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You're listening to transm on 4zzz amplifying the trans and gender non conforming voices of Brisbane and beyond.

Hello. Hello, my engine. You're listening to Transmission on 4ZZZ. My name is EZ. I use HE, him, pronouns.

My name is Ray. I use they, them, pronouns.

And we got some literary stuff going on today, don't we?

We have a lot of literary stuff. Title of the episode, Ray's Literary Stuff.

Yeah, I'm very thrilled.

I did an interview recently with author, local author A.K. malford. So I'm going to be chatting with them a bit later on. And we're also going to be chatting about incredible poet Andrea Gibson.

Yes, yes. Andrea tragically is no longer with us. However, maybe more with us than they ever were before, which is a beautiful sentiment. And we're gonna read a couple of poems from Andrea Gibson or.

Well, excerpts, poem, bits, poem fragments, fragments.

Fragments of poem, fragments of bits of words, of things.

That in and of itself is a poem.

And you selected a couple that you like. Do you want to read one of yours and I'll read one of mine?

Yeah, I, I'm going to read.

Well, you, you said that they're with us more than they ever have been. And I think that is really poignant because that is kind of the, the crux of the poem that they wrote a number of years ago that they put up on their, like, substack newsletter, which was Love Letter from the Afterlife, which has recently kind of gone viral. There was a video of them reading it to their wife. And the excerpt from the start of the poem is my love, I was so wrong. Dying is the opposite of leaving. When I left my body, I did not go away. That portal of light was not a portal to elsewhere, but a portal to hear. I am more here than I ever was before.

Oh, gets me every time.

It really does.

And if. Yeah, the full poem is also amazing as well.

The full poem is incredible. Yeah, definitely. And like, yeah, check out their work. You know, start, I don't know, going to your library and requesting Andrea Gibson's work, I'm sure.

Yeah, totally.

Yeah.

Well, we'll put all the information for that in the For Triples of AMRAP page so you can click and check out all of Andrea Gibson's stuff too. And we'll put it in the podcast notes as well.

So.

So yeah, this one, this one that I've got here is not more, more to do with feminist rage. Good, good.

Very good.

Start your Tuesday right. This one is. Any feminist who has ever taken the high road will tell you the high road gets backed up and sometimes we need to take a detour straight through the belly of uncensored rage.

I was like, I will take your feminist rage and read a lot. Read some lines from the poem. I sing the body electric, especially when my power is out, which is my mouth is a fire escape. The words coming out don't know that they are naked. There is something burning in there.

Oh, oh, oh. I love that. Okay, all right. Okay.

Damn.

Okay, now I'm trying to find another one. I'm like, oh, which one do I want?

I was like, yeah, best me.

Let's go.

This is a really short one, but I quite like this. We have to create. It is the only thing louder than.

Destruction, which I think about a lot in our current time. I think that creating is incredibly, incredibly important, especially creating poetry. Creating things, you know, any kind of art form. Creating music. There is a quote from Andrea's poem First Love. We'd gone so many years without music that knew us. Music that knew you could arch your back and I'd have proof that the earth was round.

Oh, oh, beautiful. Oh my goodness. Andrea, rest in power. We send you lots of love. I'm sure they're with us all the.

Time, so absolutely like. And I think, you know, the more people read their work and are inspired by their work, the better.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Amplifying the voices of the trans and gender non conforming community of Meanjin, Brisbane and beyond. Transmission on 4ZZZ brings you the latest in trans community news, music and events every from 9am till 10am Join our team of hosts for an hour of celebrating the unique perspectives of the trans community. Transmission Tuesday mornings from 9am till 10am on 4ZZZ. You're listening to Transmission on 4ZZZ. My name is as I use he.

Him pronouns and my name is Ray. I use they them pronouns and I'm going to now play a pre recorded interview for you with the amazing author AK Malford. They she pronouns who is a best selling fantasy romance author with books in 12 languages worldwide, both traditionally and self published. Go off. Love it. Melford loves writing adventurous and feel good tales with lovable and diverse characters. They also write cosy and spicy romantic comedies under the pen name Ali K. Melford, a US and New Zealand citizen, AK now lives in sunny Australia with their partner, kids, troublemaker cats and a very patient dog.

