LO
BLOG
Here I will share thoughts and ideas on the writing world, parenting world, and the solo mum by choice world. Plus, the dancing world, the fantastic world of felines, the Madonna world, and, of course, my wonderful
memories of Bonnie Tyler.
I hope you enjoy :)
Lorena Lollylegs says Goodbye to her Idol
Issue 15 August 2026
Aug 20, 2026
“Life takes you to amazing places; and love brings you home.” Bonnie Tyler
Hello folks,
Apologies for my recent absence everywhere. It’s been a tough couple of months as I continue to grapple with the idea that Bonnie Tyler, who was supposed to be on the mend, passed away on July 8th 2026, one month after her 75th birthday.
Bonnie’s music has been a massive part of my life since my dad first played her cassettes in the car on road trips in the late 70s. I was immediately hooked, and her music has been the soundtrack to my life ever since.
If you know, you know. If you don’t get it, that’s cool too. But for now, I remain very sad, in disbelief, and cherishing the loved ones around me more than ever.
One of the nicer things to come out of all this is that my dad wrote a really incredible song called, Bye Bye Bonnie Tyler. It was originally a country song sung by a rather gruff gentleman. But his songwriting partner (they write a song a day when on a roll) re-recorded it with softer lyrics and a female vocal. Please click on the picture below if you’d like to have a listen. It went viral on Facebook, so it’s nice to know it’s reached the people we hoped would hear it. It’s also reached Bonnie’s inner-circle, so it’s our way of paying our respects to those who are missing her so very desperately.
Solo Mum by Choice update
OK, on to other things now. As I said, it’s been a tough couple of months, and receiving my second royalty cheque for Solo Mum by Choice was part of the struggle. I’m not one to delve into detail with this stuff, but I won’t lie when I tell you, looking at my bank statement that day was a brutal moment.
Here’s some perspective:
It took thirteen years to write and publish my book. I couldn’t even tell you how many versions there have been and how many times I’ve read and rewritten the thing. (Dad too!) I queried every agent and publisher in Australia, entered it into three competitions (came second in one). I had no publicist, so generated a tonne of my own marketing, including a live Today Show interview and articles in the Daily Mail and the Saturday Herald. I organised own launch (exxy!) and events and bought and designed all the publicity material (bookmarks, banner etc). Seriously, this is not a whinge, but you can see why I’d hoped for respectable sales numbers.
But my royalty cheque was close to zero. The numbers just hadn’t been processed yet, so I still have very little idea whether my book has made much of an impact at all. Only time will tell. And given that I’m in this for the long haul, the figures were always going to be a slow burn. But still, it stings.
So, what now then?
I continue the slog. I pull myself up and out of the pity-slump and get on with it. Feels good to be on my way back into the swing of things.
I’m currently messaging fertility counsellors, IVF clinics, GPs and anyone else in contact with people who will benefit from reading my book.
I’ve also just finished writing the first book of my junior fiction children’s series, Daisy ‘Dee-Dee’ Devine. Here’s the blurb:
Donor-conceived nine-year-old DAISY ‘DEE-DEE’ DEVINE lives in a solo mum by choice household,
but that’s no big deal. She’s way more interested in the mischief she can have with her bestie, Indi.
When a crazy juggling incident lands Dee-Dee in hospital she sees realises just how loved she is,
and that no matter what her family looks like, life is pretty perfect.
Thanks, Dad, for editing the bejesus out of my first drafts. Soon it’ll be ready to send off to Queryland. Wish me luck! 🙏 I foresee it in primary schools and libraries, and have big ambitions for a whole Anh Do-style series. Yay!!!
Solo Mum by Choice Goodreads update
Well, I managed to snag my first ever one-star rating on Goodreads. Any authors out there will know that this is a rite of passage to be celebrated! (Thanks Alisha, whoever you are, for giving me one star with zero explanation. Duh!)
Luckily I have a good (cough) sense of humour!
