Shauna Reid :: Blog to book deal

Photograph by Lisa Buchanan

Shauna Reid : Blogger, Author and Small Business Owner

Shauna blogged at www.dietgirl.org for 10 years.

For the last 4 years she has written at www.shaunareid.com

Shauna turned her health and fitness blog into a book called The Amazing Adventures of Diet Girl. 

A few facts:

-About 50% of her book came from existing blog posts

-Her book was published in the UK, Australia and the US as well as being translated into German, Finnish and Norwegian.

-A reader in Italy became Shauna's virtual running coach and they began a business together called Up and Running through which they have created ecourses about running and record a regular podcast together. They are currently writing a book together.

Interview with Shauna:

How long have you been blogging?

I've been blogging since May 2000... coming up for 14 years. What a nerd!

What led you to the decision to turn your blog into a book?

I'd been busting to write a book since I was six, when I would write "books" on scrap paper and staple them together stylishly. Over the years I started a few novels but never got the momentum happening to finish anything!

Then blogging came along and I remembered that writing was great fun. I was about 3 years into the Dietgirl blog, having moved from Oz to Scotland and having various adventures as I lost weight, when I started to think "maybe this could be a book someday". Then I got some emails from blog readers suggesting the same, and that seemed like enough evidence to give it a red hot go!

How did you go about beginning that process?

I didn't know where to begin so I started scrawling random things on the back of a junk mail letter. It felt less daunting that way! I sketched out a basic outline of the "plot", which sounds silly for a memoir but from that point on I looked at my life like a plot and ruthlessly decided what was in and what was out.

I then broke that outline down into chunks and decided to give myself a month to write a first draft each chunk - if I don't have a deadline, I procrastifaff endlessly! I committed to writing for 2-3 hours after work, every weeknight.

The first draft really truly stank! But it was great to have something down. Who was it that said, "you can't edit nothing"?

I wasn't thinking of publication at that point. It was more about this determination to stop wanging on about writing a book, and actually attempt to do it.

How long did it take to put together?

In total it took about a year on and off, but the last four months was solid writing and editing (and freaking out, I gotta say). I was about three months into that rubbish first draft when I was approached by an editor from Transworld, an imprint of Harper Collins here in the UK, who'd heard about my blog. I then moved from draft writing to putting together a proposal for the publisher, which was accepted, and from then on it was getting the real book written.

What has been the most rewarding part of the process?

The first reward was actually FINISHING something I'd wanted to do more than anything in the world. I'd talked about it and dreamed about it for so bloody long, but never followed through. There was a lot of fear and feelings of fraudulence wrapped up in that... e.g. who the hell am I to write a book? Those feelings didn't go away when I started writing - they got more intense - but I'm chuffed that I kept going. I didn't think I had it in me.

The second reward has been all the people I've met and the unexpected tangents. For example, a reader in Italy became my virtual running coach, then we became great friends, then started a business together called Up & Running (link - http://www.upandrunningonline.org/). We've created awesome e-courses for runners and have helped thousands of women around the world find their inner athlete. Collaborating and creating the e-courses with Julia is great fun and a different kind of writing from books -- I get to see the impact of the words much more quickly! We're also writing a book at the moment.

Did you use excerpts from your blog or did you write the whole thing from scratch?

At first I was doing it all from scratch but then I realised a lot of the blog stuff was the best, because it was spewed straight from the guts at the time it happened. So it was about a 50/50 split in the end!

Are there any things that you would change about how you went about the process?

I wish I'd enjoyed the publication process more! It's an awesome thing to write a book, and I didn't properly celebrate it at the time. It was those aforementioned feelings of fraudulence in terms of the writing, combined with insecurity about my appearance and feeling uneasy with the whole "weight loss inspiration" thing.

I didn't handle it well, looking back. I remember doing press & telly interviews and not being able to look at the results afterwards, worrying I wasn't "skinny enough" to have written that book. I look at those clips now, and I looked and sounded just fine... I want to give myself a big hug and/or a kick up the bum :) 

I've grown up lot since then. If I had my time again, I'd have a big party with friends and family and celebrate the heck out of it!

How was 'The Amazing Adventures of Dietgirl' received by the general population?

It went well! I got some fab reviews and it sold well. It went on to be published in the US as well as translated into German, Finnish and Norwegian which was ace. I still get a stready stream of emails from readers five years down the line which always makes my day. I love how you write a book and then it gets sent out into the world and you have no control of where it goes next. I love hearing about the random ways people came across it.

Any advice for a group of writing students about this experience?

Starting small is the way to go. It may feel like one page of scribble is "not good enough", but it really is! You are on your way, baby! Just do that again the next day, and the next. Let the momentum build over time and give yourself credit for your efforts.

Don't worry if your first drafts are terrible... give yourself credit for having created raw material!

Don't worry about what other writers are doing - write what excites and/or moves YOU. That authenticity and energy will come barreling through.

Try to have fun and let go of the outcome. I get stuck in a draft sometimes thinking, "This is tripe! No one will want to read this!". But we gotta plough on and not worry about the ifs and hows of publication until we have an actual piece to work with.