From being a driving force behind Maybelline to the New York Times best-sellers list, Australia’s Natasha Lester is leaving her mark on history. Telling stories inspired by incredible real-life women history has overlooked, Ms Lester has captured readers around the globe, and now she heads to Big River Distilling Co. in Fyshwick on Thursday 12 October to discuss her new novel. CW caught up with Ms Lester ahead of the event to discuss passions, women and great reads.
- Tell us about The Disappearance of Astrid Bricard.
It’s about Astrid, who comes to Manhattan in 1970 with a dream of becoming a fashion designer. She quickly finds fame – but not for her designing skills. Then, on the eve of a fashion battle between France and America at the Palace of Versailles, when it looks as if Astrid might finally make her mark on the world of couture, she disappears, leaving behind only a white silk dress and the question: what happened to Astrid Bricard?
2. When did you fall in love with storytelling?
From the time I first learned to write! My mum has lots of books, poems and stories that I wrote as a kid. Throughout my whole childhood, if I wasn’t writing books, I was reading them.
I loved the feeling of being completely immersed in the world of the story and I thought it would be an amazing superpower to have – to be able to sweep people away to another world entirely from the one they actually inhabited.
3. What inspired you to include real-life women in your books?
A bit of rage, actually! It seems grossly unfair that there are so many remarkable women throughout history who quite literally changed the world, but who have been left out of the history books and who now languish, almost unknown, as footnotes or bit players.
Without some of those women continually fighting against barriers and obstacles, I perhaps wouldn’t have the opportunities that I have today. So, I also write my books to honour them and to thank them for everything they did.
4. When you’re not writing, what kind of books are you reading?
I do read a lot of historical fiction and have recently enjoyed Alli Parker’s At the Foot of the Cherry Tree and Kelly Rimmer’s The Paris Agent. But the best book I’ve read lately wasn’t historical fiction – it was Barbara Kingsolver’s Demon Copperhead, which is an absolute masterpiece, and now one of my favourite books of all time.
5. What’s next for you?
There was only one Resistance network in France in WWII that was led by a woman. That woman was Marie-Madeleine Méric, a 30-year-old mother of two children, known as “the beautiful spy”. She was in charge of 3,000 agents during the 1940s, providing the Allies with some of the biggest intelligence coups of the war, and speeding the victory over the Nazis. I can’t believe nobody has written a novel about her – she was remarkable. So I’m writing one and it’s called The Secret Life of Marie-Madeleine.
Meet Natasha Lester at Big River Distilling Co., Dairy Road, Fyshwick on Thursday 12 October 6pm; bigriverdistilling.com.au/products/ginsights-author-event
