Zibby chats with bestselling author Pip Drysdale about THE CLOSE-UP, a gripping, sultry, and ultimately shocking novel about a struggling author who discovers the dark side of fame when a stalker begins reenacting violent scenes from her thriller. Pip delves into her creative process and the intense research that went into this project. She also reflects on her global upbringing, heartbreaks, and journey from acting and songwriting to becoming an author. Finally, she shares valuable insight into the publishing world, touching on her marketing and PR efforts—and how she deals with setbacks.

Transcript:

Zibby: Welcome, Pip. Thank you so much for coming on Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books to discuss the close up. Congratulations. 

Pip: Aw, thank you. Thank you so much for having me, hey. 

Zibby: Oh, it's so great. As you know, I read your book a while ago. I was posting as I was reading. I was loving. It was so great. Tell listeners all about what your book is about, and then we'll get into you.

Pip: Okay, so the novel follows Zoe Anne Weiss, who is a struggling author living in LA. She was billed as the next big thing as an author, but then things don't go quite to plan. So her first novel bombs and she ends up working as a florist, which is not her dream, obviously. It's kind of like her dead end day job for her.

Zibby: Speaking of florists, by the way, you do have these beautiful flowers right behind you. So I hope this is on theme, that this is inspired by the book. 

Pip: It's like, I didn't know anything about flowers before this book. Now I do. Zoe is working in this dead end job as a florist and, um, to make matters worse, she has a massive writer's block.

block and her agent keeps pushing her for this, this next book that she has to write because she's contracted for it. And she doesn't really know what she's going to do to turn her life around. So everything changes for her when one night she reconnects with her ex, all an ex flame, um, Zach Hamilton. Now, Zach, when they met the first time was just some hot guy with a dream of becoming an actor.

But, um, things have changed. 

Zibby: I love that. Like people can just say, I'm just some hot guy with a dream. That's me. 

Pip: Yeah, exactly. And that's like a lot of LA, but like, he is no longer a hot guy with a dream. Now she has, her career has gone down the tubes and his career has taken off. So now he's this up and coming massive superstar actor with PR people and paparazzi and fans.

And. When she hooks up with him again, I mean, she really likes him, but she's also thinking to herself, well, this is great. Now I know what I'm going to write my book about. I can write about behind the celebrity curtain. You know, they make her sign an NDA, but she's like, well, it's okay. I'll get around that.

Lord knows how. But, um, so she, but the bad part about that is that soon, soon enough, her Name and photograph end up in the press. And so now everyone knows her name, which sounds like a great thing if you're a novelist and you're trying to sell your book, but the problem with everyone knowing your name is everybody knows your name, including Zach Stalker, who was very keen to get rid of Zoe.

Zach Stalker, who has read Zoe's first book and is now enacting all the creepy plot twists in her first book against her. 

Zibby: It's such a great idea. It's such a great idea. It's such great execution. What was it that was left on her windshield and she was completely freaked out? Like some pig heart or something?

What was it? Pig heart? 

Pip: Yeah. It was like, I think it was bovine. I think I went with a cow heart. 

Zibby: A cow heart. Sorry. Sorry. 

Pip: I was like, Googling all the different pictures of like different hearts going, which one would be big enough for her to see from a distance? 

Zibby: I mean, that is like a sick thing for you to be Googling.

Pip: Like, I know if someone looks at my Google history, I'm done. 

Zibby: Well, the idea of like your past books coming to life to haunt you is, is so genius. Cause like who wants them really to come alive? I mean, I guess some, but. 

Pip: Well, I think like if you're writing thrillers, right, you're going to be writing your very worst nightmares.

Cause it's like your. Biggest fears are things that you're sticking into your books. So if you've written a novel, like if Zoe has written a novel about a stalker, which is what she has, it's going to be her worst fear about what could happen. So then for that to be reenacted in real life with her as a victim, it really can't get worse than that, right?

Because it's like your darkest thoughts coming back to bite you, so. 

Zibby: So does that mean these are your worst thoughts? 

Pip: Sort of. I mean, like, I think I could probably go worse, but like. 

Zibby: Oh my gosh. 

Pip: It's my own brand, so. 

Zibby: Okay. Well, I loved the LA setting. I loved even the florist, you know, backstory. There aren't that many.

I mean, I guess Tia Williams just did a book and, you know, about a florist, but I don't know. It's so beautiful. Like you can't help but feel like you're getting the benefits of being around flowers, even just reading about flowers. And then of course, when she drives them up to Zach's house and they see the flowers.

Spill because of the dogs and now she's in trouble and like you can just feel the pain and the, like, mortification and all of it. Um, to Okay. Go into the backstory of the florist, how you came up with that as the job and what fun research you, you did have to do. 

