We spoke to the lovely and talented Polly Crosby (author of The Illustrated Child and The Unravelling) about the process of writing her second novel, the importance of persistence, and how terrible phone signal played a part in her signing with Juliet Mushens. The paperback of The Illustrated Child will be published tomorrow, July 8th (Waterstones, Amazon). You can pre-order Polly’s second novel, The Unravelling, ahead of its release next January (Waterstones, Amazon).

Tell us about yourself!

Hi! My name’s Polly Crosby. My debut novel, The Illustrated Child, about an artist who creates a series of picture books starring his daughter, came out last October, and the paperback is out on July 8th. My second novel, The Unravelling, a historical story set on a wild and mysterious island in the North Sea, is out January 2022. I would say my books are gothic mysteries influenced by fairy tale and folklore, with lots of things hidden in them to unravel (see what I did there?).
 

Your novels are often described as emotional and evocative - what inspired you to write The Unravelling, and how did the writing process compare to your debut novel, The Illustrated Child?

The idea for The Unravelling began when I visited a strange spit of land on the Suffolk coast called Orford Ness. It has a fascinating history, having been used for lots of different purposes over the last hundred years, and it has now been left to re-wild. I loved the idea of something manmade being taken over by nature, its secrets covered up with winding brambles and twisty roots.

I wrote The Unravelling over about a year, whereas The Illustrated Child took ten! The lovely thing about your debut novel is that you can take as long as you need, but a second novel often needs to be completed more quickly. Fortunately, The Unravelling proved quicker to write. I think that’s mostly because I had a deadline, and also because I had a literary agent and an editor both looking forward to reading it!
 

What has been a highlight of the publishing process so far, and what are you looking forward to?

There are so many - like seeing the cover of your book for the first time, or holding the finished hardback in your hands. Not to mention the total excitement of meeting your publishing team, and seeing their vision for your story. But I think my favourite moments were securing Juliet as my agent, and learning from her that she had secured me a publishing deal.

I’m looking forward to so many things: I’m really excited about The Illustrated Child coming out in paperback. I adore the cover, it’s just the right side of eerie! I’m also desperate to hold a copy of The Unravelling in my hands for the first time. I was allowed to draw a map of the island to go in it, and I can’t wait to open it up and see it in there! The cover for The Unravelling is also just sumptuously beautiful, haunting and unusual and a perfect representation of the book inside.

I think, in the long term, I’m also looking forward to carving out my place in the book world, to creating a career, and not just a mad and wonderful couple of years.
 

What was your journey to gaining representation like?

It was a long journey – I wrote my first (unpublished) novel age twenty (I’m forty one now!), but it wasn’t until nineteen years - and three unpublished novels - later that I signed with Juliet.

I submitted to about six agents altogether, and had three or four ask for the full manuscript. Juliet, who is notoriously busy and very hands-on with her own clients, didn’t get back to me straight away. I did the right thing and let her know that I had interest from others, and then I went to meet two agents who had offered to represent me. They were both lovely, but at the back of my mind, all I wanted was Juliet (this is beginning to sound like a love story!).

I travelled from Norfolk to London, and it just so happened that my phone provider’s signal went down across the whole country that day, so I had no email access. I met the two lovely agents, and then got back on the train, trying to decide which one to go with.

And then, just as I whizzed through a station, my phone picked up the station wifi, and an email from Juliet flashed up on my screen, then disappeared again as I sped out into the countryside. I spent the next half an hour furiously waving my phone around, and at the next station, the email landed properly. It was very brief. It said, ‘Have you signed yet?’

I tapped back as speedily as I could, ‘No, but you need to be quick!’ I felt awful for such a curt reply, but my heart was hammering at the thought of not sending anything at all!

When I got home, she had emailed again, asking to read the full manuscript, and I promptly sent it. I went to bed that night, thinking that at least I’ve done everything I could, and I would have a story to tell my grandchildren about the time I almost became a novelist.

When I woke at six the next day, I checked my phone, never once thinking she might have replied. But Juliet had sat up until midnight reading my novel, and she had emailed at just gone twelve to offer me representation! After dancing round the house, I promptly accepted! 
 

What wisdom would you give to writers who are submitting to literary agents?

I found a good way to decide which agents to approach was to look at the acknowledgements in recent books that I had loved and that were comparable genres to mine, because authors will always thank their agent (as long as their agent is good!). In your covering letter, be honest, be polite and be concise, and make sure that the words in your sample chapters are as polished as possible.
 

What are you working on at the moment? / What are you writing next?

I’ve just finished a second draft of my third novel, which is a historical mystery about a beautiful portrait discovered in a derelict mansion. I’m currently working on an idea for a fourth, set in the 1930s, but this one is top secret at the moment, mostly because even I’m not sure yet exactly what it’s about!