Vale Publisher Louise Thurtell

I was shocked and saddened to learn that Publisher Louise Thurtell has suddenly died, and have not been able to stop thinking of all that she meant to me and all she did and changed during her Publishing career, since I heard the news.

I wanted to write something about Louise because I don’t think many people realise just how crucially her time as Publisher at Allen & Unwin affected the submissions process in books and publishing in Australia. The Friday Pitch, her idea as Publisher at Allen & Unwin, has benefitted so many authors, editors and Publishers  and had a ripple affect through the industry as a whole.

She directly influenced how manuscripts are submitted and received and responded to by agents and publishers, and therefore the careers of thousands of writers, and many now well-known Australian authors.

If you’ve never experienced it before, the traditional publishing industry operates very much like an archaic and medieval kingdom with those at the top (Publishers, Agents and Commissioning Editors) largely unapproachable and unobtainable for us mere mortals who deign to enter and try to break in.

Similar to other creative industries like film, Book Publishing doesn’t just operate with secret handshakes, politics and expectations you’re supposed to ‘know’ if you ever hope to crack it, there’s the emotional drama of devastating rejections that often take months to years to appear… and that’s AFTER you’ve slogged your way through getting your book to the submission stage.

For the most part, traditional publishing as an industry is still a complete and utter mystery, excruciatingly slow and conservative in embracing change and innovation, and those of us who studied writing and editing academically, worked as unpaid editorial assistants or have a literary agent have still struggled to get an adequate sense of expectations.

And all of this makes an anomaly and maverick like Louise Thurtell so rare, so precious and unforgettable.
She changed my life, as she did for so many authors she championed and colleagues she supported.

LOUISE THURTELL WAS A PIONEER IN DIGITAL PUBLISHING SUBMISSIONS

Louise was an innovator and a pioneer in Australian publishing at a time when even the big newspapers like Fairfax and Murdoch were slow to embrace the digital model. It was the mid-2000s, when reading a book on kindle was not yet a thing, traditional publishing was still a 99% print-only model, and none of us had any idea how the internet was about to dissolve the boundaries and hierarchies that ran the order of things.

Like all pioneers, the change Louise affected in her time as Publisher has rippled across the industry over decades.
But the funny thing about innovation is that once it’s been pioneered, you forget there was ever a time it didn’t exist.

Louise instigated the FRIDAY PITCH in her time as Publisher at Allen & Unwin, which transformed manuscript submissions from an archaic and lengthy process (often taking years) to an instantaneous email submission format which is now so common we don’t question how it came into existence.

Louise was whip-smart and the quickest reader I’ve ever known. She was generous and direct in her editorial feedback, (never cruel, blunt or cold) and in an industry where a response to a manuscript submission or cold query is usually a waiting game of months to years to never – which plays no small part in why it’s so crushing for first-time authors, editors and juniors- Louise’s open responsiveness and generosity was revolutionary.

I’ve never met such an unpretentious person who held such a position of authority and power in the publishing industry before or since.
By the time I met Louise in 2008 she’d been working in Publishing for over twenty years. I was an unpublished unknown, but she treated me like a peer and an equal from the first conversation. Unlike many of the Publishers, Editors and Literary Agents I met before and after, Louise had such an open and direct way of communicating that you felt the Game of Thrones-esque world of book publishing power plays and political agendas simply couldn’t harm you. You had an ally and a champion in Louise. Those of us lucky enough to count her as a friend and peer benefited immensely from her kindness and support.

I learnt something from every interaction with Louise. The sheer volume of her publishing industry knowledge overflowed in a cheerfully direct response free of judgement, secrecy, or hidden agendas.

I can’t begin to list what I learnt about book covers, book titles, publicity, promotion, editing, agents and contracts from the very first phone call to the Allen & Unwin office one Friday afternoon in August 2008.

In five years at University studying writing and editing, and the two years I’d been working on my first manuscript since, I’d never been given such a direct line of education and communication into the book industry, which was just how Louise Thurtell operated. She loved books. She loved reading.  She could spot the potential and the direction in something immediately. She was honest, open, and direct.

