24. E. Foley & B. Coates
“...two of the most significant historical moments in writing belong to women”
The latest Worshipful Ones interview took place on a gorgeous spring day in late February in Peckham. My guests this time are authors Beth Coates and Liz Foley – an inspiring and brilliantly talented female du0 - and between them they have co-authored a growing collection of non-fiction books, among them Homework for Grown-ups, What Would Boudicca Do?, You Goddess! and their latest, A Year of Living Curiously.
Both Beth and Liz have backgrounds in publishing – Beth is currently at HarperCollins and Liz is at Vintage. Unsurprisingly, this has set them in very good stead for their second career in writing. They met at as assistants at Penguin Random House in 2002, realised they had a connection and before long, had signed up to do an Italian GCSE together after work. And so began their friendship, based on learning and self-improvement. I asked how this pursuit of knowledge led them to the realisation they could write together:
“We had worked together for a while, and when you're in publishing you see authors getting signed up all the time, and we just thought, I reckon we might be able to do this”, says Beth. One evening they were having dinner with friends and the idea for their first book, Homework for Grown-ups, came up in conversation: “that was the point where we realised we should just do it. And we were really fortunate, because it coincided with [author and editor] Rosemary Davidson setting up a new imprint called Square Peg, which was for exactly this sort of book. She made it her launch title, so we were really lucky. It became a number one bestseller”.
There’s a literary background for each of the women, in different ways. Liz grew up writing stories: “I always liked writing, and I loved school - I was a complete dweeb! But my parents were both doctors, so it wasn't a particularly bookish household. I’ve always just really enjoyed learning, I found it very enriching and I still do. Even if we weren't writing the books, I'd still want to be finding stuff out, reading history books and reading outside of work. What I most enjoy about the books we write together, is that they’re about learning and discovering things about the world”.
Beth says she was similar to Liz at school: “I was really, really nerdy. And I also wrote stories – mostly plagiarised fairy tales! I'm sure I've still got some somewhere. But also, my mum was a writer. She had [Beth and her two siblings] very young, all by the age of 27. Then she went back to university, did a degree and became a copywriter. She’s written a couple of books on gin - she's a gin expert. So she was always writing and books were part of the fabric of our lives.”
Both women agree that their teachers played a huge part in their love of literature and learning. Liz says “I can remember three English teachers that immediately pop into my head. I can honestly say that’s how I am in this job now, it’s because of them”.
Penguin Random House has several imprints (an imprint is a subsidiary of a publishing company, and it's the name that appears on the book as its publisher), and both Beth and Liz worked for Vintage, which publishes across a wide range of genres, among them history, politics, science, physics, and fiction. Beth says “I vividly remember, as a 20-something, going into a meeting with all these incredible women [editors], talking about exciting new projects and I remember thinking I could either be intimidated by this, or just go, wow, I'm getting to read all these book proposals about things I wouldn’t have otherwise had access to”. Liz agrees: “we had access to the work of great thinkers, on a huge variety of subjects. Amazing that it was part of our job to be reading these things all the time”. It sounds like heaven to have a job where everyone from assistant-level up is encouraged to read and give an opinion on book proofs. Although, Liz adds, “I do think there is a danger that I might have a period where I think I cannot read another book!”
I asked Beth and Liz what their process is when they plan a new book and it turns out, they’re already working on their next one: “we share ideas all the time”, says Beth, “and then what we do is we try and take a day where we'll go somewhere like a spa or somewhere we can go and just talk and think, whilst doing something gentle like swimming”.
Beth carries on “Liz is obsessed with documents, like Google Docs and spreadsheets….” “I am” Liz chimes in, “so then we kind of list it out. And because we write together, we need to work out what we're each going to go away and do, how we're going to pull it together, and make a timeline. But then the bit that we love most is the back and forth, where we're editing each other's pieces”. Beth goes on to explain: “but there is a lot of planning. Particularly with A Year of Living Curiously, we did one month each. We had this huge spreadsheet of all 365 entries”.
