A Conversation with Rachel Wood

We were lucky enough to sit down with the debut writer of this month's September romance subscription pick, Rachel Wood, author of Annie Knows Everything. We loved it so much and can’t wait to shout about it from the rooftops - it was a resounding 5-star read - the wit, the heart, the tension! It was simply all too perfect, and we know our romance readers are going to devour this one. 

Annie and her antics are on their way across Australia to our subscribers as we speak, so they’ll be very excited to hear that you’ve let us pick your brain as they get stuck in.

It’s such a privilege to feature Rachel in this Q&A, and we’d like to extend a huge thank you for taking the time to answer our questions.

We had a lot of fun with this Q&A, so make sure you grab your favourite cosy beverage, and your copy of Annie, as we chat to Rachel all about the story, her writing process and even potential movie adaptations.

1. Since Annie clearly Knows Everything™️, if she could give us the elevator pitch for what this novel is about in one sentence, how would she put it?

[RW] I think Annie would tell you it’s a story about a woman who after being made redundant from her job and learning her sister is engaged to the WORST man alive, she decides to take matters into her own hands, taking a new role that she’s not qualified for (but could be) and convincing her sister she would be better off alone. And all that would go PERFECTLY if SOMEONE (Connor) wasn’t obsessed with watching her every move and being the ‘voice of reason’

 

2. You’ve been putting books into eager readers’ hands since your book subscription launched, and your physical store in 2021 - so it was only a matter of time before you wrote your own. What was the inspiration for the premise behind the story? 

[RW] ANNIE started as a way to make my friends laugh. Every Friday I get together with two friends I met on my creative writing MA and the three of us spend the morning or the afternoon writing. We have a standing rule that at the end of the session you read out what you wrote that day, which we used as an insurance policy so no one just wasted the afternoon scrolling twitter. The girls would diligently work on their novels and screenplays every week, and mostly I’d just show up and catch up on my emails for Rare Birds. I’d write little scenes about a woman working at a dysfunctional company to make the girls laugh at the end of the day – one of the earliest scenes I can remember reading them was about the boss calling the whole department into a meeting room, told them he thought of them as family, and then promptly announced a quarter of them would be laid off. When I got serious about trying to put a novel together, Annie evolved from there.

 

3. Data strategy is a big move away from your background in creative writing and copywriting - where did the inspo/expertise come from? And to follow up that question - where did you get the idea for DinoCode? The Booxies team want to play it. 

[RW] Before Rare Birds (in ancient times) I worked at a big marketing agency that had a lot of crossover with the tech industry. I knew a lot about tech companies and how ripe they were for spoofing. A lot of the people I met at that first job are still my best friends, and have gone on to work for the big tech companies, so I’ve always kind of been familiar with it, if that makes sense. I have no idea where the DinoCode inspiration came from, but I do vividly remember writing it one afternoon, giggling all the way through the scene. A lot of people reach out to me now and say Brian is their favourite character. He’s one of my favourite characters too.

4. You paint such a vivid picture of New York - what made you want to set your story there? Dare I ask if it’s its own character à la Sex and the City?

[RW] The boring answer is it was a process of elimination - I didn’t want to set it in the UK because I wasn’t confident I could do it justice, and I didn’t want to set it in Toronto (where I’m from) because I knew my friends and family would assume everything was about them. My dad lived and worked in New York for seven years when I was a teenager, so I knew the city very well, and knew it would be the perfect setting for a tech company with lots of money but very little sense. Some of the locations – like Connor’s school – are real places. When I met my publishers in the US, one very fun moment of kismet was that one of the people working on my team had actually gone to his school IRL.

 

5. ANNIE has a whole ensemble of memorable characters in your writing process, where did you pull inspiration from their traits?

[RW] I loved writing the side characters; I made so many friends at work and I really wanted to capture how much larking around you do at your job sometimes. A lot of their characters just developed naturally – I’d chuck Annie in a scene with another character and then just start by writing them bantering back and forth.

6. Annie has some bills to pay, so she needs to clock in for a shift at your Edinburgh bookstore, Rare Birds Books. What are the top 3 books she’s recommending to all her customers today?

[RW] Nora Ephron’s Heartburn, Monica Heisey’s Really Good, Actually and Madeleine Gray’s Chosen Family. 

 

7. You’re going to a rave with Annie, Carrie and Sam. What is your getting-ready drink and song of choice?

[RW] I know this will age me horribly, but I’m fairly confident the song Saturday Night by Wigfield could raise me from the dead. I have loved it since I was a kid and can remember thinking – even then – this is how grownups party!!! I’ve played that song at every single party I’ve ever thrown, ever. My getting-ready drink of choice is an espresso martini. 

8. So it goes without saying this story would make an incredible movie (directed by Nora Ephron, of course), but who are we casting as our leading duo?

[RW] This is a tough question for someone who doesn’t watch a lot of movies, and I’m not sure I have a good answer! I think someone like Maud Apatow or Zoey Deutch could capture the Annie vibe. For Connor, maybe Lewis Pullman? For most of the time I was drafting I pictured Carrie as Renee Rapp.

 

9. Writing a debut must have been very full on - what’s your typical ritual to unwind between drafts?

[RW] I do lot of cooking and baking in the evenings when I’m deep in book mode – I find it’s a good distraction and kind of lets me mull over the book while my hands are busy doing something soothing and then after all that thinking, you get a treat. 

10. When you’re writing, what’s your fuel? Coffee to get you through the late nights? Red wine to get the creative juices flowing?

[RW] The number of cups of tea I make and let go cold while I’m writing is crazy.

 

11. Because Annie is a champion blagger, I need to ask - If there was one book you could steal for yourself and say you wrote without anyone being the wiser, what would it be?

[RW] I guess it would have to be Pride & Prejudice. I’d like to see my picture on a bank note.

 

12. And to follow that - if you could believably con your way into a new job and get away with it, what would you want that job to be?

[RW] I keep joking that one day I’m going to open a brewery, which is very next-book coded ;) 

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A massive thank you again to Rachel for taking the time to chat with us. If you had as much fun with this Q&A as we did, then you'll understand exactly why Annie Knows Everything was our romance book of the month for September!

We had so much fun sneaking this brilliant read into our Mystery Booxies, and seeing everyone's reactions as they unboxed it has been the absolute best. You can still get your September Mystery Booxies until 14th of Sep (unless sold out prior) but if you missed out on September's mystery box, don't worry, you can still grab a copy and Build Your Own perfect reading experience to go with it.