If you asked Louise how something worked or what something meant or if an idea had potential– she told you, and she’d teach you why it was or wasn’t a good idea the process.

Most agents and publishers don’t do this – citing lack of time, ten thousand emails and fifty meetings to attend, and those are all completely valid. But Louise was so responsive and open to helping writers that it was actually shocking.

I literally fell off my bed when I saw she had called me from Allen & Unwin just four days after I pitched my book.

LOUISE THURTELL PIONEERED THE FRIDAY PITCH

I’ll never forget that early morning message from Louise after I’d emailed her my manuscript for Love & Other U Turns in August 2008.

It was the Friday each month she’d dedicated to receiving email submissions, a bold concept simply called FRIDAY PITCH at Allen & Unwin, where she was Publisher at the Arena imprint.

She picked up the phone (!) when I called Allen & Unwin on a Friday at 4pm (who does that?!) to see if I could scrape in for the day’s submissions. She responded to my emailed query immediately, asking for the full manuscript by 5pm, promising to read it over the weekend. I still have her email. I printed it out!

It’s hard to fathom now, but in 2008, you couldn’t hope to email a manuscript submission to a publisher or directly to an agent without some kind of connection, introduction or ‘in’.

It was a matter of posting a HARD COPY version of your full manuscript (often two?! depending on their requirements) and a return postage-paid envelope (!) along with a cover letter. You then waited months to years to know whether or not your expensive parcel had even been received or opened.

But in her time as Publisher at Allen and Unwin, before kindles and e-books revolutionised how we read books, Louise instigated a way for unagented writers to send ‘cold’ submissions on one designated day a month via email.

This meant that Allen & Unwin was the first Publisher in Australia to accept direct email submissions from unagented writers (and actually respond!). The digital submission model was then copied and mimicked by multiple Big Publishers across Australia very quickly so that by 2010, when my first book was published, most of the big publishers had a day each month when they would read submissions to a specific email address.

The New York Times bestselling memoir CLEO by Helen Brown was a Friday Pitch to Louise, as was Fleur Mc Donald’s first novel RED DUST. Fleur’s since gone on to write over twenty books, many bestsellers in the rural romance category…

Pan Macmillan followed Louise’s Friday Pitch innovation with their own version of Manuscript Monday, and Penguin, HarperCollins and Hachette also soon added a version for digital submissions for unagented or ‘cold’ manuscript queries that then gave first-time authors a direct line to email submissions, without an agent. Publishers now all have online portals to receive digital submissions, but at the time Louise started THE FRIDAY PITCH she made the bold decision to share a direct email address so writers could simply… email a manuscript as an attachment.

By leading the way with a simple a digital model for submissions (and her direct email address!), Louise single-handedly changed the course of publishing submissions and dissolved many of the hidden hierarchies that prevented so many writers from even making it through to the ‘slush pile’. 

Until Louise instigated Allen & Unwin’s FRIDAY PITCH, a first-time author with no agent would have had to print a hard copy of their manuscript, snail mail a synopsis and cover letter BEFORE being requested to send a full manuscript… a process that took months to years. First-time authors had a miniscule chance of being ‘found’ in a ‘slush’ pile of non-agented submissions, let alone read by the Publisher.

But just four days after I’d sent Louise my manuscript –  a Tuesday the 18^th of August, at 8.30am (yes, I remember the time and date!), she had left me a cheerfully enthusiastic message to say she’d lost sleep to finish my manuscript and was on her way to pitch it to the sales team and get me an offer of publication.

You don’t forget a phone message like that. I had to play it over and over to check it was real.

When you’ve been battling with a manuscript on your own for any length of time… to receive a direct response from a Publisher and Editor that’s not just passionate and enthusiastic but full of recognition for who you are as a person – seeing you as an author before you actually are one… it’s revolutionary for your self-image.