As the pair researched the subject for each entry, they would see if it had something that would pique people’s interest. But with quite a lot of the things they researched, they realised they wouldn’t be able to dig into it sufficiently or find something fun to say in the space they had available. It was also essential to them that they covered a wide range of subjects – not just the things they love like history and mythology, but science and art, music and subjects that may have been slightly out of their comfort zone.
“Which is another part of the joy of it, is making yourself learn stuff about things that you don't necessarily want to learn” says Liz. Beth explained that the guiding principle was that there had to be something on every page that made you go, ah ha! I didn't know that. There was some brutal editing and if something was too boring, it would get cut. They also tried to give each month a “mood” that would be appropriate. “The point of it was to try to be a bit uplifting, it was supposed to be about piquing your curiosity and how that brings you some level of joy, instead of just doomscrolling, which is what we all do all the time. We intended it to be the antidote to that”, says Beth.
An approximate time frame, from the kernel of an idea to the finished article being ready to submit, is about a year and a half. Beth claims that Liz is much faster than she is, but that A Year of Living Curiously was particularly interesting to write because it’s the first book they had worked on post-Covid. Beth says “I think we were both a bit depleted, in terms of energy and also getting to midlife and …demand from the children and all of that. I think also we set ourselves a big task, thinking oh, this is going to be so fun, but actually 365 things to engage with and research was a lot! Because there’s an entry for every day, it felt as though there would never be an end to it”. The editing process was far more joyous, however, and then they knew that they really had something.
Once complete, a book will go off to the publisher where it embarks on the next stage of the process, encompassing negotiation, editing, production, design, and finally, publication and distribution. Both women chime in “it's so amazing getting the final finished thing and seeing how they’ve made it look. They made [A Year of Living Curiously] look beautiful”.
What's the secret? Do they ever get tired of each other?! They insist they don’t and I can see why – they really complement one another. They’re the perfect example of women achieving even greater things when working together. By their own admission Beth is more disorganised and Liz says she’s more ordered and process driven, or, as she puts it: “I'll do boring boring and then Beth will add optimism and flair” but Beth insists that she’s doing herself a disservice. Beth continues “there were times with the latest book where I really needed Liz there. I’d be panicking and thinking I couldn’t do it, and we’d both be lifting one another up”. Liz agrees “I really love working with you. But we've always been surprised - we've done how many books now? Eight - and we haven't ever rowed about anything. We disagree quite comfortably with each other”.
They’re particularly grateful for one another when it comes to the pressure of the publicity side of the process, attending events and talks together and knowing that they are going to enjoy each other's company, even if they’ve travelled halfway across the country. But Beth and Liz stress that the team is greater than the two of them. “We’ve worked with amazing editors along the way who've been essential. Laura Hassan, our current editor at Faber is just amazing. We’ve known her for a long time, so we have a very honest relationship - we don't mind when she ‘says this is boring’, and she has some amazing ideas. So much of her work is in our books. In terms of having a shared vision for what the book should be and keeping the energy up and encouraging us to keep going, Laura has been vital” enthuses Beth.
They each have simple rituals that get them into the right frame of mind for a day of writing. Liz says she has to have a large cup of green tea every morning and “that's my signal to my brain that I'm starting work, whether it's publishing work or the writing. And I cycle to work every day and I find it a really useful way to think things through. You're in a mindful state, where you're engaged in something, but your subconscious brain can be quietly working on things. It was on a commute that I unlocked some of the more interesting angles on how to tackle topics for A Year of Living Curiously”.
Beth says she discovered the Pomodoro Technique really helpful while working on the latest book. “Oliver Burkeman wrote about it in his book, Four Thousand Weeks. You remove all distractions, set a 25 minute timer, really focus, and then have a ten minute break”. While doing this Beth handwrote everything, which also feels quite ritualistic and removed the need for a screen. She explained that during Covid, she got into bad habits around screens (like many of us), and generally finds it harder to focus when working constantly in front of a screen as it can be so distracting.
