Kat Brown

1. Please tell us a bit about yourself and your work.
I am nobody, which is why I wanted to make a book about infertility – I’m an arts journalist usually and I wear lots of other hats. When I was trying to conceive, and then went through failed IVF, so many books available to me were by celebrities, or centred white upper-middle-class women who would often end up with a baby at the end. I was very hungry for liminality. I wanted to read about uncertainty. I wanted to read about violent feelings, enormous grief and to have someone to hold my hand while I went through this myself. My book No One Talks About This Stuff is an attempt to bring together feelings and stories from all areas of infertility experience so that we can find our own story in those of people with whom we might have nothing in common.

2. Has writing always been a focus for you or was it a Plan B?
I felt very strongly that I wanted to add a book to the infertility bookshelf. I wanted to crowdfund a book so that I had more control over the stories that were included – rather than, say, having to include familiar names or people who already had written books on their infertility experience. It was important to me to shine a light on different experiences from a variety of intersections. I’m still trying to figure out my Plan B but I have some amazingly powerful women in my life, parents and non-parents, who make that journey feel more manageable.
 
3. How do you explore ideas or find inspiration for your work?
I worked with my editor to draw up a list of 15 people to approach to write for the book – some came from her (excellent) suggestions, others from people I knew or found interesting. When we got some extra funding, I was able to include seven additional stories and to do that I opened the book for public submissions so I could include experiences I didn’t know about. Everyone who contributed to the book was paid for their contribution, or waived it to put towards the crowdfunding total. On a subject basis, it was important to me to ensure that this was inclusive in terms of class, race, sexuality, gender identity and choice. This is a book about how people live and it needs to reflect that variety.

4. What does the process of writing involve for you?
A lot of procrastination, listlessness and worry – and then absolutely no problems when it comes to actually writing The Thing. I would go to the big Starbucks nearby and just focus on it for a couple of hours until it was done. It’s a very similar way to how I do my journalistic writing. I have always instinctively known the shape of how a piece will go, and then I just crack on. Unfortunately, this works great for short non-fiction, very badly for fiction. I’ve been trying to write fiction for 15 years and bloody hell, it’s hard! You simply can’t write fiction by the seat of your pants!

5. And what does writing then also give you in return?
I’m often surprised by what comes out when I write. I don’t find it very exceptional, just usually quite clear and unexciting (good journalism I suppose!) but then I get feedback from people saying they have had very strong responses to it. It’s a reminder that nobody sees you the way you do yourself. And of course, writing about personal things and publishing them where people will hopefully find it results in messages of community and companionship which is wonderful.
 
6. Has seeing your work in print changed how you view yourself, and also how you view your NoMo status?
I wish it had! That’s the work of therapy more than publishing. I hold what Jody Day said quite closely: that being childless doesn’t mean you have to be “exceptional” or go off and become a millionaire entrepreneur etc. etc. to validate your existence. That said, I’ve also had quite a few very challenging health experiences in quite close succession, and that has really impacted how I see myself and my value. The month before No One Talks About This Stuff came out, I published my second book, It’s Not a Bloody Trend, which is about ADHD diagnosis in adults. I spend quite a lot of time wishing I were an accountant.

7. Tell us about the wider reception that you’ve had to sharing your story - has it changed how others have viewed you and your identity as a non-parent?
I hope it’s made people understand their own loved ones a bit more. I’ve had feedback from readers who weren’t able to acknowledge their own losses, and it’s impacted them ever since – of course it has. I was so glad to include a ‘Remembering Our Children’ section in the book, for parents and non-parents to acknowledge the children they lost and didn’t conceive. Zoe Clarke-Coates’ Saying Goodbye services were very powerful for me. The introduction of Baby Loss Certificates are an extra level of validation for many people, but for people like me who never conceived, there is still that disenfranchised grief that is nevertheless very much felt.

8. How do you feel about the current representation of childless and/or childfree people in literature?
I’m often surprised by it, because it often just pops up not having been mentioned in general blurbs about the book – perhaps because marketers worry it might scare people off? One of my favourite books of recent years, Sorrow and Bliss by Meg Mason, has a big infertility/childlessness narrative that runs in parallel with a storyline around mental health conditions. So many great books include this as part of their wider narrative, but it’s often not spoken about (the irony!).
 
9. What would you like the publishing world to know about non-parents, both as writers and readers, and our stories?
We’re all just people, just doing our best. Social media and podcasts have democratised who gets to share their stories, and we are more open to hearing different perspectives as a result. However, the ‘happy ending’ narrative continues to dominate – and that’s understandable. We want to know that things will work out okay, and that can include being a ‘good’ survivor or someone ‘making the most’ of something. There is great peace to be found in holding space for people whose stories don’t follow accepted narratives. Poetry is really leading the charge here, showing how we can identify with stories and themes even if they aren’t directly about us.

10. What future plans do you have, especially for your writing?
I would love to figure out how to write a novel. The way I 'cracked' non-fiction was simply by having two books I really wanted to write. I need to do the same thing for fiction. In the meantime, the way I work on my writing is to read a lot, and widely. Read everything. Read everyone. Through that, we are better connected, and can find comfort in the similarities rather than the differences.