Unfortunately most publishers, agents and industry Big Wigs I’d previously met had treated writers like me pitching our books as lowly peasants begging for scraps. Without an entrée or introduction in the industry, you start to feel as though you’re insane for even trying to get published.

Not Louise.

She was warm and responsive from the first interaction, instantly seeing the work and its potential. I felt like I’d won the lottery!

On that Tuesday in 2008, after playing her phone message multiple times and screaming until I could gather my focus to call her back, she invited me for lunch at her home and a walk in Watson’s Bay the following Sunday. That’s how friendly and enthusiastic she was!

The opening of the door to publishing was life-changing for me, and in Louise I found a kind and friendly mentor.  She introduced me to my publicist, invited me to meet the sales and distribution team who’d be ‘hand-pitching’ my book to retailers, and after, she took me and a bunch of authors and the publicity team out for dinner in Fitzroy. It was such a fun night and you never felt like you needed to restrain your personality because of who she was in the industry.

In every interaction, Louise was honest and direct…about books, agents, sales, all of the complex politics of the publishing world I’d been trying to figure out on my own for so long. In that life-changing walk around the beautiful cliffs of Watson’s Bay in 2008, she shared her background in Law, her love of reading and her family, and her career in publishing at Harper Collins, Transworld, Random House then Allen & Unwin, and a brief spell as a Literary Agent for Curtis Brown. Her industry knowledge was wide and expansive because she had held so many roles, and this was what made her such an incredible teacher for writers like me.

The big egos, manipulation and bullying in media and publishing are notorious, which made her cheerful and big-hearted fortitude even more unique.

I’m not the only one whose sanity she saved in the baffling world of book deals and underhanded ‘political’ negotiations which are such a painful and paradoxical part of an industry that is, at heart, about creative ideas and self-expression. But it’s a business, really, which is why you do need to go in with your eyes open.

Experiences of rejections and confrontations in Publishing have caused untold personal agony to many of us who, until we met Louise, assumed it was ‘just us’ and perhaps weren’t cut out for the industry or had some major personal fault.

I felt safe enough sharing a particularly wounding publishing interaction with Louise the very first time we met because despite her power (to change her mind on my book!), I trusted her, completely and immediately.

And in her two sentence reply as we sat on the rocks overlooking the sea, she showed me that I was right to trust her in an industry filled with mirages. And i was so grateful that I took the risk to tell her. She shared some simple facts (about the person AND the business) I would never have had the privilege to know had I not met someone like Louise with such a far-reaching background and relationship base… her response freed me to see the problem was not me… which meant I could let it go.

That, to me, was worth more than the book deal itself – she handed me back my power which I’d mistakenly given to a bully.

LOUISE’S CONTRIBUTION TO BOOK TITLES AND OTHER PUBLISHING BUSINESS

Louise wasn’t just generous to first-timers in the industry, she mentored editors and publicists she worked with, explained book sales figures (and emailed me my figures on a weekly basis for two months, which, again, is not something you’d expect from a Publisher or even an agent, who manage hundreds of books and authors at a time and god knows how many emails).

She patiently explained complexities of the business like retail sales and returns models (so I could translate my first royalty statement), timelines and editing processes so I could plan the year after I’d signed my contract, and taught me about the importance of book titles when we brainstormed the title for LOVE & OTHER U TURNS. I think Louise actually came up with that. My first idea had been UNDONE (a negative in a book title is apparently a no-no for sales), then I played with LOVE, LAUGHTER & TRAVELLING LIGHTLY, but LOVE & OTHER U-TURNS came after she explained how important it is to evoke a transformation in a memoir title.

Little nuances like that showed me so much about storytelling and book marketing – Louise showed me the meaning of true mentorship in Publishing, and how the best of the best, like Louise, treat your creative work with the passion and enthusiasm as if it’s their own, transforming your own considerations of the creative process, too.