⭐️
Other Stuff
Mum Brag Moment:
I don’t usually like to brag about my clearly fantastic child, but here goes. We have this thing at school called ‘Speak out,’ where the children get up in front of their class and deliver a one-to-two minute speech. It’s full on! I mean, there were flashcards and everything.
Anyway, it was stressful, because my daughter had very little concept of what to say, how to write notes, or any of that kind of thing. There were tears. (She cried a little too 😭)
We eventually came up with something. She wanted to talk about family, so it was a nice, easy, subject matter. She included a knock-knock joke, and took a shark egg (don’t ask) in to hold up at a certain moment in the speech.
Her last line was, ‘In our family we don’t have a dad, but we have lots and lots of love.’ Nawww! (She wrote it all herself).
So anyway, the brag is: she made it through to the next round where, next week, she’ll speak in front of all the Kindy through to Year 2 kids. So proud of her. It’s not about getting through so much, but what that represents. All the hard work and tears. A metaphor for author life, ha-ha. Gulp. (Did Lollylegs just bring this back to herself?!?)
Anyway, one PROUD mama x
Podcasts and Radio
There are more coming up – Dr Tash’s The Fanny Mechanic (I KNOW!!!) will be a real hoot, and also Kelly Sgroi’s Writerly Q&A which is out very very soon. Tomorrow maybe! Plus a live interview for Pick’n’Mix Radio (tune into Alive 90.5fm, Tuesday 25/8 at 3pm for that one.)
A.O.B (Any Other Business)
Seeing as I’m having a bit of a whinge in this newsletter, please indulge me one more time as I let you know what the HARDEST part of being a published author is.
‘Oh, it has to be all the work. The writing. So many words,’ you say.
Nope! That’s the easy part!
‘The editing? What a pain in the proverbial that must be. And sooo repetitious!’
Nope!
‘Oh, the organising of events?’
Narp.
‘Hustling to get on national TV and in magazines and papers? That MUST be it.’
Well, yeah that was a mega-punish. But no, that’s wasn’t the worst part. OK, you give up?
The worst part is having events and not getting bums on seats. Especially when people you thought would support… well… haven’t.
SO – thank you to those who came out to one (or more!) of my gigs. Or who tried. Or who supported from across the globe (I’m looking at you, Daughter!) It means the world, truly. I’m a person who gets out to support other authors and artists where I can. It ain’t easy, especially as a sole parent, but I try.
I’ll continue to do events, because I love them. And most of them were packed. But towards the end it became harder, so it’s something to think about in the future.
Me being me, all I can think about now is how in a few year’s time, I’ll be packing out libraries like some of the authors I look up to today!
Well, that’s all for now. Thanks for reading, folks, and I hope you’ve found this rather raw email insightful and, in a strange way, inspiring and uplifting.
Until next month,
Lorena Lollylegs xx
Instagram: @lorenaotes
Facebook: Lorena Otes
*For more notes like this, please subscribe to my newsletter here
Lorena Lollylegs is Live!
Issue 1 June 2025
Jun 26, 2025
“Resilience is about bouncing back and never giving up.” Madonna
Thanks for reading Lorena Lollylegs!! Subscribe here for free to receive new posts and support my work.
Subscribed
Hello folks,
I’m so happy to have you here for my inaugural Lorena Lollylegs Newsletter. On the last Thursday of each month, I’ll drop into your inbox with some short, sharp and snappy banter. I’ll delve into the big stuff, small stuff, and funny stuff, including book recommendations, dance world snippets, parenting chit-chat, and even videos of me hanging upside-down on a monkey bar at the local playground. Because we all need a laugh!
As promised, at the bottom, I’ve included the article I wrote about the time I met Madonna. Yes, THE Madonna Louise Veronica Ciccone. Born August 16th 1958 in Detroit to Italian immigrant parents, Madonna and Tony Ciccone. Yep, I’m quite the fan. Have a read and see what you think. I’d love to hear your response.