Speaking of distractions, how do they balance careers in publishing and writing with motherhood? “It’s impossible to do it perfectly, but I always come back to prioritising the kids, particularly as they're getting older” says Beth. “We once met someone at a party, and she said they need you more when they’re a teenager, so maternity leave should happen then, not when they are babies. That’s always stayed with us, and neither of us had kids at that point! My whole work/life balance has changed over the years and adjusts according to what’s happening. For example, my eldest is doing her GCSEs, so right now that's what I've got to focus on.”
Liz says she finds it harder to find a balance that works for her and sometimes finds herself spreading herself too thinly, “but I do feel lucky to be working in the industry that I am. I work from home two or three days a week, so that when my kids come home from secondary school, I am there, in a way that wasn’t the case when I was a kid”.
“It is a juggle, but for A Year of Living Curiously, all the kids came to the book launch and it was so lovely” says Beth. “That's the first time they've really engaged in the fact that we'd published a book. And we dedicate all of the books to all the kids every time [Beth has three daughters and Liz has three sons]. But I like showing them that you can do cool things, have a job and be a mum. All of those things are possible!”
Liz and Beth live close by, Beth in Peckham and Liz in Brixton. I ask them how living in London impacts their work and they both agree immediately that it’s the access that they have to everything. “I feel like there are ideas everywhere in London” Beth elaborates, “we had a lovely day when we were working on What Would Boudicca Do? Where we popped up to the National Gallery to do some research. We thought, how lucky that we can just decide on a Tuesday afternoon at 2pm that we're going do that”.
It was while writing What Would Boudicca Do? that the women learned more about Enheduanna who is widely considered to be the first recorded writer. Beth continues “it was on a stone tablet, a hymn to a goddess, and was created around 2300 BCE. Liz joins in “I thought it was really interesting, given how dominant male voices have been in writing for what seems like all of history, but actually the first recorded author is a woman! And the first book that people consider a novel is The Tale of Genji by Murasaki Shikibu, a Japanese writer. That to me was very inspiring, particularly given the industry that we work in, with two of the most significant historical moments in writing belonging to women”.
Moving on to future projects, the pair have already mentioned that they’re planning their next book, but it sounds as though they have endless ideas for more: “there was a version of Homework for Grown-ups, which was about interpreting the Bible, wasn't there, that you always thought would be really fun to do?” Beth asks Liz. “I'm not a religious person, but I’d really like to get into the stories and characters. I do think something around the Bible would be quite fun. Or maybe it would be about all the big religious texts, not just the Bible. Because one of the things we really liked about working on these books was the influence of all of these stories on art and music. You see them everywhere. Everyone's into Greek and Roman mythology at the moment, but there are other really influential stories that you see around you that are worth exploring, that influence TV, film and literature”. Which is lots more ground for them to cover on their next swimming & brainstorming day.
Finally, I ask them about women who inspire them or who they want to shout about. Beth gestures to the two artworks on the wall behind her. One is by Liza Giles, an artist living in Peckham: “about ten years ago she decided she wanted to become an artist and she's now represented by Flowers Gallery. Then this other one is by a woman called Anna Burns, she’s a visual artist and a spatial designer – she’s off to Coachella soon to do the staging for a Basement Jaxx show. She put on an incredible exhibition in Peckham above the train station last summer”.
Beth also tells me she discovered jewellery brand Alighieri when looking for a gift for their editor Laura after finishing What Would Boudicca Do? and found that the brand’s pieces resonated with her, because each one tells a story. She shows me one that she’s wearing – it’s beautiful and really unusual.
Liz says “for me, it's the writers that I work with as an editor. It's hard for writers out there because you don't earn lots of money initially (or ever). It’s a precarious career, but there are a few women writers that I work with who are amazing at balancing their artistic creativity with a sense of business about their work. Susan Stokes Chapman is one and she is amazing. I love working with her because she is an incredible, creative person who is really canny about what needs to happen to make a book successful, and asking what are the things she can do in partnership with the publisher to really make it work”.
Partnership. It can be the key to great success, as Beth and Liz have shown. I'm so looking forward to seeing what they bring out next.
Find Beth & Liz’s website here, buy their excellent books at all good bookshops and on Bookshop.org and follow them on Instagram here.