In our phone calls, emails, lunches, dinners and drinks across the coming months and year prior to publication, Louise taught me about editing, about writing, about publishing, contracts, agents and books. That kind of access to information is such a privilege when you’ve never worked ‘in-house’ at a major Book Publisher and it’s your first book.

For a writer to see the hidden machinations and interactions in such a secretive industry from a supportive mentor like Louise is precious and valuable. I think of her often when I’m teaching writing and publishing in my courses – she showed me how important it is not just to explain how to do something, but WHY it matters in the context of the publishing business sales model as a whole.

I’m not alone – every editor, publicist and fellow author Louise introduced me to consider Louise a maverick and an anomaly in an industry where bullying, secrecy and politics wear so many sensitive souls down and have many of us wanting to give up. She had such a bold Leo personality that was powerful in a kind-hearted and whip-smart way. She was never cutting or cruel or judgemental in her delivery of important information. Which meant you could receive it.

Louise beautifully embodied the purpose and symbolism of the mentor archetype in the classic Hero’s Journey storytelling framework that I teach and think about a lot.

When I consider my individual publishing journey and the path to publication for many of the authors Louise championed, cheered and discovered, she was the Mentor turning up with the sacred gift that got us over the very first big threshold.

Success in publishing and any creative industry is a difficult path, because you need to wear your heart on your sleeve to create but ultimately it’s a big BUSINESS, where monsters lurk at every corner and no first-timer is EVER never given a MAP for such a mysterious and hidden ‘Special World’. Even when you study writing for years as I did, or send submissions over and again, putting your time and dreams and money and life on the line for just one person to make or break your career.

Agents and Publishers rarely tell you why they reject you, they just don’t respond.

But Louise was not like that.
After Love & Other U-Turns, she encouraged me to send her other ideas, and some went through to acquisitions, thanks to her quick response and feedback. I learnt more from the ideas she rejected than the ones she accepted! And the generosity in which she responded or introduced me to another key professional I will never forget.

To write a book for publication is, at heart, a call to share who we are, create something beautiful, make our mark in the only way we know how. It’s a calling to connect and share ideas with others who love them, too.

No writer, author or literary figure I’ve ever met has felt they had any true choice in the matter. Like artists, dancers, actors and others who do work that often takes years for very limited material ‘return’, and feels like a gamble, it’s a soul calling that doesn’t often make sense, particularly from a business perspective.

It’s inconvenient, difficult and impractical and the threat of ‘reality’ and simply giving up and doing something more ‘logical’ taunts and teases us in our darkest hours.

LOUISE THURTELL WAS A MENTOR, A TEACHER AND A WISE AND FRIENDLY GUIDE

Mentors like Louise got so many of us over the threshold into the ‘special’ world of Publishing through her support and care. You never lose the word ‘author’ next to your name. It’s a complete identity shift. And unlike formal education and lessons, the wisdom Louise imparted from such a broad perspective on publishing and books meant that those she showed and taught and edited and supported have now gone on to keep sharing these things down the line. Publishing is one of the least transparent industries there is, but Louise did a lot to change that just by being her open, passionate and generous self.

In the world of story, The Special World is special because it IS so difficult. It’s an unknown place where human becomes hero, where you metamorph into who you were meant to be all along… you just couldn’t see it without that holy recognition from someone ‘higher’ than you with more knowledge and experience who can see the bigger picture.

And in the 12 stages of the Hero’s Journey, it’s not until the Mentor appears with a vital gift, that we cross its sacred threshold and really enter the quest to change our identity. Who does that, by choice? No-one. Everything unknown is a threat to the ego.

Until we meet a Mentor, we’re lacking a vital piece of armour, knowledge, or sometimes (in my case), just ONE life-changing fact (hidden knowledge) that fortifies our spirits enough to sew up a wound that threatened to derail us and get us over the line into the REAL purpose of our journey. It’s not until you meet that Mentor that you can go All In. You don’t have it in you, yet. That’s their purpose and their function. To give COURAGE (the literal meaning of encourage is to give someone someone support, confidence, hope, courage.) And courage cannot exist without fear.