Hello everyone. My name is Ray. I use they, them pronouns. And today I am joined by an incredible author. Do you want to introduce yourself, your pronouns and maybe a bit about your work?

Sure.

I'm A.K. mulford. My pronouns are they, she and I write both fantasy romance and romantic comedies. So I'm a hybrid author, meaning I'm both traditionally published and self published across both of those pen names. And I'm excited to be chatting with you today.

I'm so pumped. I love the fact that you're both traditionally published and self published. I guess an industry question, is that something that a conscious choice, a genre choice?

It's actually something I kind of set out to do from very early on. I'd always been writing my whole life and always thinking about being an author, but thought it wasn't a realistic career pursuit. And so I went into the sciences instead and was a wildlife biologist for many years with a particular interest in primatology and the study of primates.

I love that.

Yeah, you know, as one does. And then I also majored in classical civilizations as well because I needed to get my mythology on, you know, so. But in the background I was always writing stories, even as a young kid, filling notebooks and notebooks. I would be the kid at summer camp, like under a tree filling notebooks of stories and not wanting to join the kickball game. I just thought that it wasn't practical. Nobody I knew, especially nobody that was like me, was publishing. And so I, I couldn't really see myself in the industry. But then, you know, as I got older, self publishing became more of an option in my conservation job. I was sitting at my desk, you know, taking notes on what my five year plan would be if ever I was publishing one day, but didn't think I would do it. But I always knew if I ever did, if I ever did bite the bullet and publish something, I'd want to start self publishing and eventually become hybrid and have some books traditionally published too, because, well, the biggest reason was all of the studies at the time were showing hybrid authors made the most money. And for me, you know, I thought, okay, well that's the most sensible thing to do for a career path then is to do a little bit of both. But also, I'm classic adhd. I'm a dabbler. I like to have my eggs in lots of different baskets. And so for me, I thought, you know, I To experiment with everything and try all of the different publishing paths. So that was a conscious choice from very early on.

Yeah, yeah, that's relatable. Like I do like traditional published books but I also have like zines and then I make games and I do the. And like just 20 different things. Because I also feel like if you're working in the creative scene, it's really hard to kind of have just one income stream as well. We can always talk about that a bit later because I do want to pick your brain on if you know someone does want to get published, what your thoughts are.

But.

But let's talk about your work a bit more first. Tell me a bit more about your books. As you said, you write fantasy as well as rom com. Tell me a bit about both of those.

So I started off writing fantasy. My first book, the High Mountain Court was kind of loosely based on a dream. I had an anxiety dream and then I started building the world around that and slowly it became. I fell in love with all the side characters. I wanted all of them to have their own romances too. And it slowly spawned into a five book series. So I self published the first two books in that series and then the series got picked up and is now published by Harper Voyager and it was picked up around the same time I was selling my new series, the Golden Court trilogy. The third book is about to come out in that and that is a genderqueer wolf shifter romantasy series. And all of the book covers are different Pride Flag covers, the US covers, the UK and Australia covers are still have some of the colour elements in them but are slightly different.

I was gonna ask actually about how like, you know, talk to me about like representation in your books and I'm like, you're already there. I love it. Anyway, sorry, keep going.

I was like, you know, I don't do subtle. I'm like, put the, put them right on the covers. Like if you look at this series and don't see that it's queer, I can't help you. You know, I think it's. I think it's fun though when it surprises people because it is a little metaphor for gender fluidity and queerness, that series. So I think some people get pretty far into it before they're like, wait, I thought this is about wolf shifters. It's actually about terfs.

We love to see it.

But anyway, so those are my fantasy series and I have a brand new book coming out with Harper Voyager next year. It's going to be the first book in A new trilogy called Dream Slayer that is a dark sapphic fantasy. Basically a dream falls in love with a nightmare and they have to journey out of hell together. And it is very dark and twisty and I can't wait to share it with people.

Oh my God. As someone who goes to both a queer book group and a science fiction fantasy book group, I'm going to tell everyone we'll be your biggest fans.

Hey everyone, come see my book.

Check out this queer content.

Yes. I can't get enough. You know, I want to write all the stories that I just want to exist in the world and want to read myself. And then my romantic comedies are more for a lighthearted reprieve from my heavy fantasy world building. So because I used to be a wildlife biologist, I wrote a zookeeper rom com series about this family of zookeepers in this quirky little zoo off the coast of Connecticut in the States on this little island. And lots of found family. All of the siblings are queer and neurodivergent, which if you've ever worked in a zoo, is, you know, tracks.