Pip: Okay. Well, when I start books usual, generally when I start books, I kind of just start writing.

And so the very first scene I needed her to be. seeing Zach again. Like I was just writing and this is what was happening in the scene. Like I didn't know where it was going to go or anything at this point. And I kept thinking to myself, well, how the hell is a girl who's not famous going to end up in the same room as someone who was, who is famous if like, even if, and they need to have known each other before.

So there has to be a reason that she's put in the same room. So it had, so that gave me options like catering or, I mean, there are a number of different things she could do, but floristry was the one that's like the most beautiful and fun. I mean, who doesn't like flowers? So yeah, then I went down a whole rabbit hole of it thinking, well, what kind of floristry?

Cause you know, you think floristry and then you start looking into it and I'm kind of specific about my details. I was like, and now we have all different sorts. I didn't know this before. So at first I was doing like Japanese floristry. And then I realized I did like a whole heap of Japanese floristry classes to learn about it.

And then. I realized that actually you can't transport those phases. You have to do it on site. And I'm thinking that's not going to work for my scene. So I changed it to English floristry, and then that allowed me to give a pretty theme and we'll kind of came together, but it's definitely not a seamless process.

Zibby: Interesting. Wow. Who knew? Like, you just don't know when you read a novel all the things that go into it. I'm picturing you now, you know, assembling, assembling intricate Japanese floral arrangements and then having to throw away all that knowledge. But at least you can have like prettier dinner parties now.

So that's good. Okay. So the parts also about the stalker and why the stalker, you know, appears. And even when she's going, by the way, the one apartment complex that you described, I swear I lived in, when I lived in LA. Like in the late 90's, where she's like, when she parks and she's going. It's not where she lives, it's where her friend lives, where she goes and visits in the, you know, towards the beginning.

And there's like the, You know, the arbor and he's waiting there. That wasn't her house. 

Pip: Uh, I think it was. I think that is her house and, and the guy she's sleeping with downstairs is standing out with the other woman. 

Zibby: Yes, yes, yes, yes. 

Pip: Yeah. And I actually based that on, um, I found his street and everything, but I didn't really love any of the buildings cause they were all like these really new build ones.

So I based that on the Melrose Place building. 

Zibby: Oh, of course I remember. Yes. 

Pip: It was like, it was like what dark things could happen in Melrose Place building, like. 

Zibby: Totally. I lived in like a Melrose Place type of building because I was obsessed with Melrose Place when I moved to LA myself and so had to seek out something similar.

But it was like a beautiful, I only lived there a few months, but like J. Lo was living on the other side before she was like huge and just, you know. Hang out by the pool. Anyway, it looked just the way you described. And I was like, I wonder if she was on Havenhurst Avenue. But anyway, not exactly the same.

Okay. So why is this her worst fear, your worst fear worth like pursuing in novel form? All of these things are out of your control. Like, where does this come from for you? 

Pip: I think for me, The thing that you mean, what was most scary about this book for me? 

Zibby: Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Where, where, where's the personal link?

What are you most worried about? 

Pip: Well, I think when you're a creative, I mean, you'd notice like you put things out into the world and then you really have very, you have no control over what happens once they're out there and you, you do your best, you try to be a good person, you do everything you can, but ultimately you don't really have any control.

After that point. And so people can, could take your work and use it against you in a way. And there would be very little you could do about it. And while I was actually thinking about this today, you know, if you're super famous and you get a stalker, you can pay for bodyguards and security guards and great security systems.

If you are a regular person, you know, who doesn't have any kind of public profile at all, you can probably like move house. Get off social media and hide, you know, make it that they can't, like, you could like quit your job or whatever. The moment that you have any kind of public profile and, or your fame adjacent or something, which Zoe is, you don't really have those options.

So it's like, you kind of, you're even more susceptible because you don't, you have the. You have the public profile. So you have people knowing things about you that they might not otherwise know and having access to you and access to your work and your inner thoughts and what have you. But you don't have the, the means by which to protect yourself in the way that you might have if you were massively famous and successful.

So it just felt like a very vulnerable place to be. And I think for most creatives, that is a vulnerable place. I mean, the internet is like, a cesspool a lot of the time, like, you know, and I think a lot of us struggle with it. 

Zibby: It's true. I have a friend who went on some date from some app, whatever, and then the guy wasn't leaving her alone and was emailing her employers and doing all these sketchy things and she didn't know what to do.

I mean, it's terrifying. There's no good answer. Yeah. 