The mentor imparts a gift, an encouragement and an inspiration to the hero, without which we wouldn’t  push through the fears and monsters lurking at the gate and in the swampy unknown path that lies ahead.

That gift is different for every Hero in every Human story, but it always acts as a protective talisman, an anchor and a reminder of what is possible and who we really CAN become if we but dare to try.

Louise gave me that gift the first time we walked along the cliffs and she simply solved the mystery that had puzzled my human brain and led to fear and resistance (and shame for trying) which had been completely unnecessary. It was like she lifted the veil for me and showed me the truth, and with that, the interaction that had unconsciously held me back for so long, lost its power and charge.

She continued to mentor and teach me in every interaction we had since, turning up with a line in an email, a phone message, even a facebook post out of the blue recommending that I read WILD because she had a feeling it would resonate.

It wasn’t just that Louise was the Publisher for my first book – Louise revealed the truth about publishing and made me remember why I truly wanted it and why it mattered. That’s what you need to come back to, when you struggle with the hidden enemies in any Special World, but particularly in Publishing, which holds more than its fair share of bullies.

Louise played this benefic mentor role for so many colleagues, editors and writers, and, I’ve since discovered, artists, actors and other friends. She was open-minded, enthusiastic and interested in so many ideas, creative concepts, relationships, friends and things, and made many introductions. She’d devour a manuscript or a pitch and be so quick to grasp its potential. I wonder if she ever realised how far-reaching her enthusiasm and support and connection reached. I hope that by writing this, her family and others shocked at her loss can be comforted by the sharing of stories, which keeps her alive among us.

THE POWER OF THE PRINTED WORD…

I printed out every email Louise sent me in those giddy first weeks when she accepted LOVE & OTHER U TURNS for publication. I keep them in a special folder in my shelf to read whenever I need a reminder of heart-led leadership and what’s possible when we dare to put ourselves on the line with creative ideas.

Prior to Louise, the only other professional who’d read the work had given me the impression my writing was bad, my desire to travel the outback of Australia was entirely unrelatable and my choice to eschew ‘conventional’ relationships, mortgages, renovations and living arrangements was slightly… well, stupid. But Louise’s laughter, interest and enthusiasm for the story encouraged me to share more about the dusty roadhouses. She told me it read like a fairy tale!

The immediate recognition of what I was trying to say in the story was what truly transformed me, and gave me the joy and inspiration to know why writing and seeking publication was worth it. She GOT it. She CONNECTED with it, and me. It made HER feel less crazy for certain preferences and we all felt liberated by the sharing of the story! And when the book was published, I heard from more and more women like Louise, AND me, who valued creative freedom over certain creature comforts.

And because SHE got it, and championed it, the rest of the world was allowed to see it, too. Every time I met a colleague at Allen & Unwin they’d tell me how much she raved about my book in her time there. That kind of passion and enthusiasm is life-changing for a writer’s self-esteem.

Louise’s words, which I’ve kept as my own talisman, remind me that even when the path looks riddled with dangers and monstrous blows, you could just be a moment away from a sacred gift. And it’s all about opening yourself up, again and again.

Louise reminded me that when you dare to tell the truth, to show up for your dreams, to move forward from vision and not from fear, no matter how many blows you may get from ‘lesser’ forces and entities, it only takes one moment of recognition from a true mentor to give you the fortitude to surmount a world of challenges on the road to creative fufilment.

Thank you Louise, for all you did for Australian authors, for keeping your light and warmth as you enthusiastically pushed for change, for being such a fun and caring friend, and for being a kind-hearted champion of books, authors, creatives, women, ideas and publishing. 

True mavericks don’t just elevate one person’s life, as you did mine.

You changed the industry for the better, and all who work within it.

I’ll never forget you.
Thinking of your beautiful kids and family, who you loved so ferociously, at this sad time.

If you’re an author or writer or anyone who worked with Louise, please feel free to share your memories in the comments.