Is.

Very honest real life. So I'm working on the fifth book in that series right now, which is called hold you'd Horses. And it's an ace love story and I'm having so much fun with it. And the main character, Heron, is trans femme and is kind of coming into their asexuality and the love interest is an autistic character who's lying about being a horse girl from Wyoming. And just shenanigans ensue. And so, yeah, I'm loving writing their book right now. And then that pen name. I also co author a cosy paranormal series. The first book's called Pumpkin Spice and Poltergeist and it's a cosy sapphic paranormal rom com. And the second book is also cosy Sapphic and it's called Curtis and Cold Brew and that's coming out in September. And I'm very excited about that. Basically a witch makes a deal with a very sexy like suit mommy demon. And shenanigans ensue.

I love shenanigans. I feel like that is often the basis of beautiful rom coms, like especially queer rom coms. There's always some shenanigans and some things where I'm like, like, yeah. And I'm often just like reading them, being like, oh no, am I cringing or am I a little bit flustered? Like, yeah, I love it so much.

All of like the awkwardness of like heightened reality, at least for most of the people I know is very true to life. All of the panic spirals we go into in our own minds when we're falling in love I think is very true.

I. Look, yes, I was going to say, I often have a queer panic spiral and I feel like. Like, I don't know if it's like, queer culture or not. Whether or not, like, our lives are kind of. I don't know, I always feel like mine's quite heightened and everything's, you know, often, like a little bit chaotic, a little bit more full colour. Sorry. To any straights listening to this, you too can be queer. Read some of AK Muffet's work, actually.

It's funny how many people I've had message me over the years and say, you know, I didn't think that I was, you know, gay or bi or pan or ace or non binary or whatever it may be, but reading this book has. Has made me think things. I always reply like, I'm sorry, question mark or congratulations.

It's like both.

Sorry and welcome.

Like, both things are true at once. Condolences and congratulations. I was gonna say. Yeah. Like, how have readers come to your work and related to your work?

I think more and more I'm finding, like, a queer first audience, you know, Whereas, like, my first few books, I feel like the queerness was more in the subtext than, like, here in front of her. And so it was really interesting having people kind of dive into the world from that angle and then starting to see themselves, like, more and more in the context of the story and maybe questioning themselves or even just saying, like, I feel like I understand my friend more. I feel like I, you know, can relate to people more deeply through these characters and their friendships. But then also now more and more too, having people who are seeking out my stories because of the representation in them and being so excited that they get to be the protagonist of the story and not just the queer best friend. And so that's like, huge to me as someone who, you know, I grew up being like Lord of the Rings nerd and was like, I don't see myself in any character in this book, but I love it so dearly. And I wish I was in here and my relationships were in here and my friendships were in here. And so definitely a big propeller for me into the stories that I write now was, you're all coming with me. We're all getting our own books.

Yeah, because as you said, like, yeah, you want to be writing the books that you want to see in the world, which is a beautiful thing. And I feel like that. I'm not sure if that's one of the main motivations in terms of propelling you to write an exorbitant amount of books.

Too many.

You're extremely swift. I thought I wrote real fast, but I'm so impressed. Yeah, I was gonna say, tell me about your writing process, if you've got any tips for listeners who are keen to write their own stories and get them out in the world.

Well, I've published 26 books in the last four and a half years. I'm working on.

Yeah, cool. That's so many.