Pip: And it's like the police, there's a limit to what they can do. Right. So. I mean, when they know who it is, I think they've got a little bit more scope, but all they can really do is go and say, Hey, don't do that. And then sometimes that will inflame the situation and you don't know what, you don't really want to do that because that'll make it worse.

And so, yeah, it's like we're all one post away from ruining our lives. I know. Aren't we? You really are. You're living on the edge, man. 

Zibby: Yeah. We're all just living on the edge. Wait, tell me about you as a writer and you as a person. So you grew up, where did you grow up? Where did, when did you decide to be a writer?

What was your career? Like just give me your whole little life story. 

Pip: Okay. It's very convoluted, but I'll give it a go. 

Zibby: Great. Even better. 

Pip: I grew up all over, really. I grew up in South Africa and also in Zimbabwe and also in Australia, most of it was in Australia. And then also in Canada for a couple of years, I actually learned to talk in Canada, so my accent's still a bit all over the place.

And then ..

Zibby: Wait, why did you live in all these places? 

Pip: Well, I think my parents were very keen to leave Africa when I was a little kid, so we left when I was seven. And then, I mean, obviously I'd already learned to talk at that point, we'd already been to Canada. I think Canada was a first go. They were like, let's get out of here.

So we went, we moved to Canada and then my mom got pregnant with my, with my sister and decided it was way too cold because we were in Toronto. So that was, so then we came to Australia and that was a lot warmer, probably too warm, but warmer. And then we ended up back in Zimbabwe for a few years when I was, um, a teenager, I think it was three years, maybe four years, because my dad was from there originally, and then that Zimbabwe didn't go, it wasn't going well, so we left again, came back to Australia, and I moved to New York soon after that for three years, and I went back to Australia, went to uni, went to London for a few years, came back to Australia because my heart was broken, and you always go back, to your mom when your heart's broken and then back to London for a bit and like it's just been back and forth a lot so yeah.

Zibby: What, tell me about the heartbreak. Can you tell me what happened? 

Pip: One, there's so many man. 

Zibby: The one you had to go to a different continent. 

Pip: That one I was crazy in love with him and I think it just didn't work. I think like you know he was one of these types like I don't know how much you know about Britain, but they've got very different, like, he was one of these types who were, who'd gone to Eton and had, like, had every possible advantage and he just had a very particular way of being.

And I have a very particular way of being, which is like, I don't like people being mean to me. Like, um, ..

Zibby: I approve of that way of being, I think that's pretty, yeah. 

Pip: Yeah. So like the two didn't match that well, like each other, but ultimately like, you know, I think he just, it just didn't work. So, um, but I was absolutely heartbroken, um, by that one.

Yeah. So I went back to Australia for a few years. I think it was two years and then I went back to London. It's been all over the place. Now I'm based in Sydney and I've been here for two years, which is actually really lovely. It's such a beautiful city. So plan on staying. One never knows. 

Zibby: Okay. Australia is number one on my, on my wishlist.

I feel like I love Australia. All Australian books, all Australian authors, like everything. I'm like, wait, this is like the subset of stuff that I like here, you know, but like sorted for me. It's pretty awesome. 

Pip: I think you'd really like it. And the flight isn't too bad from, um, you're, oh, you're in New York, aren't you?

The flight from New York actually is bad. I'm not going to lie to you. It's like 20 hours or something. Yeah. LA is okay. It's like 16. New York's quite far. 

Zibby: I mean, I could definitely get a lot done. So that's good. Next time I have a big project, I'll, I'll board a flight to Sydney. That'll compel me to finish.

Um, wait, so when did writing get into your, when did you start writing? 

Pip: Okay. So I was always doing creative things. Like, first of all, I, when I moved to New, to New York, I was acting. I did that for three years. Like, thankfully the internet, I mean, like TikTok and stuff wasn't a thing back then. So it's all in someone's like draw somewhere.

I think thank goodness. 

Zibby: Was it like stage acting or film TV? 

Pip: I did really bad guerrilla films like you know these really low budget kind of films which I did really enjoy because you'd get like this lighting guy he'd come from this massive thing and he'd come and do this side project after hours and we'd be filming like at midnight, because that was the only time we could get the venue.

And I kind of liked it, but I was also 20 years old. So you like that stuff when you're 20 years old, right? It seems fun, exciting. So, and then I also did some awful Broadway, which was really fun as well. Like I really, really loved it. And then, then after that, while I was there, I, I like, I learned guitar for, cause I had a friend who taught guitar and like, I just picked it up and started writing songs and stuff. And then I moved back to Australia and started writing songs and made a couple of records and they were kind of, I don't know, I just play cafes and get stuff played on the radio and like, it was very, it was low key, but that was kind of what I wanted, you know, it was just like very hippie, but I was back when I was like early twenties and then in 2015, suddenly, I just, like, I don't know, it's like all the other stuff fell away and writing books was the thing that was interesting to me.

