January's Monthly Digest: There's So Much Happening in Natasha Lester-Land in 2024!

The first thing I want to say is welcome! So many new people have subscribed to Bijoux over the past month. I don’t know why, but it’s lovely to have you here!

I thought I’d say hi properly to you all in a video and let you know a bit more about what Bijoux is. If you don’t have time to watch the video, here’s the quick summary: I publish a minimum of three posts a month. This post, the Monthly Digest, is always free for all subscribers. The other two (occasionally three) posts each month are for paid subscribers. One of those is the Magazine, which is probably my most personal post, and the other is usually a personal essay tackling some element of my writing life or deep-diving into something connected to one of my books, like this post about Mizza Bricard. I sometimes open up these posts to all subscribers so you can see what’s happening behind the paywall.

Generally speaking, my posts are a mix of things I like to write about, such as my author life, writing process, history, fashion, books, writing tips and ruminations on what I’m watching, listening to, reading etc. If there’s something particular you’d like me to write a post about, let me know in the comments—you never know, I might do it!

Hip Hooray, It’s Publication Day!!

At last! Thank you to my North American readers, who’ve been waiting so patiently for publication of THE DISAPPEARANCE OF ASTRID BRICARD. It’s finally available in North America—hurray!—and I hope you love it! The reviews on Goodreads are fantastic and I’m so pleased the story is finding its way into people’s hearts.

If you’re in North America and you see it in a bookshop, please send me a pic on social media—it’s so hard living on the other side of the world and not seeing your new book baby out in a bookshop! I haven’t even got my author copies yet and I can’t wait to see what that gorgeous hardback looks like.

If you’d like to know more about the book, the dedication encapsulates it all:

For every woman who’s ever had a man make her into someone less than she truly is.

Pick the book up if you love:

✨ Everything 1970s

✨ Fashion history (especially when it comes to Dior)

✨ Complicated mother / daughter stories

✨ Romance that spans years and years

✨ New York City, Studio 54

✨ Daisy Jones “I’m not a muse” vibes

✨ A mystery: seriously what happened to Astrid?

Virtual Launch Event

I’d love you to join me in celebrating the book’s publication! The wonderful people at RJ Julia bookshop are hosting a virtual launch event where I’ll be in conversation with Kate Thompson (The Little Wartime Library) and we’ll be talking about the inspiration behind ASTRID, my research, the blend of fact and fiction, the 1970s and lots more. You can reserve your place here. Hope I see you there!

No More Lady of Leisure—It’s Back to Work Time!

You’d be forgiven for thinking I haven’t done much real work since mid-November when I left to go to Europe and then South Africa and then promptly disappeared to our beach house for Christmas and most of January. I did do a lot of relaxing, but there’s also a LOT going on behind the scenes that’s been keeping me busy and that I just can’t talk about—yet! All I’m going to say is please cross your fingers for me. If all the hard work pays off, it’s going to be very exciting.

In February, I’ll be working on the edit for my next book, which currently has a working title of THE SECRET LIFE OF MARIE-MADELEINE. This is where I’ll need to deep-dive into the plot, characters, pacing, conflict, language—everything really!—and make the book the best it can possibly be. I think I know what I need to do to take it to the next level, so it will be interesting to see if my editors’ thoughts and questions line up with what I’m thinking. Hopefully they do!

Then it will be time to start another book! I sent my editor six ideas in December, but there was one that I was really hoping she’d like better than the rest because that’s the one I wanted to write. And that was the one she picked!

I can’t wait to dive into it—it’s a little bit different to what I’ve written before, as well as being very much the kind of book a reader could imagine me writing. That’s about all I can say about it for now! To get myself started, I’ll be using John Truby’s The Anatomy of a Story upfront to do a little bit of planning (not too much; I haven’t turned into a planner yet!) as it worked so well for me when I was writing MARIE-MADELEINE.

Writing Workshops Coming Soon!

Some of you might know I used to teach quite a few writing courses. But over the past couple of years I haven’t been able to find the time to fit in teaching along with everything else. I love teaching though and I miss it and so many people have asked me when I’ll start teaching again that I’ve decided 2024 will be the year.

I’ll be spending a bit of time in Sydney this year as I settle my daughter into uni there, so my face-to-face teaching options will include Sydney and Perth. And online is possible too. To help me work out which courses you’re most interested in attending and where I should hold them, I’ve put together a very short three-question survey. If you do think you might be interested in attending one of my writing courses sometime in the future, it would be great if you could complete the survey for me. I’m not collecting any personal data, and answering the survey will in no way be taken as a commitment by you to coming to any of my courses. Thank you for taking the time to complete it!

Writing (or Rewriting) Historical Fiction

As a historical novelist, the headline of this article in Esquire caught my eye. Having now read the piece, I don’t think the headline really does justice to the content, but it’s definitely worth reading. It especially resonated with me as I recently interviewed Australian author Alli Parker, who wrote a novel about her grandparents meeting in Japan during WWII and her grandmother’s subsequent struggles to be allowed to come to Australia, which had a White Australia policy in place at the time.

Alli’s book is fabulous, and the interview with her was absolutely fascinating and touches on a number of the points Vanessa Chan is making in her article. If you’d like to watch my interview with Alli, you can do so by joining the online book club that I host with fellow historical novelist

Belinda Alexandra

. The link to the interview is here.

I hope you enjoy it, although please ignore the technical difficulties we had at the start—you can probably fast-forward through those first few minutes. I’ve interviewed quite a few authors over the course of my writing life so far and I have to say this stands out as one of the most interesting interviews I’ve ever done.

Catch Me at the Perth Writers Festival

While my book tour is well and truly over, I still have a few events coming up this year and the first of those is for anyone in Perth. I’m a guest at the Perth Writers Festival and will be appearing in one session on Feb 24 called Leading Ladies! My fellow panellists are authors Rachael Johns, Sasha Wasley and Amal Awad, so the session is definitely going to be a lot of fun! Hope you can join us.

Things That Caught My Eye This Month

• Back Row by

  Amy Odell
  was the very first Substack I ever subscribed to. I always love her writing and, as someone who’s very into fashion conservation, this piece tackling the do’s and don’ts of celebrities wearing iconic historical dress was one I especially enjoyed reading.

When Wearing Historic Clothing Does — and Doesn’t — Make Sense

• Kerri Maher
  has started a new interview series with authors who published their first book after their 40th birthday. Her first interview was with Steven Rowley of The Guncle fame and it’s well worth a read. It’s full of great writing advice and an inspiring story of never giving up.

"I am a writer because I write."

• And I bought myself this gorgeous sculpture for the beach house. It’s by West Australian artist Howard Bradfield and I love it! It sits by my desk so that I can’t help but be inspired when I write.

Have a Great Week!

That’s all for January’s Monthly Digest! I’ll be back in the inboxes of paid subscribers next week with a personal essay about my summer. In the meantime, I hope everyone isn’t too gobsmacked that it’s almost February (how did that happen!) to enjoy the coming week and month!