But, you know, I write more than I want to publish, so I have more books that I'm sitting on for. I might be out in three, four years from now. But for me, I was not always this way. I spent decades with a graveyard of shiny object projects that I got 10,000 words into and then abandoned forever and literally since I was a kid, decades of my life of doing this and now never getting to the end of a book. And at the time, you know, I wasn't diagnosed as autistic or ADHD until my eldest child was, so I was in my 30s by the time that I even started to wrap my head around it. And now, of course, looking back at my entire life, I was like, oh, wow, that was very clear, very obvious now. But of course, at the time, you know, how little we knew it. And it really wasn't until I. I learned every bit of writing advice, right? I read every book and everything and absorbed all of it and felt very disconnected to all of it. And I think, like, a lot of neurodivergent people felt very broke that I couldn't replicate the process and routines of these successful writers who are giving this advice. And so it wasn't until I finally kind of threw that out and. And said, what would I do if I was doing it the right way? For me, you know, let go of all of the, I should do it this way or you have to write this ways. And for me, you know, working with an ADHD coach and different coaches and therapists and doctors and things started to amalgamate my own writing process. One that was very neuro affirming, you know, that had lots of body doubling and lots of shiny objects and rewards. And for me, I found I was much better at seizing upon that hyperfocus and doing a lot very quickly and then leaving it to rest for a while and coming back in very quickly again then doing a little bit each day. Yeah, that was Something and I should also say I homeschool two kids. I'm also, you know, I've got a lot going on. So for me it was much easier to squirrel away two or three days straight to like fast draught, like the first half of a book than it was for me to do half an hour every day, which is what I thought you should be. You know, it's what everybody tells you to be doing and that you just need and consistency and things that ADHD brains are allergic to. I don't know, routines. I don't like routines. I don't perform well and I'd rather do a lot to the point where some might say too much to everybody else very quickly and then take a week and rest and recover than try and motivate myself to do a little bit each day. So that's what I do. I've started a little writing challenge called the three day 30k, which is you don't have to do 30, 000 words. That's the big goal. There's actually, it's all fantasy themed so there's little adventures you can choose. Like the Bard's adventure is like 6,000words over three days and like the hero's gauntlet is like 21k over three days. And people use their own adventures and there's a little quest map. It's very nerdy and neuro affirming in a glorious way. And so we all get, get together and do writing sprints and cheer each other on and do three intensive days of writing and then we take a break for three months and then we do three more intensive days. And I feel like for a lot of writers who are, you know, working full time, who are parents who are juggling like a million other things, the idea of trying to write every day is so daunting. But it's much more feasible to be like, hey, how about we set aside like three long weekends a year and just focus deeply on writing for those times and then between those times we can noodle on our manuscript when we have the spoons for it and when we don't, we're kind to ourselves about it. And I think that that has been really beautiful actually seeing how many people have really like resonated with a different style of writing.

So yeah, and I feel like I'm just thinking because whenever I've done things like NaNoWriMo, Rest in Peace over that time, I'm like, oh yeah, this is great. This is a short period of time for me to work on a book and Then you realise how long it is, then you realise you have to do it every day. And then as soon as you miss a day, I'm like, well, I failed as a writer, as a person. Whereas, like, smashing about at a book in a week, I'm like, yeah, let's go.

For me, honestly, like, I did more than that per month anyway in a shorter amount of time. So actually, it was slowing me down and demotivating me in a way. But also I feel like I'm the sort of person who can only sustain the novelty part of my motivation, my ADHD motivation, for about three days. I'm the sort of person who buys a journal and I'm like, I'm gonna write in this every day. And then three days later, I abandon it and I never use it again. With so many hobbies and different things.

Oh, my God. And I like how there's, like, a graveyard of hearts written in notebooks.

There are so many. And I'm. I'm trying to make myself go back and, like, use other pages of them, but it's just. It's. You know, I do that with my writing as well. But. So, yeah, for me, me, I. Three days is about the magic number of how much I can be really excited about something before other motivators need to kick in. And people with ADHD obviously can do nano and other, like, longer challenges because they can rely on other things to keep them going. But I do feel like we also have a much more acute sense of failure and failing. You know, most people, most neurotypical people, if they don't hit their challenge goal, they're like, oh, well, oh, I'll try again next time. Whereas.

Right.

And whereas we internalise that as, like, well, I can't do anything right. I'm a failure. I'm always disappointing myself, you know, all of these things. And so it makes it much harder to show back up again because we've added all those layers on top of ourselves.

So it's all this, like, kind of, like, internalised pressure. And, like, I feel like a lot of, like, those kind of books and workshops when I was at Union and stuff, like, this is how you write, this is how you should be performing as a writer to get your work out there. And you're like, oh, God. It's not only daunting, but it's also putting that added pressure on yourself. And it's just. It's a lot. I'm not. I'm not about it.