I think before then it always felt too big. Somehow a song is like three verses in a chorus. It's hard. Don't get me wrong. It's hard, but it's, it's controllable and it's a bit like acting. Somebody gives you the script. So writing books felt like a huge, huge undertaking and I just didn't think I'd like be able to.

And then I kind of had this, um, story idea that wouldn't leave me alone. Around 2015. And I just really committed to it, you know, and I did it. And, you know, I always kind of thought in the back of my mind, I'm going to get this published. And I was just so, I was so hell bent on it. And I did get it published.

Like it did actually, like, that was the one that was like my breakout novel in Australia. And it did so well, so quickly here. And like, ..

Zibby: What was that called? And what was that about? 

Pip: That was called The Sunday Girl, and it was about a woman coming out of a very toxic relationship. And when I say toxic, I mean hugely manipulative and kind of violent and just very bad, right?

She kind of, she knows that she could take like the high ground or like, you know, cower, but she was just like, screw this. I'm going to get revenge. And so she's like, she knows a lot about him and about his life. So she goes to take revenge on him, but things do not go to plan, obviously. So yeah, so it's a bit of a, downward spiral, but it was a lot of, um, I actually, I don't know if it was fun to read, to write.

I think it was a little bit more traumatizing to write, but it was really, but it did really well. And like, and yeah, I was quite proud of that book. So it's a long time ago now though. 

Zibby: Okay. So that was a breakout hit. You were very excited. And then what happened? 

Pip: It came out in the U S during COVID when all the stores were closed and it bombed.

And when I say I mean, bombed. So I had a really big success in Australia and I was, and like, you just assume, like, I think I was so naive because I'd never had a book come up before. I didn't realize that like, you know, things don't always go that way. Sometimes they go very, very, very badly. And that's what happened for me the second time.

But then I used that to write this, this book, the closeup. So if I didn't have that experience, I wouldn't know what it felt like to have something completely just die in the water. So, yeah. 

Zibby: Yeah, the tides of, of book publishing are, uh, quite unpredictable. 

Pip: So unpredictable. You really have to take the long view.

You can't get too bent out of shape about the imminent stuff. 

Zibby: Wow. So, knowing what happened last time, how did you approach even this? This book, the marketing, like psychologically, it sounds like you're in a good place, but do you do anything like totally different? 

Pip: You see what the first one, I didn't have an agent that one got, you see, I hadn't, didn't have an agent at all.

I got the publisher without an agent and then they sold it on. So I think if I had an agent behind me for my first one, it probably would have gone completely differently, especially my agent. Cause she's awesome. So that, that. That is different this time because I do have her also I think the publishing, we don't have COVID, which is helpful.

Zibby: Yes. 

Pip: And also I think like the publisher who's doing it seems really behind it and they're really good about I'm doing it. And also I'm working with a PR person this time, which I didn't do last time. And I really think that's helpful. That's massively helped because I, in Australia, that's not something you do that was suggested.

Like apparently people do that in the U. S. all the time. I had no idea. So I think that has helped. And yeah, I mean, I feel much better about this one, but don't get me wrong. I was traumatized when people didn't do well. I like, I was really upset. So.. 

Zibby: How do you handle it when you get really upset? 

Like what's your go to?

Pip: Oh, I cry. I cry. Okay. And, um. I think that one, I was already going to get EMDR for something else, which is like this thing where they make you look at life and it like blanks your mind of bad things. Um, so I just, I was like, can we just zap another one? 

Zibby: Yeah, can you just like throw this on as well? Can I get a value pack please of EMDR?

Pip: Get rid of this one too, because I think it's holding me back. So, um. 

Zibby: Oh my gosh. I feel like I'm the last person to try EMDR. I think I have to go. I have to just, you know, 

Pip: It's so good. Like, if there's just, like, I wouldn't get rid of everything because I actually think some stuff is quite helpful as a writer.

Like it's good to have some scars. It's good to have some wounds and it doesn't get rid of things, but it does lower the volume of them. So you just pick a couple. Just so you're not overloaded. 

Zibby: Got it. Okay. So how do you feel like your background, I don't think I've ever even spoken to somebody who's lived in so many disparate places all over.

How does, how did that inform how you see the world and how you write about emotion and does it change from place to place or do you feel like people are more similar than one might think or the opposite? Like what's your takeaway? 

Pip: I think people are people are people are people, no matter where you are.

