to kind of really get a bit of a sneak peek into why they wrote the book or the themes behind it, or kind of dig around a bit more or get that question answered, like, why did that character do that? Or, you know, it's really great to be able to get that before anyone else. It's quite fun, isn't it? Oh yeah, completely. However, now this is a bit like asking you which is your favourite child. Is there a particular book that's on your books at the moment that you're just loving? I'm sure you're excited about every single campaign, but is there one that just, you're going, if you had one book to recommend right now? Are you allowed to do that? I don't know, I feel like if I said, if I said then it's, you know, and I didn't say that a certain person or certain people, they'd be like, "Oh, why didn't you say?" I do, I have to say, I do, I do read every book that comes through, and we get about 40 to 50 submissions a month, and we only do about 40 to 50 books a year, so I do have to read a lot of books, and so if a book comes through and I've, and we're doing a sort of a full campaign on it, I have read that book and I have liked it enough, stroke loved it, you know, to support it and get behind it. So I kind of love all of the books, but I am a massive foodie. So when we worked on the Curry Compendium, I loved that because that was just— that is basically ticking all the boxes for me. It's like the food and the books, and the guy was— that Richard says, the guy who wrote it was lovely. And so that was really good because I would, you know, in the interest of obviously, you know, making sure that it was all decent, decent book, I had to cook like lots of lovely food. Of course you would, it's your job. Exactly, that was a hard position, but what, but also what I would say is when I get a book that my kids can enjoy, I love that. So, so my eldest, who is now 13, when she first read Abiola Bello's Emily Knight series, she was just like, oh my god, this is amazing, and so she's now done the 3 books and Ellie has read all 3 books and I love I love the Emily Knight series, it's like fantasy fiction for young kids, well, young teenagers. And then we've just done a book called A Head Full of Magic over at Hashtag Press by Sarah Morell, and my youngest daughter, who is not a big reader at all, have to force her to read, like literally bribe her to read, she read this book in 2 days off her own back and absolutely loved it. And I was like, oh my God, that makes me feel so good that she's actually getting on with a book that I've worked on, you know, it's— that's a really good feeling. So I think when the kids like the books, that makes me even prouder, um, and makes me like the books even more, basically, because it's kind of like somebody else who's really important to me also likes books. My husband doesn't read any book, any of the books I work on, ever. He's absolutely not a reader, and, um, I hate him very much for that. But that's good, so you have to do a lot of reading, which means if he doesn't like reading, he can just get on with the housework. That's how it should be, right? Next time I'm sitting in the garden reading for work with my wine on one hand and the book in the other, I'll be like, "You do know you need to be doing the cleaning, right?" "I'm working. This wine and this reading is working, thank you, dear." I do feel like it's really taken the mickey there. So I remember when I did English literature at A-level, and I remember my teacher saying to me, "What do you want to do for a job?" And I basically went, "Well, what jobs involve just being able to read, getting paid to read?" And I've just worked— like, it took me a while, don't get me wrong, but I finally worked out the job where you get to read, you know, and you get paid to read. It's amazing. It's brilliant, isn't it? Yeah, yeah. I was actually going to ask you, what's your perfect scenario for reading a book? What's your favourite environment? But I think you just kind of said it. And it's interesting because I've got, I've got a really ridiculously busy household and I've got to read quite a lot. I mean, it's at least a couple of books a week for my work. And I sometimes find it hard in the house because either the dog wants something or the kids want something or the washing machine's just finished and blah, blah, blah. So I'm a huge fan of going to a café or a nice little winery somewhere. And just kind of sit in there and people kind of go, "Oh, are your friends not turning up?" I'm like, "I didn't invite anybody. I've got all the friends I need right here in this book." I did actually, a friend of mine said, "Oh, I want to buy you a spa break just to kind of relax a little bit. Who would you like to take?" And I said, "Can it be dog friendly?" They're like, "No, no, take a person." I was like, "I was going to take a book and if you want me to to take somebody, it's going to be the dog. Oh, the dog's just heard me mention her name, so she's just walked in. Well, not her name, but referred to her. Yeah, just the dog. Dog. And she's like, "That'd be me, Mummy. Did you say we were going away?" But no, I love that. I love that idea of just being out somewhere, you kind of, and it's you time. And although, yes, we're working, we have to read, we have to get all these things done, but in line with what Women's Radio Station and Men's Radio Station is about, and about mental health and men's mental well-being. Giving yourself that time away from the house where you're just absorbing in literature, whether it's comedy, fiction, learning about something, non-fiction, finding out more about somebody else's life, it just enriches the soul and that just helps us kind of understand a little bit more. And I think it's invaluable, that sort of time where You know, people used to think that reading was something you did when you were bored or, you know, had endless amount of time. It's just not true. You've got to speculate to accumulate with your mental health. Yeah, and you do need to carve the time out as well. It's like you say, there's always going to be another distraction. And it's interesting because we— I think we find it as a, as a sort of nation— I don't— I mean, I'm talking for the UK. I don't know how