How I Write: Sue Rainsford
Irish fiction and art writer Sue Rainsford shares her writing routine and inspiration …
Based in Dublin, Sue Rainsford is the author of novels Follow Me To Ground (2018) and Redder Days (2021). Her stories and novels have been nominated for the Republic of Consciousness Award, the Desmond Elliott Prize, the Prix Jean Monnet des Jeunes Européens, the New York Radio Festival Awards, the Desperate Literature Prize for Short Fiction, and have received starred reviews from Kirkus Reviews and Publishers Weekly. Her short story, “Shorn”, was read by Saoirse Ronan on RTÉ Radio 1.
Sue Rainsford’s new novel, From Out My Heart, is published on October 9 by The Lilliput Press, €16.95. It’s a Gothic novel ideal for darker nights – Lilliput’s description is “think Shirley Jackson meets True Detective meets The Wicker Man”, which sounds hard to resist – and follows Phyllipa, a scholar dedicated to Edgar Allan Poe’s work, as she travels to a remote, river-ruled community to meet with Lana, a woman who claims to be possessed by Virginia Clemm, Poe’s cousin who he married when she was a child.
My daily writing routine
“Ideally, I start the day by running along the canal. It gets my body and mind in sync. Once I’m home and showered, I make a cup of very strong coffee and read a book that resonates in some way with whatever I’m working on. It might take five minutes or an hour, but I read until I feel inspired and then I start writing – it’s important I don’t start until my fingers are absolutely itching. Most days, I write between 9.30am and 2.15pm, and then I go to collect my son from school. Sometimes I’m exhausted and ready to finish. Other days, I could write until midnight.”
My writing spot
“I have two. Mostly, I sit at a window-facing desk in our sitting room. I like to sit there with the shutters open and music blaring, though I sometimes get distracted by people trying to steal bicycles and the like. The other is the corner seat on our roof garden. Even though we live in the city, it feels like another world entirely. I go there as soon as there’s a whiff of sunshine and let the finches flit around me.”
My favourite part of the writing process
“Somewhere around a novel’s third draft. I like this stage because things are clicking into place and the end is in sight, but there’s still some excitement because I don’t yet know the manuscript by heart.”
The books that are inspiring me …
“This summer, I finally got around to reading Doris Lessing’s The Golden Notebook. I’ve never read anything like it in terms of structure; Lessing grafted her own form for a book that’s entirely itself, and completely uncompromising throughout. Also, I was lucky enough to read an advance copy of Kate Zambreno’s new novel Foam. It’s about soft sculpture and motherhood and entwines art with daily life in the way only Zambreno can.”
Right now I’m working on …
“We spent the summer in Zimbabwe and visited Nyanga, a place where there’s been extraterrestrial sightings and a series of strange disappearances. I’m writing a story set there, though it’s too early to say which way it’ll go. I’m also working on my fourth novel which is – loosely – about motherhood and mysticism, and how folklore impacts experiences of femininity in Ireland.”
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