Solo Mum by Choice book update
Huge news!
Carolyn, my publisher from Hawkeye (link below), called me last week for an editing update. And she had some rather gargantuan ideas to send my memoir to brand new heights. And let me tell you, I’m bloody excited about it!
I Definitely, For Sure, Met Madonna!
London 1993, 6am
DOWN by the tradesman’s entrance of the Lanesborough Hotel, freezing my kazoonies off as the hours dragged on for decades, a throng of new-found friends hunched together, exchanging near-miss stories of how they almost, one time, nearly: met Madonna.
It’d been five hours of agony. All we wanted was a glimpse of our idol. Madonna had packed Wembley Stadium only a few hours prior, for her Girlie Show World Tour. I’d bolted from the show, straight to the packed London Underground station, onto the tube, pegging it for her hotel that sat directly opposite Hyde Park.
The aim was to get there in time to see Madonna arrive, and then watch her go inside. Maybe she’d stop and chat! Invite me in for a cup of tea? We’d talk about life, love. And the fact that she’s always welcome to visit me in my messy, but clean, South London flat.
A dedicated cohort of fans with similar dreams gathered nightly. Faces we hoped she’d one day recognise as the devoted ones.
Suddenly, boom! My reveries were disrupted by a sudden rush of frenetic energy that was my friend Ben whooshing in from behind. He’d just finished the graveyard shift at Wetherspoons in Piccadilly. “Any news?”
“Nope. Nothing. She’s still inside, I think.”
“What do you mean, ‘I think’?” He looked up, craning his neck to see the edge of the penthouse suite and screamed out,
“Madonna!!!”
“She won’t hear you. It’s too early.”
Ben shoved a Red Bull into my hand. “I.W.F,” he said, with a cheeky grin. That was code for Infused with Vodka. “This’ll keep you going. She’ll be out jogging soon.”
I slurped my drink, the cold buzz electrifying my brain in an instant. Ben was right. Madonna did relish her daily early-morning jog around Hyde Park. We’d just have to sit, and wait.
At the other end of our small, anxious, vigil, some out of tune singing was beginning to spark. “Get Into the Groove, Madonna you’ve got to prove your love to us!” Ben and I joined the refrain. Perhaps she’d hear us all and come down! Excitement was building as everyone started chanting, “MA-DON-NA! WE-LOVE-YOU!”
Delivery fans frequently clogged the driveway, making the tradesman’s entrance a twenty-four-hour affair. But when Madonna’s car pulled in, a shockwave of exhilaration flushed through her disciples. Something could happen at any minute, now. Her car, a sign of hope. The longer we waited, the more invested we were. Our determination to meet Madonna, insatiable.
Eventually, a tiny blonde woman emerged from enormous metallic doors at the rear exit of London’s poshest hotel. Desperate screams pulsated through the air. Hysterical flashes from pocket cameras everywhere, with pens poised for autographs.
Madonna vanished into her car, flanked by burly bodyguards. No jogging today. Her head was down, avoiding all eye contact. Tears stained our collective faces as desperation encumbered us. “Madonna. Pleeeeeease!”
Once the car door slammed shut, it was done. Hunched over and empty, we watched her drive away once again, leaving our dreams to fall into the frosty gutter. Our hopes, our adoration, the collective love for our idol, momentarily diminished.
This pattern replayed nightly through the London leg of Madonna’s tour. Ben and I were there. Hoping this time… or the next… that something would happen. The sheer adrenalin of seeing her in the flesh energising us to persist. “Surely next time she’ll stop!” I gasped on the third night. Ben looked at me. “Yeah. She must eventually. Right?”
She never did.
***
London, 2000
MY love for our Queen never waned. She released a few more albums, and there was another tour in sight. The very specific friendship Ben and I had forged seemed as much about the camaraderie of two superfans as it was meeting the woman herself.
To be continued...
To find out how this story ends, please follow the link below