“I left school at sixteen and spent twenty years assuming that was that. She started at seventeen and got a doctorate. I signed up for a course the week I finished it.”
Marea O
Writer
Four books in development
First out November 2026
Hello from Marea O
Writing the Next Chapter: this website holds the books I’m writing, the ideas behind them, and the MoSaic Book Club.
The MoSaic Book Club
Open to all. Tell us the book that resonated with you, and why. Each month we choose one and talk about it together.
Publishing
I’m a writer, pending publication. My first book is out this November, with three more projects in the pipeline.
Letters
A monthly letter on my journey to publication. What I’m making, what’s working, and what isn’t.
About the writer
Marea O grew up in Ireland and currently lives in Dubai. She’s a director in Digital Trust for a Big Four firm. The rest of the time, she writes. She has a Master’s in Strategy, a background in law and HR, and a stubborn belief that imagination is more useful than knowledge.
One is what she does. The other is who she is.
This is a sample content
This is a sample content
“A remarkable storyteller. There’s a range and diversity to her ideas that you don’t often see. Her talent and determination for storytelling are rare and mean she has real creative potential.”
Adam Hamdy — Sunday Times and international bestselling author and screenwriter
“A corporate mind and creative voice. Marea O sharpens one against the other. That’s what makes her storytelling land: pragmatism with flair.”
Richard Chudzynski — lawyer and children’s author
Marea O
Writer & Avid Reader
WRITING the NEXT CHAPTER…
Hello from Marea O
Issue Two • October 2026
This month: why I stopped the reluctant structure I’m now putting around my writing, and why I think I’m a method writer…
WHAT HAPPENED IN OCTOBER
For seven months straight, I’d been writing and building the Marea O brand alongside a very demanding full-time role – day in, day out, weekends, the lot. I was burnt out.
Two weeks into October, I resurfaced. That time away changed things, and I:
- fixed the plot point for The Choice,
- started redrafting SHIELD, and
- considered moving Mabel and The Shooting Star to next Christmas.
Then, against everything I’m about to say, I started something new — just to add to the list 😊: Pieces of Me, a serialized modern-day romance with a song attached 🤷♀️. I went to my happy place, and it helped with everything else. It turns out imagination needs TIME and SPACE — two things that, I feel, none of us have much of.
METHOD WRITING
So why does stopping work? Because imagination needs room. When I stop the world around me, the how, when, where and what of a story fall into place. I think it’s because I write the way some actors practice method acting they shed themselves to inhabit a character. The more time and space I have, the more fully I can do the same — letting go of myself, rebuilding and inhabiting the characters I’m writing about. I don’t know if it’s a thing, but I’d call myself a method writer.
STRUCTURE
Through all of this, the one thing I didn’t want for my writing was structure. I’m structured in every other part of my life, so structure felt like being bound and locked into limited thinking. But if a story is to make sense and you want it published, it needs structure. So I’m trying to think about structure differently. Here’s what I’m doing:
- Excel: I’m building an Excel workbook. I know, I know, there are a million ways to do it, and AI is genuinely useful here. I’ll share it once it’s perfected, because it’s a topic our community needs to tackle. No doubt it’ll be a bit… nuanced.
- Idea folder: Instead of half-writing every idea and adding another title to the never-ending list of books in me, I’ve created an IDEA folder, organized by month, year and genre. I can return to each idea one day, I hope, and decide what it wants to be: a song, a short story or flash fiction. It’s not much, but it’s something. And I’d love to hear what others do — what works for you?
From creative space, with love …
Marea O xo
What art offers is space — a certain breathing room for the spirit.
John Updike
04
Books in progress
04
Genres
Nov
First book out
02
Letter a month
Join
the Book Club
Einstein Said
Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited. Imagination encircles the world.
Read this month's letterPublishing
Four books, four genres. The first this November.
Out November 2026
The First One
Mabel and the Shooting Star
A Christmas taleA young girl moves to the Middle East with her dad. This Christmas, she asks for three seemingly impossible wishes. Her new friends from all around the world set out to prove that hope can arrive in the most unexpected ways.
And what follows
-
2027
Shield
Privacy for children -
In development
The Choice
Dystopian thriller -
In development
Venus Jones
Dramedy
MoSaic Book Club
The book. Why it resonated. Our mosaic.
So, here’s the question: what book comes into your head right now, and why does it resonate?
Here’s how it works
- Post your book and a line on why. Just one. Whatever rose up, and the reason it did.
- The first week of every month, we announce the Book of the Month.
Tell us yours. One book. A line on why. That’s all.
Join the Book Club
Open to all. No account needed. Your details stay with me.
Book of the Month
Already in? Post your book on Substack →
One of my favourite books. I remember reading this on the commuter train into London and literally crying laughing at eight in the morning. With a line like this, it’s comedic gold:
“The Answer to the Great Question… of Life, the Universe and Everything… is… Forty-two.”
Of course it’s Forty-Two. Why not? It’s as good an answer as any. Deep Thought, the supercomputer, spends seven and a half million years calculating that answer, and when it finally delivers, nobody can remember what the actual question was.
It never fails to make me laugh, and I think it’s a commentary on looking outside for answers when really the truth is within you — and it means something different to each of us, celebrating our uniqueness.
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From the club — what resonated, and why
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Educated
Beth B. -
Breakfast at Tiffany’s
Lil M.“I’ve been the person who won’t name the cat. Watching her put him out in the rain was the first time I understood what I’d been protecting myself from.”
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Flowers in the Attic
Marc T.“I read it far too young, hid it from my mother, and finished it in three days. It was the first time a book felt dangerous, and I’ve been chasing that feeling ever since.”
Endorsements
What others say about Marea O
Adam Hamdy Bestselling author, screenwriter and producerA remarkable storyteller. There’s a range and diversity to her ideas that you don’t often see. Her talent and determination for storytelling are rare.
Richard Chudzynski Lawyer and children’s authorA corporate mind and creative voice. Marea O sharpens one against the other. That’s what makes her storytelling land: pragmatism with flair.
