Read a Q&A with Genevieve Novak | No Hard Feelings

Genevieve Novak is a writer from Melbourne. She writes romantic comedies, content, and really long text messages. Genevieve loves croissants, Joni Mitchell, stories about complicated women and female friendships, and her dog, Viktor. She hates being called Gen. No Hard Feelings is her debut novel.

Today, Genevieve Novak is on the blog to answer a few questions about her new novel. Read on …

Genevieve Novak

Please tell us about your book, No Hard Feelings!

GN: It’s a fun, sweet, tough and relatable read about the high highs and low lows of your twenties. It explores mental health, career crises, friendship breakdowns, difficult relationships, brutal hangovers and relentless self-criticism … in a fun way.

Where did the inspiration for this novel come from?

GN: It came from the total chaos of my own twenties, and those of my friends. It’s a period of immense change and confusion, and I wanted to tell that story in a way that felt relatable and ultimately hopeful.

Introduce us to Penny, your protagonist. What inspired her and what was your favourite thing about bringing her to life?

GN: Sweet, neurotic Penny. We meet her as she’s entering her late twenties, and she’s floundering while everyone around her seems to be flourishing. She’s stuck in the same old bad habits and patterns and doesn’t know how to break them — or if she even really wants to. We follow her attempts to compete with her friends, experience her devastation when none of it works out, and feel the jagged edges of all the many building blocks she has to use to start healing. She was inspired by all the complex, flawed, wonderful women I know, watch, or read about. She’s the amalgamation of their neuroses, faults and hopes.

Penny was fully formed from the day I showed up to the blank document. It wasn’t my job to craft her so much as it was to get to know her. I spent a lot of time with her, in her head, and that intimacy made it difficult to force her to struggle. There are anxiety attack scenes in the book that gave me anxiety attacks to write. I just wanted to wrap her in a blanket and make everything alright. It was such a joy, then, to build her up and give her the tools she needed to welcome happiness into her life. It was immensely gratifying for her to earn her happy ending, and to witness her progress from anxious mess to healthy adult. Even though, obviously, it was all by my hand, I’m really proud of her. Is that weird?

If your heroine Penny could have a date with any fictional character, who would it be and why?

GN: I’m bending the laws of physics to take a character from a novel and send her off on a date with a character from the stage and screen, but I’d do anything to overhear the repartee between Penny’s unfiltered thoughts and Fleabag’s broken fourth wall commentary. They’d probably get inappropriately drunk way too early in the evening, and talk so quickly for so long that they’d hardly have time for breathing. Somewhere around 2 AM and their third bottle of wine, one of them would make an off-colour joke about something heavy, and they’d start talking about their trauma. A teary breakdown would take place as they clung to one another in some grimy gutter off Smith Street. Freaked out by their honesty in the cold light of day, they would immediately ghost each other.

Why do you think that novels about aimless millennials and ‘adulting’ remain so popular?

GN: So many of us millennials are stuck in a period of arrested development, where we’re well and truly adults but still haven’t really figured out what’s going on. There are plenty of reasons why that might be: economic and political unrest, changing social structures, an abundance or scarcity mindset brought about by dating apps, travel and career opportunities, the joy-theft of comparison thanks to social media, and lots more.

It’s harder to hit the same milestones our parents hit when they were years younger than we are — like buying a house, finding a sustainable career, or starting a family — so the things we consider markers of adulthood still feel out of reach. Or maybe we aren’t interested in them. But without them, we still don’t feel fully grown no matter how many birthday candles we blow out.

I personally find it really comforting to find stories that tell me I’m not the only one who has no idea what I’m doing or where I’m going. Maybe we learn something from these characters, or maybe we just don’t have to feel so alone in the experience.

Can you tell us a little bit about your journey towards becoming a writer?

GN: I’ve always wanted to be a writer. I did a degree in creative writing and was grateful for any career I could make out of that. I worked as a copywriter for advertising agencies and start-ups for years, so Penny’s experience in the agency space had roots in those memories. These days I write content in the public sector, so I’ve been writing in some capacity for a long time.

Melbourne’s endless lockdowns through 2020 and 2021 were the perfect excuse to finally get something significant written, and I gave myself until my 30th birthday to have No Hard Feelings finished. I met that deadline with a few days to spare, and everything has gone at turbo-speed since then. I’m not 31 for another couple of months!

What do you love about writing fiction?

GN: I love how healing it is.

No Hard Feelings isn’t autobiographical, but heavily fictionalised versions of situations I’ve been in or emotions I’ve felt made their way into the final draft. It’s incredible the things you learn about yourself through writing fiction, and the lessons you don’t learn until it’s all out on paper.

I might not always agree with the things my characters do or say, but writing them anyway is an exploration in empathy. If I start writing a character that’s loosely inspired by someone, or a type of person I dislike, I end up having to spend a lot of time justifying the way their behaviour fits into the plot. By delving into their personality, giving them dialogue, making them interact with my protagonist and allowing them space in the story, I’m forced to understand them. I still might not like them, but it’s a little easier to coexist in the real world with them once I allow myself to see them as three-dimensional people with faults, redeeming qualities, and valid points of view.

Ultimately fiction allows moments of catharsis and exploration and fantasy, and it’s limitless.

What is the last book you read and loved?

GN: I tore through Self Care by Leigh Stein in about two days. It was razor sharp. I love and hate when you find a new book or film that sticks to your ribs and makes you feel like a talentless fraud by comparison.

What do you hope readers will discover in No Hard Feelings?

GN: I hope we all learn to be a little gentler to ourselves and to retrain our inner critic’s voice. If someone is lucky enough to not identify with Penny’s anxiety disorder, then I hope it offers insight into that experience and produces empathy for the people who do endure it.

And finally, what’s up next for you?

GN: I’m working on my second novel now, which is yet untitled. I’m sending this next protagonist off in the complete opposite direction from where we left Penny, and she’s going to teach herself (and me!) a thing or two throughout her journey. Plenty more swearing, hangovers, self-discovery and hot characters on the menu.

More immediately, I’m going to give my dog his dinner, put on an episode of Mad Men, and do a hair mask.

Thanks Genevieve!

—No Hard Feelings by Genevieve Novak (HarperCollins Australia) is out now. Limited signed copies are available while stocks last!

No Hard Feelings

Limited Signed Copies Available!

by No Hard Feelings

Penny can't help but compare herself to her friends. Annie is about to become a senior associate at her law firm, Bec has just got engaged, Leo is dating everyone this side of the Yarra, and Penny is just ... waiting. Waiting for Max, her on-again, off-again boyfriend, to allow her to spend the night, waiting for the promotion she was promised, waiting for her Valium to kick in. Waiting for her real life to start.

Out of excuses and sick of falling behind, Penny is determined to turn things around...

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