much this is the case abroad, but I know we've kind of got into this habit of of an evening, we'll binge watch something on telly and we'll literally watch like 2 or 3, you know, show episodes in a row of our latest thing that we're watching. And we kind of— it's very accepted to carve out that time, sort of glaze over and just stare at the screen. But it's not as encouraged or accepted to kind of book out the time to just sit and read for a while as a way of chilling out. So it's like, I would love it. I mean, don't get me wrong, I love watching TV. But I equally love reading a book. And it just feels like if I say, if I sort of say, oh, I'm gonna spend the evening reading a book, I get kind of funny looks from the family. I get sort of funny looks from my friends, like, what, what, you're just gonna sit and read all night? I'm like, yeah, that sounds great to me. And it'd be great if more people felt they could do that without it being weird, or, you know, or, or they're being judged for it. Because actually it's so good for you to just not be staring at the screen and actually falling into the pages of the book. Well, it's exercising your brain, and yet, you know, people can quite happily watch 2 or 3 episodes on Netflix, which is 2 and a half, 3 hours easily, which is half a book the majority of the time. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, yeah, exactly. And don't get me wrong, like I say, I can fall into that trap as well. I, you know, I've always got my latest thing that I'm watching on TV, and it's very easy, isn't it? Especially on Netflix, where it just kind of automatically brings the next episode up for you, doesn't it? You don't even have to press a button. Um, I was just gonna say, you've got to actually make that decision to stop it, otherwise it's going to keep on going. Exactly. It's a bit like with audiobooks though. That's why I love audiobooks, because I have to do so much reading on the screen or on paper, like paper books. So I quite like— if it's a book that I'm not working on, I quite like to listen to it because it feels like a different experience. But the problem with that is I often I'm laying down and then after about an hour I'm like, "Ah!" Well, interestingly, especially when you kind of, you send me emails with books that you've got, you know, with the offer of an interview, I always ask for the physical book as well because otherwise if you've got it on your iPad it's too easy to quickly check your Instagram, your Twitter, or you've just seen the ping of an email come come through, and I will shove all the tech in a different room and just, yeah, yeah, I'll leave it in your handbag. Yeah, yeah, I mean, I do love taking a book with me wherever I go, so I have quite a big handbag, and whatever book I'm reading at the moment, I will have it with me so I can grab, you know, if I'm sat in the car waiting for the kids after a club, I can grab for 5 minutes in the car, or if I'm on a train to London, I can do an hour then, or, you know, even like you said about the spa day, or for my birthday I got a spa day last month, and I took a book with me and I read the whole book in the spa and I was just like, this is, this is heaven, this is absolutely heaven. So yeah, always have a book with me. I'm sure this is something that you can probably relate to as well, having kids similar ages to mine. I have quite often had friends saying, oh, I can't believe you're constantly traipsing around London taking your son to all these football training sessions, and I'm like, well, actually, I'm audible-ing it in the car on the way there, I then get out, I've always got about 3 books on the go, then while he's in there I'm reading a book and I get an hour and I'm like, yes, actually, isn't it? It's actually quite nice. I'm out of the house and I'm getting stuff done and it kind of, it evens out the brain a little bit. If your brain's going, oh, I don't have time to do so and so and so and so, actually just plan your time a little bit better. But what would you be doing whilst you're waiting for that club to finish? I would just be scrolling through Twitter or Instagram or I'd just be scrolling. Yeah, I would be scrolling. I think I'm going to get arthritis just in that finger. The scrolling is really bad, but having a book stops me from scrolling. That's the truth of it, you know. If I've got some downtime where I'm sat somewhere and I'm trying to kill time, basically, it's either read a book or scroll through on my phone. Do you know what? That's quite interesting because, do you remember when the pandemic first kicked off and everybody had to queue up outside all the supermarkets and they were going, "Oh, I've been there for 45 minutes." '25 minutes.' And I had this woman come up to me and said, 'Oh, you're at the beginning of the queue. Could you just tell me how long you've been waiting so I know how long to expect?' And I just said, 'Oh, I don't know, honey. I got through 3 chapters.' And she's like, 'Okay, maybe I should bring a book next time.' Yeah, I hugely recommend it. Take the downtime. Yeah. So what we want to— we want our listeners to understand a little bit more about what you do and how they can find out more about you. Okay, well, basically we work with authors, publishers, and literary agents, from self-published authors that are working on their first book and are going to publish it on Amazon imminently, to traditionally published authors by like the Big Five who want to hire someone to help them maybe with the social media, And because a lot of authors who get published by the bigger houses, they do still need to do a lot of their own PR marketing, you know, social media. And there's sort of this misconception amongst some people that you're going to get it all done for you if you go down that sort of trad route, which is, it's not always the case. To the point where, you know, actually I can't think of a single author who doesn't need to do something for themselves because, you know, you can't expect your publisher to do it all for you. View. So we kind of work with all sorts of authors and all sorts of books, and we basically try and connect the books with their readers. That's like kind of the bottom line of it. So