I think ultimately, even if you look back in time and you read things from like, you know, 500 years ago, you've still, I mean, I remember being the wife of Bath at school. And I mean, I feel like I get her. Okay, so that's Chaucer, right? So I don't think people so much are different, but I think that by moving a lot, you do become quite a tuned person.

To noticing things and picking things up in your environment that I might not otherwise be, and I think that that's quite helpful as a skill when you're writing books because you.. You go to a place and you, you immediately kind of start figuring it out. And that's comes from being a kid, moving to so many different countries and having to figure it out because it feels like a sense of survival when you're little, doesn't it?

You want to fit in. Right. So, so I think it definitely plays into. What I notice and what I put in my box and probably the themes that I put in my box. So, for example, with this book, I would never have put the close up in a different city because it's all about the American dream and wanting fame and like the dark things that come with that.

And so to me, it had to be somewhere while it could be somewhere like New York or London or whatever. L. A. is like quintessentially that, you know. And when I went to LA, the first thing I have noticed apart from the fact that I felt so damned hopeful, the moment I got off the airplane, it was so weird. It was like, I was in weird hope.

Like, I think I've got it in there. This narcotic sense of possibility. Right. Cause it really felt like that. But I also, I was really blown away by the light and I, like, I'm quite sensitive to things like light. And I remember thinking, I get why a movie, like the movie industry set up here. And I remember thinking about it and looking at the light, thinking, It's kind of like, it feels like hope, but you know, hope takes you and take you in all the best places and all the worst places, you know, can lead you in either direction.

And so you see, I, I don't know if I would notice those things if I had not lived in lots of different places, because maybe I wouldn't, I wouldn't look at the world that way. But it's so hard to know, isn't it? 

Zibby: Yeah. Well, that was interesting. 

Good. You know. So for the close up, what is something you want readers to take away once they put it back on the shelf?

Like, what do you want them to, how do you want them to be kind of changed after reading it? Like, what should, what do you want? 

Pip: How to tell this without ruining it? Cause I mean, always I want people to have fun, right? To be like kind of amused and feel all the feelings and what have you, but there's a real social commentary going on in this book, um, specifically the ending and I mean, specifically the very, very, very last line, I think, actually from the book.

Zibby: I won't read it out loud and ruin it for anyone. 

Pip: And I, I, I mean, most people that have read it and talked to me afterwards have been like, you know, there's kind of a sense of acknowledgement of, yeah, that's how, how it is. Do you know, like, like, so I suppose for me, I wanted to do that because it's like you like, God, how do I say this without ruining any of the plot twists?

I think it's important to me that I reflect the world back to itself, the way that it actually is, because that's without like casting judgment in any one direction or the other, at least not in my work. So then people can make their own choices about things and their decisions about things and see them clearly and go, Yeah, you know, that's, I, uh, I don't try to write, like, I'm not trying to change reality in my books.

I want to reflect it back. 

Zibby: Love that. Amazing. Do you have advice for aspiring authors? 

Pip: Ooh, just keep going. Like I know it's boring, that advice, but it really is the only advice. That and I would say, try to find an editor to work with relatively early. Like, I didn't even know that that sort of thing existed when I wrote my first draft.

But then once I had a first draft and I sent it. I think it was called, I remember, but it was in the UK and it was called a literary agency, like a literary consultancy. And they would, um, take your manuscript and pay you with an editor. And I just learned so much through the process. And I still learn so much through the process of working with editors.

So I'm always a really big fan of like, Don't give up, do it the best you can, keep turning up on the page, and then get help, you know, give it to an editor, see what they say, learn from them, take it back, get excited about the next draft, and understand it's going to be way harder than you ever thought it would.

Because it always is. Every book, right? Yes. 

Zibby: Um, okay, last question, is Pip your real name? 

Pip: Um, yes. Well, it's short for Philippa. 

Zibby: Perfect. Zibby. Zibby is short for Elizabeth. So there you go. 

Pip: Okay, cool. I was wondering that actually. 

Zibby: Yeah. Here's to, here's to fun nicknames. I actually hated having a nickname growing up because I felt like it was such a pain in class and everything and I don't know.

Pip: But also, no, you wouldn't be under Z on the roll, would you, because I was thinking that would be lost. But yeah, Zibby's a cool one though, because you never really hear it. You're the first one. 

Zibby: Well aside from like great expectations, I haven't heard Pip very often, you know, Dickens.

Anyway, so much fun to talk to you. Great book. Fabulous. I, I am sure that your experience from COVID with this book in the U. S. is not going to be repeated and I will be rooting for you. So congrats. 

Pip: Thank you so much . 

Zibby: Okay. Thanks. All right. Bye, Pip. 

Thank you.