1. What drew you to write The Swift Dark Tide?

I needed to write my way through uncontainable emotion, through sensory experience that felt too intense for my body and too mysterious for my mind. Discovering my queerness in the middle of my life called for a large creative endeavour.

2. Tell us a bit about the experience of writing The Swift Dark Tide …

It took approximately three years, in spurts. I wrote it in real-time, as the events were happening to me. Then I spent a year editing and polishing it.

3. Who is this book for?

Anyone exploring their selfhood, especially later in life. Women who are wondering if they deserve pleasure; (yes). Lovers of queer romance. Daughters, mothers, personal historians seeking answers from their ancestors.

4. What do you hope readers will take from this book?

Permission to follow their bodies, to listen to the insistent hum of their soul.

5. Can you tell us about the cover art for the book?

This cover image is a snippet of a watercolour that my mother painted when I was still living with Noah, before everything started to shift and dissolve. The whole picture is of a female nude with long dark hair, staring softly down, into her own chest. I used to look at this painting at my mother’s house and long to have it hanging in my place, in a room of my own. Now it hangs to the right of my bed, and I take great big gulps of its colour, its watery intensity, whenever I need.

About you as a writer

6. What prompted you to start writing books and when did you start? 

I wrote as a child and illustrated books. Then the crushing discomfort of adolescence rendered me silent. It was only when I fell in love in my forties that the voice came back.

7. One thing you’ve learned the hard way when it comes to writing books?

Fight for a room of your own.

And lastly…

8. What book are you currently reading?

The Strays by Emily Bitto

9. What’s the last book you read that you loved?

The Hummingbird, by Sandro Veronesi