Marian Keyes has written numerous bestselling novels and sold millions of copies of her books, but talking to her feels like catching up with a friend rather than a powerhouse of the literature world. After initially bonding over our love of Diet Cokes, we sat down before her Stylist VIP event to chat about her work, writing a romcom and the importance of representation for mid-life women.

Keyes is one of the most successful and prolific contemporary authors out there, having sold over 35 million books globally including Rachel’s Holiday, Anybody Out There? and Watermelon. She has also published three collections of essays and a cookbook, Saved By Cake. She co-hosts the Now You’re Asking podcast and next she’s coming for your TV screens: her bestselling 2020 novel Grown Ups is being adapted for a Netflix series. It’s safe to say, she’s been busy.

Keyes’s writing is always rooted in the contemporary female experience and she’s fearless in tackling difficult subjects like addiction, depression and grief, and making them accessible and tender while always remaining brilliantly witty and funny.

This month, the Irish author has released her 16th novel: My Favourite Mistake. It’s a book that’s gone straight in at No 1 in the hardback charts and follows Anna Walsh, a character we’ve met before in Anybody Out There. She’s left her seemingly perfect life and relationship in New York to help her friends run their luxury retreat back in Ireland. It covers fractured friendships, perimenopause, HRT and mid-life sex, and it gives us a satisfying should-they-shouldn’t-they relationship.

For Keyes, her books don’t necessarily follow an initial structure or plan as she likes to live with the character for a while and follow where they take her in the writing process. However, the process has stayed the same over the past three decades: it always starts with the person.

“I can go down a lot of dead ends and cul-de-sacs – my characters never fail to surprise me in some of the things they end up saying or doing,” the writer tells Stylist. But these dead-ends are never wasted. “You have to find out what works and what doesn’t work.” Even if that means cutting scenes or whole sections of a story and starting again, says Keyes.

At the heart of My Favourite Mistake is a love story, but that wasn’t the original plan for Keyes’s latest novel – it’s just the one that felt the most natural in terms of how she was feeling. “I was so broken after the pandemic, and I found myself reading lots of love stories as a sort of respite from it all. I just loved the warmth of the stories and the funny and brilliant tropes.” This warmth is visible in how Keyes speaks about love and romance, especially as the stigma attached to ‘chick lit’ is not as pronounced as it was during the 00s.

So, Keyes was inspired to write her own love story between Anna and Joey – including an enemies-to-lovers storyline, which is the author’s favourite trope in the genre. “It’s been a 20-year thing and they’ve hurt each other a lot, but it’s really a love story for people in mid-life.”

Romantic love isn’t something that should just be reserved for people in their 20s and 30s and that’s what Keyes wanted to focus her new novel on. “It’s about representation. These emotions don’t go away when you’re 50 or 60, and I love that older women are now less likely to be silenced or shamed. I’m now able to say things that I would’ve been far too scared to say when I was 20.”

Not only is Keyes still writing brilliantly funny books but she’s also trying new things (“I started rock climbing last year”) and falling in love with new friends.

When I talk to Keyes about how relatable her stories are to women of all ages, she’s slightly taken aback, saying it’s something she hopes her books are to readers but isn’t always certain of the reception. “I like to write about women like me, living a sort of confused and messy life, so to hear people say that they can see their own lives reflected in my words, it’s very lovely.”

Marian Keyes spoke at an exclusive event for Stylist members. Not a Stylist+ member yet? From just £2.99 a month, a membership gets you unlimited access to our weekly digital cover story, daily exclusive content, Stylist magazine every month in a made-for-mobile digital format, and more.

Images: @shotby_farheenxo