whether that's via people like yourself interviewing the authors and then sharing that interview and people listening to it and thinking, oh, that sounds interesting, I'm going to buy it, to social media campaigns where we're getting the book out there and connecting it with book bloggers and reviewers and influencers and endorsers. We do events, so we organise like literary parties, which we used to do before COVID quite a lot. Bring them back, please! Oh, well, we're starting to, we are starting to, but it's that tentative kind of— it costs a lot of money, doesn't it, to set up an event? And it's always that kind of fear at the moment about is anyone going to turn up? I feel like people are getting out a lot more, but there's still that kind of, ooh, is it better to spend the money on online stuff still. So during the pandemic, we had switched all of our PR marketing obviously to digital online stuff, and we're definitely getting back out there a lot more. Even down to nobody was even wanting to receive a paperback book through the post, you know, you know, at first when no one really knew how it was transmitted and it was like, I don't really want to get post, thanks. And people like bleaching their Amazon orders, their Amazon orders. Yeah. And I just said, oh goodness. So yeah, so it's been a bit weird, isn't it? But yeah, so basically that's what we do. We kind of connect readers with books and in various ways, but very much around PR, marketing, and branding. And we help some authors to move on and get like a deal, a traditional deal, or an agent for the next book as well. So we kind of build up their brand, and you know, there's various things at play behind the scenes of a book coming out, as you can imagine. So we try and tap into as many different PR, marketing, and branding strategies as we can to basically make the book as successful as it can be. And strategize around their needs and their goals, I guess, because everybody's different and every book is different. Exactly that. And that I learned that really quite quickly actually, in that what success— what it means a book's been successful for one author, it can be so different to what that means for another author. Success is so different, it's just such a different concept to different people, you know. Some people say to us, right, I need to sell X number of copies to get my money back on what I've spent so far, and then I'm done. I don't need to do anything else. I just want to do it, see how I got on, and that's it. Other people are like, right, I want a full-time author career. I want, by the time, you know, in the next 5 years, I want to be signed with a literary agent. I want to get a traditional publishing deal, I want this and the other. And some people are like, I just want people to love my book. I just want to get loads of really lovely positive reviews, and I want to know that my book being enjoyed by some people, you know, and that is success to those 3 different people. And then there's different variations of that across the board. So, you know, over 400-odd campaigns, well, we're nearly at 500 now, to be honest, but at that point we've seen so many different markers for success that we don't— so when someone says to us, "Oh, you know, what do you see as success in a campaign?" It's like, "Well, no, what do you see?" And it sounds like a cop-out, but it really is that, you know, we can kind of make anything happen And what we can't guarantee is how many sales you're going to make, because there's just so many factors involved in that. But the more people that know about your book, the stronger the chance is that you're going to sell a decent number of copies, right? Yeah. Well, I must say, thank you so much for sending so many incredible authors my way. Thank you. To be featured on Get Booked. I've loved chatting to so many of them. Quick reminder to our listeners to pop onto literallypr.com to find out a little bit more about you and what your ever-growing team is up to. And I'm assuming there's going to be a party to celebrate 500 campaigns, so I should— there should be, shouldn't it? Yeah, that would be a really good idea actually to do that. Yeah, I think, I think basically any excuse for a party is always quite a nice one. So yeah, let's, let's hope that everyone Next time we do one of our parties, hopefully everyone will come along and have a lovely, a lovely time. Yay! I can't wait. I'm looking forward to come through. Thank you so much. You'll be invited. Oh my goodness, good, you will be. Yeah, and some of my favourite authors as well. We can all just basically get together and finally see each other in person. Yeah, that would be lovely. Now we are going to organise something. We're actually looking, we were talking about it in the team meeting, they were probably going to do it in September, so— Oh, brilliant, something to look forward to. Thank you so much, Helen, for joining us at Get Booked for Women's and Men's radio station. I hope all you lovely listeners have enjoyed listening to the show as much as I've enjoyed doing it. And just a quick reminder, we had Elise Krentzel, that's E-L-I-S-E K-R-E-N-T-Z-E-L, chatting to us about her fantastic book Under My Skin, followed by chatting to Helen Lewis from Literally PR, talking to us about anything and everything books related. Helen is also the co-founder of The Author School, the Diverse Book Awards, Ink Publishing Services, and Hashtag Press. You can find out more about Literally PR and all their latest campaigns and authors at literallypr.com. I do love doing this show, opening discussions and offering support via the incredible writing community out there. Do come and join us, get involved, and if you want to catch up on previous shows, you can at womensradiostation.com/shows/getbooked and on our SoundCloud. While you're on womenstradiostation.com. Please do check out all the other incredible shows by our unbelievably talented presenters out there. And if you want to check out some more of my book views, books that I've been having a look at and loving recently, you can do at hazelbutterfield.com and on my Instagram @nuttybutty10 and @getbookedwrs. You've been listening to Hazel Butterfield for Get Booked. Until next time,