Yeah, well, you think of how many pieces of writing is. Well, you sit in your garden at 10am every day and your wife brings you a cup of tea and you, you know, what world was this? Obviously someone who's not. Not carrying the majority of the domestic labour in their house, who isn't making a lot of decisions for other people, a carer or other. Or if you have a job where you're making lots of choices all day long at the end of the day, trying to say, okay, it's nine o', clock, I really just want to, like, binge watch some dropout TV and chill out for a bit.

Right.

Instead, I have to write for an hour.

Like, I'm gonna write a thousand words and it's like, oh, no.

Yeah, because I homeschool and I'm have this need for efficiency very much. For me, it takes me about half an hour to get into flow each time I sit down and write. So if I'm writing for an hour each day, I'm only getting half an hour of that time. But if I write for seven hours one day, I get six and a half hours of flow stuff. For me, it's actually much more efficient to do a lot in one go then a little bit ongoing.

And I feel like, yeah, if there's, there's, you know, people listening that are like, oh, my God, that's me. Try that method. Because, you know, you only kind of know what works for you if you try it. It is unfortunately a lot of the time, I guess, often about failing or like, you know, just having things just not work for you. And then you can try something else.

Even if it's not your jam to do ongoing. I think doing this once for three days, it's such a condensed challenge that all of your hurdles and mental block blocks become really apparent really quickly. That's useful ongoing, whether you do intensive writing challenges or not. Just being able to see, oh, okay. This time of day, every day is a hard sticking point for me. Whenever I get to this place in my book, I struggle. And you can see all the things that are in your way a little bit easier and the things that help you go faster. And so then you can make notes of that and reflect on that and then use that ongoing. Regardless. Regardless of how you write. Yeah, I feel like it's kind of my lot in life. Like, my goal as an author is to just go around giving people permission to do things differently and do things in the way that works, which I.

Feel is for a lot of listeners. I reckon that resonates because, you know, for people who are queer and trans and gender diverse. And then also, you know, the Venn diagram of being neurospicy in some way. Like a lot of the advice just does not stick. Being given permission to be yourself is a lot more valuable. And I was going to say, if people do want to join the writing challenge and read your books, of course.

Tell me, like, yeah, and all of the things. Or you can go to akmult.com and all of the goodies are on there.

Yeah, I will make sure that we put that in the show description and all that kind of jazz, because that would be amazing. Is there anything that you wanted to talk about that we haven't covered, especially things that you're up to next? Because I know that Pumpkin Spice just came out. Yeah. What else is happening in your world?

Yeah, we've got a lot going on at the end of the book. Two in the pumpkin spice world, called Curses and Cold Brew, is coming out in September. And the third book of the Golden Court trilogy, A Heart of Crimson Flames, is coming out in November. December, depending on where you are in the world. And then I've got Dream Slayer, the new book, coming out next year. Lots of exciting things going on. And I'm also working on a little companion book to the three day 30k challenge. Basically, I haven't settled on the title yet. I'm thinking I'm going to call it the Chaotic Writer's Guide to Hitting the End. Overall, I feel like, you know, all of the writing books that you see in like the storefront are all just very neurotypical, like very aggressively neurotypical. I want something that people see and go, yep, that was one's for me.

You know, like, oh my God, it's so many colours. It's all. It's. Yeah, that covers all the pride flags. I think that might be me. I love that so much. I'm very excited. Hopefully there's a lot of listeners who will go and, yeah, grab your books in, in stores and in libraries. Support your local library. We love libraries.

Just got back from Wellington, New Zealand and, well, library. I snuck some of my bookmarks into my books there as like a little. Hopefully they find somebody finds them and it's the best.

I love that I saw that on your TikTok. So, yes, please follow AK Melford on TikTok. I think your TikToks are hilarious and amazing and very, very affirming.

Just being a goofball, I think that's my favourite form of marketing.

I mean, honestly, I feel like marketing is so often. It's just such a hot mess. And it's so like, what can I do to be myself at the same time as promoting the work that I'm passionate about? It's a difficult balance.

Totally. Yeah.

Thank you so much for chatting with me today. And thank you for having me.

You're listening to transmission on 4 triple Z. We're about to bounce out of here. Thank you, Ray, for that interview with AK Molfu. That was awesome.

Was so great to chat with them.

See you all next week. Bye.

Thank you so much for listening to Transmission. See you next Tuesday, 9 to 10am on 4ZZZ.