I’M WRITING ABOUT ISSUES THAT DIDN’T EVEN EXIST WHEN I STARTED WRITING

makes life more fascinating and gives me a different outlook. As long as the world stays fresh, I hope I can stay fresh.”

Fresh she has remained, venturing into Young Adult literature just last year with Finding Audrey, and this year, with My Not So Perfect Life, shifting from the usual love story to quite another – that between a woman and her boss, one in her 20s and one in her 40s, who must learn to compromise, connect and balance their real lives with their “perfect” social media lives.

“I’m really glad to have written a book where the primary relationship is between two strong women,” Kinsella says. “They are in two different stages in their lives, both with their separate issues while failing to understand one another. It was really interesting to explore the issues of women at work, of being a role model, of judging somebody on their appearance and having a female boss, rather than exploring the traditional boy-meets-girl.”

As an author who seems to resemble the very women she writes about and for, Kinsella has been able to use social media in her favour, building a brand that has made her the most accessible of any chick-lit author on the bestseller list. Via Twitter and Instagram, Kinsella has been able to form deeper bonds with her readers, who crowd her posts with praise one might expect for, say, a musician or actor.

Kinsella says that social media has become a great resource for the celebrity author. “I used to get fan letters and they would take a month to arrive, and then I would write a reply and mail it back. But now I get a tweet and it’s amazing how I can communicate with my readers instantly. That’s the huge benefit, showing what my life is like and sharing those moments. I’m as guilty as anyone else as putting up the fun, nice, glossy stuff and not too many pictures of me slumped at my desk, moaning, ‘This stupid book, I hate this book, I can’t write this book.’ But now I feel I’ve gotten more personal – you can only connect so much at an event – all year round, I can answer questions or just say hello.”

With ideas “bubbling and overlapping” in her head years before she actually sets pen to paper, prolific annual output and an adoring fanbase of women who have graduated, found careers and built families alongside her, it seems the sprightly, gutsy heroines Kinsella has given birth to in her books will only continue to come calling.

“Actually, when I start writing I always think it’s a bit like having a baby,” Kinsella says with a laugh. “Believe me, I know, I’ve had five babies! You go through exactly the same process, and think, ‘Why have I done this? This is a huge mistake!’ And then it comes out, and it’s like, ‘Ohhh, this is actually quite amazing! God, you know what? I need to do it again. I want to do it again.”